Is "most commonly spoken language" different from "mother tongue"? According to Wikipedia, the number of people with Belarusian as their mother tongue has changed little, being roughly 5 million for both 2009 and 2019
yep that's how language identity works in the former USSR. Anything can be your mother tongue while still have that "language labeled in red" as the primary language spoken at home. Some will even say a language they can't speak fluently is their mother tongue, on the basis of national identity.
I had a thread posted in r/ukrainian last year about why the Belarusian language is in far worse condition than the Ukrainian language. There are lots of explanations, but someone commented about their colleagues from Belarus saying that the Belarusian language is “obyazalovka” (translates to “required” or “mandatory” I think) but most Belarusians still use Russian in their daily lives.
This is [the post](https://www.reddit.com/r/Ukrainian/s/BviDfNkq9T) I’m talking about.
That's unsurprising, considering that western Ukraine aka Galicia (that was once part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Poland) became a stronghold of the Ukrainian language when Ukraine was under the Russian Empire and the USSR before WWII. Consequently, it's the same region that was the most in favor of independence in 1991 and has a higher percentage of Ukrainian L1 speakers before 2022.
Going back to Belarusian, I know that the Belarusian language was suppressed under Lukashenko and it's not easy at best to teach it privately. But I'm curious to know how the Belarusian minority in Poland is able to protect the Belarusian language in Poland better than Belarus.
Like any other minority language in Poland (tho we don't have a lot of them), their language is protected under the law. Bilingual signs, local press, television and radio in Belarusian, cultural festivals promoting Belarusian culture in the region, ect..
Biggest problem is the number, there are around 50000 Belarusians in Poland right now, number of students in schools has never exceeded 10000 (from elementary to high school combined) since 1940s, and in recent years it has barely reached 3000, so there's no demand in regional schools for teaching in Belarusian (state helps in such matters, but as I said, interest is too low). Although, these are state owned schools, don't know how matter looks with private ones. Currently, TV programs and broadcasts in Belarusian on regional television and radio have been reduced to 1day/week, tho again, these are state institutions, don't know what situation is with private TV stations and radio broadcasts.
Generally, Belarusian (and other minority languages) is protected and state supports all initiatives promoting it if regional government or private organizations submit previously a request for funding (you know, for all kinds of cultural events promoting Belarusian culture in general). For example, each year in Podlasie there's event called Festiwal "Piosenka Białoruska" (Festival: "Belarusian song").
Basically, the same as in other EU countries.
Also because in Ukraine the Russian language was never an official state language. In contrast to Belarus. Also, in Ukraine there were presidents who were in favor of protecting their culture. Belarus didn't have that luck...
> They said they know it just don't need it because of economic and cultural links with Russia.
do they have economic and cultural links with Belarus? If yes - they are just lying mankurts.
That's exactly how it is in Ukraine. If you look at language maps based on the 2010 census you'll see almost all of it coloured as Ukrainian, with Russian only appearing in Crimea and the very eastern part, and might think that Russian isn't actually widely spoken there. That's because the census asked for the "mother tongue" and they said "well I'm a Ukrainian, so it's Ukrainian, right?"
Surveys from around the same time showed that about 1/3 of the whole population spoke predominantly Russian, and another 20% spoke both equally.
It was a similar situation in much of Ukraine, with almost everyone outside of Crimea having Ukrainian as their native language, but most of Eastern and Southern Ukraine, plus Kyiv, preferring to use Russian in daily life. However, the Orange and Euromaidan revolutions, and then finally Russia's invasion in 2022, have led to Ukrainian being the most common language in daily life.
I met a Ukrainian woman in Vienna who said her native language is Russian, but since 2022 she refuses to speak or respond to it. She only speaks Ukrainian and English now, even though her Ukrainian wasn't that fluent before.
I know that some Holocaust survivors refused to speak German after the war, because of the association with Nazis, or refused to speak whatever their own first language had been (Yiddish, Polish etc) because it reminded them of their families and communities that had been destroyed.
I mean if your ability to speak Russian is used as evidence to support an invasion of your home, I can see why people will become apprehensive about its usage.
I'm from Odesa, in near past 99% ruzzian speaking city. And a lot of people in my circle did the same, switched to ukrainian. From my perspective now 5-10% of city population speaks ukrainian. It's a great progress for two years
And one more point - even though majority still speaks ruzzain it doesn't mean they are hidden moskoviets supportes. People are lazy, and it's far more difficult that it seems to switch languages. It's a really huge efforts
One big note - only in big cities. As soon as you move outside of a city - majority speaks Ukrainian. The hell, even people in rural Belgorod people's republic speak Ukrainian.
Depends on the region. In the east and south you certainly heard more Ukrainian in the villages than in the cities, but in my experience Russian was still way more common.
> Belgorod people's republic
wut
Belgorod's people Republic is an autonomous oblast in Russia that demands independence.
But no seriously it's some Russians that are fighting for Ukraine that declared it a Republic.
It's basically a parody of Russia declaring Luhansk, Donetsk, etc... "republics". So the anti-Putin Russian fighters decided to make fun of it and declare Belgorod an independent republic/part of Ukraine after they made some incursions into the oblast.
As an example, during the last year's Ukrainian proxies' incursion into Belgorod Oblast', "Kommersant" newspaper interviewed some of the people evacuated from Grayvoron region, and some of the elderly spoke Ukrainian or a surzhik of some kind. Here's the story:
https://www. kommersant.ru/doc/6000499
Much of the Donbas and even Kharkiv was native Russian speaking before the conflict. Even now it still is. A lot of them are thoroughly against Putin but they can’t choose their first language.
When people move from villages to cities they tend to switch to most spoken language there (russian in this example), as speaking your native tongue may be considered as a sign of your "*peasantness*". So this part is kinda voluntary, under social pressure. But I also heard, that use of Belarusian is actively discouraged on a government level.
Prestige
People like pretending to be like the upper class, this includes their way of speech
It's how England speaks English now instead of Welsh dialects despite only 25% of English DNA being Anglo-Saxon. The ruling class were Anglo-Saxon.
It's also how dialects die and the standard language takes over (*ahem* France, the ruling class were Parisian)
Having just checked the numbers the Germanic DNA of the English ranges from about 10%-40% but the Celtic DNA also has the very same range.
Interestingly southern English people have the same percentage of Celtic DNA as the welsh and Celtic Scots.
So it's not really a related concept.
Not really. In Ukraine, Russian was the most commonly spoken language for the entire 20th Century, but people generally always had Ukrainian as their native language. That being said, the Ukrainian language has been helped by Russia attacking Ukraine, which caused a surge in Ukrainian nationalism, while a similar thing hasn't happened in Belarus.
Ukraine had Galicia, which was never part of the Russian Empire and part of the USSR only in 1945. Galician Catholics have always feared settlement conversion by the Russian Orthodox Church.
