Don’t Be Embarrassed... T o Speak Ukrainian!
November 9 marks the Day of the Ukrainian Language and Literature. Linguists admit that ours is one of the world’s most developed languages. Courses of Ukrainian language and literature are taught at educational institutions in the US, Canada, France, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia. It is one of the UN’s working languages. Moreover, the International Association of Ukrainian Studies was founded 1989 in Rome.
On the eve of the holiday, The Day requested Larysa LESHCHYNSKA, a Ukrainian language teacher for 25 years, principal of Kyiv’s secondary school No. 154, which opted for Ukrainian as the language of instruction in 1998, to express her opinion on the problem of a more extensive use of Ukrainian in this country.
“What is the most difficult thing for a teacher in switching from Russian to Ukrainian?”
“Mastering the terminology of exact sciences and the fact that many families still use Russian on a daily basis. Unfortunately, a Soviet-time stereotype still prevails: the common perception was that Ukrainian was spoken by uneducated rural residents only. Although our pupils do not share this viewpoint, far from all have enough civil courage to break stereotypes outside the school walls. Interestingly, the streetcar stop near our school was called ‘Russian school’ before 1998. Our school used to draw a lot of people because Russian was the language of instruction. Now the situation has changed radically.”
“What makes you think so?”
“Concrete facts. This year, our eleventh (graduation) class admitted a pupil who came from Mykolayiv and wished to be taught in the Ukrainian language, although he had been learning all subjects in Russian before that. Also taking into account that last year the same class admitted a pupil from the Crimea, who also quickly adapted himself to a new language, we can conclude that the official language’s practice is clearly on the rise. Interestingly enough, the parents of the children who came to us from Russia begin to learn Ukrainian together with their kids and even try to use it at home.”
“How can we speed up the extension of the field where the Ukrainian language is used?”
“We have repeatedly discussed this problem with our schoolchildren. They think those who have achieved success in life should make a contribution. If successful people could display high-quality knowledge of Ukrainian, this would have an effect on others. I once chose what was then considered non-prestigious Ukrainian as my teaching specialty thanks to my instructor Tamara Voyevodska. I saw that an intellectually rich individual could not be the bearer of second-rate things. Some people are embarrassed over their poor command of the language and, hence, try to speak it as little as possible. It is very important to help this kind of people to overcome fear and the feeling of inferiority. This is an effective means of strengthening our official language and our nation as a whole.”