It’s been over 15 years now that the Social and Political Psychology Institute at the Ukrainian Pedagogy Academy has been monitoring and analyzing the Ukrainian youth — their values, social interactions and the factors that influence the formation of their mentality and culture. The specialists have already collected a store of information and come to certain conclusions. In particular, the younger generation clearly shows that the 21st century has become the one of information, which the youth obtain from TV, the Internet and social networks. The quality of this deluge of information, particularly the language, a mixed Russian-Ukrainian dialect, influences those people and the future of our country in general. The media thus bears responsibility for the upbringing of young people. Ph.D. in psychology, professor, head of the mass-psychology laboratory at the Social and Political Psychology Institute Vadym VASIUTYNSKY told to The Day about the prospects for Ukrainian youth depending on their choice of language and the Ukrainian language’s value for the younger generation.
During a previous conversation we discussed the fact that the Ukrainian language will develop in Ukraine no matter what. Do you still agree with this opinion, or has the government’s policy changed your mind?
“I’m a bit pessimistic about the current situation, but I realize that the development of the Ukrainian language isn’t linear, it’s rather wavy. Now the wave has rolled back. This is a certain reaction of the whole society and its Russian-speaking part to the period they considered that they were forced to speak Ukrainian. I think it’s a temporary situation. I wouldn’t like to use the word ‘aggressive,’ but a lot of people have a persistent and hysterical intention to eliminate the Ukrainian language from the social sphere. It’s mainly manifested on the leading TV channels, especially in entertainment programs. I would call it a hysterical glamorization. However, this situation can’t last for long as society gets tired of it as well. I think that the reaction will start in a while as this way of self-expression will gradually bore the majority, and society will rise to the next level. In my opinion, in the upcoming years the Ukrainian language won’t be explicitly promoted like it was under the ‘orange’ government, though that period wasn’t marked by real Ukrainian language popularization either, they talked more than they did.
“For me Ukrainization is a state of mass consciousness, meaning that this process is in progress. There are two tendencies here. The first one is mental and political Ukrainization. If we compare the current situation with the last years of Kuchma’s rule, Russian-speaking people are much less willing to go to the streets under Russian flags (if some of them do, they go with Ukrainian flags). This means that we are drifting apart from Russia in the political sphere. The Ukrainian political nation is emerging, and in this sphere Ukrainization is happening faster. Today Russian-speaking young people living in the eastern regions are more patriotic than the older generation from those regions, which is a positive tendency.
“The second trend concerns the language itself. Here Ukrainization is more problematic. I would highlight two main reasons for that. The first one isn’t essential but obvious: the stable and all-embracing pressure of the ‘Russian world,’ which we traditionally support, consciously or unconsciously. Even if conscious Ukrainian patriots are against the presence of the Russian language, it means that they reflect on it, acknowledge its influence and support the meaning of Russian discourse in our life.
“The second reason is almost disregarded but it’s very significant. Over the last twenty years the generations have changed; the older generation, which spoke Ukrainian more but was less patriotic, has been replaced by a younger generation that is more patriotic but speaks Ukrainian less. According to the statistics, in Ukraine the people communicate in Ukrainian slightly more than in Russian, but Russian dominates among the youth. This means that independent Ukraine is being and will be built mainly by Russian-speaking people. Will they try to Ukrainize Ukraine?
“Some of them will. The more that, according to our information, Russian-speaking people reorienting to the Ukrainian language have the highest level of the civic consciousness, self-consciousness, understanding of their purpose in life and aspirations to self-perfection. Today they are the most active and conscious part of the Ukrainian society, and of the youth in particular. However, such people aren’t numerous. On the other hand, as a rule, they are esteemed in society and are role models. In 10-20 years their behavior will become a model for average people. This may be followed by switching to Ukrainian, with the conscious support of the people. While Ukraine continues to be Russified in linguistic terms, it may turn out that a language Ukrainization may result from the mental Ukrainization that is taking place.
“One more factor steadily gaining weight is the demographic one: the Ukrainian ethnos is dying out, we have bad prospects. This tendency is common for the whole of Europe: the European race is dying out, too. The question is: Will Ukraine speak Ukrainian if every year there are less and less native speakers, and our territory will be populated by representatives of other cultures (not necessarily Russian, as they have the same problem). Everyone will decide how to address this. If we hold the Ukrainian language, culture and mentality sacred, this is an approaching tragedy… However, we also have a positive demographic tendency: in western, Ukrainian-speaking regions the birth rate is higher. It may save us.”
Why do Ukrainian-speaking parents have Russian-speaking children? What is behind this paradox?
“This situation is really weird, though it’s typical for central Ukraine, and Kyiv in particular. Parents speak Ukrainian to their children, the children go to Ukrainian schools, but when they grow up they speak Russian with their peers, they get married and start Russian-speaking families. The Russian language is more attractive for the youth, they consider it more sophisticated, elegant and intellectual… That is why young people, guided by what is modern, interesting, fresh, energetic and active, choose the Russian language, which improves their self-perception and does not make them feel Russified.
