“My English Skills Are a Huge Benefit to Me”: What Local Students’ Narratives Reveal About Language Ideologies at the University of Tartu

Abstract

This study investigates how Estonian L1 students with high self-perceived English proficiency experience and (re)produce the language ideological regime at the University of Tartu. Situated within the broader context of globalization and Englishization in higher education, and informed by scholarships on language ideologies, critical language policy, and stakeholder perspectives within EMI, the study explores how students position themselves in relation to their peers and academic staff, and how they evaluate the advantages and challenges associated with different language repertoires. The analysis is based on 17 semi-structured interviews conducted in 2024 with students enrolled in Estonian-medium programs that incorporate English expectations and practices. Findings show that students perceive their repertoire as an asset, granting full access to academic content and networks. Yet, their accounts also reveal challenges related to academic literacy. Students position themselves as competent users of English and sometimes question the legitimacy of those with perceived weaker skills. The study highlights how English privilege and native-speakerism intersect to shape perceptions of academic competence and authority. It calls for great attention to stratifying language ideologies to foster more inclusive and equitable academic environments.

1. Introduction

Individual language repertoires are not only resources for self-expression but are also socially evaluated for their symbolic and strategic value. In the context of globalization, language competence has become commodified (Heller, 2010), and English is increasingly imbued with high exchange value and prestige (Grin, 2001; Piller & Takahashi, 2006; Hogan-Brun, 2017). In Estonia, Estonian remains a strong, widely used (Ehala & Koreinik, 2021), and institutionally supported language. However, as in many contexts, the rise in English is reshaping linguistic hierarchies across multiple domains, including academia (Soler, 2024). Universities have become a key site where tensions between local and global language ideologies become visible (Soler & Vihman, 2018). This paper offers a view on the language ideologies of the University of Tartu through the lens of its students who claim to be proficient both in Estonian and English.

The University of Tartu, Estonia’s oldest university, positions itself as an “international national university” (University of Tartu, 2021), which signals ideological tensions and potential policy ambiguities (Soler & Rozenvalde, 2024). On the one hand, the university’s language policies are closely tied to the state (Rozenvalde et al., 2023), as the university carries a special mission to preserve and promote Estonian as the language of higher education and research (University of Tartu Act, 1995). On the other hand, it seeks global competitiveness and hosts a diverse and multilingual student and staff population (University of Tartu, 2025), for whom English often serves as a shared academic language (Rozenvalde & Klaas-Lang, 2023). However, Englishization is not a neutral tool of internationalization. As critical research has shown (Phillipson & Kabel, 2024; Soler & Rozenvalde, 2024), it also functions as a mechanism of linguistic dominance that can erode the academic status of local languages. This makes the university a fertile site for investigating how language ideologies are formed, negotiated, and experienced in practice.

While previous research has mostly addressed overt and covert language policy tensions at the state and institutional levels (Rozenvalde et al., 2023; Soler & Rozenvalde, 2021), and from the perspective of staff (Klaas-Lang & Rozenvalde, 2023; Soler & Rozenvalde, 2024), less is known about how these ideological regimes are interpreted and navigated by students. Where student experiences have been studied, the focus has been on local Russian L1 students (Klaas-Lang et al., 2025).

This paper addresses this gap by focusing on the language ideological regime of the University of Tartu through the lens of local Estonian L1 students who feel confident using both Estonian and English. These students might be seen as winners of globalization (Teney et al., 2014), possessing what could be perceived as the ideal language repertoire: Estonian for local legitimacy, and English for global access. Yet their experiences also raise critical questions about value, recognition, and legitimacy. This paper, therefore, aims to explore how Estonian L1 students who self-identify as highly proficient in Estonian and English experience and navigate the bilingual demands of academic life at the University of Tartu, and how their narratives both reflect and reproduce the language ideological regime of the institution. By analyzing how students perceive their own repertoires, frame linguistic advantages and challenges, and position themselves vis-à-vis peers and academic staff, the paper seeks to uncover the ways in which English and Estonian are valued, contested, and hierarchized in higher education.

To explore these questions, the paper asks:

• How do the Estonian L1 students perceive their own language repertoire, especially their Estonian and English skills?
• What kinds of advantages and challenges do Estonian L1 students with high self-perceived English proficiency describe in navigating their studies, and how do they frame these experiences in relation to academic demands?
• How do these students position themselves in relation to their peers’ and teaching staff’s language repertoires, and what kinds of hierarchies or comparisons emerge from these positionings?
• How do students’ narratives and positionings reflect and reproduce the language ideological regime at the University of Tartu?

