3 Reasons Why Many Ukrainian Citizens Speak Russian
Russian propaganda has been talking about the so-called “discrimination of the Russian-speaking population” for years. But Russians didn’t like to tell how this population appeared in Ukraine and how their language became so widespread. Let’s try to highlight three historical reasons why many Ukrainian citizens speak Russian.
- Russification in Russian Empire
Ukraine became a part of Muscovite Tsardom (and later the Russian Empire) in 1654 when the Ukrainian Cossack Hetman, Bohdan Khmelnytsky convened the official meeting called Pereiaslavska Rada (Pereiaslav Council) for a ceremonial pledge of allegiance by Cossacks to the Tsar of Russia. At the same time, Cossacks were negotiating an agreement with a Russian delegation that resulted in two official documents: the March Articles (from the Cossack Hetmanate) and the Tsar’s Declaration (from Muscovy).
This alliance was doomed from the very beginning. Ukrainians perceived it as a military union that could be dissolved at any moment. Russians, on the contrary, treated them as the subjects of the Tsar. When Cossacks asked Vasilii Buturlin, the head of the Russian delegation, to swear allegiance as they did he refused to do that, saying that Tsar didn’t have to swear allegiance to his subjects. That accident might cause negotiations to break up but Khmelnytsky was in dire straits: he badly needed military assistance in his war with the Polish King. So when Buturlin promised that “Tsar didn’t change his word” Cossacks treated that as a sort of oath. It turned out to be a big mistake…
Russian authorities did help Ukrainians in their war with the Polish King but this aid cost them freedom. Tsars gradually destroyed Ukrainian autonomy by using Cossacks as cannon fodder in their wars and placing more and more Russian troops in Ukraine. In the second half of the 18th century, Catherine II, the Russian empress, removed both the Hetmanate and Zaporozhian Host. Cossack regiments become units of the Russian army and their leaders were included in the Russian gentry. These changes benefited the Cossack elite as it got full control over the Ukrainian peasants who lived on its lands. That’s why former Cossack leaders didn’t protest against this administrative reform. However, not everybody was welcomed in this club of the Russian elite: Petro Kalnyshevsky, the leader of Zaporozhian Host, was arrested and placed into Solovetsky Monastery in northern Russia where he lived in horrible conditions.
It might seem that the game was over. Ukrainian nobility began to assimilate with Russians and make a career in Russian institutions. But then the new ideas become widespread in Europe. The Enlightenment and French Revolution with their ideas of fraternity, freedom, and liberty changed the concept of the nation. Intellectuals started to associate it not only with nobility and government institutions on some territory but with all the residents of this territory who shared a common language, traditions, etc. This concept influenced Ukrainian intellectuals as well. They started collecting folklore, studying the traditions and history and writing some pieces in vernacular Ukrainian.
Ivan Kotliarevsky was the first poet who did that. He wrote a poem Eneïda, which was a travesty, based on Virgil’s Aeneid. Kotliarevsky portrayed the main characters as Zaporozhian Cossacks so it is no surprise that they spoke in the vernacular. It is unlikely that Kotliarevsky knew about the trend mentioned above but the timing was perfect. The first part of Eneïda was published in 1798 and the poem became immensely popular. Now Ukrainians consider Kotliarevsky as a founder of new Ukrainian literature.
Other writers and poets followed his example: Hryhorii Kvitka-Osnovianenko, Leonid Hlibov, Taras Shevchenko… In the 1850s, Ukrainian writer and scientist Panteleimon Kulish created the first Ukrainian phonetic alphabet that was simpler to learn than the Russian one. And in the early 1860s, Ukrainian intellectuals started to launch primary education in Ukrainian by founding Sunday schools. At the same time, Pylyp Morachevskyi, a retired official from Nizhyn in north Ukraine, finished a translation of the New Testament into Ukrainian. All these events might become the time of revival for Ukrainians but…
In 1863, Pyotr Valuev, Russian minister of interior, issued a decree that forbad many publications in Ukrainian except for fiction books. Also the document, known as Valuev Circular, stated that the separate Ukrainian language had “never existed, does not exist, and shall not exist, and the tongue used by commoners (i.e. Ukrainian) is nothing but Russian corrupted by the influence of Poland.” In 1876, Russian Emperor Alexander II issued another decree, known as Ems Ukaz that banned the use of Ukrainian language in print almost completely. The authorities allowed reprinting old documents and publish fiction books but the publishers had to obtain special permission from main censorship body that was a tough task.