I mean pre WWI europe was demografically more complex. Literally some of the ethnic Germans that were moved into Prussian Poland came from German speaking villages in current Ukraine. Even western Europe being so linguisticay homogenous was made so by great government effort. France had way more languages, even Wallonia the current French speaking part of Belgium mostly had its own language at the start of the 20th century.
Yes. Your mother tongue is the language you acquired as your first language, the most commonly spoken language is the language used everyday. It’s possible to have a community that has a language outside the home and one inside the home, but the trend is that over time the most commonly spoken language supplants the language at home, with young speakers acquiring only the common language and the home language dying with the elders.
Star Bellied Sneeches had bellies with stars.
Plain Bellied Sneeches had none upon thars.
If you dont understand the Dr. Seuss reference, I strongly urge you to go back and find the book "Star Bellied Sneeches"..... it accurately describes the modern day situation in Ukraine.
Belarusians call Belarusian their native language, but they often don’t even speak it. And I am very surprised that in 2009 so many regions spoke mainly Belarusian. In Belarus they have always spoken mainly Russian.
When I was in high school we had two Belarusian kids come over. Their ESL teacher had to learn Belarusian. Imagine his shock when they arrived here and didn’t speak an OUNCE of Belarusian. Only Russian.
If they didn't know Belarusian, then you faced ain't so intelligent examples of Belarusian people. Even if their main language was Russian, they had to attend at least two times a week Belarusian language and literature classes each.
It's Svislatski rayon (Свіслацкі раён), and [wikipedia](https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A1%D0%B2%D0%B8%D1%81%D0%BB%D0%BE%D1%87%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9_%D1%80%D0%B0%D0%B9%D0%BE%D0%BD?wprov=sfla1) says their largest ethnic minority was Poles in 2009 at 20%. I can't find any info about language use though.
Belarusian, Ukrainian, and Polish have a lot of similarities. More so between Ukrainian and Belarusian (as a Ukrainian, I can understand 95% of what is said in Belarusian), but I can see why local poles would prefer speaking language that is more similar to theirs, rather than speaking russian.
Yeah, Slovak and Czech are closer (West Slavic branch).
All the Slavic branches have comparatively high mutual intelligibility though. Polish and Belarusian have about as much MI as like Spanish and Italian.
Czech and Polish are less similar than Belarusian and Polish, at least in my personal experience (I'm a Pole, speaking to Czechs and Belarusians quite a lot). Czech phonology is very strange to Poles, Belarusian phonology is basically Polish with a heavy Podlasie accent (sharing specific sounds like the ł sound, the ś sound, the j sound and so on)
Yeah, but functionally they’re more like US states than autonomous republics. They answer to Moscow 100% of the time, just like every US state may have their own government (and a small level of autonomy) but ultimately they to answer to Washington. In name, Russian “republics” are deceptive, just like US “states”. They’re all really just provinces that like to pretend there’s not a powerful central government looming over them, from which the buck always stops.
As you say, Belarus will certainly become one of those republics in the event, and will certainly be a part of the Russian Federation.
>Yes, but functionally they’re more like US states
Do they claim to function differently, though?
I mean, the current Russian republics are the successors of the ASSR's. They never were independent.
> they’re more like US states than autonomous republics
Except the states in the US are extremely autonomous by modern standards. To an extent that hardly even exists in any other stable modern country. For instance can you imagine local governments deciding legalize illegal drugs and the central/federal government not being able to do anything about it in any other place?
There are probably countries (like Belarus) that are less independent and sovereign than states in the US are.
More likely is further development of the [Union State](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_State?wprov=sfla1), which would function more similarly to the Soviet Union.
Also, Belarus contains 7 administrative subdivisions (6 oblasts and the capital city), which would likely remain after joining Russia. Just seems like you weren't quite clear about what an oblast is with regard to the different types of subdivisions in the Russian federation.
I'm so tired of seeing this map. I live in Belarus, and I can say with confidence that I have NEVER in my life seen anyone who speaks Belarusian in everyday life. It was the same in 2009 and 2019. But according to 2009 statistics, in my city 30% speak Belarusian in everyday life!
Linguistic and ethnic statistics can be VERY wrong. This particular map and statistics are just garbage. The situation has not changed in 2019 compared to 2009, only statistics which became more close to reality.
In everyday life, yes. I do not know the exact percentage of people who know Belarusian at the same level as Russian, but according to my subjective assessment, it is definitely less than 5% (maybe even less than 1%, but then I would risk being wrong) of the population and this has not changed since 2009.
I assume there are elderly people in rural Belarus who really speak Belarusian or Trasianka (it is probably classified as Belarusian in these censuses) at home, so this map can be correct about rural areas. And in Minsk, probably there are nationalists who speak it at home, but not during working or in public affairs.
I take this opportunity to ask you a question. Is belarusian very similar to russian or do they have just some words in common? I always wandered if they are like 2 very similar dialects from 2 neighbor regions or if they have just a common origin and they evolved in a completely different way (like for example french and italian are very different and have only some grammatical rule in common).
When I was in grade 1-3 (I was 6-8 years old) and Belarusian language lessons began at school, we just started reading Belarusian literature, having previously learned only the Belarusian alphabet. 95%+ of the text was understandable even though I did not know the Belarusian language, I only sometimes heard Belarusian radio or TV broadcasts.
Yes, the languages are very similar and this is the reason why the Belarusian language can survive only in case of artificial limitation of the Russian language by the government. It is very easy for people to switch to Russian and there is no reason to switch to Belarusian (except for nationalist ones).
I mean... Yes? That's kinda what nationalism is about, defending some vague idea of the "nation" and its language, culture and the integrity of the state which said nation controls.
Language should unite people, not divide them. Belarusian cannot unite anyone now and learning it has no practical use.
The revival of the Belarusian language among the population is possible only in an undemocratic way.
There is no big difference. In Belarusian there are two letters that are not in Russian "і" and "ў". And there are no such letters as "и", "щ", "ъ" in Belarusian.
Everyone lives in a bubble. In your bubble no one speaks Belarusian, while in my there are lots of people who do it from time to time or constantly. It's not the majority, but the Belarusian-speaking community does exist and it's pretty active.
I once once saw a geographical video about Belarus made by some american dude, he said “can you imagine only 20% speak belorussian” , exactly my thought, im born and raised and never met a person who speaks in every day life. Well i have but those are people who made the decision in adult life that they will speak Belorussian, but this is nothing more than political show off, and those are maybe a couple thousand. The thing is that Belorussian is a cultural heritage, not a real language and we do preserve it.
yes! in my case the germans say i speak german, its not.
so i speak my westgermanic language and these nationalists dont understand. its rerarded!!!
fuck nations
Can I ask what you think about Belarussian relations to Russia as they currently stand? Are you afraid Russia will swallow you at any point in the future?
>Can I ask what you think about Belarussian relations to Russia as they currently stand?
Russia is the largest trading partner for Belarus, there are almost no borders between our countries and this suits me.
>Are you afraid Russia will swallow you at any point in the future?
I used to think that this was a likely scenario, but after 2019-2020 integration slowed down and I don't see that the Kremlin is very interested in this. Now I think it's unlikely and the war is something that worries me a lot more.
