Ukraine; was Re: I say Myanmar, you say Burma

[Mark Mandel]

It seems to be not a question of Russian or Ukrainian, then, but of
English. We don't use the definite article with the names of most
countries -- I know this topic (definite articles in country names,
not this one specifically) has been discussed either here or on ANS-L
-- and as a rule we don't use articles with proper nouns that refer to
a single entity. (Never mind ethnonyms like "the Dutch" (collective)
or "the Dane(s)".) So when we say "the Ukraine", we're treating
"Ukraine" like a common noun, and all Ukrainians know what that common
noun means. Eh?

m a m

On Wed, May 7, 2008 at 3:46 PM, Paul Johnston <paul.johnston at wmich.edu> wrote:
> As I recall it, Bulgarian does, though it's suffixed, as in many
>  Balkan languages.
>
>  Yours,
>  Paul Johnston
>  On May 7, 2008, at 3:34 PM, Laurence Horn wrote:
>
>  > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>  > -----------------------
>  > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>  > Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
>  > Subject:      Re: Ukraine; was Re: I say Myanmar, you say Burma
>  > ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>  > ---------
>
>
> >
>  > At 1:51 PM -0500 5/7/08, Dan Goodman wrote:
>  >> Cohen, Gerald Leonard wrote:
>  >>
>  >>>
>  >>> Yes. In Russian, "kraj" (pronounced like English "cry") means
>  >>> "edge, border, and "u" means "at." So: "at the border."
>  >>> But I don't see the difference between thinking of the country as
>  >>> "The
>  >>> Border Land" ("The Ukraine") vs. simply "Border
>  >>> Land" ("Ukraine"). Why
>  >>>  is "The" so important here?
>  >>
>  >> What seems likely to be:  They overestimate how important it is in
>  >> English.  If I recall correctly, at least some Slavic languages don't
>  >> have direct equivalents of "the."
>  >
>  > Are there any that do?

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