More on the _the_ thing

[Stephen Bobick]

  >It seems to me that the language of the speaker has de facto "home court
  >advantage." Are we, by which I mean speakers of English like myself, to
  >scrap Moscow in favor of Moskva (I can see that discussion coming next).
  >And do not Russians bastardize Paris, calling it Parizh? I take no
  >umbrage at the fact that my home state of Illinois is mispronounced by
  >Russians, who pronounce the silent final s, nor at the fact that my home
  >town, Chicago, is mispronounced through transliteration of the "ch"
  >rather than "sh" initial consonant.

None of these examples exhibits the critical motivation for arguing against
the use of "the" in the title of Ukraine.  The "the" connotes membership
in a larger entity.   And to us Ukrainians it is obvious what that entity is.
And that entity threatens us.  Look at Zhirinovsky's agenda, Belarus'
recent move to reunite with Russia, and the recent Duma "ruling" on the
"illegality" of the breakup of the FSU, and you can see why Ukrainians don't
want the English speaking world using a term for their country which relegates
them to the status of a "subregion" of someplace else.  Ukrainians are tired of
being called "Little Russians" and of their language being referred to as
a "peasant dialect" of Russian.  The use of "the" is just one more example
of this attitude, as far as Ukrainians are concerned.

  >It's their language, for God's sake,
  >and however they want to refer to us is peachy with me, as long as they
  >keep Chicago in Illinois and don't put it somewhere in Alaska or Nevada.

  >I agree with the chap from England. Don't tell me how to speak in my own
  >house. It's not polite.

There are plenty of Ukrainian-Americans living in the same house as you.
Your use of an offensive term for their homeland is not polite.

  >And I still offer Ukrainia as a solution (for us
  >English-speakers on whose ears "Ukraine" grates). -- gregg opelka

In light of this thread, I think I'd agree with you here!

-- Stepan

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