These two decrees made huge damage to the Ukrainian culture. They deprived many Ukrainians of a chance to get even primary education in their native language, to read Ukrainian books and press. And last but not least, these measures cultivated a sense of inferiority in them because they thought that their language was true “nothing but Russian” as official propaganda said. In 1905, these bans were partially lifted. Russian authorities allowed the publication of books and press in Ukrainian but getting an education in Ukrainian remained forbidden until the collapse of the Russian Empire.
Fortunately, Russia captured not all of the Ukrainian lands. At the end of the 18th century, after the partitions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the western part of today’s Ukraine was annexed by Austria. Austrian authorities didn’t ban the usage of the Ukrainian language in education, press, or publishing. This difference gave Ukrainian intellectuals from the Russian Empire the opportunity to publish their works in western Ukraine or move there.
2. Russification in the USSR
The Soviet Union was famous for its hypocrisy. It had democracy in Constitution and prison camps in reality. Slogans said that all citizens are equal regardless of their ethnic background but in reality, some nations were “more equal” than others and experienced discrimination and even mass deportations (Crimean Tatars were the most notorious example). The same was true for Ukrainians.
In 1921, the majority of Ukrainian lands were captured by Russian Bolsheviks who later created the USSR. It was the time when Soviet authorities tried to look like Ukrainian ones: they encouraged Ukrainians to join the Communist Party and allowed them to use the Ukrainian language in various fields— media, publishing, schools, higher education, research institutions, government agencies, etc. In 1928, Mykola Skrypnyk, the People’s Commissar for Education, officially approved the Ukrainian orthography that was compiled by linguists from different Ukrainian territories. But this “honeymoon” didn’t last long.
In the 1930s, Soviet authorities changed their national policy. Many Ukrainian intellectuals were arrested and executed or sent to prison camps. Ukrainian literature and art lost an entire generation that was later called the “Executed Renaissance”. Ukrainian peasants suffered from repression as well. Many of them lost their lands and households and were deported to Siberia. Others were forced to join the collective farms where they had to work as slaves. Great Famine (or Holodomor in Ukrainian) became the culmination of their sufferings. Several million Ukrainians were starved to death because Soviet authorities demanded more and more crops from collective farms. Peasants fled from their villages to the cities. In the 1930s, the Ukrainian cities were still largely Russified so these peasants who were afraid of being detected tried to forget their native language as soon as possible.
The decade passed after a decade but Soviet national policy remained the same. In 1959, Soviet authorities passed a law that allowed parents to choose the language of school education. It was a typical example of Soviet double standards. Colleges, institutes and universities taught their students mostly in Russian. Moreover, learning Russian was obligatory for all students. So it was obvious what language of education parents would choose for their children. Furthermore, it became possible not to learn Ukrainian as a school subject, especially for people that moved from other Soviet republics. The results were horrible. By 1988, there were no Ukrainian schools in Donetsk, Chernihiv, Kharkiv, Luhansk, Odesa, Mykolaiv, and other big cities.
Russification affected not only the educational process but the Ukrainian information space as a whole. Russian books and press burst into Ukraine like an avalanche. Ivan Dziuba, Ukrainian literary critic and dissident, described this process in his famous piece Internationalism or Russification:
Enormous numbers of books, newspapers and magazines are being
imported into Ukraine from the Russian SFSR (their quantity
considerably exceeds the quantity of Ukrainian books, newspapers
and magazines published in the Ukraine), and this alone creates inequality, an unfavourable ratio for the Ukrainian printed word. Any bookstall can give us an idea of this : several dozen or hundreds of Russian books, newspapers and magazines and only somewhere in the corner two or three in Ukrainian and one in Yiddish. But besides that, almost every republican or provincial newspaper in Ukraine is published also in а similar Russian edition. Every republican
or provincial publishing house brings out а considerable percentage of Russian books. Scientific and technical publishing houses in general bring out imcomparably more in Russian than in Ukrainian. The republican radio not only devotes much time to the relaying of broadcasts from Moscow (and as everyone knows) Moscow radio does not broadcast in the national languages of the
Republics), but also broadcasts many Russian programmes of its own. То justify this situation the argument is sometimes put forward that seven million Russians live on the territory of the Ukraine. But this is not the point. First of all, the percentage of Russian publications in Ukraine is many times greater than the percentage of the Russian population; secondly, what does the equal number of
Ukrainians in the Russian SFSR and in Kazakhstan have? At least one Ukrainian newspaper, one Ukrainian school? Even the supply of the press from the Ukraine is highly unsatisfactory.