The study is informed by theoretical work on language ideologies and language policies. More specifically, it draws on the notion of language ideology (Kroskrity, 2000; Irvine & Gal, 2000), critical language policy (Tollefson, 1991, 2006), and linguistic capital (Bourdieu, 1991). It also engages with scholarship on ideological positioning (Bucholtz & Hall, 2005) and language legitimacy in multilingual educational contexts (Bonacina-Pugh, 2020). Student narratives are understood as discursive sites where broader ideological structures and individual agency intersect.

Empirically, the paper is based on a qualitative study conducted between 2022 and 2024 at the University of Tartu. It draws on semi-structured interviews with 17 students whose first language (L1) is Estonian, who have completed general education (mostly) in Estonian, are enrolled in Estonian-medium university programs, and who consider themselves fluent in English. Their English proficiency is shaped not only by formal instruction but also by extensive informal exposure, including digital media, travel, or international schooling experiences.

By attending to the lived experiences of bilingual students at the University of Tartu, the paper contributes to research on language ideologies in higher education and Eastern Europe. It highlights how language ideologies are reproduced, resisted, or reinterpreted in everyday academic life and offers insight into how symbolic hierarchies of language shape notions of legitimacy and competence in academic contexts. In doing so, the paper contributes to broader debates on multilingualism and inequality in higher education. It also offers insight into how globalization reshapes the value of national languages in academic settings.

2. Theoretical Framing

This study is situated within the field of critical sociolinguistics, drawing on scholarship that conceptualizes language use as socially and ideologically structured. In this paper, language ideology is understood following Schieffelin et al. (1998) as “representations, whether explicit or implicit, that construe the intersection of language and human beings in a social world” (p. 3). Language ideologies are socially shared and institutionally reproduced frameworks that link linguistic practices to legitimacy, authority, and identity (Irvine & Gal, 2000; Kroskrity, 2000). This perspective enables us to examine how students’ narratives reveal broader structures of power and inequality in university. Building on this, the paper uses the notion of language ideological regimes (Kroskrity, 2000; Irvine & Gal, 2000), used here interchangeably with language regimes and understood as the institutionalized and often implicit systems of beliefs that shape which languages, varieties, and speaker identities are deemed legitimate or valuable. These regimes are not static, but are constantly reproduced through institutional practice, social discourse, and individual positioning.

It is further grounded in critical language policy (Tollefson, 1991, 2006), which frames language practices and choices as embedded in broader histories of stratification and inequality. Language policy is understood to include everyday language practices and the ideological expectations that shape them (Spolsky, 2004, 2009). The concept of linguistic capital (Bourdieu, 1991) is central to the paper, as it allows an examination of how certain language skills are positioned as resources that confer symbolic and practical advantages in a setting, such as English in today’s academia.

Student narratives are analyzed as acts of positioning, through which speakers construct themselves and others as competent, legitimate, or marginal in an institutional setting (Bucholtz & Hall, 2005). These positionings are not merely descriptive but ideological: they reflect and contribute to the reproduction of broader language hierarchies. Legitimacy—using appropriate language in each context (Heller, 1996)—might be multi-layered (Bonacina-Pugh, 2020). In this context, one’s perceived adequacy or inadequacy is shaped not only by their own experiences but also by norms about what counts as legitimate language (Bourdieu, 1991; Heller, 1996; Bonacina-Pugh, 2020).

The broader process of Englishization in higher education (Kuteeva, 2020; Wilkinson & Gabriëls, 2021a; Soler, 2024) is understood here as the increasing institutional use and symbolic dominance of English in teaching, research, and administration. Beyond its pragmatic dimension, Englishization functions as an ideological process that naturalizes English as the privileged medium of knowledge production and circulation (Phillipson & Kabel, 2024; Kuteeva, 2020). While Estonian remains the official medium of instruction for many students, English permeates the academic lives (Rozenvalde, forthcoming).

While Englishization of universities has been driven by global pressures, it has also been actively steered by local policy decisions (Hultgren & Wilkinson, 2022; Phillipson & Kabel, 2024; Soler, 2024). In response, the University of Tartu has devoted considerable institutional attention and funding to preserving and developing the Estonian language in academia. In contrast, the role and functioning of English in the university’s academic environment have remained largely invisible. This suggests the presence of hidden language policies (Shohamy, 2006), where English operates through implicit norms. The analysis that follows seeks to make these implicit dimensions visible by examining how students experience and interpret them.

Research has shown that the spread and use of English in universities reproduce and intensify existing social and linguistic hierarchies (Shohamy, 2012; Kuteeva et al., 2015; De Costa et al., 2021), broadening the gap between those who are proficient in English and those who are not (Rozenvalde, forthcoming). But what about students with strong language skills, how do they navigate the bilingual demands of the university life? Insights from English-medium instruction (EMI) scholarship remain relevant here. Even though the students participating in this study are not enrolled in English-medium programs, EMI practices, such as English-taught courses, English-language readings, and interaction with international peers, structure their academic trajectories.

