Reykjavík Grapevine - 11.10.2013, Page 10

Reykjavík Grapevine - 11.10.2013, Page 10
10The Reykjavík Grapevine Issue 16 — 2013 www.ishestar.is For further information check out our website www.ishestar.is, call +354 555 7000 or be our friend on Facebook. Come ride with us For 30 years Íshestar has given people an opportunity to experience the Icelandic horse on long and short trips. Horses are our passion. Come ride with us in the beautiful surroundings of our Íshestar Riding Centre. You get free transport from all major hotels and guesthouses in the capital area. Online voting? You just know some- one's gonna figure out a way to make the winner a word too rude to say in public, let alone print. That hopefully will not happen be- cause one suspects that the impetus behind the contest is to encourage positive discussion about the Ice- landic language. As it is, discussion about the language among Iceland- ers, at least the part of it that takes place online, is notoriously vitriolic, even by the notoriously vitriolic stan- dards of the notoriously vitriolic Ice- landic online vitriol. So, if I understand you correctly, on- line discussion in Iceland is vitriolic? The unofficial motto of the Icelan- dic part of the internet is: "If you can't stand the heat, take your face off the stovetop." That said, if I actu- ally wrote that on an Icelandic online discussion forum, I would probably get yelled at, figuratively speaking, for using an American phrase as the basis for a motto for something Ice- landic. To which I would say: "Well, it was first coined by President Harry S. Truman, who was a badass mofo who nuked the hell out of people sooner than look at them." And then they would say... You're angrily arguing with voices in your head now. Sorry. This is what happens to people who are exposed to Icelandic online discussion, a constant state of anger over everything. This leads to quick polarization. Icelanders who are persnickety and pedantic about lan- guage refer to those who they feel are too permissive and loose in their language use as "málsó!ar," which means "language slob" or "language besmircher." Those who prefer play- fulness and freedom tend to call the other side "tungumálafasista," which means "language fascist." I suppose the irony of using terms like "slob" and "fascist" with such lack of precision is lost on everyone. Online discussions about language in Iceland tend to be on the level of kindergarten fights and it is impos- sible to take part without coming out of it wearing a black shirt covered in poo. Language is always a hotly debated topic in any society, but in Iceland this is especially fraught be- cause the foundational stone of the independence movement of the 19th and 20th Century was the idea that Icelanders were special because of their language and their literature, i.e. what they did with their language. What follows from this is that anxiet- ies about a changing society often ex- press themselves as anxieties about language. Ah, so a fear of language change is really a fear of social change. This can sometimes be seen in strange ways. On September 17, the top story on the front page of the newspaper Fréttabla!i! was: "One out of ten infants has a mother tongue other than Icelandic." The article led with the somewhat alarming sen- tence: "Difficulties lie ahead for pri- mary schools if there is no response to the great increase of children with another language than Icelandic." The rest of the article is a fairly dry survey of how primary schools and their administrations are responding to this new reality. I don't see why that's so strange, it's a fairly interesting story and on a slow news day I can easily see why that's the top story. The story at the bottom of the front page was about intense sandstorms stripping paint off cars, cracking windows and scaring the bejesus out of everyone who got caught up in it. It says something about the importance of language that the fact that one in ten babies under six have parents who speak a tongue other than Icelandic is considered more newsworthy than life-endangering sandstorm. Makes sense to me, it's newsworthy that anyone born outside Iceland would want to raise their children in a country where the weather can strip paint off cars. I see your point. As the news article goes on to say, this is a fairly recent development, historically speaking, and children of non-Icelandic par- ents only became common in the school system 10 years ago. Worries about change in Icelandic society are expressed in fears about language. The reverse of that is the fact that all of these children will be taught Ice- landic. Bilingual Icelandic speakers can interpret and translate beautiful words between cultures, which will enrich both societies, though I sup- pose that makes for a less snappy headline. The Icelandic state broadcaster RÚV and the humanities department of the University of Iceland have launched a contest to find the most beautiful word in the Icelandic lan- guage. People can submit their suggestions online and explain why they think their word of choice is especially beautiful. Then a committee will select a few of the submis- sions and the wider public can vote for their favourite one online. Words: Kári Tulinius | Illustration: Inga María Brynjarsdóttir So What’s This Beautiful Word Contest I Keep Hearing About? Iceland | For Dummies Continues over Happy, happy, joy, joy! Earlier this month Iceland was named the Most Peaceful Country by the 2013 Global Peace Index, again. The report ranks countries based on factors in three major categories: conflict, societal safety and militarisa- tion. Iceland's overall status shot it straight to the top, that's right, #1 of 162 countries evaluated. So what's all the grumbling about? On October 1, more than 50 earth- quakes were detected just north of Eyjafjör#ur, North Iceland. Although the quakes were mild, they appear to be part of a new wave of seismic activity in the North. All right Earth, we get it. You're upset. But what's this all about, really? Maybe it's the proposed road over the lava fields of Gálgahraun. Despite the fact that the fields were declared a protected area back in 2009, construction for the pro- posed road was given the green light earlier this month. Since the clearance of the proposal, groups like Hraunavinir (“Lava Friends”) have organised protests in the area, including a heated stand-off between protestors and a fleet of construction equipment in September. There is now talk of setting up a tent city in the fields until the issue is resolved. NEWS IN BRIEF SEPTEMBER by Parker Yamasaki

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