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According to Recke and Napiersky, the first poems in Estonian from the pen of a woman were allegedly published in 1779, in the sheet music book Oden und Lieder in Musik gesetzt by Andeas Traugott Grahl, a private tutor in the Governorate of Estonia, but unfortunately it is not preserved. More luckily another sheet music book by him, Lieder und Handsachen für das Klavier und den Gesang, published in Leipzig in 1784, was available to the researchers before World War II. Two poems by Estonian ladies were published there: Tio, tassane ja helde and Liesole. A variant of the Tio-poem (the so-called Rosi-poem) was published in 1787 in the 5th volume of the reader Lesebuch für Ehst- und Livland by Friedrich Gotthilf Findeisen in Oberpahlen (Põltsamaa) in Livonia, and a year later, in 1788, in a longer version in the German literary magazine Der Teutsche Merkur. To the latter, the poem was mediated by Christian Hieronymus Justus Schlegel, a private tutor in Estonia from 1780 to 1782, and then pastor, who left Estonia in 1783. However, he did not ascribe the Rosi-poem to an Estonian lady, but to a gentleman, von Tiesenhausen of Saus, who wrote the poem on the occasion of the passing of his wife. There are several manors called Saus or Sauß in Estonia. Traditionally the Rosi-poem has been ascribed to Ber(e)nd Heinrich von Tiesenhausen of Groß-Sauß (Sausti or Kaarepere). But there was another manor called Sauß (Sauste) near Wesenberg (Rakvere), which belonged to captain Hans Wen(t)zel(l) von Tiesenhausen from 1779 to 1781. Based on several sources, this paper brings forth arguments to support the thesis that the gentleman, von Tiesenhausen, mentioned by Schlegel was actually Hans Wenzel von Tiesenhausen. This man was probably also identical with the captain von Tiesenhausen, whom Grahl has named as his employer in the subscription call of the Lieder und Handsachen. According to Professor Gustav Suits, Grahl acted as a private tutor somewhere near Wesenberg. The paper also suggests that H. W. von Tiesenhausen was the author of the poem Der Client an seinen Sachwalter, published in the muses almanac Estländische poetische Blumenlese for 1780. Earlier this poem has been ascribed to Johann Georg von Tiesenhausen from Northern Latvia. Dirk Sangmeister has guessed that the Albrechts who published the almanac mentioned the name Wesenberg on the cover of the first issue of their periodical (for 1779) in honour of the owner of the Wesenberg manor, judge Jakob Johann von Tiesenhausen and his family, with whom Sangmeister believes the Albrechts stood in a cordial relationship as Sophie Albrecht dedicated several poems to a certain Ottilie von Tiesenhausen. The last one lets us know that on the 9th of June 1781, the news of the death of her beloved friend had reached Sophie Albrecht. The date 9th of June 1781 (due to calendar differences actually 11 days later) can also be found in the archival materials concerning H. W. von Tiesenhausen – on this day his bankruptcy proceedings were started. Already in January 1781 he had sold Sauß; in March 1781 his other manor – Tuddo (Tudu) – was sold too; these are likely the two manors mentioned in his German poem. The bankruptcy proceedings were evoked by a lawsuit, initiated in March 1780 by J. J. von Tiesenhausen, who from 1774 to 1780 rented his Wesenberg manor to his second cousin Hans Wenzel. From 1779 the latter had difficulties in paying the rent. As at the time of the publication of Estländische poetische Blumenlese it was H. W. von Tiesenhausen who was living in the manor of Wesenberg, the recipient of the poems by Sophie Albrecht was very likely his wife. Neither the given nor the maiden name of this woman or her birth date and the exact death date are preserved. H. W. von Tiesenhausen mentions his wife without her name in his report to the court, Demüthigste Anzeige und Unterlegung der wahren Umstände meines gegenwärtigen unglücklichen und betrübten Schicksaals (The humblest report and interpretation of the true circumstances of my current unhappy and sad fate), signed 26 June 1781. It appears that his wife really died shortly before the composing of the report. Frau Capitainin Tiesenhausen has also been mentioned three times in the birth register of the Wesenberg church in 1777 as a godparent, one of the cases being as godmother of a girl, whose mother was the sister of G. W. von Schwengelm, the employer of mister Schlegel, who mediated the Rosi-poem to the Teutsche Merkur! The paper also presumes that the ladies mentioned by Grahl could have been translators and guesses who these women were, but as we lack confirmed proof, the investigation must continue.

