Talk:Kharkiv

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Please see the discussion at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Ukrainian subdivisions. Irpen 20:23, Apr 6, 2005 (UTC)

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Summary of older discussions:

• Archive 2004-2009

edits by taivo

he-he, Taivo I know you an american professor, taught in Ukraine in the past and so on and so forth, but please refrain from doing reckless edits of what you believe is right. I think we Ukrainians know better what language is spoken in Kharkiv. Also, for an english spelling name of Kharkiv go look it up in Oxford dictionary( this is a response to your comment - we, AMERICANS, refere to Kharkiv here(ed. in the US) as Kharkov. You can refere to it whatever you like, but note that since spanish is super-widespread in the US, we don't call boston, new-york or any other city in a way it's pronounced in Spanish, let alone add "different name" of american cities in spanish, just because spanish is widely spoken in large such cities as New-york or Boston or any other city. Rkononenko (talk) 07:34, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Yawn. This has been discussed a hundred times with Ukrainian nationalists. It doesn't matter what the Rada wants, common English usage prevails in the English Wikipedia and "Kharkov" is just as common in English as "Kharkiv". Live with it. (Taivo (talk) 11:56, 1 April 2010 (UTC))

We include Kharkov so that readers using older texts know they are at the correct page when they arrive here. The fact that English language sometimes uses Kharkov may be regrettable to some people, but it's a fact we have to accommodate. Likewise, Kiev is still the standard spelling found in English language material, so please do not replace it. Knepflerle (talk) 12:34, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

We don't list the Spanish name for Boston because Spanish is not a major language in Boston. We list the Russian name for Kharkiv because the majority of residents of Kharkiv speak Russian and "Kharkov" is common in English texts--just as common as "Kharkiv". (Taivo (talk) 13:05, 1 April 2010 (UTC))

@Taivo. You can yawn as much as you want, as well as, quoting you "You(ed. user Rkononenko) are being reported for edit warring". Dude, do you really think I can't do edits using proxy server? I'm only changing things that were spelled incorrectly in the Article, and used Russian language as a source, not Ukrainian. I mean WTF, this is Ukraine, not Russia, and things here are spelled in Ukrainian and not in Russian. So I totally think that all of my edits are in lieu with Wikipedia rules and will only benefit the artile. Lastly, stop doing russian-spelling-promoting edits in this artice and go give some more lectures at whatever university you are teaching.Rkononenko (talk) 13:11, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

@Taivo; and concerning your response as to why you don't spell American cities(in particular, you referred to Boston) in Spanish, it's simply pathetic. By the way I live in Cambridge, (which as you know is basically Boston) and when walking in Cambridge/Boston suburbs one mostly hears Spanish(not English). From what I hear from your fellow countrymen, many American cities now have the majority of residents speaking Spanish and not English. So your argument is once again pathetic. and by the way, the majority of kharkiv does not speak Russian, that was probably your impression when you lived in still soviet-oriented-ukraine of 90s, but things have changed there since then.Rkononenko (talk) 13:28, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

An aside, for comparison: 5.9% of Cambridge, MA registered using Spanish at home (verify); 44.3% of Kharkiv Oblast registered as using Russian (verify). Incidentally, I'm always struck by how much Haitian Creole you hear around Boston. Knepflerle (talk) 13:56, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Concerning Knepflerle's side note, the numbers you're giving are 1. from 2001 census (wich means they are outdated, since after the collapse of the USSR and Ukrainian independence considerably more people started to speak Ukrainian) 2. those census numbers still confirm that the majority( 53,8%) are registered as using Ukrainian, which breaks Taivo's claim that most of Kharkiv speaks Russian. A side note from me - I didn't get the thing about Haitian Creole. What did you mean? Rkononenko (talk) 14:15, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

They were the most recent figures I could easily find. I do believe 2001 is somewhat post-USSR to if my memory is correct! I just thought it was interesting to get an idea of the relative size of these minorities - although the numbers will have changed, there is an order-of-magnitude difference between the two, and I would be surprised if this were not still the case.