“The division between the spheres of Russian and Ukrainian has been blurred of late, but it still exists. The glamor, loved by the youth, is hardly present in Ukrainian. I don’t know whether it’s the government’s fault but we can see that television is totally obsessed with Russian-language glamor. It irritates me, but the young people like it! Instead, the Ukrainian-language sphere remains unattractive. The Ukrainian language sounds artificial and unnatural in popular entertainment programs. For example, Savik Shuster announces something in Ukrainian and then everybody switches to Russian with a sense of relief. It’s even worse than if the programs were fully in Russian, as it strengthens the idea that the Russian language is better than Ukrainian.
“There’s one more question to consider. We have FM-stations and leading television channels that form the youth culture. Why don’t we still have any popular TV-channels or radio stations that would offer the modern youth a Ukrainian-language dose of culture? Of course, such projects need funding and I understand that funding in Ukraine is mainly pro-Russian (despite the well-known thesis that capital doesn’t have nationality). However, we do have pro-Ukrainian capital; there are many educated and wealthy people for whom Ukrainian cultural products are very important. The sphere of the Ukrainian language remains very traditional (folk songs, painted eggs, etc.); we don’t have anything to attract modern youth to the Ukrainian culture.
“Now everything Ukrainian is actively presented in Russian. The younger generation in the east, south and even in Kyiv sees everything Ukrainian in Russian “packaging.” The Ukrainian language is something accidental, secondary, additional and unnecessary. It’s dangerous as the use of the Ukrainian language is imposed. It can be seen in all the spheres, especially in education. It’s declared to be Ukrainian, but very often it’s only a formality. When a class finishes everybody switches to Russian, both Russian-speaking and Ukrainian-speaking people.
“It’s clear that this situation can’t be changed within a month or even 20 years. This is a long period for rethinking, but we could have done more by now. There’s a question: Who has to do something for this and what should they do? The majority of young respondents, when asked ‘Who is responsible for the state of the Ukrainian language in our society?’ answered that the people are. When asked ‘Who is responsible for the use of the Ukrainian language in your environment?’ they answered, ‘I am.’ It means that young people realize that they have to care about the Ukrainian language, but when it comes to their behavior, it differs according to the views they hold. They lack reflection and the possibility to see things from a distance. The love for the Ukrainian language remains in slogans. The same goes for the millions of Russian-speaking people, as most of them aren’t hostile to the Ukrainian language, but don’t do anything to support linguistic Ukrainization.”
What’s your attitude to the theory that the Ukrainian language may disappear, like the Belarusian one, because it isn’t spoken?
“I think that the Ukrainian language needs a lot of time to disappear. We are the witnesses of the revival of European languages that almost died; every year there are more and more people speaking them. Let’s recall the 1970s-1980s, Brezhnev’s times, when the Ukrainian language was hardly used in public. Then it seemed that it was nearly dead, but later it quickly recovered and now it feels much better than 20 or 40 years ago. So, speaking about its disappearance is groundless. On the one hand, there’s the tendency for Russification I mentioned, on the other hand, we gradually realize ourselves as Ukrainians and if we manage to resist the dangerous ideas about the Rusification of everything Ukrainian, I think we’ll manage to preserve the Ukrainian language. Our language’s prospects must be viewed over a long historical period. One year, two or five aren’t enough. We need about twenty more years.
“As for the Belarusian language, its situation is more complicated since it doesn’t have a region similar to our west. However, it doesn’t have to deal with the Crimea or the Donbas, which are large Russian-speaking regions. Their Russification isn’t quantitative but qualitative. The Belarusians don’t see themselves as Belarusians. Still the tendencies of national identification as being Belarusian are reinforced there. There’s an impression that the Belarusian language is being revived, but I’m not a specialist on this matter.”
COMMENTARY
The Day asked the “young MP,” a participant of the Ukrainian Parliament Assistance Program, how we can reasonably resist “glamorization” in the Ukrainian media space.
Kateryna MAKSIUTINA, Krasnoarmiisk, trainee at the secretariat of the deputy Speaker, the Ukrainian Parliament Assistance Program:
“Television often ‘educates’ the younger generation. Yet there’s a question: Who do we educate with this media content? Everything that happens today in the Ukrainian media can be reflected in one sentence: ‘feast during the plague,’ consciously turning the people into an enormous gray mass, unable to think or develop, and ignoring the horrors happening around them.
“Why does this problem exist? A void is usually fill with rubbish. That is why we have to create an alternative meaningful product to solve this problem. Our generation doesn’t see or hear outstanding people. Our minds are getting used to the life of the so-called elite, disregarding those who really deserve attention.
“However, we have to understand that such a difficult question can’t be resolved in one day, it has to be approached in a complex manner, [taking into account] preschool education, schools, universities and media… If the approach is correct, the demand for intellectual media will unavoidably rise. Ukraine needs demanding consumers, and professional and responsible producers.”