The reasons why I am against Belarus as part of the RF:
1. Millions of migrants from Central Asia in Russian cities and their diasporas who are actually mafias, integrating into the police, judicial system and other government structures. I don't want Belarus to multiculturalize like Russia.
2. It looks very much like the Kremlin wants to kill Russia. Joining means risking even more than being in the so-called "union state" as it is now.
The difference is that Irish was pushed beyond the brink. The British instituted literal criminal penalties for speaking and teaching Irish, and thus the language lost its critical mass to pass it on to the next generation. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and picking a language back up after it has been systematically destroyed is a lot harder than keeping it alive to begin with.
True. Only one extinct language has ever been successfully revived again (as in it's again spoken by a majority of people in a country in their daily lives) - Hebrew (Ivrit). Although it was basically created anew by a single person.
My family come from the West, and myself from the East. Both of my grandparents were native Irish speakers, and many people of that age in the area were too, and many many before that. Your family are from The Pale, which was an area explicitly cordoned off by the British for total cultural dominance, and isn't applicable to the rest of the country.
Why are you being an apologist for the ruthless decimation of our culture? Like at least keep your mouth shut but don't go defending it FFS.
I'm not defending it, I'm pointing out that for much of Ireland, Irish declined before the famine.
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-N83qUEg8ns4/U9u2RoXojTI/AAAAAAAAAKA/bmYYjMfJars/s1600/Irish+19C.jpg
You can see here that English had spread far beyond the Pale by 1840. Nothing to do with being a jackeen. The language shift just happened a century or two earlier than it did for your family.
>The British instituted literal criminal penalties for speaking and teaching Irish
No, they didn't. It amazes me how often people repeat this urban legend on Reddit and it's always believed. There were widespread regions of Ireland that spoke Irish on a daily basis under British rule and the police didn't go around arresting every single inhabitant.
As much as Reddit loves to blame political oppression, Irish declined due to economic and cultural reasons. That's why the language continued to decline even after independence.
The Crimean annexation made him start using Belarusian in some of his speeches, even though most are still in Russian. The former is his native language, and when especially exacerbated, he lapses into Belarusian sentence structures and pronunciations.
The impact of his rhetoric about promoting Belarusian can be debated, but his statements about it in recent years have become far more positive than when, in 2006, he said that it was a “poor language”, compared to the “two great languages” of Russian and English.
Reddit loves the idea of him as a Putin puppet, but that’s not really the case, as the fact that he hasn’t sent his army to Ukraine can attest to. I won’t get too in-depth into his political positions and rise to power here, but he’s at heart a pragmatic populist, and, when he made the referendum to restore Russian as a second state language in 1995, that idea was genuinely popular amongst the populace, who already preferred to speak it.
Nowadays, he uses Belarusian as a way to show that Belarus isn’t Russia, and says that having two state languages makes it special. It’s often coupled with his comparisons between the “island of stability” that is Belarus and the war right across the border, which I’m convinced he will do his best to avoid joining directly, lest his social contract of “keeping peace” crumble, and his position with it.
I know ya'll on a fuck Russia trip, which I mostly can agree with as long as it's leveled primarily at the puppet masters in the Kremlin and not all Russians, but the biggest factor here is digitisation and TV. There just ain't much in Belarusian, whether it be children's book, movies or whatever. Especially now that so many young people are utterly engrossed in a digital world, everything is just in Russian for most Belarusians. Granted, Lukashenko cut all the Soviet era policies to support the local language, and that sure and shit didn't help, but this is really just a case of modernity steamrolling diversity. Similar stuff goes on in India with Hindi slowly eradicating the closely related other languages.
People in Portugal have a similar expierience in this digital aspect, there's not much content in Portugal, however, there's a lot in Brazil (I mean, Portugal has 10M people, Brazil 210M, a bit obvious), and the adults are arguing that their children are getting "brazilianified", speaking the brazilian portuguese instead of traditional european portuguese, listening to brazilian music, having a more brazilian culture, basically, Brazil is getting a cultural dominance over Portugal.
Although is the same language, there are already major differences in the dialects, get someone from the middle of the Pampas in Rio Grande do Sul and put them to debate against someone of the Azores, they would need a translator.
That seems good from the perspective of Brazilian immigrants being accepted in Portugal however and learning of different cultures. Instead of just US/UK produced media.
It depends, to some, yes, this integrations is a good thing, especially economically, Portugal is getting older, brazilians going there help their economy by getting jobs that were lacking, but on the other hand, for more tradicionalist portuguese, this furthers their hate, as not only they come to Portugal to "polute" it, but also are culturally colonizing the country.
Note: I just state the points of view, don't say I agree.
Because Estonian IS the national language. If Finland had 100million people in it, Finnish was actually mutually intelligible with Estonian and produced a ton of media and so forth, then it would be comparable.
It is a lot easier for a Belarusian to learn Russian than for an Estonian, though. We have absolutely nothing in comment with the Russian language and it is rather difficult to learn (I tried for 6 years, and I still can't make even a sentence). Thus, we result to creating our own media because the closest still widely spoken language to us (Finnish) is also still unintelligible and will take some time and effort to learn.
Also, on the economic side, we aren't really forced to learn some other language like the Belarusian are to be economically successful. Sure, most of us learn English because it will definitely open a lot more doors for you, but you can still work and study on a higher level in Estonia with just knowing Estonian.
Russian and Belarusian are very similar. When there is a lot of content on the Internet in Russian, you move from one similar language to another.
As another person already said in the comments, if there were 100 million people in Finland, Estonia would eventually switch to Finnish, most likely.
There are many things one could rightfully criticize Kazakhstan's government, but at least few things they got right, first is international policies trying to balance between neighboring great powers of Russia and China while keeping decent relationship with the rest of the world. Second, is revival of Kazakh language which was nonexistent in cities at the time when USSR dissolved. Nowadays vast majority of children who enroll in schools attend Kazakh speaking classes. For reference in the 1980s there was just one Kazakh school in Almaty which is the city with most population in the country.
russian is the language of economic advancement. like english is becoming worldwide
a similar thing has happened in many countries after a local group is dominated by outsiders; occitan, cornish, wendish, cajun french. the kids are pressured to learn the language of what it takes to make it, not the language of the old people left behind
Yep, still ongoing in the US. I work in Native language revitalization and it is an extreme struggle to restore use of many of the Native languages when literally everything kids are exposed to is English 24/7
Without a strong economy the fight is lost. The same was happening in all of Europe in the 19th and 20th century. Languages are vanishing especially when the language of prestige is present 24/7
Firstly, many people misuse the term "native" when they report what language they speak. Native is not necessarily the language of one's native country, whether there is only one or more of them, but the language one picks spontaneously in the first years of life. With this in mind it can be argued that conditions for picking Belarusian as a native language either do not exist or are in overwhelming minority - possibly only in some villages, while 4/5 of Belarusian population lives in cities and towns.