As for Haitian Creole: the Boston area is the only place I hear this language spoken on the streets, and I found this interesting as I'm quite interested in the language. Knepflerle (talk) 14:26, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

@Knepflerle, unrelated to the dispute at hand. You said you sometimes hear Haitian Creol in Boston area, are you also from Cambridge?Rkononenko (talk) 14:38, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

• "things here are spelled in Ukrainian and not in Russian"; things here (as in at en.wp) are spelled in English. It's why we use Prague and not Praha, Moscow and not Moskva. Vienna comes from the French name for Wien, not the German. We still use it, however, because English speakers understand it and use it.
• "Dude, dou really think I can't do edits using proxy server?"; look, if you do that, your edits will get reverted and the article will be locked. You personally won't have achieved what you want and furthermore nobody else interested in the city will be able edit the article. Please don't go down that route and stop other people from editing the article. Knepflerle (talk) 13:29, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Actually, Rkononenko, I lived in Ukraine from 2007-2008 and my wife is from Dnipropetrovsk, so I understand the linguistic situation in Ukraine very well. Kharkiv, like Dnipro and Donetsk and other eastern cities, is a primarily Russian-speaking city. They know Ukrainian because they are taught in school, many know and use Surzhyk, and some are native Ukrainian speakers. Official signage is in Ukrainian, but Russian signage is quite common for non-official purposes. As far as the English Wikipedia goes, the title of the article is Kharkiv, in Ukrainian, because the the Ukrainian and Russian versions are about equally found in English texts (unlike "Kiev", for example, which is still overwhelmingly the most common English spelling). But within the article, the Russian variant is absolutely relevant because it is still commonly found. (Taivo (talk) 13:43, 1 April 2010 (UTC))

@Knepflerle. Now you don't understand what I'm trying to say. Of course you don't call Moscow or Prague, Maskva or Praha in English. But at the same time proper nouns are not translated( since you are a German, I'll give you an easy example: Sweinesteiger is not called Pigrider in Englsih). My edits included changing names of famous Kharkiv citizens(proper nouns) to their Ukrainian counterparts, as well as eliminating dozens of other minor Russian'isms(also proper nouns ones). With his reverts, Taivo didn't just add alternative Kharkov in the first paragraph, he aslo deleted all of those proper nouns changes.Rkononenko (talk) 13:47, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

If you want to change things in the article to Ukrainian spellings, especially where the wikilink points to an article with a Ukrainian title, I don't object. But you are eliminating the Russian version of the name against consensus. In your zeal to respell, don't eliminate the common Russian forms that English readers will know these things by. (Taivo (talk) 14:00, 1 April 2010 (UTC))

@Taivo I don't see how my edit is against consensus. Please provide proof that there is a consensus that Russian(not Belorussian, Greek or German) spelling should also be included?Rkononenko (talk) 14:21, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

There is a consensus that English spellings be used on the English wikipedia - be they of Russian, Belarusian, Greek, German or Ukrainian origin. If you can demonstrate that the current spellings are less used in English than the spellings you propose, then you can change them. But you have to demonstrate that first. Knepflerle (talk) 14:30, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

But you are contradicting yourself. You're saying that There is a consensus that English spellings be used on the English wikipedia, but at the same time saying that we should add Russian version of spelling Kharkiv to the first paragraph( and not Romanian, Hungarian or any other language also used by minorities in Ukraine) even though Kharkiv is the correct English spelling( as confirmed by Britannica, verify) of the city.Rkononenko (talk) 14:52, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

The problem is you're eliminating them "because they are Russisms"; on English wikipedia you should eliminate them if they are "not Anglicisms". There's a big difference; for historical reasons a lot of Russisms have become Anglicisms. Just because a term referring to Ukraine entered into English through Russian does not mean it is not the correct English term, just as English has French-origin terms for proper nouns in Austria and German-origin terms for proper nouns in the Czech Republic. You need to look at English-language sources and check which spelling is used: sometimes it will be the Russian, sometimes the Ukrainian. I'd suggest making a list of the changes you want to make here; we can have a quick check of the sources and correct the ones which are not Anglicisms. But there is no excuse or need for removing the reference to the spelling Kharkov in the lead; it's mandated by our policy. Knepflerle (talk) 14:04, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Rkononenko, you are of the mistaken impression that there is a "correct" spelling of placenames in English. There are only "common" spellings in English. The Rada cannot dictate what a correct English spelling is. They can only request that the U.S. government use one spelling or another. English spellings are determined solely by English usage. Encyclopedia Britannica is only one place where spellings can be found. It is by no means the only place and it enjoys no official status in the English-speaking world. Read any history of World War II and it will only talk about the Battles of Kharkov. Look at any atlas and it will usually list "Kharkov" right alongside "Kharkiv" as alternate names of the city. When I was going to Rivne, I was finding virtually nothing about it in my atlases and on-line until someone told me to look under "Rovno"--that's where it all was. So for Ukrainian cities, it is important to list the Russian name as an alternate, especially in eastern Ukraine. English speakers use the Russian names all the time. As far as the census is concerned, people in Ukraine don't always know what language they are speaking and recognize both since linguistically they are not really different languages, but dialects of a single language. People switch from Russian to Ukrainian based on convenience and my Russian-speaking wife had no problem living in Ukrainian-speaking Rivne. But even if only half of the people of Kharkiv speak Russian, that still means that the Russian variant of the name in the article is quite appropriate. You must also pay attention to the titles used in the articles that you want to link to. The article for the oblast is Kharkiv Oblast, the articles for the battles are labelled "Kharkov", and the article for the capital city is Kiev. (Taivo (talk) 15:17, 1 April 2010 (UTC))