Research on EMI has shown that academic success depends not only on general language proficiency but also on academic literacy, discipline-specific vocabulary, and genre awareness (Aizawa et al., 2023; Sun, 2025). Even highly proficient EMI students have been found to face challenges in navigating unfamiliar academic genres (Al Zumor, 2019; Rose et al., 2020). Moreover, studies by Soruç et al. (2022) and Ekoç (2020) stress that EMI success is multifactorial, including self-efficacy and self-regulation skills. Han and Dong (2024), and Ekoç (2020) highlight that EMI contexts can create hidden barriers even when students appear linguistically capable. Al Zumor (2019) and Aizawa et al. (2023) provide empirical support that even high-performing EMI students face language-related challenges, for example, in content comprehension. Han et al. (2016) offer insights into how language teaching regimes reproduce inequalities, especially when English is promoted without equitable support structures.

In addition, Kuteeva (2020) shows how language ideologies circulate in EMI, shaping both self-perceptions and judgments of others. Students do not simply report their skills; they also construct social identities and hierarchies through talk, when comparing their language abilities to those of their peers. As Shirahata and Lahti (2023) argue, positionings are ideological: students draw ideas from dominant ideologies on how to orient themselves and their peers on international campuses. Moreover, Wilkinson and Gabriëls (2021b) highlight that not all forms of multilingualism are equally valued in EMI institutions, and suggest that EMI students’ multilingualism often remains unnoticed, undervalued, and underused.

3. Materials and Methods

To explore how students navigate the academic environment at the University of Tartu, with attention to their perceived linguistic advantages and challenges, their positioning in relation to peers and lecturers, and the university’s broader language ideological regime, a qualitative study was conducted, which centered on student narratives of language acquisition and academic language use. The study focuses on BA and MA students whose L1 is Estonian and who are enrolled in Estonian-medium programs. All participants had received their general education in Estonia and predominantly in Estonian. They described themselves as highly proficient in both Estonian and English, with English skills developed through formal schooling as well as informal exposure, and their self-perceived language skills were confirmed in the initial email contact when they were invited to participate.

The analysis is based on 17 interviews conducted between February 19 and March 8, 2024 (see

Table 1. Informant profile.

Level of studies
BA	8
MA	5
Integrated BA and MA	4
Main faculty of studies
Arts and Humanities	6
Social Sciences	2
Medicine	5
Science and Technology	4
Year of birth
1992	1
1997	1
1998	1
1999	1
2000	3
2001	3
2002	5
2003	2

). A qualitative approach was chosen to investigate an underexplored topic and to gain insight into the lived experiences of students in contexts (Creswell & Poth, 2023). Participants majored in 13 different academic disciplines across all four faculties of the University of Tartu. They were recruited through institutional mailing lists. A non-probability purposive sampling strategy was used, and data collection continued until thematic saturation was reached. Participants were compensated with gift cards for their time and contributions.

Before the interviews, participants were informed of the aims of the study and signed informed consent forms. The interviews were conducted in Estonian. All data are anonymized in the paper; interview excerpts are translated into English by the author, and identified in the text by participant number.

The interviews ranged from 22 to 40 min in length, resulting in a total of 8 h and 10 min of recorded material. Audio recordings were transcribed using automatic speech recognition software (Olev & Alumäe, 2022), followed by manual correction and anonymization. The transcripts were then uploaded into the qualitative data analysis software Atlas.ti 25. The interviews were analyzed following a thematic analysis approach (Braun & Clarke, 2021). A combination of deductive and inductive coding was applied. In the deductive phase, the initial codes were derived from the research questions guiding the study. The starting codes included self-perceived proficiency, advantages, challenges, peer comparisons, lecturer comparisons, language ideologies. These codes ensured that the analysis remained closely tied to the aims of the study. In the inductive stage, the coding was expanded and refined through repeated close readings of the transcripts. New codes were added when patterns emerged in participants’ accounts, for example, challenges of writing, terminology in Estonian, effortlessness as fluency, accent as boundary, or generational differences among lecturers. Related codes were then grouped into broader themes that form the structure of the results section. This process ensured that the findings were grounded in participants’ narratives while also linked to the study’s conceptual framework.

4. Results and Discussion

The analysis that follows addresses the four interrelated research questions in turn. First, it examines how students perceive their own Estonian and English skills (RQ1). Second, it explores how they frame the advantages and challenges of navigating their studies in relation to academic demands (RQ2). Third, it analyzes how students position themselves in relation to their peers’ and lecturers’ language repertoires, including the hierarchies and comparisons that emerge from these positionings (RQ3). Finally, the fourth question on how students’ narratives and positionings reflect and reproduce the broader language ideological regime of the University of Tartu is woven throughout the sub-sections and brought together in the concluding discussion (RQ4).