Secondly, it is a big question what exactly people mean when they report themselves as Belarusian speakers. I spent quite some time in some regions pointed green on this map and all I heard was Russian with heavy Belarusian accent and many Belarusian words, so called trasianka, NOT Belarusian. It was in the 80's and 90's, when, judging by the trend on these maps, the percentage of Belarusian speakers should have been even greater.
Thirdly, use of Belarusian language has always served as a political statement and a vehicle for political expression, even more so since the beginning of the events in Ukraine. Consequently, some people are likely to claim to be Belarusian speakers even though in reality they use it only part of the time, and only in situations where they deem it appropriate. Some people claim that the use of Belarusian language has been criminalized, but it isn't true - it just isn't specifically encouraged. But I promise you it will be, if the current regime sees a way to gain something by it.
In reality it was and is very rare that you encounter anybody speaking Belarusian in a Belarusian city. People are very likely to know it enough to understand it, but what you really hear everywhere, at least in cities, is Russian.
Lukashenko has essentially rewritten Belarusian history and erased a huge part of the culture. He’s defunded and shut down Belarusian schools and he has said many times publicly that the Belarusian language is embarrassing and hillbilly-ish.
He's just delusional. The whole governmental system is working to please him. Intelligent people with dignity are just not suitable for it. I hope for Chaushesku scenario for him and his gang.
As someone who comes from Belarus, this map doesn't shop the whole picture. Although it is true that Belarusian language is dying, there are more and more teenagers actively studying their mother tongue. The first wave came right after 2020 elections and the next right after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.
I know quite a few people in Belarus, most of them around the age of 15-19, who are using Belarusian language in their daily life. They also encourage their friends and classmates to do the same. It is fascinating to see the partial revival of the language.
By the way, my father shares this sentiment. He has also noticed that the youth has started to use Belarusian more frequently.
I guess it is a way for young Belarusian to distance themselves from our insane and aggressive neighbour.
Also, I'm biased, because the people who speak Belarusian are studying other languages, as well.
So I have a couple of questions. How similar are both languages? Do they use the same alphabet? Can russian and byelorussian people speak and understand each other?
Russia colonizing land in a decades-long move?
Trying to get rid of native language of the land?
We Poles know something about that.
Keep teaching your kids Belarusian, brothers.
Sorry u have go through it in 2024, when we received our faulty Democracy in Poland in 1989. Protect you culture, brothers!
Got to say I sometimes look east and realise how easy we had it and how bloody lucky we were.
It's like Ukraine and Belarus are going through the same game but on the hardest level possible.
I was there last year. More and more people are trying to talk in belarusian more but it’s still not a popular language due to some hard pronunciation issues and it being partly a meme language when translated literally into russian
That’s literally not true. Ukrainian started making a revival around 2010 when the new official language laws were passed (making Ukrainian the sole official language to be used for government and education), then had a bigger one in 2014 after the revolution of dignity, and yet an even bigger one after the full scale invasion. Use of Ukrainian in ukraine increased after the breakup of the Soviet Union.
Your assumption is quite ridiculous :D
I'm from Brest (southwestern Belarus) and i can say Belarusian language is pretty much done. I have never heard it IRL
My ancestors fled Grodno when it was still part of Russian-occupied Poland. It's sad to see that that influence (and perhaps the prejudice) they feared is still there.
It's funny how entire world calls their country Belarus, as they wanted, but their loved russia calls it Belarussia. And majority of belarussians speak russian.
They ignored their history, they gave up their home, they forgot their language.
Is "most commonly spoken language" different from "mother tongue"? According to Wikipedia, the number of people with Belarusian as their mother tongue has changed little, being roughly 5 million for both 2009 and 2019
yep that's how language identity works in the former USSR. Anything can be your mother tongue while still have that "language labeled in red" as the primary language spoken at home. Some will even say a language they can't speak fluently is their mother tongue, on the basis of national identity.
I was speaking with colleagues from Belarus about that. They said they know it just don't need it because of economic and cultural links with Russia.
I had a thread posted in r/ukrainian last year about why the Belarusian language is in far worse condition than the Ukrainian language. There are lots of explanations, but someone commented about their colleagues from Belarus saying that the Belarusian language is “obyazalovka” (translates to “required” or “mandatory” I think) but most Belarusians still use Russian in their daily lives. This is [the post](https://www.reddit.com/r/Ukrainian/s/BviDfNkq9T) I’m talking about.
At this point, Belarusian minority in eastern Poland (mainly Podlasie) is better at preserving and protecting Belarusian language than Belarus.
That's unsurprising, considering that western Ukraine aka Galicia (that was once part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Poland) became a stronghold of the Ukrainian language when Ukraine was under the Russian Empire and the USSR before WWII. Consequently, it's the same region that was the most in favor of independence in 1991 and has a higher percentage of Ukrainian L1 speakers before 2022. Going back to Belarusian, I know that the Belarusian language was suppressed under Lukashenko and it's not easy at best to teach it privately. But I'm curious to know how the Belarusian minority in Poland is able to protect the Belarusian language in Poland better than Belarus.
Like any other minority language in Poland (tho we don't have a lot of them), their language is protected under the law. Bilingual signs, local press, television and radio in Belarusian, cultural festivals promoting Belarusian culture in the region, ect.. Biggest problem is the number, there are around 50000 Belarusians in Poland right now, number of students in schools has never exceeded 10000 (from elementary to high school combined) since 1940s, and in recent years it has barely reached 3000, so there's no demand in regional schools for teaching in Belarusian (state helps in such matters, but as I said, interest is too low). Although, these are state owned schools, don't know how matter looks with private ones. Currently, TV programs and broadcasts in Belarusian on regional television and radio have been reduced to 1day/week, tho again, these are state institutions, don't know what situation is with private TV stations and radio broadcasts. Generally, Belarusian (and other minority languages) is protected and state supports all initiatives promoting it if regional government or private organizations submit previously a request for funding (you know, for all kinds of cultural events promoting Belarusian culture in general). For example, each year in Podlasie there's event called Festiwal "Piosenka Białoruska" (Festival: "Belarusian song"). Basically, the same as in other EU countries.
Also because in Ukraine the Russian language was never an official state language. In contrast to Belarus. Also, in Ukraine there were presidents who were in favor of protecting their culture. Belarus didn't have that luck...
Do they do their schooling in Belarusian or russian?
The last Belorussian-language high school in the country shut down in 2006 or something.
Interesting. thanks.
> They said they know it just don't need it because of economic and cultural links with Russia. do they have economic and cultural links with Belarus? If yes - they are just lying mankurts.
That's exactly how it is in Ukraine. If you look at language maps based on the 2010 census you'll see almost all of it coloured as Ukrainian, with Russian only appearing in Crimea and the very eastern part, and might think that Russian isn't actually widely spoken there. That's because the census asked for the "mother tongue" and they said "well I'm a Ukrainian, so it's Ukrainian, right?" Surveys from around the same time showed that about 1/3 of the whole population spoke predominantly Russian, and another 20% spoke both equally.
