Talk:Ukrainian language

"Ukrainian jargon" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Ukrainian jargon has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2023 May 1 § Ukrainian jargon until a consensus is reached. 1234qwer1234qwer4 00:07, 1 May 2023 (UTC)

About faulty sweeping statement in the ingress & footnote 15

I hereby quote he initial 'synopsis' (such an intro+summary section is called ingress in my native tongue, not sure about english) on the subject of the Russian Communist Party (basically the same as Soviet Russia's executive organ) and its official opinions on the Ukrainian language as a medium and as a part of a culture:

" Russification saw the Ukrainian language banned as a subject from schools and as a language of instruction in the Russian Empire, and continued in various ways in the Soviet Union."

That last claim is the fact (or, to me spontaneously, disinformation) in question. I checked the footnote that supposedly confirmed that the sneaky ruskies also in their soviet form found wicked ways to oppress a local culture without doing it "on paper" I guess the article-maker means. It stands to reason that the footnote reinforce the notion in the wiki article. The text referenced reads as follows;

"From 1804 until the 1917 revolution the Ukrainian language was banned from schools as a subject and a medium for instruction.

This almost total suppression of Ukrainian culture eased somewhat under the Bolsheviks. They permitted a controlled Ukrainization of the party and administrative elite (...)".

The book continues to mention among other things that the relations between "big brother" Moscow and vassal govt in Kiev wasnt as tense as for example between Soviet Russia and Poland. The text also continues to, just two sentences after the above quoted sentence, mention the 1930's great famine, which by most laymen, and many historians, and wiki writers is blamed on Stalin's administration who requisitioned a lion's share of the harvests and left local peasants to starve. This - however!! - is NOT anywhere in any works of fact defined as a general Russian tendency to love to cause mass-death but a well known historical event, perpetrated by a combination of 1. a chaotic logistic and political situation, 2. the recurring unknowns, mistakes, sabotages, and aggressive stress factors all systems who deny capitalism get to experience (if not from within or planted from outside by massive military force) and 3. JV Stalin, the Purger of the executive branch's too sharp minds and of the Party's and the Revolution's veterans, poster boy for the dictator mustache style, arbitrary evil and despotic rule both in the liberal West and Reactionary East, but even Stalin can't be blamed for ever having the Ukrainian culture or language in his crosshairs. The kulaks, yes, as a class even. They were not endemic to Ukraine but existed all over former Imperial Russia and all neighboring nations with farmland a-plenty.

There you have it. I wouldnt have written this oddly long comment if the wiki page simply threw isht at all things red, many articles lack objectivity and use Robert Conquest as basically their only source when it comes to the nitty gritty, the real headlining "crimes", Conquest; ultraconservative, bordering on fascist and at any rate an avid apartheid fan and right wing junta supporter (specifically of Ian Smith's Rhodesia), warfare romantic and most importantly a continous distributor of known Gestapo falsifications. But he IS at the same time such a big established name I gotta take that standing. The rules of the game. BUT: making such a sweeping propagandistic claim - that Russia in itself, in all forms, Tsarist, Socialist, Authoritarian, Anarcho-Capitalist, third world-poor and defenseless, lacking real administration except puppet functionaries who sign off priceless amounts of property, land and resources for cheap to transnational big money players ("free" Russia in the 90's), - want to destroy Ukrainian culture and in spite of its different forms and real pressing problems and threats to its own well being, finds sneaky ways to do it even when it cant be seen and add a footnote to the claim WHICH DOESNT SUPPORT THE CLAIM AT ALL - that grinds my gears something fierce (sry for the rhyme and the worn phrase).

