Monday, March 07, 2005, 09:36 GMT
Saying NYET to Russian
Hardly anyone these days has a good word for the language
of the former Soviet Union. Teenagers in Central Asia say
they hate it; thousands have taken to the streets of
Moldova and Belarus to protest it; former Soviet
governments have deleted it from their mandatory-education
programs, and some countries, like Latvia, have passed
discriminatory laws against those who speak it. A Russian
visitor to rural Moldova or Uzbekistan might have a fine
conversation with a person over 35--but a 20-year-old will
greet him with blank stares. "If before more than 90
percent of the people in the Soviet territories spoke
Russian, now less than half do," says Vladimir Neroznyak, a
Moscow linguist who helps advise the Russian government on
language policy. Within the decade, he predicts, that
figure will have fallen to one in 10. What a change. Not
long ago the language rivaled English as a lingua franca of
empire. Then came the revolutions of the early 1990s, when
the former republics began promoting local languages as a
symbol of independence. Anti-Russian "affirmative action"
programs sprang up, rewarding those who spoke the local
tongue with coveted university jobs and government
positions. Meanwhile, Russian-language schools lost funding
or were shut down. Small-scale linguistic scuffles in
Ukraine led to such extremes as a proposed ban on Russian
pop music and the formation of ultranationalist
"Ukrainization teams" to harass sellers of Russian music
and literature. Last April a Russian-language radio station
in Latvia lost its license for violating laws limiting the
Russian "content" of its broadcasts to 25 percent or less.
The results are evident everywhere. The number of schools
that conduct classes solely in Russian has dropped by 71
percent in Turkmenistan, 65 percent in Moldova, 59 per-cent
in Kazakhstan and 47 percent in Uzbekistan. Leaders of many
newly independent states are pleased. "For decades we
couldn't even think in our own language," says Moldovan
parliamentarian Stefan Cekareanu, whose party earlier this
year helped organize demonstrations against a communist-
backed initiative to reintroduce compulsory Russian in
Moldovan schools. "If Russian were to somehow become
official again, other Soviet habits would start to creep
back."
Russian is under assault even within Russia itself. As many
as 10,000 foreign words, such as bucksi, voucher, biznesmen
and bizneslunch, have entered the language within the past
decade--the opposite of what takes place in "A Clockwork
Orange," where Russianisms like moloko and droog invade
English. "Whether we like it or not, half of Russian
business is conducted in English," says Neroznyak, who is
lobbying to introduce language-purity laws as strict as
those of the French.
The Kremlin is on his side. Over the past two years
President Vladimir Putin has more than doubled the amount
of money appropriated for the protection of the language.
Russian "must be preserved as a language of international
discourse," he said soon after being elected, if only so
that the former Soviet states will be "able to compete" in
the world at large. Putin's wife, Ludmilla--a linguist by
education--has become the Kremlin's spokeswoman for the
campaign. Across the former Soviet territory, she can be
found opening Russian-language centers and attending
Russian-language "Olympiads" where students compete in
grammar drills.
Clearly, there are benefits to being able to speak the
tongue of Mother Russia. For one thing, much of the
literature available across the former Soviet Union is
still mostly in Russian--few former republics have had the
finances to publish new translations. Others say Russian
should be kept alive so the countries of the former Soviet
bloc, like those of the European Union, will be able to
communicate with each other, as Putin points out. Last year
Kyrgyzstan broke the mold and granted Russian official
status alongside Kyrgyz. Tajikistan is considering
following suit. Vyacheslav Belayusov, a professor at
Moscow's Linguistic University, explains that the past
decade's "euphoria of independence" is at last beginning to
fade: "People are starting to realize that hiding in their
nationalist corners won't get them anywhere."