Taivo, so basically, after reading in your comment the argument that linguistically they(ed. Ukrainian and Russian) are not really different languages, but dialects of a single language I realized that probably you are just some unknown professor in some unknown community college in States, who doesn't know what he is talking about and tries to spread that ignoramus-like knowledge of his throughout Wikipedia. Just to let you know, Ukrainian is a separate Slavic language in Eastern Slavic Languages group (Slavic languages), just like English is a seperate language in a Germanic group (Germanic languages). Saying that linguistically they(ed. Ukrainian and Russian) are not really different languages, but dialects of a single language is equivalent to saying linguistically they(ed. Spanish and Italian, or French and English) are not really different languages, but dialects of a single language.

Concerning your point that you couldn't find Rivne on the internet when you were travelling around Ukraine, the answer is simple: Ukrainian names were not very widespread on the web in the middle 2000's as Russian internet users( who are very much familiar with Ukraine from the USSR times) wrote various things on the web, some of which were related to Ukraine, while Ukrainian internet users were nearly non-existent(considering 46 million population of Ukraine) and that's the only reason for your difficulties. You, Americans, think that if there is not much information on the internet about something( or I should better say if Google doesn't find many matches for it) you automatically think that this something is insignificant/unimportant/nonexistent/misspelled/absent etc. Since Ukrainian internet is basically a baby and is just starting to grow( both in terms of people connected to broadband and people actively doing various things(business, shopping, reading blogs whatever) in it), there is not many things written yet by Ukrainians on the web. But, it'll change soon in the near future, and I hope such useless debates won't possibly occur just a few years from now Rkononenko (talk) 16:46, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

(ec) Actually, it shows that you're not a linguist. The reason these four varieties (including Belorussian and Rusyn) of East Slavic are called "separate languages" is political. They are different, just as British English, Scots, and American English are different, but they are generally mutually intelligible. If you look at linguistic classifications that use the single criterion of mutual intelligibility, the four are always linked into one language (for example, Linguasphere, Voegelin & Voegelin). Like Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian, there are non-linguistic factors that cause people to separate them (spelling, Polish loan words in Ukrainian, Hungarian and Slovak loan words in Rusyn, history, etc.). But considering the ease with which Ukrainians switch from Ukrainian to Surzhyk to Russian and back again, and the fact that I have heard many conversations with one person speaking Russian and the other person speaking Ukrainian, it's clear that only non-linguistic factors treat these as separate languages. But this article is about Kharkiv, not about the linguistic nature of East Slavic. So far you have provided no reason to remove all Russian variants from this article other than you don't like them. (Taivo (talk) 17:05, 1 April 2010 (UTC))

And I never said that Ukraine or Ukrainian was "insignificant". It just illustrates that the Russian variants of Ukrainian names are still very common in English and should not be removed from Wikipedia just because you don't like them. (Taivo (talk) 17:05, 1 April 2010 (UTC))

Wow, what a mouthful. Mister Kononenko, instead of chewing on same old stale arguments, insulting your opponents, making far-fetched (albeit unfounded in fact) conclusions about them, and threatening to engage in a full-scale anonymous IP warfare, why don't you first peruse our extensive discussion archives on the subject. Why, Talk:Kiev/naming alone should keep you entertained for hours, if not days! You could compile all of the arguments presented over the course of several years, tally up the counter-arguments, and then give us a list of things which are still unclear to you or which you believe had never been addressed. That would be a fresh turn of events. I fully concur with Taivo's yawn here—as long as you keep recycling same old arguments, you are not going to be taken seriously. Might as well not waste your time and ours. Best,—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); April 1, 2010; 17:13 (UTC)

@Ezhiki. I laughed so loud when I read your comment, then saw your profile, and lauphed even more - you are a male Russian American. Can't stop lauging, sorry. Ok, it's over now. Oh shit, it's back again, can't stop laughing. Ha-ha-ha This is something new, russian-american. Ha-ha-ha. Rkononenko (talk) 17:57, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