I won't edit the ingress text today. All articles and keywords even remotely connected to Ukraine, Russia, the 2014 events, Russias invasion or more supercontroversial: Nato's expansion or the Zelenskyj regime's blut und boden rhetorics or worst of all: Vladimir Putin himself or actually any stupid little thing that can be perceived as having anythinng to do with it will blow up a storm. Wikipedia is usually good with balance but when it comes to views opposed to the current politicial paradigm Ive given up. But if ppl are gonna lie, its degrading to the entire academic tradition to use a reference that says almost the opposite of your claim. IHSjohansson (talk) 12:24, 12 May 2023 (UTC)

I'm going to ignore the assumptions of bad faith and outright genocide denial in this comment, and just address the substance of the discussion, which is the claim that:

[Russification] continued in various ways in the Soviet Union

You are indeed right to point out that the source cited does not address this issue comprehensively, although in my view it is probably sufficient. Either way, this is an entirely fair and helpful claim to make.

Again, I am going to focus on language only in an attempt to keep this discussion on-track: an exhaustive overview of Russification policies in Soviet Ukraine is beyond the scope of this talk page, but I am happy to provide a couple of examples of ways in which the Ukrainian language suffered during that period.

• Publication in Ukrainian was a hot topic throughout Soviet history, but there can be no doubt that the publication of newspapers and other periodicals in Ukrainian was severely limited during the 1930s. See Martin, Terry. 2001. The Affirmative Action Empire: Nations and Nationalism in the Soviet Union, 1923-1939, pp. 108, 369.
• Monolingual Ukrainian education was withdrawn, while monolingual Russian eduation remained an option in Ukraine. See Weinstein, Harold. 1941. 'Language and Education in the Soviet Ukraine', The Slavonic Year Book, 1, 124-148.
• Ukrainian was not used as a language in the workplace in most of Ukraine's cities. See Martin, Terry. 2001. The Affirmative Action Empire: Nations and Nationalism in the Soviet Union, 1923-1939, p. 122.
• Literature was rarely translated from/into Ukrainian, apart from where the other language involved was Russian. Foreign literature was experienced "through" the lens of Russian, and Russian literature was very rarely translated into Ukrainain (some authors in fact objected to this practice personally). See Kamovnikova, Natalia. 2019. Made Under Pressure: Literary Translation in the Soviet Union, 1960-1991, chapters 1 and 3.

There you go. If you would like to improve the page, I suggest tidying up vague/overly general statements, adding concrete examples, and adding better references. All the best, Akakievich (talk) 17:15, 14 May 2023 (UTC)

Claims about Old East Slavic in lede

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Hello all,

Recently there has been some back-and-forth about the claims made r.e. Ukrainian's relationship to Old East Slavic in the lede of this article. I reverted the most recent edit, because it makes some outlandish claims (proto-Ukrainian began in the 6th century and has vocabulary derived from Sanskrit? really?) but I think the editor makes a very good point that the blanket statement Ukrainian is a descendent of Old East Slavic is perhaps unwarranted. Indeed, we contradict it in the very first section. There are certainly reliable sources which support the Old East Slavic theory [1] and it appears still to be the prevailing hypothesis, but others e.g. Shevelov make credible claims to the contrary.

As per BRD, I am starting a discussion to hopefully establish consensus.

Opinions? I would be inclined to make mention that this is disputed in the article lede, but certainly not erase it completely as it still seems to be the most commonly cited view in scholarship on the topic.

Inviting @Liliylo: to weigh in. Akakievich (talk) 13:35, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

So you show that this theory about the existence of a single Old Russian language belongs to Russians, and do not delete the edits. Ukrainian science believes otherwise and we have evidence. Show that there are two positions, but you only approve of one sided story! The fact is that you are promoting Russian history and Russian theories to the West, bypassing the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences. I will publicize your actions! Liliylo (talk) 15:03, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