Perhaps so, but there's an undeniable generational divide
when it comes to speaking Russian. Visit Karakalpakstan,
the poorest region of Uzbekistan, and you can see. At a
small museum and cultural center at the heart of town, a
group of grandmothers, all products of the Soviet regime
and fluent Russian speakers, pay at least a third of their
monthly pensions to bring their grandchildren to Russian
classes. "I think in Russian. It's in my blood," says one,
Clara Hojametova. But two teenage girls sauntering into the
city's newly modeled Progress language center, not far
away, see the world differently. A little more than a
decade ago they, too, would have been polishing their
Russian and preparing for work somewhere in the far reaches
of the Soviet empire. Now they carry English grammar and
computer manuals. "English is easy, it's interesting and
it's new," says 14-year-old Adele Setjanova. "Russian has
been around for ages." Even those who are less ambitious
feel similarly. As 12-year-old Shalgasbai Shuotkanov puts
it, contemplating a life living where he is now, "We're not
going anywhere, so why bother learning Russian?"
Russia has won some improbable allies in the fight to save
its language. Both NATO and the European Union have pushed
Baltic countries to drop what critics say are
discriminatory laws. Among those countries is Latvia. To
run for political office there, candidates have been
required to speak fluent Latvian--despite the fact that
Russian speakers make up 30 percent of the population. Last
April one Russian-speaking woman from Latvia who was barred
from a parliamentary race won her case before the European
Court for Human Rights. In February, NATO Secretary-General
George Robertson told the Latvian Parliament that its
language laws might affect NATO's decision to invite Latvia
into its ranks. Reason: the issue is a contentious point
with Moscow. "It's not in our interest to admit countries
that don't have good relations within their borders or with
their neighbors," one NATO official explains.
Will the combined forces of Putin, NATO and the EU be
enough to rescue Russian from the mausoleum? Optimists say
the language has withstood assaults before. At the
beginning of the 19th century, upper-class Russians spoke
only French at home, and the Westernizing reforms of Peter
the Great brought an invasion of various European words.
But this time around, Russia has faced a challenge not only
to its language but to its power. In 1904 Joseph
Chamberlain proclaimed: "The day of small nations has long
passed away. The day of empires has come." Unfortunately
for the Russian language, today's motto is: all empires
must crumble.
Hardly anyone these days has a good word for the language
of the former Soviet Union. Teenagers in Central Asia say
they hate it; thousands have taken to the streets of
Moldova and Belarus to protest it; former Soviet
governments have deleted it from their mandatory-education
programs, and some countries, like Latvia, have passed
discriminatory laws against those who speak it. A Russian
visitor to rural Moldova or Uzbekistan might have a fine
conversation with a person over 35--but a 20-year-old will
greet him with blank stares. "If before more than 90
percent of the people in the Soviet territories spoke
Russian, now less than half do," says Vladimir Neroznyak, a
Moscow linguist who helps advise the Russian government on
language policy. Within the decade, he predicts, that
figure will have fallen to one in 10. What a change. Not
long ago the language rivaled English as a lingua franca of
empire. Then came the revolutions of the early 1990s, when
the former republics began promoting local languages as a
symbol of independence. Anti-Russian "affirmative action"
programs sprang up, rewarding those who spoke the local
tongue with coveted university jobs and government
positions. Meanwhile, Russian-language schools lost funding
or were shut down. Small-scale linguistic scuffles in
Ukraine led to such extremes as a proposed ban on Russian
pop music and the formation of ultranationalist
"Ukrainization teams" to harass sellers of Russian music
and literature. Last April a Russian-language radio station
in Latvia lost its license for violating laws limiting the
Russian "content" of its broadcasts to 25 percent or less.
The results are evident everywhere. The number of schools
that conduct classes solely in Russian has dropped by 71
percent in Turkmenistan, 65 percent in Moldova, 59 per-cent
in Kazakhstan and 47 percent in Uzbekistan. Leaders of many
newly independent states are pleased. "For decades we
couldn't even think in our own language," says Moldovan
parliamentarian Stefan Cekareanu, whose party earlier this
year helped organize demonstrations against a communist-
backed initiative to reintroduce compulsory Russian in
Moldovan schools. "If Russian were to somehow become
official again, other Soviet habits would start to creep
back."