As to two previous comments, what are you talking about, man? I'm not going to start any anonymous IP adress war, what for? Notice, that everybody who wants to include russian-oriented parts into article(or comments favorably to Taivo edits) is in some way connected to Russia: in case of Taivo, it's his wife from Dnipropetrovsk(probably Russian-speaking), then this russian-american Ezhiki, and finally Knepflerle, I guess a German(I lived in Germany for two years, and made of it an unusual conclusion that Germans are super pro-Russia oriented, even call their kids like Lena, Tania). I'm waiting for someone more impartial to contribute to the article/discussion. Rkononenko (talk) 18:11, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Oh yeah, the old "you have a black eye, go fix it and then argue philosophy with me" argument ((c) Strugatskiye)... how could I forget. What a witty rejoinder! How logical a reasoning!</sarcasm>

Anyhoo, are you going to just continue with insulting everyone on this page, or are you going to find a fresh argument not previously discussed for a change? You are very unlikely to attract "someone more impartial" if all you can offer is some moth-eaten misconceptions and a mouthful of insults.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); April 1, 2010; 19:07 (UTC)

(outdent) So, Rkononenko, if all people with the imaginary ties to Russian that you claim we have are excluded from the discussion, then you are also excluded because of your real or imaginary ties to Ukrainian. Fairness all around. (Taivo (talk) 19:32, 1 April 2010 (UTC))

@Taivo. I actually agree with your last comment, and ideally people with interest (including myself) should restrain from contributing to such articles. True, fairness all around. But it should be two-way deal: if I refrain from editing, you also should. Give it a few weeks, lets see what will others( maybe even some impartial seeking-knowledge-expanding dude) contribute to the article.

Also, if you want, for instance, to add Russian way of spelling Kharkiv into the first paragraph(claiming that it would benefit knowledge-seeking English speaking users who can stumble upon a Kharkiv article and be smitten by a novelty that it is not Kharkov as they remember from 1974 textbook on WWII they read in their youth years at Harvard), lets make a vote, like the 1 week voting for admins, and lets see what community decides. Rkononenko (talk) 20:24, 1 April 2010 (UTC)

Before you get too excited about a "vote" (which is not the way Wikipedia operates), check out the last Ukrainian/Russian related survey done at Kiev. The question was should Kiev be moved to "Kyiv"? Here are the results. One vote to move, all the rest to keep it at "Kiev". (Taivo (talk) 20:38, 1 April 2010 (UTC))

And you need to get some perspective, Rkononenko. The "vote" to keep Kiev at Kiev and not move it to "Kyiv" was overwhelming. That was the title of an article at stake. You're asking that we remove the Russian version of the name of a city that carried its Russian name for centuries before the Ukrainian version became official. You're not asking to move the article to another name (it's already at Kharkiv). You're asking to remove one piece of information about the name of a city. That's a ridiculous request and will fail. It's the equivalent of removing the population figure from the city template. It's just part of the body of fact about Kharkiv--it carried a Russian name for centuries and there is still a great deal of English-language literature that carries that Russian name. Take your hatred of Russians elsewhere, it's not appropriate here. If you look at the articles for every other major Ukrainian city, they all carry the Russian name as an English variant. Kharkiv isn't special. (Taivo (talk) 23:25, 1 April 2010 (UTC))

My interest is mainly genealogical. I have people who tell me they were (or documents that tell me) were born in Kharkov, Charkov,... (For example, ship-board manifests, tombstones, passports) I need information for my work that clarifies, 1) what the town is called now in English 2) what the town is called in it's official language. 3) what the town was official called at the time of the birth (death,...), 4) who was ruling it at that time. This information is needed to even be able to guess on where official records (for the time) may now be located, to match other databases, and to determine mundane things, like what languages would the records be, or what languages my relatives might have spoken.

The ruling history and names are available for most other significant places. Even at Kyiv there is information about the use of "Lemberg" when under the Austrian Empire. This is exactly the type of information an encyclopedia should have. It's not intended to be of political nature, and really has no political content, unless information revealing non-disputable facts could be political. Mjchonoles (talk) 11:00, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

You can find information on the language people were speaking if you check the Russian Empire Census from 1897. Although most of the records for this census was destroyed it has survived in certain parts of Ukraine since the local authorities didn't always follow the orders from St Petersburg. The statistics can be found for Kharkov Governorate here [1]. As you can see the majority spoke Ukrainian (Малорусский). If the census records for this region have survived they probably would be located at the archives in Kharkiv [2]. I have myself studied such records from Kiev Governorate and they give detailed information about each household, similar to the American censuses. Närking (talk) 11:33, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, that is helpful. Though I would need to also know to (hire someone to) translate the records, whether I would need Russian or Ukrainian translators or both. Mjchonoles (talk) 23:51, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, a native speaker can be a good idea, even though knowledge in reading cyrillic letters (also handwritten ones) can take you a long way. All those records are written in old Russian. There are also Church records that can give you lots of information. Those can be found either in Kharkiv or Kyiv, but I think the Mormons have microfilmed them also. Närking (talk) 19:53, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

