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Johannes Aavik ( – 18 March 1973) was an linguist and innovator of the Estonian language.Toivo Miljan, Historical Dictionary of Estonia, Scarecrow Press 2004
He suggested intensive borrowing from Finnish, and some of his suggestions were quickly accepted and became part of standard Estonian vocabulary. From 1914 he started to artificially create new Neologism stems to replace "awkward" compound words. Thus, he proposed relv ("weapon") instead of sõjariist (literally, "war tool"), roim ("crime") instead of kuritöö ("evil deed") and veenma ("convince") instead of uskuma panema ("put into believing"). He generally tried to avoid the sounds t and s and preferred shorter words to longer ones. He also favoured o in successive syllables to u, as is common in the South Estonian dialects. Aavik considered many of his neologisms as created out of nothing (see ex nihilo lexical enrichment). However, many of Aavik's neologisms were influenced by foreign languages and lexical items (Aavik had a broad classical education and knew Ancient Greek, Latin and French).Zuckermann, Ghil'ad (2003), Language Contact and Lexical Enrichment in Israeli Hebrew. Palgrave Macmillan. [1], pp. 149-150. For example, his innovation roim ("crime") might have been influenced by the English language word crime; relv ("weapon") might have been influenced by the English word revolver; and taunima ("to condemn, disapprove") might have been influenced by the Finnish word tuomita ("to condemn, to judge").
Aavik also tried to modernize the grammar. He advocated the usage of i-plural instead of t(d)-plural ( keelis pro keeltes) and the i-superlative instead of the ordinary superlative ( suurim pro kõige suurem), as well as – nd instead of – nud in the active past participle. He proposed inflectional affixes to the ma-infinitive, and some of them entered into popular usage. He also tried to introduce a future form of verbs and a female personal pronoun, however these got little positive response.
Aavik published numerous essays and translations to propagate his ideas; he had vocal supporters as well as opponents. In 1919, he published a dictionary of 2000 Neologism. About 30 words that he created are still in use as of today. These include for example laip ('corpse') or mõrv ('murder'). His principles (utility, aesthetics and native quality) were summarized in Keeleuuenduse äärmised võimalused (Extreme Perspectives of Language Innovation; Tartu, 1924).
Language innovation slowly died away after the 1927 act that made it compulsory for schools to teach standard Estonian as put down in the Estonian Orthographic Dictionary (1925, chief editor Johannes Voldemar Veski) and Estonian Grammar (by Elmar Muuk, 1927). However, some words proposed by Aavik and fallen into oblivion have been picked up and re-introduced by more recent literati.
Aavik's innovations are discussed in the essay "Linguistic Innovation in Estonian" by Paul Saagpakk, published in his Estonian–English Dictionary.
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