Russian is under assault even within Russia itself. As many
as 10,000 foreign words, such as bucksi, voucher, biznesmen
and bizneslunch, have entered the language within the past
decade--the opposite of what takes place in "A Clockwork
Orange," where Russianisms like moloko and droog invade
English. "Whether we like it or not, half of Russian
business is conducted in English," says Neroznyak, who is
lobbying to introduce language-purity laws as strict as
those of the French.
The Kremlin is on his side. Over the past two years
President Vladimir Putin has more than doubled the amount
of money appropriated for the protection of the language.
Russian "must be preserved as a language of international
discourse," he said soon after being elected, if only so
that the former Soviet states will be "able to compete" in
the world at large. Putin's wife, Ludmilla--a linguist by
education--has become the Kremlin's spokeswoman for the
campaign. Across the former Soviet territory, she can be
found opening Russian-language centers and attending
Russian-language "Olympiads" where students compete in
grammar drills.
Clearly, there are benefits to being able to speak the
tongue of Mother Russia. For one thing, much of the
literature available across the former Soviet Union is
still mostly in Russian--few former republics have had the
finances to publish new translations. Others say Russian
should be kept alive so the countries of the former Soviet
bloc, like those of the European Union, will be able to
communicate with each other, as Putin points out. Last year
Kyrgyzstan broke the mold and granted Russian official
status alongside Kyrgyz. Tajikistan is considering
following suit. Vyacheslav Belayusov, a professor at
Moscow's Linguistic University, explains that the past
decade's "euphoria of independence" is at last beginning to
fade: "People are starting to realize that hiding in their
nationalist corners won't get them anywhere."
Perhaps so, but there's an undeniable generational divide
when it comes to speaking Russian. Visit Karakalpakstan,
the poorest region of Uzbekistan, and you can see. At a
small museum and cultural center at the heart of town, a
group of grandmothers, all products of the Soviet regime
and fluent Russian speakers, pay at least a third of their
monthly pensions to bring their grandchildren to Russian
classes. "I think in Russian. It's in my blood," says one,
Clara Hojametova. But two teenage girls sauntering into the
city's newly modeled Progress language center, not far
away, see the world differently. A little more than a
decade ago they, too, would have been polishing their
Russian and preparing for work somewhere in the far reaches
of the Soviet empire. Now they carry English grammar and
computer manuals. "English is easy, it's interesting and
it's new," says 14-year-old Adele Setjanova. "Russian has
been around for ages." Even those who are less ambitious
feel similarly. As 12-year-old Shalgasbai Shuotkanov puts
it, contemplating a life living where he is now, "We're not
going anywhere, so why bother learning Russian?"
Russia has won some improbable allies in the fight to save
its language. Both NATO and the European Union have pushed
Baltic countries to drop what critics say are
discriminatory laws. Among those countries is Latvia. To
run for political office there, candidates have been
required to speak fluent Latvian--despite the fact that
Russian speakers make up 30 percent of the population. Last
April one Russian-speaking woman from Latvia who was barred
from a parliamentary race won her case before the European
Court for Human Rights. In February, NATO Secretary-General
George Robertson told the Latvian Parliament that its
language laws might affect NATO's decision to invite Latvia
into its ranks. Reason: the issue is a contentious point
with Moscow. "It's not in our interest to admit countries
that don't have good relations within their borders or with
their neighbors," one NATO official explains.
Will the combined forces of Putin, NATO and the EU be
enough to rescue Russian from the mausoleum? Optimists say
the language has withstood assaults before. At the
beginning of the 19th century, upper-class Russians spoke
only French at home, and the Westernizing reforms of Peter
the Great brought an invasion of various European words.
But this time around, Russia has faced a challenge not only
to its language but to its power. In 1904 Joseph
Chamberlain proclaimed: "The day of small nations has long
passed away. The day of empires has come." Unfortunately
for the Russian language, today's motto is: all empires
must crumble.