If they have been microfilmed by the LDS church, then they should be available at ancestry.com, I think. (Taivo (talk) 20:00, 4 April 2010 (UTC))

Well, I'm not so sure about that. But the microfilms can be borrowed from any LDS center. Närking (talk) 20:34, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I will probably be going to the local LDS center, and I suspect I'll be forwarding it to a Russian speaker. Though of course, Russian (and perhaps Ukrainian) has changed significantly in vocabulary, and somewhat in character set since that time. Thanks Mjchonoles (talk) 00:07, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Don't worry, Mjchonoles. "Kharkov" will remain the first sentence of this article because 1) Rkononenko has no support for removing it and consensus rules in Wikipedia, and 2) Wikipedia policy is to include all important alternate names in the lead sentence of an article. (Taivo (talk) 11:24, 2 April 2010 (UTC))

Taivo draws a rather strange conclusion from Mjchonoles's comment. How I see it, the Kharkov name can and should be included in the article, but only as a historical name used in times of Russian empire ruling over Ukraine. However, this should be a separate paragraph and in no way in the first paragraph. And Kharkov is not, quoting Taivo, an important alternate name of Kharkiv, it is simply a past name used by Russian-language rulers(and obviously their documentation) in Russian empire.Rkononenko (talk) 14:06, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Check out Istanbul, Rkononenko. In the first sentence, both "Byzantium" and "Constantinople" are listed. "Byzantium" hasn't been used for centuries, but there it is in the first sentence. "Constantinople" became "Istanbul" long before Kharkov became Kharkiv, but there it is in the first sentence. (Indeed, as "Kharkov" is Russian and "Kharkiv" is Ukrainian, "Istanbul" is just the Turkish form of Greek "ConSTANtinoPLe".) Petty anti-Russian nationalism has no place in Wikipedia, Rkononenko. Start a blog if you need to express yourself in that vein. (Taivo (talk) 15:05, 2 April 2010 (UTC))

And reading back through the material that you archived, Rkononenko, it's clear why you archived it--there's plenty of evidence there that "Kharkov" is a common English alternate name for Kharkiv. (Taivo (talk) 15:14, 2 April 2010 (UTC))

Yes, Rkononenko, my main argument for including "Kharkov" could be satisfied by placing the name in other than the first sentence. And I could live with that conclusion. However, my general preference appears to match the general approach found on Wikipedia, which is include important names in the header. For example, many Ukrainian towns with previously high proportions of Jewish or Polish speakers, include names of the towns in those languages. Mjchonoles (talk) 23:51, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

As, for example, at Rivne. (Taivo (talk) 00:12, 4 April 2010 (UTC))

1. This is English language Wikipedia, not Galician language. Kharkiv is a transliteration of the word Galicians use for Kharkov. Surely English language Wikipedia should use normal English names for places. The Galicians have a political agenda and wish to impose their names for places on the rest of us. However it is against Wikipedia policy to use Wikipedia for this political purpose. WP:NOTADVOCATE

1. These comments are incredibly inflammatory and indicative of your own anti-western political agenda, no? It's official use, not something so-called Galicians made up and started spreading to Wikipedia. --Львівське (talk) 03:56, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

2. Eastern and Central Ukraine have a different history than Western Ukraine. Whereas Western Ukraine was once part of the Kievan Rus' state, Eastern and Central Ukraine were inhabited by nomads. Large-scale settlement started in the 18th and 19th Centuries. In the cities the largest group of settlers were generally ethnic Russians - this was the case in Kharkov: according to the 1897 census there were about 110,000 Russian speakers, 45,000 Ukrainian speakers, 10,000 Yiddish speakers, and about 9,000 others. Consequently the historical native languages are Russian and to a lesser extent Ukrainian. Some cities like Yekaterinoslav (now called Dnepropetrovsk) had a greater proportion of Jews, so that Ukrainian was the the third most common language (see 1897 census). Other census returns show that there must have been some cities in the Kharkov Governate where Russian-speakers were a minority. And census returns from the Kharkov Governate as a whole show a majority of Ukrainian speakers, which implies that the rural population must have been Ukrainian speaking. The history of the settlement of this part of Ukraine was complicated - indeed more complicated than I had thought. All this should suggest that intollerence of Russian-language names for cities in Eastern and Central Ukraine is inappropriate.
3. In modern Ukraine, the dead hand of the state puts Galician spellings for place names on highways. So it is useful to also have the Galician names for places on Wikipedia.

