Paul
Goble
Staunton, June 11 – The Kremlin isn’t
pleased that the number of Ukrainians who use Russian is declining, but it if
far more concerned with something else: the possibility even likelihood that “Russian
too obviously is ceasing to be the language of the majority,” according to Kyiv
commentator Yekaterina Shchetkina.
That reflects its understanding of
the way it can use the language issue against Ukraine not only now when Moscow’s
actions have alienated many Ukrainians from all things Russian but in the
future after the war is over and Moscow will again be better positioned to use its
“soft power” (dsnews.ua/society/lishniy-alfavit-kak-nizvesti-russkoyazychnyh-do-diaspory-09062017220000).
Moscow’s position
on language and Russians in Ukraine is something many Ukrainians do not fully
understand, but to the extent they do, Shchetkina says, Ukrainians will see why
changing their alphabet from the Cyrillic to the Latin script could ensure
Ukraine will pass “the Lagrange limit” between Russia and Europe and become
fully part of the latter.
Speaking at a recent Livadia
conference, Russia’s education minister “expressed concern not so much about ‘the
threat to the Russian language’ [in Ukraine] as to the sad fate of the Cyrillic
alphabet from which one after another the former republics of the USSR have
departed,” the Kyiv commentator says.or them
The minister’s words reflect a
longer view than many are accustomed to adopting, she continues. “The problem
of the reduction in the popularity of Russia is of course for them unpleasant,
but in principle, it can be reversed. To love or not to love Russian culture,
to read or not read Tolstoy is a political question.”
At present, Russia in Ukraine is “’unpopular,’”
Shchetkina points out. “But tomorrow, possibly, the situation will change.” And
then Moscow will be able to recover its influence in Ukraine through the use of
its numerous cultural channels. “Sometime
the war will end,” and the larger country will seek to restore its dominance
via other means.
Indeed, she says, “the return of
Russian to the broad cultural spaces of the post-Soveit countries is completely
possible: it is a question of time and a change of the political conjuncture.”
But until that happens, she says, “what
is really important now in the language policy of Russia is not to permit ‘the
Russian language population’ to be transformed into ‘a Russian diaspora.’ For
Russia, at least with regards to Ukraine, a diaspora is a not terribly reliable
level of pressure.”
Moscow fully understands this and that is why it spend so
much time talking about “’the Russian language population’” of Ukraine. It “has never considered this population as a
minority, let alone a diaspora.” Instead, the Russian regime does everything it
can to blur the limits between Russian speakers and ethnicity.
“By
defending ‘the Russian language population,’” she says, Moscow pursues a
variety of “hybrid goals,” not least of which is to suggest that Russia is
intervening in Ukraine in support of what it views as “’an oppressed majority,’”
a conception that lends a certain patina of legitimacy to what Moscow is doing.
Consequently,
Shchetkina says, “the problem of the Russian language in Ukraine from the point
of view of Russia’s ruling clique is not the reduction in its use but that
things be arranged so that Russian does not too obviously cease to be the
language of the majority.” Thus, Moscow’s concern is about image rather than
reality.
That
is why Russian officials today are more concerned about maintaining or
restoring the Cyrillic alphabet in the post-Soviet states than they are about the
number of Russian speakers. The latter may go up or down, but the shift to
Latin script marks a final break with a Moscow-centric world.
“From
a political point of view, a shift from Cyrillic to the Latin script is an
excellent move,” Shchetkina says. “It guarantees a rapid and radical break with
Russia’s information space and its culture as a whole.” That is because “’the linguistic commonality’”
of Ukrainian with Polish and Czech “is no less than with Russian.”
“But
[Ukrainians today] read primarily Russian resources and not Polish ones. A
transition to the Latin script would mean that already the next generation,
raised on the Latin script would find it easier to read books, news, and social
networks easier in Polish or even in English than in Russian.”
According
to Shchetkina, “from the point of view of ‘a civilizational project,’ this
shift would mark Ukraine’s escape from the orbit of the Russian empire and its
move into the embrace of the Pax roman, the civilization formed by Latin.”
Obviously,
there are and will be many arguments against such a move – including historical
ones. But there is an overwhelming political one in favor: “we either will take
radical measure [like this] or we will remain forever in ‘a united cultural
space’ secured by ‘linguistic commonality.’”
Indeed,
the Kyiv commentator says, “the alphabet can play here a key role,
significantly more than the presence and number of ‘the Russian-language population.’” Ukrainian and Russian are too similar if they
use the same alphabet to ensure that Ukrainian and thus Ukraine will have an
independent future.
But
if Ukraine shifts to Latin, that future will be ensured, not only because Ukraine
will look westward rather than eastward but also because the Russians who
remain in Ukraine will become a real diaspora rather than “’the oppressed
majority’” Moscow imagines them to be – and that will make better relations
between Ukrainians and Russians there possible as well.
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