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Saturday, July 11, 2020

The language war in Ukraine

This article is by
Syed Ahmed Uzair
Syed Ahmed Uzair
Eastern Europe

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Article Contributor(s)

Syed Ahmed Uzair

Article Title

The language war in Ukraine

Publisher

Global Views 360

Publication Date

July 11, 2020

URL

Vladimir Putin, Matteo Renzi and Petro Poroshenko

Vladimir Putin, Matteo Renzi and Petro Poroshenko  |  Source: Press Service of the President of the Russian Federation  via Wikimedia

The adoption of Ukrainian language by the citizens of Ukraine has emerged as an important aspect of Ukraine’s struggle for a sovereign nation. For centuries, the Ukrainian language has played second fiddle to the dominant Russian, thanks to the mighty influence of the Tsar empire and the Soviet Union. When Ukrainian language was declared as the official language of independent Ukraine in 1991, there was finally a hope that it would gain its rightful place as a National language of Ukraine. However, despite the enforcement of Ukrainian as the official language of the state, Russian continues to be very much prevalent in the country.

While Russian language is dominant in more urban areas, Ukrainian is spoken much more in the rural areas. The ongoing efforts to convince people into believing that the Russian speaking minority are being oppressed in the countryside. The other side of the language divide believes that the Ukrainian language is in far greater need for support from the state so it comes out of the shadow of Russian language.

The Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014 was a hallmark of this complex language war that has been breeding in Ukraine for a long time. Both the Kremlin and Putin justified the annexure of Crimea, citing the need to defend the Russian speaking minority of Ukraine.

The language war has been Russia’s biggest tool in disrupting Ukraine. This was made clear when a United Nations Security Council meeting held on 16th July,2019 regarding Ukraine’s move to make Ukrainian their official language, became a heated argument between Russia and the West. While Russia made clear that they were defending the Russian speaking minority in Ukraine while respecting the official language of the state, the US, backed by its allies like France and Britain employed the meeting to demand an end to the Russian occupation of Crimea.

It was not a surprise at all when the Language Law was passed in 2019, intending to increase the influence of Ukrainian in the society, especially in spheres like media and public services. The language law states that Ukrainian shall be mandatory for all official purposes pertaining to the state as well as international treaties. This law appears to be in line with the broader public opinion. As per a poll conducted by the Democratic Initiatives Foundation and Razumkov Center in December 2019, 69% of Ukrainians were in favor of Ukrainian being the official language of the state, while maintaining the freedom to use Russian in daily life.

Former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko was a supporter of the law that was passed on May 15th, 2019. However, Volodymyr Zelenskiy who was elected Ukraine’s president on May 20, 2019, has described the law as a set of “prohibitions and punishments” citing that it will complicate bureaucratic procedures and increase the number of officials rather than decreasing it.

Ukraine, it seems, is emerging from the perils of the language war and looks to adopt a bilingual approach for dealing with the language challenge. For instance, Russian speaking Ukrainians have been central in Ukraine’s resistance to the Russia backed insurgents in Eastern region of Ukraine . The election of a Jewish Russian-speaker, Volodymyr Zelenskyy as Ukraine’s sixth president in 2019 is seen by many Ukrainians as a positive step for the country’s politics of language.

Despite all the progress, however, the language war continues to be a sensitive issue in Ukraine. A Ukranian social media user on 11th June 2020 posted an English and Ukrainian bilingual McDonalds' menu, which implied that Russian language is removed from the menu. The post became viral soon and was picked up by a pro-Kremlin politician and social media star Anatoliv Shariy, who claimed that the menu reflected on the negative attitude towards the Russian speaking Ukrainians. McDonald's issued a statement clarifying that Russian language option was never present in its menu anywhere in Ukraine, but the damage had been done.

It seems that the saga of using language for political gains will keep on running in Ukrainian as both sides on the partisan divide are progressively entrenching their respective positions.

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February 4, 2021 4:37 PM

How the conservatives and white supremacists responded to “Black Lives Matter” movement

The civil rights movement in America labelled “Black Lives Matter”, which erupted after the murder of George Floyd by a uniformed officer has been going in full swing. The event of Floyd’s death triggered a mass reaction against the state violence in which black people are abused without any accountability on the police’s part. A few of the protests have been demanding the defunding of the police department, that the police force should be dissolved.

Many protests are peaceful protests, but there have been instances in which the protestors use violence to express their sentiment. Such protests have received a lot of backlash; Donald Trump, the president, said that “these THUGS are dishonouring the memory of George Floyd” and that “when the looting starts, the shooting starts”. He also mentioned that he would send the National Guard to “get the job done right”, in context of his perceived lack of leadership in Minneapolis where Floyd was killed, and consequently, where the protests were taking place. The tweet with the slogan “When the looting starts, the shooting starts” has since been censored by twitter, which gave birth to another controversy.

Trump also blames the riots on Antifa, which is a terrorist organisation according to him, the name of which stands as a short form of anti-fascist. The organisation is a group of leftist activists who protest against an expression of what they find xenophobic, racist or sexist and fascist, claiming that such expression would suppress minority voices. There is no defined hierarchy or membership process, though it has been claimed by the group that it is secretive and is organised into autonomous local cells. In some reports, though, it is categorised as a far left militant organisation which believes in direct action rather than peaceful protests.

The police force in Minnesota believes that there are white supremacists attending the protests to agitate the protests and incite chaos. The Brookings Institution characterized the same as accelerationism, in which people incite chaos to destroy social order, so that in a highly polarized society, people would take their side. In the same vein, it has been reported that a white supremacist channel on Telegram incited followers to engage in violence and start a second civil war by shooting into the crowd. Franklin Graham, an evangelical pastor, has said that the idea of dismantling the police departments “has to be one of the most irresponsible ideas” that he’s ever heard. He says that the police are what stand between “us (the citizens) and total anarchy”.

An UK Member of Parliament told one of his constituents that while racism is a cancer, and I am glad the perpetrator is on a murder charge. Nevertheless, looters, arsonists and rioters have it coming.” While a number of celebrities have been showing support for the Black Lives Matter protests, the former Miss Universe Malaysia Samantha Katie James used instagram stories to say that the protesters who are angry over the murder of George Floyd are “foolish humans”, and that the black people chose to be born as colored people in America. She also said that the brutality should be taken as a challenge and that “the whites have won”. When asked to clarify what she meant by saying that the Black community chose to be born as coloured, she said that their soul chose where and how they were born.

The people are responding in many different ways to the news. On a Brietbart report on Samuel L. Jackson expressing his views in support of the protests, there have been comments which say that “Floyd was a criminal and he was high on drugs and that he was not killed by asphyxiation he had a heart condition.”(sic) or “When da White people start rioting? We are still the majority, and it would really stir up the fudge. These a****ts think they are getting away with something, but only because the silent majority has yet to speak… and act.” (sic).

It seems that George Floyd’s unfortunate death has brought out not just the simmering anger of the long black community in open but also unmasked the outright white supremacists as well as their apologists.

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