Helsinki is the capital, largest and most populous city in Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the Uusimaa region in southern Finland and has a population of 673,011. The city's urban area has a population of 1,268,296, making it by far the most populous urban area in Finland and the country's most important centre for politics, education, finance, culture and research. Helsinki is located 80 kilometres (50 mi) north of Tallinn, Estonia, 400 km (250 mi) east of Stockholm, Sweden, and 300 km (190 mi) west of Saint Petersburg, Russia. It has close historical links with these three cities.
Swedish is a North Germanic language spoken predominantly in Sweden and in parts of Finland. It has at least 10 million native speakers, the fourth most spoken Germanic language and the first among any other of its type in the Nordic countries overall.
Vantaa is a city and municipality in the region of Uusimaa in Finland. Vantaa has a population of 246,023, making it the fourth most populous city in Finland. Vantaa is part of the Helsinki Metropolitan Area, which has over 1.5 million inhabitants. The administrative centre of Vantaa is located in the Tikkurila district. Vantaa lies in Southern Finland and shares borders with Helsinki, the Finnish capital, to the south, Espoo to the southwest, Nurmijärvi to the northwest, Kerava and Tuusula to the north, and Sipoo to the east. The city covers a total area of 240.35 square kilometres (92.80 sq mi)), of which 1.97 km2 (0.76 sq mi) is water.
Espoo is a city and municipality in the region of Uusimaa in Finland. Espoo is situated on the northern shore of the Gulf of Finland and borders Helsinki, Vantaa, Kirkkonummi, Vihti and Nurmijärvi. The city also includes the enclave of Kauniainen. The city of Espoo covers an area of 528.03 square kilometres (203.9 sq mi) with a population of 311,888, placing it as Finland's second most populous city. Espoo is part of the Helsinki Metropolitan Area, where more than 1.5 million people reside.
Finland Swedish or Fenno-Swedish is a variety of the Swedish language and a closely related group of Swedish dialects spoken in Finland by the Swedish-speaking population, commonly also referred to as Finland Swedes, as their first language.
The Swedish-speaking population of Finland is a linguistic minority in Finland. They maintain a strong identity and are seen either as a separate cultural or ethnic group, while still being considered ethnic Finns, or as a distinct nationality. They speak Finland Swedish, which encompasses both a standard language and distinct dialects that are mutually intelligible with the dialects spoken in Sweden and, to a lesser extent, other Scandinavian languages.
Sweden Finns are a Finnish-speaking national minority in Sweden.
Finland's language strife was a major conflict in mid-19th century Finland. Both the Swedish and Finnish languages were commonly used in Finland at the time, associated with descendants of Swedish colonisation and leading to class tensions among the speakers of the different languages. It became acute in the mid-19th century. The competition was considered to have officially ended when Finnish gained official language status in 1863 and became equal to the Swedish language.
Helsinki is the capital of Finland and is its largest city. It was founded in the Middle Ages to be a Swedish rival to other ports on the Gulf of Finland, but it remained a small fishing village for over two centuries. Its importance to the Swedish Kingdom increased in the mid-18th century when the fortress originally known as Sveaborg was constructed on islands at the entrance to the harbor. While intended to protect Helsinki from Russian attack, Sveaborg ultimately surrendered to Russia during the Finnish War (1808-1809), and Finland was incorporated into the Russian Empire as part of the Treaty of Fredrikshamn. Russia then moved the Finnish capital from Turku to Helsinki, and the city grew dramatically during the 19th century. Finnish independence, a civil war, and three consecutive conflicts associated with World War II made Helsinki a site of significant political and military activity during the first half of the 20th century. Helsinki hosted the Summer Olympic Games in 1952, was a European Capital of Culture in 2000, and the World Design Capital in 2012. It is considered a Beta Level city by the Globalization and World Cities Research Network (GaWC), according to their 2012 analysis.
Meänkieli is a group of distinct Finnish dialects or a Finnic language spoken in the northernmost part of Sweden along the valley of the Torne River. Its status as an independent language is disputed, but in Sweden it is recognized as one of the country's five minority languages.
Uusimaa is a region of Finland. It borders the regions of Southwest Finland, Tavastia Proper (Kanta-Häme), Päijänne Tavastia (Päijät-Häme), and Kymenlaakso. Finland's capital and largest city, Helsinki, along with the surrounding Greater Helsinki area, are both contained in the region, and Uusimaa is Finland's most populous region. The population of Uusimaa is 1,734,000.
Language shift, also known as language transfer or language replacement or language assimilation, is the process whereby a speech community shifts to a different language, usually over an extended period of time. Often, languages that are perceived to be higher-status stabilise or spread at the expense of other languages that are perceived by their own speakers to be lower-status. An example is the shift from Gaulish to Latin during the time of the Roman Empire.
Helsinki slang or stadin slangi is a local dialect and a sociolect of the Finnish language mainly used in the capital city of Helsinki. It is characterized by its abundance of foreign loan words not found in the other Finnish dialects.
The two main official languages of Finland are Finnish and Swedish. There are also several official minority languages: three variants of Sami, as well as Romani, Finnish Sign Language and Karelian.
Finland is Christian majority country, with Islam being a minority faith. The constitution of Finland ensures freedom of religion and Muslims are free to proselytize and build places of worship in the country.
Swedish is the official language of Sweden and is spoken by the vast majority of the 10.23 million inhabitants of the country. It is a North Germanic language and quite similar to its sister Scandinavian languages, Danish and Norwegian, with which it maintains partial mutual intelligibility and forms a dialect continuum. A number of regional Swedish dialects are spoken across the country. In total, more than 200 languages are estimated to be spoken across the country, including regional languages, indigenous Sámi languages, and immigrant languages.
The official language of Estonia is Estonian, a Uralic language of the Finnic branch, which is related to Finnish. It is unrelated to the bordering Russian and Latvian languages, both of which are Indo-European.
Finnish is a Uralic language of the Finnic branch, spoken by the majority of the population in Finland and by ethnic Finns outside of Finland. Finnish is one of the two official languages of Finland. In Sweden, both Finnish and Meänkieli are official minority languages. The Kven language, which like Meänkieli is mutually intelligible with Finnish, is spoken in the Norwegian county Troms og Finnmark by a minority group of Finnish descent.
Sámi languages, in English also rendered as Sami and Saami, are a group of Uralic languages spoken by the Sámi people in Northern Europe. There are, depending on the nature and terms of division, ten or more Sami languages. Several spellings have been used for the Sámi languages, including Sámi, Sami, Saami, Saame, Sámic, Samic and Saamic, as well as the exonyms Lappish and Lappic. The last two, along with the term Lapp, are now often considered pejorative.
A variety of ethnic groups have long existed in Finland. Prominent examples include the Swedish speaking minority within the country and the Sami peoples in the north. With modern international migration to Finland, different ethnolinguistics groups populate the country, most prominently in Helsinki.