The Ukrainian language is a descendant of the Old Ukrainian language. The Old Russian language itself was called the Old Ukrainian language, but this term should be avoided, because there may be a change of concepts due to a different interpretation of the term Old Russian language by Russians and Ukrainians, since in Russian the sound of Russian (русский язык) and Russian (русский язык) is the same, but in Ukrainian there is a difference руська мова (Ukrainian language) and російська мова (Russian language). Liliylo (talk) 15:31, 14 June 2023 (UTC)

https://archive.org/details/st-sophia-of-kyiv

I have attached a link to Ukrainian doctor of historical sciences. The only evidence is graffiti on the walls of the Cathedrals of Kyiv and Chernihiv. Listen to this scientist if you want to understand why our scientists do not support the theory of a Common Slavic language. Shevelyov was the one who claimed that Kyiv spoke the old Ukrainian language. What is the Old Ukrainian language - it is a complex of dialects of Northern Rus'. In Novgorod, there were graffiti in the Old Belarusian language on the walls of the temple. Regarding the Rostov-Suzdal land. Of course, there were their own dialects. It is possible that the Finno-Ugric languages ​​influenced the formation of Russian, if they do not believe that the Russian language arose from Old Ukrainian, but Shevelyov thought so. Liliylo (talk) 12:59, 15 June 2023 (UTC)

Then where does it descend from? Straight from Proto-Slavic? This would be a POV of a very small minority. Mellk (talk) 13:01, 29 July 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Change the number of native speakers

There are officially 32,6M people with Ukrainian as their first language. It's also state on the Ukrinian language page in other languages. The number on this page is too little to be real and the source links to a non-existent page. Meli.roden (talk) 08:21, 26 June 2023 (UTC)

Little Russian language

The discussion below pertains to the following three statements:

1. Ivan Kotliarevsky, regarded as the pioneer of modern Ukrainian literature, subtitled his Eneida (1798) as a translation into Little Russian language; this subtitle was used until 1842, but changed into Ukrainian language for the next edition in 1862.
2. As late as 1845, the Ukrainian poet and philologist Ivan Vahylevych referred to his language as Little Russian.
3. Pylyp Morachevskyi, the author of the first translation of the New Testament into Ukrainian, called the language Little Russian in his manuscript from 1861; but when first published in 1907, the language of his translation was named both as Little Russian and as Ukrainian.

References

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Crash48 (talk • contribs) 16:35, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

@Crash48: Our articles should primarily be based on secondary sources, see WP:PSTS. The fact that a certain author used a certain name for a language (in this case, the name "Little Russian"), normally becomes relevant only if a secondary source sees this as relevant. The second problem with your edits is that the whole concept of "Little Russia" was used by the imperialist / colonialist government in St.Petersburg with the intention to suppress Ukrainian identity (see e.g. Serhii Plokhy, The Gates of Europe, Andreas Kappeler, Kleine Geschichte der Ukraine, Timothy Snyder's 2022 lectures on Ukrainian history (available on YouTube)). We cannot just mention the name "Little Russia" without discussing the problems of that concept. Rsk6400 (talk) 13:00, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

1. Little Russia and Little Russian identity have their own detailed articles, so that anyone interested in "the whole concept" can get there in one click;
2. This article is about the language (and the history of its name), not about the country (and the history of its name) or the nation (and the history of its name) -- the three names weren't always the same;
3. Until the 1860s, the name Little Russian language was used not only by the imperialist / colonialist government in St.Petersburg, but also by the majority of Ukrainians themselves, as you can plainly see from the primary sources, all of them published in Ukraine, and none in St.Petersburg;
4. WP:PSTS states unambiguously that primary sources may be used to support statements of facts, such as the fact that a certain author used a certain name for a language;
5. That a statement about the history of a language's name "normally becomes relevant only if a secondary source sees this as relevant" is your own fabrication, not backed by WP:PSTS or any other policy.

Crash48 (talk) 17:21, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

1. Informations important for this article should be mentioned in this article.
2. "Little Russian" is obviously derived from "Little Russia".
3. Ukrainians used that name because they were in a colonial situation. The censorship in Russian Ukraine was the same as in St.Petersburg.
4. Of course, but the selection of the facts is the problem.
5. According to WP:DUE, Neutrality requires that mainspace articles and pages fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by reliable sources, in proportion to the prominence of each viewpoint in those sources. I understand this as "secondary, preferably academic" sources.