This article was inspired by the first author’s observations in the teaching process, which refer to different learning patterns in studying a piece of music. I have noticed that although I teach all the students by using quite the same methods, part of them remember the pieces rather quickly and they prefer to play and practise them from memory. Some others, on the other hand, prefer to play from notes, and they continue doing it during the whole learning process. The aim of this article is to find, by an evidence-based method, the occurrence of the abovementioned learning patterns and describe their characteristic features. In case peculiarities occur, which can be projected against the typology of different learning patterns, it is possible to study connections with the earlier learning styles and learning and information processing theories. It also enables us to offer applications for a more person-centred approach in piano pedagogy to enhance both the learning process, student-teacher collaboration, and the student’s development as well as make them subjectively more pleasant for both parties. To investigate the learning patterns in basic piano studies, I video-recorded the classes with students of possibly similar backgrounds, giving them tasks testing their memory and note-reading skills. Based on the analysis of the collected information, I made conclusions about the existence and nature of hypothetical intuitive learning patterns. The interesting observations made by formal and non-formal examination add material for future in-depth studies, as the described phenomenon should be approached, above all, as a continuum, which enables us to estimate students’ inclination towards one or the other side to a greater or lesser extent, and consequently, the application of a better adapted teaching strategies.

The paper discusses George Berkeley’s metaphysical account of the Creation in his work Three Dialogues Between Hylas and Philonous (1713). As we know from Berkeley’s correspondence, his detailed attempt to show that his immaterialist philosophy is compatible with the Mosaic description of the Creation was occasioned by an objection from the wife of his friend Sir John Percival. According to Berkeley’s philosophy, only minds and ideas exist. Physical things such as books and trees are mere collections of ideas in human minds. No thing can exist unless there is a mind to perceive it. Yet the Mosaic story states that many things were created and existed before humans came into being. Lady Percival pointed out that Berkeley’s view makes it hard to understand how things could be created if there were no human beings around to perceive them. In response, Berkeley offered a sophisticated metaphysical construct in which the creation of the physical world is interpreted as God’s decree to produce certain kinds of ideas in potential perceivers. The paper aims to show how Berkeley’s response to Lady Percival’s objection reflects the complicated relationship between philosophy and revealed religion in the early 18th century. Berkeley’s commitment to biblical truth sets significant limits to his philosophical speculation.

The article deals with the representation of nationalism in Lilli Suburg’s (1841–1923) short story “Liina” (1877). Lilli Suburg was a writer, journalist, pedagogue, and the first Estonian feminist. “Liina” is her most famous literary work, which also belongs among the most important works of early Estonian literature. “Liina” was published in two editions (1877, 1884) and was also translated into Finnish (1892). It is important in the context of Estonian national movement because it is a short story based on the central idea which emphasizes the importance of being Estonian. It became popular among readers and made the author famous. “Liina” is based on Suburg’s German-language diary, and it is an autobiographical short story about an Estonian peasant girl who struggles to remain Estonian. The national ideas represented in “Liina” emphasize the importance of remaining Estonian in an environment where social mobility rather implied Germanization. On the other hand, the national theme in “Liina” represents a gendered viewpoint. Suburg understood the woman as a national subject equal to the man and therefore the carrier of national ideas is a woman – the protagonist called Liina. The article deals with the representation of nationalism and gender in the short story and also with the context of the creation and reception of the work.

Within the project “Pragmatics above grammar: Subjectivity and intersubjectivity in Estonian registers and text types” (PRG341) we are studying the expression of subjectivity and intersubjectivity in different written and spoken registers of modern Estonian. We focus on adverbs that function as discourse markers (e.g. vist ‘maybe, probably’, ilmselt ‘apparently, obviously’, tegelikult ‘actually’), markers that develop from main clauses containing cognition verbs that take sentence complements (e.g. (ma) arvan ‘I think’, usun ‘I believe’, (mulle) tundub ‘it seems (to me), it appears (that)’) as well as modal and performative verbs (e.g. võib (juhtuda) ‘can (happen)’, peaks (tulema) ‘should (come)’; kinnitan/väidan (olevat) ‘I affirm/claim’). The analysis combines quantitative corpus-linguistic and qualitative pragmatic approaches, thus belonging to the field of corpus pragmatics. Unlike previous studies of related topics, the project systematically compares the usage of markers in different registers (spoken, online communication, print texts) and text types. The pilot studies performed thus far have revealed several problems with the existing Estonian corpora, important in the study of pragmatics. Firstly, some text types are underrepresented or not represented at all, the text types cannot always be distinguished, and the particular text may not always correspond to the nominal text type (e.g. an academic text may contain quotes from texts of other types). All of this makes it difficult to do comparative statistical analysis of different text types. Secondly, the markers under examination are multifunctional and identifying their (inter)subjective function requires consideration of context broader than a single sentence. However, the public search systems for the existing corpora do not provide this context. For instance, the discourse marker function of cognition verbs is indicated primarily by the fact that the topic of the conversation or text follows through the subordinate clause, not the main clause. Since the available search systems do not provide context larger than a single sentence, the identification of the topic of the discourse, and therefore of the potential discourse-marker function of the verb, is made more difficult. To avoid these problems, the project working group is developing a new “Pragmatics” corpus, being created in the SketchEngine environment. The corpus is made up of 10 subcorpora representing different text types and registers. Each subcorpus contains roughly 500,000 words.