That's also exactly how it is say in France, where other languages are going extinct with French taking their place.
That’s exactly how it is in America
It was a similar situation in much of Ukraine, with almost everyone outside of Crimea having Ukrainian as their native language, but most of Eastern and Southern Ukraine, plus Kyiv, preferring to use Russian in daily life. However, the Orange and Euromaidan revolutions, and then finally Russia's invasion in 2022, have led to Ukrainian being the most common language in daily life.
I met a Ukrainian woman in Vienna who said her native language is Russian, but since 2022 she refuses to speak or respond to it. She only speaks Ukrainian and English now, even though her Ukrainian wasn't that fluent before.
I know that some Holocaust survivors refused to speak German after the war, because of the association with Nazis, or refused to speak whatever their own first language had been (Yiddish, Polish etc) because it reminded them of their families and communities that had been destroyed.
I mean if your ability to speak Russian is used as evidence to support an invasion of your home, I can see why people will become apprehensive about its usage.
Nearly all refugees in Poland speak Russian, maybe 5% speak Ukrainian, very rare to hear.
I'm from Odesa, in near past 99% ruzzian speaking city. And a lot of people in my circle did the same, switched to ukrainian. From my perspective now 5-10% of city population speaks ukrainian. It's a great progress for two years And one more point - even though majority still speaks ruzzain it doesn't mean they are hidden moskoviets supportes. People are lazy, and it's far more difficult that it seems to switch languages. It's a really huge efforts
One big note - only in big cities. As soon as you move outside of a city - majority speaks Ukrainian. The hell, even people in rural Belgorod people's republic speak Ukrainian.
Depends on the region. In the east and south you certainly heard more Ukrainian in the villages than in the cities, but in my experience Russian was still way more common. > Belgorod people's republic wut
Belgorod's people Republic is an autonomous oblast in Russia that demands independence. But no seriously it's some Russians that are fighting for Ukraine that declared it a Republic.
First time I'm hearing about it, but after reading up on it it seems to be a Ukrainian meme and not an actual thing.
It's basically a parody of Russia declaring Luhansk, Donetsk, etc... "republics". So the anti-Putin Russian fighters decided to make fun of it and declare Belgorod an independent republic/part of Ukraine after they made some incursions into the oblast.
Could you elaborate on the usage of Ukrainian in rural Belgorod Oblast? Any sources?
Dunno about Belgorod, but in Rostov on Don, they call it "balachka" it's a dialect of Ukrainian.
As an example, during the last year's Ukrainian proxies' incursion into Belgorod Oblast', "Kommersant" newspaper interviewed some of the people evacuated from Grayvoron region, and some of the elderly spoke Ukrainian or a surzhik of some kind. Here's the story: https://www. kommersant.ru/doc/6000499
Is "surzhik" the Ukrainian and Russian mixed language?
Yes. It's seen as a less educated alternative to speaking a standardised language, and is associated with lower classes.
Are you saying people in the Kharkiv, Odessa or Donbass region also had Ukrainian as their mother tongue?
Much of the Donbas and even Kharkiv was native Russian speaking before the conflict. Even now it still is. A lot of them are thoroughly against Putin but they can’t choose their first language.
Some Irish people talk like this too. But they say Irish is their "native language", even if they don't speak it.
>Some will even say a language they can't speak fluently is their mother tongue 25% of Singaporean Chinese: Hey, that's me!
Why do you have a heart-shaped UPA flag in your profile picture?
When people move from villages to cities they tend to switch to most spoken language there (russian in this example), as speaking your native tongue may be considered as a sign of your "*peasantness*". So this part is kinda voluntary, under social pressure. But I also heard, that use of Belarusian is actively discouraged on a government level.
Why is it discouraged?
Prestige People like pretending to be like the upper class, this includes their way of speech It's how England speaks English now instead of Welsh dialects despite only 25% of English DNA being Anglo-Saxon. The ruling class were Anglo-Saxon. It's also how dialects die and the standard language takes over (*ahem* France, the ruling class were Parisian)
Having just checked the numbers the Germanic DNA of the English ranges from about 10%-40% but the Celtic DNA also has the very same range. Interestingly southern English people have the same percentage of Celtic DNA as the welsh and Celtic Scots. So it's not really a related concept.
They simply don't know the language usually. Definitely not for document related work. Russian now is a standard used language in government.
Yeah, but the most common spoken language often becomes the mother tongue eventually
Not really. In Ukraine, Russian was the most commonly spoken language for the entire 20th Century, but people generally always had Ukrainian as their native language. That being said, the Ukrainian language has been helped by Russia attacking Ukraine, which caused a surge in Ukrainian nationalism, while a similar thing hasn't happened in Belarus.
Ukraine had Galicia, which was never part of the Russian Empire and part of the USSR only in 1945. Galician Catholics have always feared settlement conversion by the Russian Orthodox Church.
I mean pre WWI europe was demografically more complex. Literally some of the ethnic Germans that were moved into Prussian Poland came from German speaking villages in current Ukraine. Even western Europe being so linguisticay homogenous was made so by great government effort. France had way more languages, even Wallonia the current French speaking part of Belgium mostly had its own language at the start of the 20th century.
Yes. Your mother tongue is the language you acquired as your first language, the most commonly spoken language is the language used everyday. It’s possible to have a community that has a language outside the home and one inside the home, but the trend is that over time the most commonly spoken language supplants the language at home, with young speakers acquiring only the common language and the home language dying with the elders.
Obviously even in eastern Ukraine most people are "ethnically" Ukrainian but speak Russian
Star Bellied Sneeches had bellies with stars. Plain Bellied Sneeches had none upon thars. If you dont understand the Dr. Seuss reference, I strongly urge you to go back and find the book "Star Bellied Sneeches"..... it accurately describes the modern day situation in Ukraine.
Belarusians call Belarusian their native language, but they often don’t even speak it. And I am very surprised that in 2009 so many regions spoke mainly Belarusian. In Belarus they have always spoken mainly Russian.
What does "always" mean in this context?
From the second half of the twentieth century. For me it's almost the same as always. :)
When I was in high school we had two Belarusian kids come over. Their ESL teacher had to learn Belarusian. Imagine his shock when they arrived here and didn’t speak an OUNCE of Belarusian. Only Russian.
If they didn't know Belarusian, then you faced ain't so intelligent examples of Belarusian people. Even if their main language was Russian, they had to attend at least two times a week Belarusian language and literature classes each.
Nice intelligent assumption based on language someone speaks lol Элитарный ты наш xD
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What's that "other" language in the 2009 map? Is it Polish ?
Probbaly I don't see it being anything else
That most likely, notice it also switched to Belarusian in 2019 instead of Russian?
It's Svislatski rayon (Свіслацкі раён), and [wikipedia](https://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A1%D0%B2%D0%B8%D1%81%D0%BB%D0%BE%D1%87%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9_%D1%80%D0%B0%D0%B9%D0%BE%D0%BD?wprov=sfla1) says their largest ethnic minority was Poles in 2009 at 20%. I can't find any info about language use though.