4.1. Students’ Perceptions of Their Estonian-English Repertoire

This sub-section explores how the interviewees describe their Estonian and English skills to set a brief context for the interviewees’ language experiences at the university. While the interviewees refer to other languages in their repertoires as well, these are not included in the analysis due to scope limitations and, following the lead of Wilkinson and Gabriëls (2021b), will be discussed in a forthcoming publication.

4.1.1. Estonian Skills

The interviewees position themselves as confident users of Estonian. Some assert their competence through claiming to be mother tongue speakers, which is presented as a self-evident marker of language authority, for example, “I speak Estonian as a mother tongue, as well as possible” (07) and “Estonian is my mother tongue, I rate it highly” (01). Such statements suggest that for these interviewees, native-speaker status is the primary criterion for legitimacy in Estonian, making further justifications unnecessary. Additionally, others signal confidence while avoiding such a claim. Instead, they link proficiency to naturalness or ease: “Estonian is my mother tongue/…/it comes out normally” (10). Some students express affective attachment to the language, with statements such as “Estonian is definitely the best language I speak because I love the Estonian language” (03). Such responses frame Estonian not only as a functional skill but also as a source of pride and belonging.

4.1.2. English Skills

The interviewees’ descriptions of their English skills show more variation. To begin with, some position English as equal to Estonian in terms of proficiency, saying, “there’s really no big difference between them” (05), “in English it’s the same, I’d say equal with Estonian” (07), “I’m good at both languages” (08), and “the same language, just like Estonian” (13). These students frame their Estonian and English as equal and interchangeable in terms of language competence. This echoes Bucholtz and Hall’s (2005) notion of positioning, as students construct themselves as legitimate speakers across both languages, resisting hierarchical differentiation.

By contrast, others treat Estonian as a reference point against which English skills are assessed: “Estonian is definitely the strongest [language for me]” (03). Importantly, the interviewees who do not emphasize the equality of Estonian and English in their repertoire still speak confidently about their English skills, framing their English as strong, fluent, and sufficient. Some stress their pragmatic comfort, for example, “I feel very confident in that language” (01), “I can express myself very well” (02), “I can speak it fluently” (10), and “I can manage freely” (14). Some interviewees stress effortlessness as a marker of fluency, for instance, “I don’t often have to think about how to construct a sentence” (11) and “I understand everything, there aren’t really words I don’t get” (12). These suggest that automaticity is important for these students when describing and defining competence.

Some interviewees use meta-evaluative phrases, like “by my estimate” (09), “I dare say” (10), and “I’d say” (06), positioning themselves as competent evaluators of their abilities. These students assert their expertise without referring to validation from external metrics, while others highlight exam results and L1 speakers’ praise as proof of their English proficiency. For example, “I speak English at C2 level/…/I took the Cambridge exam in 12th grade and got C2” (15) and “I was told quite often that I speak very beautifully and nicely, and that was said by Brits too, so by native speakers of English” (06). This suggests that English proficiency, unlike Estonian, might require external validation to count as legitimate. While the interviewees frame themselves as proficient and confident users of English, the fact that they feel compelled to cite proof points to a language ideological regime, understood here as the shared norms and assumptions about language that shape access, legitimacy, and participation, in which English, despite being widely used, remains ideologically marked. For some, at least, nativeness remains a standard of excellence.

The analysis self-perceived language proficiency shows how the interviewees describe their language skills in ways that might reflect broader language ideologies. While Estonian is positioned as an unmarked language, English, even when used fluently and comfortably, carries ideological weight that demands justification. This contrast shows that language competence is not only a matter of skill but also of recognizability and alignment with dominant norms. Some interviewees draw on internal confidence and naturalness to claim legitimacy, while others rely on institutional credentials or native-speaker endorsement. These findings resonate with Bonacina-Pugh (2020), who argue that ideological navigation in multilingual spaces means moving between practiced language policies and top-town explicit norms. The question is whether the interviewees consider their language repertoire to be enough and valuable in the university context, as self-confidence alone does not guarantee smooth navigation (Soruç et al., 2022; Rose et al., 2020).

4.2. Linguistic Advantages and Challenges in Navigating University Life

4.2.1. Perceived Advantages of Estonian and English Proficiency

This sub-section examines how the interviewees position themselves as legitimate and competent language users at the university, and how such self-positioning reflects the underlying language ideological regime. Specifically, it addresses how the interviewees perceive their Estonian and English as resources that enable access to academic practices, facilitate navigation of university life, and carry legitimacy.

