Ukraine/The Ukraine

[Paul B. Gallagher]

anne marie devlin wrote:

> While there are of course differences between the case of the 6 counties
> (also a politically loaded phrase) and Ukraine, the common factor is the
> use of 'the' to denote part of something else.  My interest is not,
> however, in the grammatical correctness or not, but in the use and
> perception of the vairables. From a personal perspective, with regards
> my part of the world, I consciously use only one variant and it has a
> negative effect on me when I hear the other.  My data strongly indicate
> that v/na cause similar reactions.  Arguments abound online re: its use.
>   I can also draw your attention to the reaction of Oleksander Spirin on
> this list when he stated that it's Ukraine and it has been independent
> since 1991.
> To paraphrase your slogan, Paul, prepositions and articles don't
> determine who's right!

You're right on that. In cases like this, speakers of a given language 
come to associate certain forms with certain demographic groups, and 
having done so, they associate the characteristics of those demographics 
-- real or imagined -- with the form. If one demographic is thought to 
be "smart" and uses a particular form, that form comes to be a marker of 
intelligence (though of course it won't correlate with standardized IQ 
test results). Grammar and logic are notoriously poor predictors of 
which form will be a marker of intelligence or other nonlinguistic features.

In the case of Ireland, as you know, certain forms are associated with 
Protestants and their allies, and certain forms are associated with 
Catholics and their allies. When I said "six counties," I was trying to 
be as impartial as possible, but I should have known that no matter how 
I expressed myself, anyone from that black-and-white environment would 
have put my speech under the microscope and discovered my true identity 
(I hope you got it right!).

In the case of Ukraine, the nationalists will want everyone -- even 
foreigners like us -- to take their side and declare themselves as 
allies. The real argument isn't the silly one about the use of the 
article per se, but about whether we declare ourselves as "with them" or 
"against them." They could just as easily have picked some other marker, 
which would have been equally meaningless to us but served just as well 
as a declaration of our affinity.

Since we have little stake in their fight, we English speakers will be 
sloppy and inconsistent in our declarations of affiliation. The use or 
omission of the article in English is a poor marker of where we stand, 
and the trend toward omission is a gradual one, not attributable to any 
particular date or event. A generation from now, none of us will use it 
-- not because we will all have taken the nationalist side, but mostly 
because the omission is consistent with the treatment of other place 
names (it's easier not to make an exception). And it will still be a 
poor marker of affiliation among English speakers. There are thousands 
of place names with no articles and no status as independent countries, 
from Appalachia to Bavaria to Siberia. Most English speakers will omit 
it only because they've gotten used to hearing it omitted, just as the 
previous generation used it because they got used to hearing it used, 
and neither has any awareness that they are taking sides. It reminds me 
of someone who accidentally wears the wrong color on a gang turf and is 
mistaken for a member of a rival gang. "Who knew?"

-- 
War doesn't determine who's right, just who's left.
--
Paul B. Gallagher
pbg translations, inc.
"Russian Translations That Read Like Originals"
http://pbg-translations.com

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