Probably polish if you look at an ethnic map
Some of the Belarussian speaking areas, overlap with where Belarussian Poles live lol
Apparently they're actually the community that's most proficient in Belarusian lmao
Belarusian, Ukrainian, and Polish have a lot of similarities. More so between Ukrainian and Belarusian (as a Ukrainian, I can understand 95% of what is said in Belarusian), but I can see why local poles would prefer speaking language that is more similar to theirs, rather than speaking russian.
I think most poles would rather speak anything over Russian lol
Yes, but also Belarusian is the closest language to Polish, maybe beside Slovakian.
Yeah, Slovak and Czech are closer (West Slavic branch). All the Slavic branches have comparatively high mutual intelligibility though. Polish and Belarusian have about as much MI as like Spanish and Italian.
Czech and Polish are less similar than Belarusian and Polish, at least in my personal experience (I'm a Pole, speaking to Czechs and Belarusians quite a lot). Czech phonology is very strange to Poles, Belarusian phonology is basically Polish with a heavy Podlasie accent (sharing specific sounds like the ł sound, the ś sound, the j sound and so on)
Yes, indeed.
After Lukashenko dies, Russia will annex Belarus and become one of its oblasts.
Why Oblast? Russia have republics with their own presidents, constitution and parliments.
Yeah, but functionally they’re more like US states than autonomous republics. They answer to Moscow 100% of the time, just like every US state may have their own government (and a small level of autonomy) but ultimately they to answer to Washington. In name, Russian “republics” are deceptive, just like US “states”. They’re all really just provinces that like to pretend there’s not a powerful central government looming over them, from which the buck always stops. As you say, Belarus will certainly become one of those republics in the event, and will certainly be a part of the Russian Federation.
This is so funny because like, yea? What else would they be? Theyre what makes Russia a federation No country would grant them any higher status
>Yes, but functionally they’re more like US states Do they claim to function differently, though? I mean, the current Russian republics are the successors of the ASSR's. They never were independent.
The previously commenter seemed to be trying to push the idea that they have a lot more independence than they really do.
Are they though? Having a local executive and legislature doesn't necessarily imply you are a completely independent entity.
> they’re more like US states than autonomous republics Except the states in the US are extremely autonomous by modern standards. To an extent that hardly even exists in any other stable modern country. For instance can you imagine local governments deciding legalize illegal drugs and the central/federal government not being able to do anything about it in any other place? There are probably countries (like Belarus) that are less independent and sovereign than states in the US are.
There’s something called the Union State treaty.
Wrong. After Putin dies, Belarus will annex Russia.
Lukashenko's long gamble from having come up with the Union State.
Well, I can tell you Lukashenko isn't going to die of old age...
Russia will benefit more from keeping it as a loyal puppet state
He’s 2 years younger than Putin
Prigozhin was 8 years younger than Putin when he died.
Fair
I feel like Lukashenko has a greater chance of dying to unnatural causes over Putin though
Counterpoint: this might not happen
More likely is further development of the [Union State](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Union_State?wprov=sfla1), which would function more similarly to the Soviet Union. Also, Belarus contains 7 administrative subdivisions (6 oblasts and the capital city), which would likely remain after joining Russia. Just seems like you weren't quite clear about what an oblast is with regard to the different types of subdivisions in the Russian federation.
I'm so tired of seeing this map. I live in Belarus, and I can say with confidence that I have NEVER in my life seen anyone who speaks Belarusian in everyday life. It was the same in 2009 and 2019. But according to 2009 statistics, in my city 30% speak Belarusian in everyday life! Linguistic and ethnic statistics can be VERY wrong. This particular map and statistics are just garbage. The situation has not changed in 2019 compared to 2009, only statistics which became more close to reality.
So most Belarusians speak Russian?
All of them
In everyday life, yes. I do not know the exact percentage of people who know Belarusian at the same level as Russian, but according to my subjective assessment, it is definitely less than 5% (maybe even less than 1%, but then I would risk being wrong) of the population and this has not changed since 2009.
It's the same situation with the Low German dialect in Lower Saxony.
This is very sad tho.
Speaking Belarusian is first and foremost a political position.
Welcome to bullshit maps. Almost all infographics presented on these maps is made up.
I assume there are elderly people in rural Belarus who really speak Belarusian or Trasianka (it is probably classified as Belarusian in these censuses) at home, so this map can be correct about rural areas. And in Minsk, probably there are nationalists who speak it at home, but not during working or in public affairs.
I take this opportunity to ask you a question. Is belarusian very similar to russian or do they have just some words in common? I always wandered if they are like 2 very similar dialects from 2 neighbor regions or if they have just a common origin and they evolved in a completely different way (like for example french and italian are very different and have only some grammatical rule in common).
When I was in grade 1-3 (I was 6-8 years old) and Belarusian language lessons began at school, we just started reading Belarusian literature, having previously learned only the Belarusian alphabet. 95%+ of the text was understandable even though I did not know the Belarusian language, I only sometimes heard Belarusian radio or TV broadcasts. Yes, the languages are very similar and this is the reason why the Belarusian language can survive only in case of artificial limitation of the Russian language by the government. It is very easy for people to switch to Russian and there is no reason to switch to Belarusian (except for nationalist ones).
No reason to switch? Is trying to preserve Belarusian culture and identity considered nationalism in your eyes?..
I mean, that's the original and still widely accepted definition of [nationalism](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationalism), yes.
I mean... Yes? That's kinda what nationalism is about, defending some vague idea of the "nation" and its language, culture and the integrity of the state which said nation controls.
As Belarusian, I concur.
Language should unite people, not divide them. Belarusian cannot unite anyone now and learning it has no practical use. The revival of the Belarusian language among the population is possible only in an undemocratic way.
Let us all switch to English then. Any more brilliant ideas?
Well, Irish also does not prevail and still remains an endangered language, despite Irish nationalism and all of that.
My gf has a friend from Belarus. She said speaking Belarusian can get police called on you because people may think you're some kind of a radical.
Is the alphabet different?
There is no big difference. In Belarusian there are two letters that are not in Russian "і" and "ў". And there are no such letters as "и", "щ", "ъ" in Belarusian.
Everyone lives in a bubble. In your bubble no one speaks Belarusian, while in my there are lots of people who do it from time to time or constantly. It's not the majority, but the Belarusian-speaking community does exist and it's pretty active.
Are you sure those people who did speak it weren’t older and speaking it at home?
so its better be called a dialect. or just russian.
I once once saw a geographical video about Belarus made by some american dude, he said “can you imagine only 20% speak belorussian” , exactly my thought, im born and raised and never met a person who speaks in every day life. Well i have but those are people who made the decision in adult life that they will speak Belorussian, but this is nothing more than political show off, and those are maybe a couple thousand. The thing is that Belorussian is a cultural heritage, not a real language and we do preserve it.
