Tuesday 4 August 2009

Where are the Estonians?

I am here at the First World Congress of Environmental History as the only Estonian representative (as a Norwegian Ph.D. Student at Department of Semiotics, University of Tartu). This March I was in Copenhagen at an international climate conference, with around 1,500 participants - as the only Estonian representative. Where are the Estonians?

Here at the environmental history congress there are maybe 550 participants, judging by the list of participants. Though scholars from Europe and the US dominate (along with participants from Canada, Australia, New Zealand), there are some representation of other regions of the world as well, South America and Asia (China, Japan, India, Taiwan, Nepal ...) included. As for Africa, there's 9 participants (15 % of world population, 1-2 % of world congress participants) - in addition to South Africa, Nigeria, Egypt and Lesotho are represented (Lesotho 2, Estonia 1).

Norway, with its 7 representatives - me not included - almost compares to Africa in participation. That's not surprising, however, given that Norway is a neighboring country. Then again, so is practically Estonia. And yet, I am the only one here - nor are there any participants from Latvia or Lithuania; making me the sole representative from the Baltic states.

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