@Crash48: Another important point is that you are already edit warring. According to WP:BRD, WP:ONUS, and WP:NOCONSENSUS the onus to archieve consensus here for the changes you propose is on you. Rsk6400 (talk) 11:25, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

1. Would the following sentence, copied from Little Russia, be a sufficient introduction to the term for the purposes of the article on the language?
   • In modern times, the concept of "Little Russianness" is described as an "indifferent, and sometimes a negative stance towards Ukrainian national-statehood traditions and aspirations, and often as active support of Russian culture and of Russian imperial policies".
2. Although the terms are obviously related, their usage was not the same;
3. Holovatsky and Vahylevych published their books in Lviv, that's in a different empire altogether; and yet, at that time, they called the language Little Russian, as you can see;
   • In case you need another example: Mykhailo Drahomanov, described as "a prominent Ukrainian nationalist", published in Vienna in 1876 a brochure in Russian, titled "On the question of Little Russian literature", in which he calls the language Little Russian (e.g. p.VIII); [2]
   • See also the book titles at uk:Граматики української мови#Західна Україна --Crash48 (talk) 13:21, 10 September 2023 (UTC)
4. You're more than welcome to try and find any mentions of Ukrainian language pre-dating Shevchenko's in 1854.

Crash48 (talk) 16:35, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

References

I saw a note about the discussion at wikiproject Ukraine. I would suggest to retain the words instead, the language was usually named Ruthenian or Little Russian because if we write that the language was not called Ukrainian before a certain date, the reader would most likely want to know *how* it was called. I don't think that the examples given afterwards contribute to the section and would agree with their removal. Alaexis_¿question? 20:28, 9 September 2023 (UTC)

The statement that the Ukrainian was named "Ruthenian or Little Russian" is supported by the source, but the source says more (e.g. that it was used by the "Russian Empire"), and making that statement in a sentence starting with the year 1187 gives the wrong impression that the names "Ruthenian" and "Little Russian" both go back to the 12th century. Since our source concentrates on the middle of the 19th century, we need a source about the origin of the name. I'm going to search for that. Since Crash48 notified three WikiProjects (Ukraine, Russia (why that ?), and Languages) of this discussion, maybe we should wait some time to see if more people want to join our discussion.

Crash48, regarding your suggestion about "Little Russianness": The fact that Ukrainians used a name that was imposed by the colonial power is not necessarily connected to Little Russianness. Rsk6400 (talk) 10:58, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

but the source says more (e.g. that it was used by the "Russian Empire") -- no it doesn't; and you have abundant evidence of its use by Austro-Hungarian Ukrainians as well, which you consistently choose to disregard.

making that statement in a sentence starting with the year 1187 gives the wrong impression -- do feel free to drop the reference to the year 1187 if you wish; the subsection's topic is the development of the language after the fall of the Kingdom of Ruthenia, anyway.

why that ? -- because at the top of this talk page, all these WikiProjects are listed as being interested in this article.

The fact that Ukrainians used a name... -- I've now added quotes from [3] (not directly related to the name of the language) into Little Russian identity#Russian Empire; please see these quotes, and optionally the whole source article, before you carry on pushing your "imposed by the colonial power" agenda. Crash48 (talk) 11:59, 10 September 2023 (UTC)

If you add comments at the beginning or in the middle of other comments, that's really confusing for anybody wanting to join this discussion. Regarding my "agenda": My agenda in this case is "No original research !", one of our three core content policies. For your use of such expressions, please take a look at the pillars of WP, especially WP:5P4. NOR also means that we (as editors) don't select primary sources arbitrarily, but follow good, preferably academic, secondary sources. That's why the primary sources you refer to are IMHO not relevant. Rsk6400 (talk) 08:53, 11 September 2023 (UTC)

@Rsk6400: do you have any source asserting any kind of negative sentiment, before the 1860s, from the Ukrainians in either of the two empires, towards the name Little Russia(n) as applied to either their region, their people, or their language -- i.e. that "Ukrainians used that name because they were in a colonial situation"? I have shown you a modern source asserting exactly the opposite: that the designation Little Russia(n) was favoured by the Ukrainians at the time, and that it became associated "with the intention to suppress Ukrainian identity" only decades later. Did you dismiss that (non-primary) source in the same way as you dismissed all uses of the Little Russian designation in the Habsburg Empire, far beyond the reach of the Russian censors?

