Even though Finland borders Russia, their languages are nothing alike. Russian is an Indo–European language, like the vast majority of languages in Europe, making it related to English, German, French, and even Greek. Finland, on the other hand, comes from a separate language family, the same one as Estonian and Hungarian: the Uralic family. Finnish, Estonian, and Hungarian aren’t the only Uralic languages, however—several more are spoken in Russia and parts of Finland. One of these is the Karelian language, shared between Finland and Russia.
Karelian is estimated to have around 30,000 speakers in Finland and an additional 100,000-odd speakers in the neighboring region of Russia. Finland recognizes Karelian as a non-regional national minority language, but speakers are scattered throughout the country and not concentrated in dedicated communities. In Russia’s Republic of Karelia, Karelian is an official minority language, and efforts to make it an official language on par with Russian are ongoing. The pressure that Finnish and Russian put on Karelian has resulted in it becoming endangered, with few translation firms offering Karelian translation services. So, we at TranslationServices.com thought we’d stand up for Karelian and put together a Karelian translation team.
Anyone who wants to see our Karelian translation rates can request a free price quote anytime!
Let’s learn a bit more about Karelian.
While Finnish Karelian speakers are scattered throughout the country, Karelian speakers in Russia mostly reside in the Republic of Karelia, which borders Finland, as well as in Tver Oblast and the Lyubytinsky District of Novgorod Oblast. Karelian is typically classified into two major dialect groups—North Karelian and South Karelian—with Tver Karelian fitting into the latter category. In both Finland and Russia, Karelian is written in the Latin alphabet, making it one of the only indigenous languages in Russia not written in the Cyrillic alphabet.
As a Uralic language closely related to Finnish, Karelian boasts a complicated grammatical structure with an extensive case system with a whopping 15 cases, including the rare prolative case, which expresses a method of transportation or communication. Karelian also features the partitive case, a hallmark of Finnic languages, which is denote partialness, unknown amounts, and ongoing or incomplete actions. Karelian, like Finnish, has no future tense, although future tense can sometimes be derived from the absence of the partitive case.
Karelian is complex—there’s no doubt about it. But that just makes the language all the more loveable, according to our Karelian translators.
To or from Karelian: what direction do you want us to translate in?
Our Karelian translators are passionate about translating both into and out of Karelian—translations from Karelian to English give Karelian speakers a chance to share their culture and history with people around the world, while translations from English to Karelian allow Karelian speakers to use their language in more ways and help learners pick up the language naturally. So, why not translate historical documents or literature in Karelian? Or, perhaps you’d like to translate research surveys, textbooks, poetry, novels, games, websites, or apps into Karelian. No matter what your Karelian translation project is, our team is eager to assist.
Send us a message today to explain the details of your Karelian translation project, and our team will get right to work.