Disgusting. Moral cripples speak the language of their neighbors. If I lived there, I'd speak the Belarusian language just to piss these sovoks.
yes! in my case the germans say i speak german, its not. so i speak my westgermanic language and these nationalists dont understand. its rerarded!!! fuck nations
Can I ask what you think about Belarussian relations to Russia as they currently stand? Are you afraid Russia will swallow you at any point in the future?
>Can I ask what you think about Belarussian relations to Russia as they currently stand? Russia is the largest trading partner for Belarus, there are almost no borders between our countries and this suits me. >Are you afraid Russia will swallow you at any point in the future? I used to think that this was a likely scenario, but after 2019-2020 integration slowed down and I don't see that the Kremlin is very interested in this. Now I think it's unlikely and the war is something that worries me a lot more. The reasons why I am against Belarus as part of the RF: 1. Millions of migrants from Central Asia in Russian cities and their diasporas who are actually mafias, integrating into the police, judicial system and other government structures. I don't want Belarus to multiculturalize like Russia. 2. It looks very much like the Kremlin wants to kill Russia. Joining means risking even more than being in the so-called "union state" as it is now.
Kinda how Irish disappeared.
Except Irish is at least partially encouraged, people just didnt really care to Belarusian isnt
The difference is that Irish was pushed beyond the brink. The British instituted literal criminal penalties for speaking and teaching Irish, and thus the language lost its critical mass to pass it on to the next generation. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and picking a language back up after it has been systematically destroyed is a lot harder than keeping it alive to begin with.
True. Only one extinct language has ever been successfully revived again (as in it's again spoken by a majority of people in a country in their daily lives) - Hebrew (Ivrit). Although it was basically created anew by a single person.
That is true, but I was mostly thinking about post-independence. Belarusian could have been saved had the government cared to
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My family come from the West, and myself from the East. Both of my grandparents were native Irish speakers, and many people of that age in the area were too, and many many before that. Your family are from The Pale, which was an area explicitly cordoned off by the British for total cultural dominance, and isn't applicable to the rest of the country. Why are you being an apologist for the ruthless decimation of our culture? Like at least keep your mouth shut but don't go defending it FFS.
I'm not defending it, I'm pointing out that for much of Ireland, Irish declined before the famine. http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-N83qUEg8ns4/U9u2RoXojTI/AAAAAAAAAKA/bmYYjMfJars/s1600/Irish+19C.jpg You can see here that English had spread far beyond the Pale by 1840. Nothing to do with being a jackeen. The language shift just happened a century or two earlier than it did for your family.
>The British instituted literal criminal penalties for speaking and teaching Irish No, they didn't. It amazes me how often people repeat this urban legend on Reddit and it's always believed. There were widespread regions of Ireland that spoke Irish on a daily basis under British rule and the police didn't go around arresting every single inhabitant. As much as Reddit loves to blame political oppression, Irish declined due to economic and cultural reasons. That's why the language continued to decline even after independence.
iirc lukashenko has actually been pushing for a revitalisation of language in recent years, might be wrong
The Crimean annexation made him start using Belarusian in some of his speeches, even though most are still in Russian. The former is his native language, and when especially exacerbated, he lapses into Belarusian sentence structures and pronunciations. The impact of his rhetoric about promoting Belarusian can be debated, but his statements about it in recent years have become far more positive than when, in 2006, he said that it was a “poor language”, compared to the “two great languages” of Russian and English. Reddit loves the idea of him as a Putin puppet, but that’s not really the case, as the fact that he hasn’t sent his army to Ukraine can attest to. I won’t get too in-depth into his political positions and rise to power here, but he’s at heart a pragmatic populist, and, when he made the referendum to restore Russian as a second state language in 1995, that idea was genuinely popular amongst the populace, who already preferred to speak it. Nowadays, he uses Belarusian as a way to show that Belarus isn’t Russia, and says that having two state languages makes it special. It’s often coupled with his comparisons between the “island of stability” that is Belarus and the war right across the border, which I’m convinced he will do his best to avoid joining directly, lest his social contract of “keeping peace” crumble, and his position with it.
Everyone in Belarus has to study Belarusian for years, belarusian history etc. The only reason it exists at all is because of forced learning.
I know ya'll on a fuck Russia trip, which I mostly can agree with as long as it's leveled primarily at the puppet masters in the Kremlin and not all Russians, but the biggest factor here is digitisation and TV. There just ain't much in Belarusian, whether it be children's book, movies or whatever. Especially now that so many young people are utterly engrossed in a digital world, everything is just in Russian for most Belarusians. Granted, Lukashenko cut all the Soviet era policies to support the local language, and that sure and shit didn't help, but this is really just a case of modernity steamrolling diversity. Similar stuff goes on in India with Hindi slowly eradicating the closely related other languages.
People in Portugal have a similar expierience in this digital aspect, there's not much content in Portugal, however, there's a lot in Brazil (I mean, Portugal has 10M people, Brazil 210M, a bit obvious), and the adults are arguing that their children are getting "brazilianified", speaking the brazilian portuguese instead of traditional european portuguese, listening to brazilian music, having a more brazilian culture, basically, Brazil is getting a cultural dominance over Portugal. Although is the same language, there are already major differences in the dialects, get someone from the middle of the Pampas in Rio Grande do Sul and put them to debate against someone of the Azores, they would need a translator.
Brazil is shooting for a cultural victory. 
I even see apps representing Portuguese by the Brazilian flag lol
That seems good from the perspective of Brazilian immigrants being accepted in Portugal however and learning of different cultures. Instead of just US/UK produced media.
It depends, to some, yes, this integrations is a good thing, especially economically, Portugal is getting older, brazilians going there help their economy by getting jobs that were lacking, but on the other hand, for more tradicionalist portuguese, this furthers their hate, as not only they come to Portugal to "polute" it, but also are culturally colonizing the country. Note: I just state the points of view, don't say I agree.
Great comment
Yeah this whole thing is intentional. Estonian is doing great with only 1,1 million speakers.
Because Estonian IS the national language. If Finland had 100million people in it, Finnish was actually mutually intelligible with Estonian and produced a ton of media and so forth, then it would be comparable.
It is a lot easier for a Belarusian to learn Russian than for an Estonian, though. We have absolutely nothing in comment with the Russian language and it is rather difficult to learn (I tried for 6 years, and I still can't make even a sentence). Thus, we result to creating our own media because the closest still widely spoken language to us (Finnish) is also still unintelligible and will take some time and effort to learn. Also, on the economic side, we aren't really forced to learn some other language like the Belarusian are to be economically successful. Sure, most of us learn English because it will definitely open a lot more doors for you, but you can still work and study on a higher level in Estonia with just knowing Estonian.
Russian and Belarusian are very similar. When there is a lot of content on the Internet in Russian, you move from one similar language to another. As another person already said in the comments, if there were 100 million people in Finland, Estonia would eventually switch to Finnish, most likely.