The data show that these students confidently position themselves as legitimate users of Estonian and English, navigating academic practices with ease. Although enrolled in Estonian-medium programs, the interviewees report encountering a vast range of EMI practices in their academic lives (Rozenvalde, forthcoming). Estonian and English are described as the two dominant and expected languages of academic life in Tartu: “it’s really just English and Estonian, I haven’t really encountered other languages in university studies” (10) and “really very much both in parallel” (11). These statements reflect a positioning of bilingualism as the norm. The interviewees present their bilingual practices as unremarkable, which signals an internalization of the university’s bilingual functioning. In practice, even though many programs are formally designated as Estonian-medium, students are routinely expected to engage with English through readings, assignments, or interaction with international peers. In this sense, the institution implicitly requires students to function bilingually, and the interviewees’ self-positioning reflects their compatibility with this expectation.

The interviewees express comfort and ease navigating this bilingual context. Their confidence stems, first, from a sense of linguistic sufficiency: “my university-level English and Estonian are good enough for me to manage comfortably” (08), “definitely sufficient for my studies” (10), and “I feel comfortable in both Estonian and English when I speak, and when I write it’s the same” (07). Second, the interviewees portray improving their English as something natural and automatic rather than effortful: “you can learn anything at a very fast pace” (04) and “you just have to learn the specialist vocabulary/…/it comes more fluently for me than for some other people” (09). These framings show the students positioning themselves as language users who do not struggle but adapt. Notably, the desire to improve English does not emerge from perceived inadequacy but from academic ambition. This presents language skills not as a deficit to be filled, but as a flexible and expandable asset. Improvement is expected to happen implicitly through study routines and exposure, not through deliberate language learning.

The interviewees describe how each language affords access to different academic practices. While Estonian remains the primary language of instruction and everyday academic interaction for these students, English serves as a gateway to global knowledge networks. Some interviewees explain choosing English-taught courses, which are electives, based on interest: “right now I have an English-medium course/…/I chose it” (01). English is also deeply embedded in the interviewees’ self-directed learning practices, for example, “if I don’t understand something, then I look for English-language material that would explain it to me” (13) and “if I want to look up something additional, then I still have to search in English/…/most scientific articles are in English, and for some topics you might find something in Estonian too, but well/that’s more of a lucky accident than a rule (laughs)/…/you have to search in English because you just can’t get by otherwise” (14). These statements position English as an indispensable academic tool. The students frame this as obvious and unproblematic, further evidencing the naturalization of English as a default language of academic authority and relevance in some contexts. In comparison, academic information in Estonian is sometimes described as outdated, limited in content, and lacking alternatives; some stress that certain academic knowledge is inaccessible in Estonian, especially at more complex levels.

Crucially, the interviewees do not report struggle, doubt, frustration, or resistance to the university’s language regime; rather, they accept it as the taken-for-granted order of things, even as their accounts reveal and reproduce the hierarchies of value and legitimacy embedded within it. Instead, they might reproduce the logic of linguistic inequality as common sense: “the Western world is, after all, English-speaking, so inevitably all kinds of good materials and good explanations are in English” (10). This framing positions English as inherently superior and treats its dominance as unavoidable. While Estonian is not explicitly devalued, it is implicitly positioned as secondary for some tasks, especially for advanced or up-to-date academic content. Such positioning reveals the extent to which the students have internalized a language ideological regime that equates English with academic legitimacy and innovation, and Estonian with locality and limitation.

4.2.2. Perceived Language-Related Limitations and Mismatches

This sub-section examines instances where the interviewees perceive their language skills as insufficient for academic purposes, or where the legitimacy of their repertoire is questioned.

While the previous sub-sections highlighted the interviewees’ confidence in their academic Estonian and English skills, some express a more constrained sense of expressive ability, especially in writing and in conveying nuanced ideas. Notably, some point to such difficulties in both Estonian and English, indicating broader challenges with academic literacy. For example, the interviewees mention issues with word retrieval—“the only limiting factor is my general expressive ability, just like in Estonian, sometimes I get stuck or search for words in English” (10),—grammatical or spelling mistakes—“even in Estonian I make a lot of spelling mistakes” (12)—, difficulties in expressing nuanced or complex ideas and a wish to be more precise—“I feel that in both languages sometimes I get kind of stuck and would like to express myself more precisely” (09).

Writing emerges as particularly demanding for some. They describe it as effortful and less fluent than speaking, whether in English or Estonian: “I know that writing is my weaker side” (12), and “when it comes to writing schoolwork in English, autocorrect is definitely a good thing, in that regard I might not feel that confident” (01). One student, who has acquired English primarily through oral means, notes: “my main way of acquiring [English] has been auditory/…/I’m good at speaking and I wouldn’t say my writing is exactly bad either, but/…/I have to put more effort into it, it doesn’t come out as fluently, and it’s not as good a text as what I could produce orally” (08). These accounts align with research identifying writing as the most challenging skill in multilingual academic context; in Estonia, this has been found to be the case with local Russian L1 students enrolled in Estonian-medium studies (XX et al.).