--Toddy1 (talk) 05:30, 5 April 2010 (UTC) amended --Toddy1 (talk) 21:11, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

I, an ethnic Ukrainian whose origins are from the Poltava region in Eastern Ukraine, and who has a doctorate from the Kharkiv State Academy of Culture find the above statement and its implications offensive. --Bandurist (talk) 03:50, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Please study some Ukrainian history before you make any further comments. Närking (talk) 10:32, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

Yes you are right - I am familiar with the history of Dnepropetrovsk, and had assumed that it was just the same elsewhere. I was wrong. Jews were only the third largest ethnic group in Kharkov. However my errors of detail do not affect my basic premise that the majority of settlers in cities like Kharkov were Russian speaking.--Toddy1 (talk) 21:11, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

You can also start with reading the article about Sloboda Ukraine. I'm not against having the Russian name in the article but your view on Ukrainian history is very corrupted. Närking (talk) 21:35, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

KHARKIV and onley Kharkiv should be used. Not Russian Kharkov. --68.36.49.223 (talk) 01:04, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

Kharkov in Contemporary English

Before you continue to make a fool of yourself, Rkononenko, I'll give you some facts. Below is the evidence that "Kharkov" is still used in English to refer to Kharkiv:

• New York Times, last twelve months: 7 times ("Kharkiv" once)
  
• Washington Post, last twelve months: once ("Kharkiv" once) (both of these refer to the same article, probably in a sentence like "Kharkiv, formerly known as Kharkov" or "Kharkov, now called Kharkiv")
  
• The Guardian, last few years: 28 times, most recent September 2009 ("Kharkiv" 58 times)
  
• Google Books, books published only in 2009 and 2010 in English that contain "Kharkov", but not "Kharkiv": 529 (containing "Kharkiv" but not "Kharkov" 94)
  

So, as you can clearly see, "Kharkov" is still very much alive and well in the English language. It is not, as you say, strictly a historical name from the "Russian empire". It is currently used very often in English. So its place in the first sentence is not only appropriate, but required because of its use in today's English language. You can continue to waste our time with your senseless crusade to rob Kharkiv of its other name or you can find another place in Wikipedia to contribute productively. (Taivo (talk) 14:54, 2 April 2010 (UTC))

It should read: Kharkiv (Ukrainian: Харків (insert IPA); [Харьков, Khar'kov] Error: {{Lang-xx}}: text has italic markup (help)) just like the Lviv article handles it.--Львівське (talk) 06:07, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

No, it should read: Kharkiv or Kharkov just like the Dnipropetrovsk article handles it and as the current text stands. Since Kharkiv is another eastern city like Dnipro, the Russian form is much more widely known and used (unlike the far western city Lviv). (Taivo (talk) 06:17, 4 April 2010 (UTC))

I could understanding making an "or statement" if the two names were fundamentally different yet both in use, like a Burma/Myanmar, but to put 2 names that are fundamentally so similar save for an I or an E is just trivial and redundant.--Львівське (talk) 22:42, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

I also bring up the Ivory Coast example, where official use trumps popular vernacular. --Львівське (talk) 22:44, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

No, it's not "trivial". It's the difference between two spellings, one of which is official in Ukraine and the other of which is more common in the English-speaking world. They are therefore of equal footing as far as Wikipedia is concerned. And, if you actually look at the Ivory Coast example, you'll see that "Ivory Coast" is in bold right there at the top of the article. It's not a good example since the placement is awkward. How much simpler to just write "Kharkiv" or "Kharkov" as is done at Dnipropetrovsk. Simple, easy to read. Anti-Russian sentiment from Ukrainian nationalists is not appropriate in Wikipedia. We need to be more user-friendly, not less just because someone is offended by Russian variants being used in English. (Taivo (talk) 23:24, 4 April 2010 (UTC))

...boy, you sure are an angry individual. It's amazing that you can bring up "anti-russian nationalism" out of nowhere, what's your angle here? It's a shame that "common use" trumps "common sense" in your interpretation of this debate.--Львівське (talk) 23:06, 5 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not angry. There are editors here who insist on mindlessly removing all traces of Russian from any article on Ukraine. I lumped you into that group when you suggested taking the Russian name of a city where nearly half of the population speaks Russian as their first language and which is more widely known in English by its Russian name and placing it in the parenthetical comments. My apologies if you're not anti-Russian, but your comments seemed to lean in that direction. (Taivo (talk) 23:14, 5 April 2010 (UTC))