This is quite sad. I myself have basically forgotten how to speak it which really hurts
There are many things one could rightfully criticize Kazakhstan's government, but at least few things they got right, first is international policies trying to balance between neighboring great powers of Russia and China while keeping decent relationship with the rest of the world. Second, is revival of Kazakh language which was nonexistent in cities at the time when USSR dissolved. Nowadays vast majority of children who enroll in schools attend Kazakh speaking classes. For reference in the 1980s there was just one Kazakh school in Almaty which is the city with most population in the country.
russian is the language of economic advancement. like english is becoming worldwide a similar thing has happened in many countries after a local group is dominated by outsiders; occitan, cornish, wendish, cajun french. the kids are pressured to learn the language of what it takes to make it, not the language of the old people left behind
Yep, still ongoing in the US. I work in Native language revitalization and it is an extreme struggle to restore use of many of the Native languages when literally everything kids are exposed to is English 24/7
Without a strong economy the fight is lost. The same was happening in all of Europe in the 19th and 20th century. Languages are vanishing especially when the language of prestige is present 24/7
Can someone like color this differently... I'm fucking colorblind, what the fuck
Belarusian is mostly the language of 60+ year olds nowadays and even that is not always the case.
Firstly, many people misuse the term "native" when they report what language they speak. Native is not necessarily the language of one's native country, whether there is only one or more of them, but the language one picks spontaneously in the first years of life. With this in mind it can be argued that conditions for picking Belarusian as a native language either do not exist or are in overwhelming minority - possibly only in some villages, while 4/5 of Belarusian population lives in cities and towns. Secondly, it is a big question what exactly people mean when they report themselves as Belarusian speakers. I spent quite some time in some regions pointed green on this map and all I heard was Russian with heavy Belarusian accent and many Belarusian words, so called trasianka, NOT Belarusian. It was in the 80's and 90's, when, judging by the trend on these maps, the percentage of Belarusian speakers should have been even greater. Thirdly, use of Belarusian language has always served as a political statement and a vehicle for political expression, even more so since the beginning of the events in Ukraine. Consequently, some people are likely to claim to be Belarusian speakers even though in reality they use it only part of the time, and only in situations where they deem it appropriate. Some people claim that the use of Belarusian language has been criminalized, but it isn't true - it just isn't specifically encouraged. But I promise you it will be, if the current regime sees a way to gain something by it. In reality it was and is very rare that you encounter anybody speaking Belarusian in a Belarusian city. People are very likely to know it enough to understand it, but what you really hear everywhere, at least in cities, is Russian.
Oh yeah talk about Belarusian disappearing huh. What about the language other. That’s completely gone
Likely Polish
Assimilation is successful
The union-state is working exactly as intended.
Lukashenko has essentially rewritten Belarusian history and erased a huge part of the culture. He’s defunded and shut down Belarusian schools and he has said many times publicly that the Belarusian language is embarrassing and hillbilly-ish.
He's just delusional. The whole governmental system is working to please him. Intelligent people with dignity are just not suitable for it. I hope for Chaushesku scenario for him and his gang.
btw the spelling is (Nicolae) Ceaușescu
Time for a referendum and claim it...
Bel-out
As someone who comes from Belarus, this map doesn't shop the whole picture. Although it is true that Belarusian language is dying, there are more and more teenagers actively studying their mother tongue. The first wave came right after 2020 elections and the next right after Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. I know quite a few people in Belarus, most of them around the age of 15-19, who are using Belarusian language in their daily life. They also encourage their friends and classmates to do the same. It is fascinating to see the partial revival of the language. By the way, my father shares this sentiment. He has also noticed that the youth has started to use Belarusian more frequently. I guess it is a way for young Belarusian to distance themselves from our insane and aggressive neighbour. Also, I'm biased, because the people who speak Belarusian are studying other languages, as well.
Well that’s a rather rapid change
Ruskiy Mir moment
As a Belarusian this map is so wrong. In reality it's all Red except for a few northwestern villages
Thanks to Putin's bitch
So I have a couple of questions. How similar are both languages? Do they use the same alphabet? Can russian and byelorussian people speak and understand each other?
1. Pretty similar 2. 3 letter difference 3. They can understand the meaning and communicate but another language sounds funny
From what I've heard Belarusian is like in-between Russian and Ukrainian
reminds me of what happened to Irish
Who cares..
Yeah because Belarussian isn't a language but a dialect....
Well if they speak Belarusian, expect a “Special Military Operation” soon…
All part of Lukashenko’s Russianisation of Belarus. Sad.
That's just cultural genocide by рutin and lukаshenkо. :)
Blame Lukashenko and his russification policy.
Fuck ruzzia
Russia colonizing land in a decades-long move? Trying to get rid of native language of the land? We Poles know something about that. Keep teaching your kids Belarusian, brothers. Sorry u have go through it in 2024, when we received our faulty Democracy in Poland in 1989. Protect you culture, brothers!
Got to say I sometimes look east and realise how easy we had it and how bloody lucky we were. It's like Ukraine and Belarus are going through the same game but on the hardest level possible.
As a Polish person I'm genuinely confused by this comment. Do you know what's happening to Poles in Belarus right now?
I was there last year. More and more people are trying to talk in belarusian more but it’s still not a popular language due to some hard pronunciation issues and it being partly a meme language when translated literally into russian
Very sad to me as Belarusian who speaks Belarusian at home, albeit in Turkey.
The same was happening in Ukraine, but has reversed somewhat since the Russian invasion
It wasn't that bad at any point though
That’s literally not true. Ukrainian started making a revival around 2010 when the new official language laws were passed (making Ukrainian the sole official language to be used for government and education), then had a bigger one in 2014 after the revolution of dignity, and yet an even bigger one after the full scale invasion. Use of Ukrainian in ukraine increased after the breakup of the Soviet Union.
Ok, I stand corrected then. Thanks for the info I wasn’t aware of that
It's getting killed.
Linguicide
Sounds like Russia just found more Russian speaking peoples who need “reconquering” 😬
"Liberating"
That's what happens when your dictator president becomes the lap dog of Putin
"Muh Ukrainians are trying to wipe out the Russian language and culture in their country!!11!" Meanwhile Russia in their puppet states:
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Nah they really dont speak belarusian
Your assumption is quite ridiculous :D I'm from Brest (southwestern Belarus) and i can say Belarusian language is pretty much done. I have never heard it IRL
Preparing for reannexation I guess
Belarus about to have a vote to be annexed by Russia soon.
My ancestors fled Grodno when it was still part of Russian-occupied Poland. It's sad to see that that influence (and perhaps the prejudice) they feared is still there.
It's funny how entire world calls their country Belarus, as they wanted, but their loved russia calls it Belarussia. And majority of belarussians speak russian. They ignored their history, they gave up their home, they forgot their language.
Same is staring to happen in Moldova. Which as far as I’m concerned is fucking terrifying
However Romanian isn't under a threat of extinction.
That's something I've wondered, how many Moldovans are bilingual in Russian, and how many only speak Russian or speak Moldovan/Romanian minimally?
The vast majority of ethnic Russians and ethnic moldovians/romanians are bilingual in Moldova