This article focuses on the narrative analysis of late-romantic instrumental music. Having adopted the structuralist-semiotic conception of musical narrative as proposed by Byron Almén (2008) as the transvaluation of an opposing hierarchy, and the concept of the musical topic as musical elements with specific stylistic-cultural associations, I analyse the expressive form of Heino Eller’s early symphonic poem “Symphonic Legend” (1923). Narrative logic was found to permeate the musical work despite its collage or suite-like form, as the composer introduces characteristic musical actors that re-appear in different musical contexts. These actors are largely distinguished by musical topics, the conventional stylistic associations related with their musical characteristics as Eller’s piece presents a wide synthesis of styles – from musical impressionism and expressionism to lyrical or chromatic late-romantic; and various topics, such as fantastic, ombra, apassionata, pianto, heroic, and pastoral. Further, I propose a layered narrative structure for the “Symphonic Legend”, as the jarring and abrupt changes in musical material, affect and topic between different movements of the piece suggest shifts in the level of musical discourse and a framed narrative, as proposed by Hatten (1994). The primary order-imposing hierarchy is identified as the pastoral-impressionist topic that acts as the introduction and coda to the entire piece while the transgressive hierarchy is carried by antagonistic musical material associated with fantastical and dysphoric topics (whole-tone scale, chromaticism, fanfare-like brass and ombra) and with the main theme-actor of the piece (a theme strongly resembling the main theme of the first part of Rimsky-Korsakov’s “Scheherezade”). While the pastoral beginning and end of the piece (1st and 11th sections) suggest a narrative trajectory of a romance or “the victory of the order-imposing hierarchy over the transgression”, the abrupt shifts that occur between those sections and the middle-sections of the piece suggest that these take place at a different level of discourse, placing the narrative weight in sections 2–10, where the primary conflict seems to be between the antagonistic material and the theme-actor. In the middle sections Eller seems to problematize the typical narrative trajectory of dysphoric to euphoric in 19th-century symphonic poems, as the theme-actor’s heroic apotheosis in the 9th section is undermined by its reprise in section 10 and ultimate inability to be united with the order-imposing hierarchy in the coda, suggesting an ironic narrative. This reading is hopefully the first of many narrative analyses of Eller’s and other Estonian composers’ unique late-romantic and early modern symphonic poems.

Restrictions and special measures were imposed around the world to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 virus, one of the most important of which was certainly the reorganization of learning and work as a home-based activity. During the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, schools in Estonia remained closed from 16 March 2020 until the end of the schoolyear; further periods of countrywide distance learning were imposed also throughout the 2020/2021 schoolyear. The new way of life that accompanied the special situation was also reflected in widespread folklore, including internet memes. Defining memes as “(post)modern folklore” that expresses and shapes shared norms and values within communities, my article analyses the depiction of distance learning in Estonian memes, highlighting different points of view: the position of the students, the teachers, and the parents. The source data comes from the meme collection of the research archive of the Department of Folkloristics of the Estonian Literary Museum, which consists of more than 2,000 meme units collected during the crisis period. Some data were collected separately, for example, Tartu Variku School organized a meme competition “My distance learning” for the students of Tartu schools in April 2020 (541 memes). The comparative global collection (12,000 units) comes from the international project of corona folklore and -humour research “Humour during the global corona crisis” led by Giselinde Kuipers (Leuven Catholic University) and Mark Boukes (Amsterdam University); the project involves researchers from more than 30 countries. The study addresses the following questions: What local features emerge in distance learning memes that spread during the pandemic? How have students used other cultural resources in these memes (e.g. pop culture elements known from literature, cinema, music and other important cultural texts)? Whether and how these memes express, for example, family relationships (between children/youngsters and parents), school relationships (between students and teachers), what patterns of distance working are prevalent, etc. The meme material which has been inspired by distance learning is a fascinating contemporary subject that combines the challenging COVID-19 pandemic and distance learning as a characteristic feature of this period. Students who are the main creators of the memes regard the humorous memes about distance learning as a form of communication which offers an alternative and multifaceted perspective on this important method of learning during lockdown. The Estonian material is largely based on internationally known universal meme templates that have been adapted to the local language and cultural space. When investigating the social networks and universal motifs reflected in the memes, it is important to rely on the qualitative content analysis. It is worth noting that the subject of COVID-19 and the pandemic period are rarely explicitly mentioned in the memes. The egocentric or student-centred perspective that is characteristic of this specific material highlights the general attitudes and shared patterns that are based on opposition, which is typical of youth culture. The common pairs of opposition are me/classmates, student/teacher, and student/parent. The stereotypical roles reflected in the memes can be analysed figuratively via the ambivalent trickster figure, known from earlier folklore studies. Students are shown as cunning go-getters who use memes to discuss uncomfortable issues, mishaps, and problems. Stereotypically, the image of a teacher, but also that of a parent, is that of an authoritarian supervisor, a grade giver from the students’ perspective. This makes memes a highly important channel for schoolchildren to make their voice heard, either consciously or subconsciously. In the future, the material could be investigated in even greater detail from the aspect of youth language use and emotions, the interdisciplinary aspect, etc.