This policy only encouraged the perception of Ukrainian culture as a secondary and inferior one. So it’s no surprise that many Ukrainians who moved to Kyiv and other cities at that time faced language discrimination. Ivan Dziuba described this as well:
And how many times has anyone in Kiev who has dared to speak Ukrainian in the street, on the tram, or elsewhere, not sensed а glance of mockery, contempt or hatred, or heard muffled or loud abuse directed at him. Here is an ordinary Russian conversation in а cinema near а poster announcing the film Son (Dream) :
‘You should see how the Banderists come in gangs to this movie … ‘
‘And do you known who Banderists are ?’
‘Of course І do. І don’t need any telling. I’d finish those reptiles off like this (an expressive gesture) . . . all of them.’
And here is one mother telling another: ‘Му son hasn’t gone to school because of this Ukrainian language. Не hates the Ukrainian teacher so much. Не calls her “а Banderist”.’ (Satisfied laughter of the two mothers.)
And here а schoolboy in his second year declares: ‘Oh, how І hate that Ukrainian language.’ Не has no convictions as yet, but this much he knows already. And he asks:
‘Mummy, was Bohdan Кhmel’nyts’ky brave ?’
‘How can І put it … ‘
‘Was he а Russian ?’
‘А Ukrainian.’
‘Ukrainian?!’ (The disappointed child pulls а wrу face.)
The child goes to а ‘Ukrainian’ school, in the capital of the Ukraine… And this child is far from being an exception: in his school the majority are of that way of thinking …
Of course, Ukrainians tried to fight against this national policy. The Ivan Dziuba’s book, cited above, was written as a letter to the Soviet authorities. (By the way, its author was born and grew up near Dokuchaevsk in Donetsk region that has been suffering from the Russian invasion since 2014.) Another dissident, Sviatoslav Karavansky from Odesa, went even further. He sent a letter to the Attorney General of Ukrainian SSR, demanding to bring а criminal action against the Minister of Higher and Special Secondary Education of the Ukrainian SSR and punish him for the infringement of the principle of national and racial equality. Karavansky had strong reasons for that. He found the discrimination in Ukrainian higher education. Competitive entrance examinations included Russian language and literature while Ukrainian language and literature appeared only in examinations for the humanities. So Russians or those who graduated from Russian schools had advantage during the admission. The result was predictable. Soviet authorities didn’t punish the minister but arrested Karavansky instead…
As Soviet leadership responded only with repressions Ukrainians sent the information about Russification to the West where they had (and still have) a numerous and influential diaspora. Sometimes they did it by risking their lives. In 1983, journalist Valeriy Marchenko found an interesting document. It was a resolution of the Board of the Ministry of Education of the Ukrainian SSR (where his stepfather worked) “On Measures to Improve the Study of the Russian Language” with the stamp “For Official Use Only”. This document included an increase in the number of schools and classes with in-depth study of the Russian language, and an improvement of forms and methods of teaching Russian in institutions with other languages of teaching, from kindergartens to pedagogical schools. It is still unknown how Valeriy managed to do that but the resolution reached the USA and was published in the Ukrainian diaspora newspaper, Svoboda. Marchenko had severe health issues with his kidneys but that didn’t stop KGB from arresting him. In 1984, he was sentenced to ten years imprisonment and five years of exile. In the prison camp, Valeriy’s health became only worse. International pressure helped to transfer him to the hospital but it was too late. On October 7, 1984, he died.
3. Russian lobby in independent Ukraine
In 1991, the Soviet Union collapsed and Ukraine got independence. In 1996, the Ukrainian parliament adopted the Constitution that proclaimed in Article 10:
The State language of Ukraine shall be the Ukrainian language.
The State shall ensure comprehensive development and functioning of the Ukrainian language in all spheres of social life throughout the entire territory of Ukraine.
Free development, use, and protection of Russian and other languages
of national minorities of Ukraine shall be guaranteed in Ukraine.
The State shall promote the learning of languages of international communication.
The use of languages in Ukraine shall be guaranteed by the Constitution
of Ukraine and shall be determined by law.
As you can see from the text, the Ukrainian authorities tried to find a compromise between giving guarantees to national minorities and reviving the Ukrainian language. There was also a law “On Languages in the Ukrainian SSR” that was passed in 1989 and elaborated on the usage of languages in different fields. But it turned out to be too soft to overcome the impacts of Russification. Moreover, the Russian lobby took advantage of it to occupy the Ukrainian information space.
