chapotraphouse

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Russian language is as much a part of Ukraine as Ukranian is. You won't see many in the media calling it Kyiv before Ukraine turned nationalist under Poroshenko (hexbear.net)

submitted 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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https://www.reuters.com/article/world/ukraine-passes-language-law-irritating-president-elect-and-russia-idUSKCN1S110Y/

Literally the whole media switched spelling around this time.

iRaq and iRan are silly but the "Kyiv" stuff is different.

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (2 children)

also its funny cuz nobody gets mad at the germans for saying "die Ukraine". In fact theres a bunch of country names in german that get used with a definite article, like die Slowakei, die Turkei, die Schweiz.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Isn't that just how the language works though? Like, it sounds unnatural to say certain nouns without adding "the" to the front. Spanish does that too, it's why Das Kapital is called El Capital in Spanish but just Capital in English.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Isn't that just how the language works though? Like, it sounds unnatural to say certain nouns without adding "the" to the front

Well the "naturalness" argument feels a bit iffy to me, but in the context of a specific language community, over time, things stick I guess. Like why do germans (I rly should say germanophones since austrians and the swiss do exist) say "der Iran", or "der Jemen"? Who came up with that? Now it probably feels natural to them, but it was never preordained.

Spanish does that too, it's why Das Kapital is called El Capital in Spanish but just Capital in English.

Im sure someone more linguistically minded can give the real explanation but in regards to your Capital example, its a peculiar feature of English in relation to the other western european languages where certain abstract nouns are not used with their articles. Like for example in English you can say "Love wins", but in German you cant say "Liebe gewinnt", you say "Die Liebe gewinnt".

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

Yeah, by "natural" I didn't mean innate or absolute. All languages are made up and for some reason these languages made up the rule that you have to put The before certain words. People can get pretty worked up about language quirks like that. Iirc there was a thread on hexbear about exactly this some time ago (translating das Kapital into Capital in English)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 month ago

die Schweiz

That's a correct sentiment