"The selection of the facts" is of no concern in this case, as 100% of sources from that time call the language Little Russian, even so far from the Imperial Russia as Britannica 1911 (Russian dialects fall into two main divisions — Great (Velikorusskij), including White (Belorusskij) Russian, and Little Russian (Malorusskij). The latter is spoken in a belt reaching from Galicia and the Northern Carpathians (see Ruthenians) through Podolia and Volhynia and the governments of Kiev, Chernigov, Poltava, Kharkov and the southern part of Voronezh to the Don and the Kuban upon which the Dnepr Cossacks were settled. and further that Ruthenians [is] a name applied to those of the Little Russians who are Austrian subjects.) Literally any sources from before the 1860s would do; whereas you seemingly oppose citing any primary sources howsoever selected, so let me reiterate that WP:PSTS explicitly allows the use of primary sources in support of statements of facts.

Now note how the modern https://www.britannica.com/topic/Ukrainian-language starts with mentioning Little Russian as a historic name of the language right in the first sentence, in bold; and it doesn't find it necessary to elaborate on the reasons why that name fell out of use. Your insistence to bowdlerise quotes from Flier&Graziosi, Britannica, etc, so as to exclude the mentions of Little Russian, has nothing to do with NOR, quite the opposite: the statement that "Ukrainians used that name because they were in a colonial situation" is your OR with no factual base.

By way of example, some may find the original name of And Then There Were None disagreeable; but nevertheless, the name features prominently in the article, without an explanation of "the whole concept" that necessitated the change of name. Crash48 (talk) 07:30, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

This discussion has gone on for long enough; I don't see how we can agree on the interpretation of WP:NOR, and we are also in disagreement about what language to use in discussions. Please note that NOR applies to main space, but not to talk pages. Therefore my use of "colonial situation" wouldn't be a violation of NOR even if I had invented it. But I didn't invent it, I got it from Timothy Snyder's lectures (link in the article). You notified three projects of this discussion, but you are of course free to seek other ways of dispute resolution. Rsk6400 (talk) 18:03, 13 September 2023 (UTC)

OK, now requested a WP:3O.

No doubt that Ukrainians were in a "colonial situation", but your claim that it was the reason why they used the Little Russian name isn't supported by any sources, and in particular not by Snyder's lecture linked in the article, which never mentions either "Little Russian" or "colonial situation" at all. Crash48 (talk) 11:36, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

I said "lectures", not "lecture", meaning it's in the series of 23 lectures. If I'd had time to search for the exact location, I'd given it. Rsk6400 (talk) 11:49, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

I haven’t had the time to unravel the discussion and article history yet. But I suspect the article needs more from secondary sources about the colonial terminology and colonial repression of Ukrainian language and national status, not less. Yes, there are academic articles about when and how some terminology was used, but making their point generally depends on statements supported by many paragraphs of background and context.

Giving examples from primary sources and implying some conclusions from them is a very poor way to try make a point in an encyclopedia article. We don’t pointedly drop examples into other language articles about who historically used names like Indian, Eskimo, Negro, or N***** to normalize them, so we shouldn’t do the same with Little Russian, Malo-Russian, Khokhol, Ukrop, or Bandera, either. Little Russian is currently a weapon wielded directly in a genocidal war by its main instigator. Whatever its historical status has been, emphasizing that without context is normalizing it and perpetuating colonial violence. —Michael Z. 16:14, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