But it happened a bit later. In the 1990s, Ukrainian culture experienced a kind of new Renaissance. Many new singers and bands started their careers. Some of them failed but others succeeded and became immensely popular. This revival is impossible to imagine without Territoria A — a cultural agency, established in 1994. It helped new singers to communicate with their audience. The agency published an information bulletin about cultural events in the country that was sent to all the Ukrainian mass media; opened the recording studio, organized music festivals, and created the TV show Territoria A — the first Ukrainian hit parade that helped many new singers and bands to reach a wide audience.
In the 2000s, this Renaissance finished. By that time, Russia overcame some of its internal problems and started to think about imperialistic expansion. Russian show business and other industries rushed into the Ukrainian market. Their influence was easy to see everywhere. Russian TV series and songs occupied TV channels and radios. Russian publishers took over the Ukrainian book market. And finally, pro-Russian politicians started to attract new voters, using speculations about “forced Ukrainization”. Their efforts culminated in the early 2010s when they came to power.
I remember that time (the 2000s and early 2010s) very well. My native city was thoroughly Russified and it was a tough task to find Ukrainian books, press, cassettes, or CDs with songs in Ukrainian. Local media were in Russian as well (except for the city council’s newspaper that published a part of its content in Ukrainian). At least 50 percent of lectures at my university were taught in Russian. I still remember lecturers who praised Russian culture and state. Some of them are collaborating with Russians now…
The situation throughout Ukraine was the same. When I wanted to write articles in Ukrainian I found out that it was nearly impossible to do as a paid job: only two media agreed to pay me for that and one of them was closed later. So these cries about “forced Ukrainization” sounded like a hypocrisy to me.
Ukrainians tried to defend their rights in court. Serhii Melnychuk, a human rights activist from Luhansk, has been doing that since 2002. His first litigation was against the executive committee of the Luhansk city council which replied to his request in Russian. “In the first instance, the court dismissed the claim, and in the second instance, on appeal, it recognized the response to me in Russian as unlawful. It was a high-profile case for both Luhansk and Ukraine” Melnychuk said in his interview. Later, he sued the East Ukrainian National University in Luhansk which violated his constitutional rights to education by teaching him in Russian. And succeeded but only partially: judges agreed that Melnychuk’s claims were lawful but nothing changed in the university.
In 2012, a pro-Russian majority in the Ukrainian parliament voted for the new language law “On Foundations of State Language Policy” that allowed regional authorities to claim Russian or other languages as regional ones if they were native for 10 percent of residents or more in that region. It caused protests across Ukraine. People protested even in Russified cities such as Dnipropetrovsk (now Dnipro) and Zaporizhzhia. But Ukrainian president, Viktor Yanukovych, signed the law.
New law recognized the official status of the Ukrainian language but did nothing to protect it. So court battles continued. Ukrainian activists established the initiative I tak poimut (“They will understand anyway”) that aimed to protect the rights of Ukrainian consumers to get information about goods and services in Ukrainian. They communicated with companies who violated the law and asked them follow it. The response was different: some businesses agreed while others just ignored the requests. One of the activists, Sviatoslav Litynskyi, went to court many times, suing different companies — both Ukrainian and foreign businesses (for example, Samsung).
The Russian invasion of Ukraine that started in 2014 changed the attitude of many Ukrainians toward their language and culture. Many of those who had previously spoken Russian started to use Ukrainian daily. In 2022, the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology conducted a survey where it asked the respondents: “How should the language situation in Ukraine develop in the long run?”. 80 percent of participants chose the answer “Ukrainian should be the main language in all spheres of communication” (in comparison with 60 percent in 2017). Sure, it doesn’t mean that all Ukrainian citizens will switch to Ukrainian at once. Russification continued for centuries so it is hard to overcome its consequences at one moment. But this survey’s results give us more hope than before. Moreover, now we have a new language law that protects Ukrainian and makes its knowledge mandatory in many spheres.
To learn more about Ukrainian history, you can read:
3 Books about Ukraine’s Past You Must Read
Independence Day of Ukraine. A Few Words on How It Happened
The War That Never Ends
Also, if you want to learn more about language situation in Ukraine I strongly recommend you watching this movie. It is voiced in Ukrainian but has English subtitles.