Some interviewees show a great deal of language awareness, recognizing how their language input has shaped their output. For example, the interviewees acknowledge that their English exposure is largely informal: “basically all the vocabulary I have comes from films” (16), and “writing a real-life email—that’s unfamiliar to me” (06). These students identify a mismatch between their informal input and the demands of academic or professional genres, including writing formal emails and academic texts.

The interviewees who have lived abroad or received general education in English before enrolling at the university describe temporary shifts in language dominance. On returning to Estonia, they report feeling awkward or less fluent in Estonian: “I felt like I could express myself more freely on certain topics in English than in Estonian” (07), and “I felt a bit clumsy in Estonian” (17). However, they also report regaining confidence relatively quickly: “now I actually feel freer again that it has come back” (07). These cases illustrate how language dominance can fluctuate and that challenges often stem from genre-specific proficiency rather than overall fluency.

Perceived ease or difficulty in language use is sometimes context-dependent. Some feel more at ease in Estonian, citing cognitive efficiency and comfort: “when I communicate in English, I still have to think, it is to some extent an effort” (14). Others feel more capable in English due to the volume of input and academic exposure: “maybe in English my usable vocabulary is even somewhat broader” (01); “I hear and read English way more than Estonian” (10). Some say that academic terminology is more accessible to them in English, while its Estonian equivalents are unfamiliar or hard to find: “academic writing in Estonian is even a bit more difficult because you don’t know the terminology of your field as well in Estonian” (02).

Some students describe challenges in navigating the interplay between the two languages, particularly in contexts where English texts are discussed in Estonian. One student notes: “using Estonian and English together really makes the system very complicated” (01). Another expresses confusion over Estonian terminology: “there’s this sort of question mark or confusion about what exactly was meant by the Estonian term” (08). In some cases, this goes beyond cognitive effort to emotional resistance: “annoying, time-consuming, and unpleasant” (05), or even aesthetic rejection: “ugly” (16). These reactions suggest that students are not only struggling with translation but facing a lack of scaffolding and legitimacy around academic Estonian. They may also be unsure whether they have the authority to create or decide on Estonian terminology.

One interviewee explicitly links their difficulty with Estonian to their language ideology: “my first year at university it was really difficult for me to study in Estonian because I had developed this mindset that everything is so much more interesting in English” (15). This case highlights how internalized beliefs about English as a superior academic language can undermine motivation or engagement in Estonian, even in the absence of linguistic difficulty.

4.3. Positionings in Relation to Peers and Academic Staff

4.3.1. Peer Comparisons

This sub-section focuses on how the interviewees position themselves in relation to their peers and their assumptions about who possesses the adequate language repertoire to succeed at the university.

To begin with, several interviewees position their peers as highly proficient in English: “everyone has very, very good English skills” (03) and “everyone knows English equally well” (13). These perceptions normalize English proficiency and obscure any variation in actual skill levels, rendering individual struggles invisible. Such statements also function as self-positioning devices, aligning the interviewees with or near the perceived norm. At the same time, some interviewees express admiration when encountering peers with particularly advanced or native-like English: “when I hear them (=classmates) answering in English in a way that’s kind of unusual, then I really think, oh wow, how cool, so many interesting words” (01). This signals upward social comparison but also implies that not everyone meets this standard.

Still, not all peers are perceived as capable. Some interviewees note that classmates struggle with academic English, speaking fluency, or general confidence. For example, “they don’t feel comfortable” (07). In such statements, peers might be described as coming from under-resourced schools: “classmates are really struggling, they come from all kinds of schools and well I’m from one of the cool schools in the capital and they are from really small ones where there’s a lack of teachers” (16). Such statements reveal the operation of socio-spatial distinctions and may suggest a sense of linguistic privilege. Sometimes this is expressed through assistance, as in “I’ve helped/…/with translation because when sentences get very long, it becomes harder for people to manage” (15).

Some students explicitly link their language advantage to their background, describing English as a source of academic leverage. For instance, “I feel that I have a really big advantage in this regard because I know [English]/…/my English skills are a huge benefit to me” (15). This becomes visible also in the statements about their ability to support others, their lack of need for translation tools, and their faster comprehension of academic texts. Such statements construct a position of authority or superiority, grounded in linguistic capital, including accent, vocabulary range, and familiarity with genres. Here, English proficiency is explicitly framed as a form of symbolic capital (Bourdieu, 1991), positioning students advantageously within the academic field and reinforcing hierarchies of competence.

