Ukrainian language

Current usage

The Ukrainian language is currently emerging from a long period of decline. Although there are almost fifty million ethnic Ukrainians worldwide, including 37.5 million in Ukraine (77.8% of the total population), only in western Ukraine is the Ukrainian language prevalent. In Kiev, both languages are spoken, a notable shift from the recent past when the city was primarily Russian speaking. The shift is caused, largely, by an influx of migrants from the western regions of Ukraine but also by some Kievans' turning to use the language they speak at home more widely in everyday matters. In northern and central Ukraine, Russian is the language of the urban population, while in rural areas Ukrainian is much more common. This is also true of much of the south and the east. In Crimea, Ukrainian is almost absent.

Related Topics:
Ukrainians - Ukraine - Kiev - Crimea

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Use of the Ukrainian language in Ukraine can be expected to increase, as the rural population (still overwhelmingly Ukrainophone) migrates into the cities and the Ukrainian language enters into wider use in central Ukraine. The literary tradition of Ukrainian is also developing rapidly overcoming the the consequences of the long period when its development was hindered by either direct supressions or simply the lack of the state encouragement policies.

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Several modern dialects of Ukrainian exist:

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• Ukrainian proper (spoken in the central part of the nation, and around Kiev). Traditionally, the variation of language naturally spoken in Cherkasy, Poltava and Kiev area is considered to be the closest to the "standard" Ukrainian.
• "Surzhyk", a mix of Ukrainian and Russian, with varying proportions, spoken in some rural regions of the east, south, and center.
• Galician, in the region of the Carpathian Mountains, several sub-dialects developed in areas under the influence of different languages (Polish, Czech, and Slovak). The linguistic differences are minor, but those of ethnic identity remain serious.
• Rusyn or Ruthenian is spoken by the native population in some regions of western Ukraine, eastern Poland and northern Slovakia as well as some émigré communities (a debate is unresolved whether it should be considered a separate language or a dialect of Ukrainian, with the government of Ukraine promoting the latter view. See Rusyns, Hutsuls, Lemko, Boyko.)

Ukrainian is also spoken by a large émigré population, particularly in Canada (see Ukrainian Canadian), United States and several countries of South America. The founders of this population primarily emigrated from Galicia, which used to be part of Austro-Hungary before World War One, and belonged to Poland between the World Wars. The language spoken by most of them is the Galician dialect of Ukrainian from the first half of the twentieth century. Compared with modern Ukrainian, the vocabulary reflects less influence of Russian, but more influence of Polish?for "store/shop" they might prefer kramnytsia (cf. Polish kramarz, orig. German) to mahazyn (cf. Russ. magazin, orig. French), whereas in Ukraine mahazyn is much more common and kramnytsia somewhat self-conscious.

Related Topics:
Canada - Ukrainian Canadian - United States - South America - Galicia - Austro-Hungary - World War One - Poland

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