Common use here is common sense. If a name is X in English, then that is what needs to be referenced in the English Wikipedia, not what the locals call it in a different language. In Ukraine, the most commonly known names in English are the Russian ones. So "common sense" is to use the Russian names for the articles. However, for most names in Ukraine, the city is so rarely referred to that it doesn't really matter one way or the other for the article title (except for Kiev, Odessa, Chernobyl, and Crimea). However, the Russian names are common enough in English to warrant highlighting in the first sentence so that English speakers can find the place they're actually looking for. Common sense is to include the Russian names prominently in the first sentence. (Taivo (talk) 23:20, 5 April 2010 (UTC))

I've seen common use trumped vs. official/local use on the ice hockey project. Example, there's a guy who played for over a decade in the NHL, Sandis Ozolinsh; editors have successfully made it Sandis Ozoliņš now, despite NEVER being spelled that way in ANY English source. Even his team's website, which is from Latvia, has no diacritics on the english version of the website....yet it's been impossible for those against diacritics / for common use to get this overruled (this goes for pretty much every czech, slovak, latvian, swedish, etc. player who's name has diacritics). --Львівське (talk) 01:07, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

Well in this case, Kharkov is a name locals may call it, but popular use in english is an archaism from soviet-era writing. This is just my opinion on the matter, but I feel parenthesis should suffice given that the variant has no official standing and isn't so vastly different that it need be pointed out--Львівське (talk) 01:07, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

"Official standing" in Ukraine is irrelevant in the English Wikipedia. It doesn't matter whether the most common English spelling is an "archaism" or not. Common English usage is the only measurement for use in Wikipedia. If most users of Wikipedia are looking for "Kharkov", then we need to present it to them in bold right in the first sentence so they know they've reached the right place when they arrive at "Kharkiv". It's all about user-friendliness. (Taivo (talk) 05:09, 6 April 2010 (UTC))

So I will assume that you will be happy to place "Kyiv" and "Odesa" unbolded within parentheses as well since they are "not so vastly different that it need be pointed out". (Taivo (talk) 05:11, 6 April 2010 (UTC))

I think I just like parenthesis vs. "or" more than anything, now that I've thought it over. I'm actually leaning more toward the Kharkov side of the argument now as well, lol --Львівське (talk) 01:07, 11 April 2010 (UTC)

And, if you want to insist on only one bolded name, then we should bold "Kiev" at Kiev and leave "Kyiv" as just another of the unbolded variants in parentheses. And isn't the difference between "Odessa" and "Odesa" at Odessa just "trivial" as well? So since the titles of those two articles are "Kiev" and "Odessa", then we can relegate the Ukrainian variants according to your criterion of "triviality" to the unbolded parenthetical comments. After all, "Kiev" and "Kyiv" are pronounced identically to the untrained American ear, as are "Odessa" and "Odesa". (Taivo (talk) 23:42, 4 April 2010 (UTC))

Well, I prefer Odessa, actually. And I preferred to use Kiev as well until recently as I've seen it come more into popular use by Kievan institutions like the sports teams or the Kyiv Post, for example, so I've made the switch.

I personally always use "Kyiv" outside Wikipedia as well. But within Wikipedia, "Kiev" is the most common English spelling and therefore is the required spelling in articles. (And, I agree, "Odesa" just looks funny. The problem is that we have several U.S. cities spelled "Odessa" and that will forever color the American spelling of Ukraine's "Odessa".) (Taivo (talk) 05:09, 6 April 2010 (UTC))

Where is Kharkiv?

On a completely different topic. Can anyone give me an "official" lat/lon for Kharkiv (that is, without referencing the un-supported lat/lon in wikipedia). I found several different locations given and wondered if there was some official location. Mjchonoles (talk) 00:10, 6 April 2010 (UTC)

Historical populations

The references used for the historical population numbers were modified by Rkononenko on 30 March 2010 (diff). Given the fact that he had previously altered the title of an English-language book (at Amazon.com), I think that a review of that edit's appropriateness by someone able to read Russian & Ukrainian would be in order. - Best, Ev (talk) 21:57, 8 April 2010 (UTC)

I have restored the 24 March population references - the book titles were what they were. Making out that the books had different titles is a lie.--Toddy1 (talk) 04:09, 9 April 2010 (UTC)

Census data

It may be misleading to quote census data for the Kharkov region in this article. Historically, the ethic composition of the Kharkov region and the city of Kharkov have been different.--Toddy1 (talk) 04:37, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

Kharkiv or Kharkov

The first sentence should be "Kharkiv or Kharkov..." just like the other cities of Ukraine are listed--Kiev, Dnipropetrovsk, Rivne, Odessa, Uzhhorod, etc. It is plain, simple and clear. It doesn't matter whether someone can read Cyrillic or not, this is the English Wikipedia and both names are found in the English literature. Indeed, the evidence indicates that "Kharkov" is more commonly found in English than Kharkiv. (Taivo (talk) 23:44, 11 April 2010 (UTC))

The way it is currently written is bad English and convoluted. It should mirror good city articles like Quebec City, Turin, Prague, etc where the alt in is brackets, and like the first example where its in common use as well, bolded.