Some interviewees link language proficiency to geographic or ethnolinguistic origin: students from smaller towns, underfunded schools, or with Russian L1 backgrounds are presented as disadvantaged. For example, an interviewee describes their Russian L1 classmates’ difficulties with English “it was incredibly difficult for students whose mother tongue is Russian/…/they had this difficulty when we studied in English/…/they had to translate it into Russian in their heads to understand and then they had to translate that into Estonian to talk to the lecturer” (13), while another describes their difficulties with Estonian, “I know that a few of them have had difficulties and when I’ve talked to them I realize that their language level isn’t the same as mine” (11). These are acts of social differentiation, where speakers construct hierarchies of access, sometimes even linking linguistic performance to intelligence, for instance, “it somehow reflects their intelligence as well, if you can’t express yourself well in Estonian/…/do you even understand the subject” (11). This reflects internalized language ideologies around language standards, nativeness, and legitimacy in academic spaces. Such comparisons reflect the discursive construction of identities through evaluative positioning (Bucholtz & Hall, 2005), while also demonstrating how linguistic capital (Bourdieu, 1991) is unevenly distributed and recognized within the university community.

Accent, in particular, emerges as a symbolic marker. Some students express discomfort or judgment towards peers’ and lecturers’ accents, associating certain accents with non-standardness or even incomprehensibility. For example, “when I hear some people speaking English, it sounds like some kind of Finn/…/then it’s like, oh dear, oh dear, oh dear” (05), and “when someone has a bad accent, I interpret it in my head as if they don’t know the language” (13). Such statements reveal native-speakerism, and they function as difference-making mechanisms and a way to produce and reinforce hierarchies where certain pronunciations or speaking styles are constructed as more legitimate.

4.3.2. Positioning in Relation to Academic Staff

This section explores how the interviewees position themselves in relation to their teaching staff when it comes to English proficiency and use at the university.

To begin with, some students position themselves as competent or even superior to their lecturers in English, for example, an interviewee brings out that their academic staffs’ understanding of English texts has been awkward and their translations into Estonian too literal, “I’ve also noticed a few cases where the lecturer comments on an English-language text that sounds like a very direct translation and there are some inconsistencies or awkwardness that come through” (01). Furthermore, an interviewee assesses a lecturer’s academic credibility through the lens of English proficiency, equating poor spoken English with diminished intellectual authority, “it was advertised like it would be a really good lecture and that the person is a good specialist/…/I was so surprised/that they were just reading off a piece of paper/in very bad English, I couldn’t understand anything/and then I thought, wasn’t this supposed to be a good lecture? How is it possible that someone who is supposed to be world-class can’t speak English?” (02). Such statements suggest a reversal of power dynamics in which the student becomes, in their own eyes, the language authority, especially in domains of pronunciation, fluency, and academic register. This reversal can be read as a reallocation of linguistic capital (Bourdieu, 1991), where competence in English is treated as a marker of intellectual authority, reshaping the academic hierarchy. This could be seen as a reflection and implementation of native-speakerist ideologies and language market values, where fluency in global English indexes competence.

Some interviewees explicitly or implicitly associate better English with higher intellect. For example, a student says that a lecturer who speaks English is “a somewhat more intellectual person” (08), while another describes a lecturer’s English as “old-fashioned” (12), suggesting outdatedness. This also reflects broader native-speakerist and ageist ideologies in which not only English competence is prized but English that is up-to-date, fluent, and with acceptable accent are seen as markers of intellect and legitimacy.

The perceived language competence of academic staff might impact practical decisions made by the interviewees. Some students highlight that they avoid foreign supervisors or prefer Estonian-language study materials because they have concerns about intelligibility or clarity. For example, “I don’t want/…/a supervisor for my thesis who’s English-speaking because even though they’re really smart they just can’t speak [well], you can’t understand what they mean, and if you don’t understand a topic yourself, then you need someone to explain it to you, and if you can’t understand them, then it’s the same as, I might as well go look up videos on YouTube” (13). Another student says, “lecturers don’t always necessarily speak English very well, which means that the study materials they’ve prepared in Estonian are definitely better and more accurate than the ones they’ve prepared in English” (14). This indicates that perceived linguistic competence might at times influence students’ access to academic support and content, potentially limiting students’ choices.

By contrast, some interviewees are empathetic towards their academic staff. Firstly, the interviewees sometimes acknowledge generational or experiential differences in English: “younger ones are better, older ones are worse” (14). Secondly, a student explicitly refrains from any criticism, noting that lacking fluency is understandable if someone has been more exposed to Russian than English: “it’s really just a matter of exposure, and they’ve probably had more exposure to Russian than to English, so it’s understandable, I don’t hold it against them” (05). Thirdly, some interviewees separate language skills from expertise: “they (the lecturer giving an English-taught course) might have been a real expert, but all that expertise got lost behind the language barrier” (12). Comments like these show a more nuanced awareness of sociolinguistic constraints and an ability to decouple competence and knowledge from language performance.