The use of the name "Little Russian" is a fact that can be supported by primary sources. However, the interpretation of why the name was used is a matter of interpretation and requires a nuanced understanding of the historical context. Some sources I've looked at suggest that the name was favored by Ukrainians at the time, but that does not exclude that it is important to recognize that the use of the name was imposed by the colonial power and was part of the suppression of Ukrainian identity. The article would benefit from more discussion of the colonial terminology and repression of Ukrainian language and national identity. It isn't appropriate to perpetuate the colonial violence by dropping examples from primary sources without context. MK882 (talk) 16:19, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

@MK882: as mentioned above, the name was used far beyond the reach of the Russian colonial power, e.g. in Britannica; and note how the modern https://www.britannica.com/topic/Ukrainian-language starts with mentioning Little Russian as a historic name of the language right in the first sentence, in bold, but doesn't include the historical context which led to that name falling out of use. Does, in your opinion, Britannica perpetuate the colonial violence by this? Crash48 (talk) 18:55, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

Thank you for bringing that up and asking a rather obsolete question. It is important to note that the use of certain terms in historical texts and modern encyclopedias often reflects the biases of the term and the time period in which it was used. While Britannica's inclusion of "Little Russian" as a historic name of the Ukrainian language may not necessarily perpetuate colonial violence, it is crucial for us as editors on a superior platform, to provide the full context and historical significance behind these terms to avoid perpetuating harmful narratives to our readers. We should strive to recognize the impact of colonialism on language and cultural identity and highlight the efforts of communities to resist this suppression. Does that make sense? MK882 (talk) 19:37, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

That seems to ignore the perpetuation of colonial and racist language generally, and high-profile problems in Ukrainian historiography specifically. Haven’t you noticed we used a Russian spelling for the Ukrainian capital city until recently?

Did you not notice Britannica does not use the name, and prominently marks it as “now considered pejorative” in bold text?

RFE/RL has a very good overview article on Western academia still working on shedding Russian colonial bias today.[4]  —Michael Z. 19:50, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

Did you not notice my reverted edit did not use the name, and included "came to be seen as implying a Little Russian identity" after the first mention, linking to the detailed article on the historical context associated with that term?

WP:NPOV explicitly states that we must align with the published sources. Only after Western academia "sheds Russian colonial bias", may we update the article accordingly. Crash48 (talk) 20:23, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

No I didn’t, because as I said I hadn’t reviewed the mass of material here and was talking about acknowledging principles, and not specific edits. But as you bring it up, I don’t think citing nineteenth-century primary sources and leaving un-cited statements like “the latter came to be seen as implying a Little Russian identity” without any explanation of the concept looks particularly good in this regard.  —Michael Z. 20:36, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

@Mzajac: see my point above: By way of example, some may find the original name of And Then There Were None disagreeable; but nevertheless, the name features prominently in the article, without an explanation of "the whole concept" that necessitated the change of name.

No conclusions are implied, and no point is made; these are simply references for how the language was called, by its speakers, in the 19th century.

Other language articles do mention historically used names right in the lead paragraph, e.g. Bohemian for Czech language, or Lettish for Latvian language; for Samoyedic languages, it remains the primary title, used with an explanation that The term has come to be considered derogatory. This language article is the only one that avoids mentioning the language's former name. Crash48 (talk) 18:28, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

That doesn’t indicate whether you’re getting my point.  —Michael Z. 18:41, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

I don't, because you're arguing against a straw man who is "emphasizing smth. without context" and "implying some conclusions ... to try make a point". Also I'm showing that your statements are factually wrong w.r.t. the (non-)use of nowadays controversial but historically notable terms in other articles. Crash48 (talk) 18:51, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

There are plenty of other endonyms for the historic forms of this language focusing just on the imperialist term is concerning—blindlynx 20:12, 18 September 2023 (UTC)

@Blindlynx: Both of your claims are unsubstantiated: that there were "plenty of other endonyms" in use before the 1860s, and that mentioning that the language was historically called Little Russian is equivalent to "focusing just on the imperialist term". Crash48 (talk) 20:30, 18 September 2023 (UTC)