--Львівське (talk) 00:10, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

No, it's not "bad English" and "good city article" is only your opinion. I believe that these Ukrainian articles handle the situation better. But, I am going to pat you on the back for your honesty and consistency in putting "Kyiv" inside parentheses at Kiev. I won't revert there for now and will wait to see if the nationalists go ape about it. But, yes, it is about "centimeters" because the most common name for Kharkiv in English is "Kharkov" and the closer we can put that name to the front of the sentence, the better so that the average English speaker won't be confused for a moment about whether or not s/he has reached the right article. And in all those other city articles you cited, the most common English name is also the title of the article, so that there really isn't any confusion since most English speakers aren't looking for Praha or Torino. Here, the most common English name is not the title of the article, so it's critical to get that most-common name very, very close to the front. (Taivo (talk) 00:23, 12 April 2010 (UTC))

Then get consensus to change the name to Kharkov then if that's your beef, this is about form/style, and yes, saying "Boston or Bastan is a city in the United States" is a awkward. --Львівське (talk) 01:53, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

The article title has been discussed before and that's a different can of worms. No, having "Kharkiv or Kharkov" is not awkward, it's perfectly clear and absolutely informative to someone looking for the name that isn't the article's title (which will be most of the people looking here). (Taivo (talk) 03:26, 12 April 2010 (UTC))

OR works if a city has 2 different names, like say, Derry, but in this case it's the same name, just transliterated from two languages, one of which isn't even official. It's silly as it is right now, and doesn't read proper. And there you go bringing up "the nationalists" again, whats your deal, hate Ukrainians or something?--Львівське (talk) 06:17, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Seems it's time for a cool down period cause people are getting a bit unreasonable. Please don’t get caught up to much in this it's only wikipedia . — Mariah-Yulia • Talk to me! 08:02, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, Mariah-Yulia :) Actually, Lvivske, I'm married to a Ukrainian and have lived and taught there, so I have no beef with Ukrainians at all, quite the opposite. But here on Wikipedia, hyper-nationalism often leads to anti-Russian sentiments. "Nationalism" is usually a bad word when used of Wikipedia editors because it means inserting POV into articles. It certainly doesn't refer to someone who stands when the national anthem is played, and respects all the elements that have gone to build modern Ukraine. And I disagree that it's "silly"--it's quite clear and straightforward. And for English speakers, the variation in spelling can be important to readers. After all, Wikipedia's purpose is to provide users with information quickly and easily. Anything that accomplishes that is to be preferred. (Taivo (talk) 09:13, 12 April 2010 (UTC))

*Joining the "thank you" chorus*. Lvivske (Львівське), take into account that per our policy on article titles and our naming conventions for geographic names the names/forms used in our articles merely mimic the ones commonly used in English-language publications, which in this particular case happen to be both Kharkov and Kharkiv. Only one can be used as title (and in this case, it probably should be "Kharkov", but that is another issue), but the first sentence has to mention both in equal terms, thus allowing for a quick identification of the subject and conveying to the reader that both are commonly used in English. Remember that the English-language Wikipedia is not prescriptive, but merely descriptive of English usage. - Best, Ev (talk) 13:57, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

Note for context: Mariah-Yulia edits the first sentence (09:20, 12 April 2010 UTC). Ev (talk) 13:57, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

I can live with the way that Mariah-Yulia has done the first sentence--with only the Ukrainian Cyrillic form in the parens between "Kharkiv" and "Kharkov". (Taivo (talk) 09:46, 12 April 2010 (UTC))

Me too. - Ev (talk) 13:57, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree; it's clear and comprehensive. Knepflerle (talk) 19:50, 12 April 2010 (UTC)

See Books Ngram Viewer --butko (talk) 20:32, 23 December 2010 (UTC)

Clash

The infobox contains these two contradictory facts:

• Founded: 1654
• City rights: 1552 - 1654

How can the city have city rights earlier then being founded?? --Mity (talk) 19:26, 27 August 2010 (UTC)