The Russian language crisis

[Daniel Rancour-Laferriere]

24 Nov 06

Dear Colleagues,
I think you will be interested in this item from today's Johnson's 
Russia List.

Regards to the list,
Daniel Rancour-Laferriere

>
> #1
> Russian Language May Lose Global Status Within Next 25 Years
>
> BRYANSK, November 23 (Itar-Tass) - The number of Russian languge 
> bearers will decrease by fifty per cent all over the world by 2025 and 
> the figure will then be approximately the same as in the early 
> twentieth century.
>
> This alarming information on the shrinking domain of Russian on our 
> planet was disclosed on Thursday at the Second Assembly of the 
> Intellectual Russia World Forum, which is under way in Bryansk.
>
> Academician Viktor Sadovnichy, the rector of Moscow Lomonosov State 
> University, noted in this connection that "the number of Russian 
> speakers will decrease by fifty per cent by 2025 compared to the 
> figure before the collapse of the USSR". "If this tendency were to 
> persist, the number of Russian speakers will decrease by one half and 
> Russian will cease to be a global language within the next twenty-five 
> years," he noted.
>
> According to Sadovnichy, Russian is now the fourth most extensively 
> used language in the world after English (500 million bearers and one 
> billion speakers), Chinese (1.3 billions), and Spanish - 335 millions 
> and twenty-five million people learning it.
>
> "Today, Russian is the native language for almost 164 million people," 
> the Academician noted. "They include 130 million citizens of Russia, 
> 26.4 million people in the countries of the former USSR, and almost 
> 7.5 million emigrants in western countries. As many as 114 million 
> people are using it either as a foreign language or as their second 
> tongue," he added.
>
> "According to the latest forecasts, French, Hindi, and Arabic will 
> outstrip Russian within the next ten years, followed up by Portuguese 
> - within the next fifteen years. This means that Russian will forfeit 
> the status of a global language," Sadovnichy stated.
>
> The rector of the country's main institution of higher learning 
> reported that the number of those, who practically know no Russian, 
> was growing in Russia. "We are witnessing more and more frequently 
> cases when Russian schoolchildren, who had studied at some colleague 
> in London for a year or so, ask us to conduct their examinations in 
> the English language," Sadovnichy complained.
>
> The Academician stressed in this connection that "Russian language is 
> the foundation of national culture and humanitarian education in 
> Russia and calls for special concern and protection".
>
> In Sadovnichy's opinion, the country "needs a single intellectual 
> cadastre - a code of conclusions and expert evaluations, allowing to 
> assess the prospect for the Russian society's humanitarian development".
>
> For this purpose, he presumes, it is necessary to include science in 
> the Russian language development programs, to establish a computer 
> system to control the quality of education.
>
> Sadovnichy's concern and ideas were fully shared by his colleague, 
> Rector of St. Petersburg State University Lyudmila Verbitskaya. "The 
> law on the Russian language was adopted two years ago, but we still 
> have no clear-cut methods to implement it," she noted, stressing in 
> this connection the need to "exercise strict control over the 
> application of those norms".
>
> Four hundred representatives from the science and education community 
> and from administrative structures of different levels are taking part 
> in the work of the Assembly's plenary meeting, chaired by President of 
> the Intellectual Russia World Forum and Speaker of the Russian Upper 
> House Sergei Mironov.
>
> ********
>
> #2 

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