Differences between Eastern and Western Ukrainian
Alla Nedashkivska
alla.nedashkivska at UALBERTA.CA
Wed Mar 10 16:51:47 UTC 2010
There are also some excellent articles in the following new publication
edited by Larissa M. L. Zaleska Onyshkevych and Maria G. Rewakowicz.
Contemporary Ukraine on the Cultural Map of Europe
http://www.mesharpe.com/mall/resultsa.asp?Title=Contemporary+Ukraine+on+the+
Cultural+Map+of+Europe
Best,
--
Alla Nedashkivska, Associate Professor
Chair, Language Coordinators Committee
Undergraduate Advisor in Slavic
Modern Languages and Cultural Studies
University of Alberta, 200 Arts Building
Edmonton, AB T6G 2E6
TEL (780) 492-6800 FAX 492-9106
Modern Languages and Cultural Studies:
http://www.mlcs.ca
Ukrainian Language and Literature Program:
http://www.arts.ualberta.ca/~ukraina/
Summer Travel Course in L'viv, Ukraine:
http://www.arts.ualberta.ca/~ukraina/study_in_ukraine/ukrainian_through_its_
liv/
On 3/9/10 11:56 PM, "Krafcik, Patricia" <KrafcikP at EVERGREEN.EDU> wrote:
> Grover--
>
> Just to add to Graham's response here:
>
> When you refer to western Ukraine, you are no doubt speaking at least in part
> of the westernmost
> oblast in Ukraine--Zakarpatia (Transcarpathia, or historically, Subcarpathian
> Rus')? If so, then it is
> understandable that you should perceive differences in language, even
> significant differences. This
> region was for centuries part of the Hungarian Kingdom and participated in the
> cultural, political, and
> social life of that body. After World War I, with the demise of the
> Austro-Hungarian Empire, Subcarpathian
> Rus' became a third republic within the new Czechoslovakia. At the end of
> World War II, it was annexed
> to the Soviet Union. Lying at the very center of the European continent, this
> region was a crossroads
> geographically and culturally, the place, for instance, where Eastern and
> Western Christianities
> encountered each other face to face. The Carpatho-Rusyns who resided and
> reside here are part of a
> continuum which stretches into eastern Slovakia (the Presov Region),
> southeastern Poland (the Lemko
> Region), including small pockets in Hungary and Romania.
>
> The Carpatho-Rusyn language spoken in eastern Slovakia was codified in 1995 as
> a distinct East
> Slavic language, and while very close to Ukrainian, it exhibits sufficient
> grammatical peculiarities
> such that Rusyn linguists and most Rusyn speakers feel their language to be
> distinct from standard
> Ukrainian. You would have noticed the same kind of situation with regard to
> language in neighboring
> Subcarpathian Rus' (Transcarpathia).
>
> Some reading that might help elucidate the situation historically and today
> are:
> "Shaping of a National Identity: Subcarpathian Rus' 1848-1948" (Harvard Univ.
> Pr., 1978) by Paul R. Magocsi;
>
> "The Encyclopedia of Rusyn History and Culture" (Univ. of Toronto Pr., 2002;
> rev. and exp. 2005), Paul R. Magocsi and Ivan Pop, eds.;
>
> "Straddling Borders: Literature and Identity in Subcarpathian Rus' (Univ. of
> Toronto Pr., 2003) by Elaine Rusinko;
>
> "The Rusyn Language. A Grammar of the Literary Standard of Slovakia, with
> Reference to Lemko and Subcarpathian Rusyn." Languages
> of the World/Materials Series, Vol. 476. Munich: Lincom, 2009, by Stefan Pugh;
>
> The Carpatho-Rusyn Research Center (1978), now an affiliate of the AAASS,
> publishes a series: Classics of Carpatho-Rusyn
> Scholarship (Columbia University Press: East European Monographs) which
> contains an impressive list of books on the
> Carpatho-Rusyns.
>
> This summer for the very first time a program of Rusyn language, history, and
> culture will be held at the Institute for Rusyn
> Language and Culture at Presov University in Presov, Slovakia--clearly a
> reflection of the growing cultural revival which the Carpatho-Rusyns in
> Slovakia, Ukraine, Poland, Serbia, and Croatia have been experiencing since
> 1989.
>
> Hope this response helps just a bit more in connection with your query about
> language.
>
> Patricia Krafcik
> The Evergreen State College
> Olympia, Washington 98505
> krafcikp at evergreen.edu
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: SEELANGS: Slavic & East European Languages and Literatures list on
> behalf of Graham Wilkins
> Sent: Tue 3/9/2010 7:07 PM
> To: SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu
> Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] Differences between Eastern and Western Ukrainian
>
> Grover,
>
> I don't know of much in the way of academic analysis into the situation, but
> having lived in Ukraine for 2 years, I feel that I have some level of
> knowledge on the subject. It is primarily a geographic tendency.
> Historically, places in the West have been under different spheres of
> influence than in the East. Lvov (or Lviv) has been under Polish rule at
> times, etc.
>
> Ukrainian language is in between Russian and Polish, maybe a little closer
> to Polish (personal opinion on the closeness, could be way off there).
>
> Most of the country, with the exceptions of some beds of Ukrainian or
> Russian nationalism speak a unique blending of the two languages called
> ??????. In my experience it, the range of the blend depended on where you
> were - certain versions were slanted towards more Ukrainian, others to more
> Russian - I very rarely, if ever, heard pure Russian or pure Ukrainian.
>
> As far as politically, it tends to match the situation
> linguistically/geographically. You can look at any electoral map and see
> for yourself. A quick google search gave me this example:
> http://www.shekhovtsov.org/misc/img/Ukrainian_Presidential_elections_2010.jpg
>
> The Western most exception is likely due to Mukachevo, a more traditionally
> Russian-leaning area.
>
> Hope this helped somewhat.
>
> Graham
>
> On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 9:57 PM, Grover Furr <furrg_nj at fastmail.fm> wrote:
>
>> Dear fellow listmembers:
>>
>> Some 20+ years ago I was struggling to read some WW2-era Ukrainian
>> materials, with a dictionary, etc.
>>
>> It seemed to me that I could perceive differences between Eastern and
>> Western Ukrainian. Names of the months, for example.
>>
>> Western Ukrainian tended towards Polish and away from Russian (maybe "away
>> from Russian" was the point?). Eastern Ukrainian seemed more Russian --
>> easier to read, for me (I can read Russian well).
>>
>> Now I wonder what's going on in today's Ukraine, where the Eastern /
>> traditionally Orthodox / closer to Russia and the Western / traditionally
>> Uniate / closer to Poland has become an important cultural and political
>> issue.
>>
>> What resources are there -- books, articles, even specifically linguistic
>> analyses -- that study the differences between Eastern and Western
>> Ukrainian?
>>
>> Sincerely,
>>
>> Grover Furr
>> Montclair SU
>>
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