Interestingly, one interviewee finds that academic staff’s insecurities in English give students more freedom to speak and write without fear of being judged for accuracy. The student says, “I can’t even imagine how to write something (in English) so that it would be extremely correct and academic/…/it hasn’t really bothered anyone, so I think that actually many lecturers themselves might also be insecure about their English” (12). This hints at interesting power dynamics once again, linguistic insecurity of the ones in power creating a space for students where language norms are relaxed.

5. Conclusions

How do the Estonian L1 students perceive their own Estonian-English language repertoire? The interviewed students frame Estonian as their mother tongue and a marker of legitimacy, tied to authenticity, affective attachment, and effortless competence. English, meanwhile, is presented as equally strong or close to Estonian, sometimes even surpassing it in specific domains such as vocabulary breadth or academic literacy, due to the volume and nature of exposure. While some students emphasize the equality of the two languages and position themselves as confidently bilingual, others highlight differences in register or modality, for instance, identifying challenges in academic writing. Importantly, the accounts show that legitimacy in Estonian is taken for granted, while legitimacy in English often requires external validation, such as exams or recognition from L1 speakers.

What kinds of linguistic advantages and challenges do Estonian L1 students with high self-perceived English skills experience at the University of Tartu? On the one hand, the students’ accounts suggest a strong sense of legitimacy within the university’s language ideological regime, shaped by the compatibility of their language repertoires with the perceived norms. In general, their language skills allow them to navigate academic tasks and opportunities with ease and flexibility. Their feeling of sufficiency is also backed by rather effortless adaptation to any new language-related skills that have to be acquired. Full participation in local and global academic activities and knowledge networks is possible. On the other hand, the data also reveal that the students encounter some language-related challenges during their studies. These are not about general fluency but instead relate to academic literacy, especially writing, either in general or in any of the languages. Participants sometimes describe some difficulties with producing academic texts due to gaps between informal language input and the expectations of academic output. Others note discomfort or hesitation in using Estonian academic terminology due to a lack of exposure or perceived authority to coin it. A student also describes an attitudinal conflict when admitting that their initial difficulties with studying in Estonian had to do with the belief that English was more appropriate for academic purposes.

How do Estonian L1 students with high self-perceived English skills position themselves in relation to their peers’ and teaching staff’s language repertoires? The students’ positions vary. While some frame English proficiency as universal and unproblematic among students, thereby obscuring actual variation, others note differences in fluency, accent, confidence, and genre-specific competence. These evaluations sometimes reflect broader social distinctions: peers from smaller towns, under-resourced schools, or minority backgrounds are described as disadvantaged. Occasionally, the students link language performance with general intelligence. This is particularly highlighted in comparisons with academic staff. Their authority is sometimes questioned based on perceived deficits in English proficiency, particularly when it comes to pronunciation, fluency, or clarity. These evaluations suggest that academic authority is, at least partially, measured through alignment with native-like English norms, revealing the ideological weight of English within the academic community.

What do such accounts suggest about the language ideological regime at the University of Tartu? Firstly, academic knowledge, its complexity and depth, is linked, to some extent, with the language in which it is delivered, English. As discussed above, this association might be projected onto individuals: those who cannot perform English according to implicit standards are sometimes perceived as less competent or less intelligent. In this way, language proficiency becomes a proxy for broader academic value. Secondly, the data reveal the pervasive ideology of native-speakerism. Originally conceptualized within the field of second language teaching, native-speakerism has been defined recently as “an ideology that presents native-speakers as the ultimate models of language use and the ideal teachers of a language, thus invalidating, discriminating, and/or underestimating non-native-speakers” (Llurda & Calvet-Terré, 2024, p. 231). However, as in Kuteeva (2020), the interview data reveal that acceptable language does not always equate standard language, native-speakerism still surfaces in two ways: nativeness functions both as a benchmark and as proof of excellence. The students draw on native-like fluency, either their own or that of others, as a form of validation and use it as a measure in assessing peers and lecturers.

These two ideologies—the privileging of English as the language of academic authority and the idealization of native-like performance—are intertwined and have a significant impact on inclusion and exclusion in higher education. Recognizing their interplay is crucial for developing more equitable language policies. In a similar vein to Han & Dong (2024), who stress the importance of paying attention to how social stratification of international EMI students is reproduced and amplified at universities, this paper contributes with the critical insight that policymakers should also pay attention to the dynamics concerning local students enrolled in programs teaching in local languages imbued with English expectations and practices.