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused unprecedented interest in ethics, as societies are confronted with difficult ethical choices: life versus economic well-being, individual freedom versus health, free movement of people versus public health. All democratic societies have witnessed disagreements concerning restrictions to the free movement of people, vaccination policies, and distribution of healthcare resources. The adopted policies and formulated guidelines showed that different countries prioritized values differently. Amongst the most challenging ethical debates during the COVID-19 pandemic were attempts to formulate clinical ethical guidelines on how limited medical resources and services ought to be allocated should the need exceed availability. This article provides an overview of the process of compiling the clinical ethics recommendations for Estonian hospitals concerning the allocation of limited healthcare resources during the COVID-19 pandemic. The article describes the stakeholder involvement, engagements with comparable international documents, main internal debates and lessons learned for the future.

The present multidisciplinary theoretical article develops its focal line of argument gradually. At first, feminist and narrative theory are consulted; after that, some treatments in the philosophy of mind are discussed. The latter’s correlative relationship with the recent “materialist turn” in philosophy affords to propose a tentative alternative to the current and universally accepted approaches to the (fictional) character much indebted to philosophical idealism. This latter observation also determines the broad – some might argue seemingly overtly complicated – theoretical reach of the article. However, its timely point of departure – the online misogynistic abuse in fan discussions directed at Breaking Bad’s Skyler White and the actress Anna Gunn –, enables to cast the issue of character engagement in necessarily broad terms, disciplinarily speaking. Be it in the context of different scientific disciplines or as the crucial vertebra connecting them, whilst also suggesting far-reaching philosophical implications. This kind of engagement, and especially its expression in online discourse, provides an impetus to inquire about the peculiarities of the human mind and the operation of human thought. Therefore, the present article zooms in on the conventionally understood binary relationship between “fiction” and “reality”, sketching appropriate terminology (continuance, narrative person, realitization) and theoretical framework (inspired, in part, by the Soviet school of philosophical Activity Theory) to help explain the human proclivity to treat characters in naïve realist terms, i.e., as real people. The central research question is as follows: what kind of ramifications can be detected for the conceptualization of character (and narrative) engagement from a particular kind of value-laden reception (like the forms of digital misogyny that emerged in the context of Breaking Bad’s reception)?

The article examines Baltic German research expeditions to the north-western Caucasus, including Abkhazia, in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, and analyses the results of these trips. Although some of these researchers, such as Peter Simon Pallas and Heinrich Klaproth, came from Germany, most of the researchers were from the Baltic provinces of the Russian tsarist state: Johann Anton Güldenstädt, Otto Moritz Ludwig von Engelhardt, Johann Jacob Friedrich Wilhelm Parrot, and Theodor von Tornau. The main focus of the article is on the descriptions of the north-western region of Abkhazia, where the historical region Dzhigetia or Small Abkhazia is located, and which was inhabited by the Dzhiget ethnic group until the 1860s. Using data from Baltic German authors, especially Theodor von Tornau, an attempt is made to answer the question of whether or not Dzhigetians belonged to the Abkhazians. The article provides an overview of the historical location and fate of Dzhigets in the 19th century. In general, the descriptions of the peoples of the Caucasus provided by the authors of the late 18th and early 19th centuries are superficial and do not follow a uniform classification. Therefore, their interpretation offers different possibilities today. The examples of recent interpretations given in the article convince us that Russian and Abkhaz authors have interpreted earlier authors differently. The most comprehensive accounts of Dzhigetia come from Theodor von Tornau, and it can be argued that the Dzhigetians were an Abkhaz ethnic group. The question of the affiliation of Dzhigets is important in today’s border disputes between Abkhazia and Russia. In the last decade, Russia has made territorial claims to Abkhazia in the region of historic Dzhigetia. It is also declared among the Russian scientific community that Dzhigetia is not historically-ethnically within the borders of Abkhazia. However, Tornau’s data refute these statements of Russian authors. The ethnicity of the peoples of the border areas would probably not solve today’s border problems, but would give to the parties of the dispute symbolic capital and moral support to defend their positions.