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Author Topic: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language  (Read 17076 times)

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Offline Manny

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The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« on: August 18, 2015, 02:57:06 PM »
Continental English

What on earth is Continental English? From which continent does it originate?

yet Ukrainian has a separate Cyrillic Alphabet

More of a variation. A few extra letters (Ґ ґ і Ї ї ) and some variations in pronunciation.

yet totally different languages.

Erm, no. Stop being a sheeple. They are very similar languages. Both being East Slavic. So close in fact that speakers of either understand each other alright.

The "differences" that some here speak of are more of a Ukrainian nationalist thing trying to be different to Russia. In reality, ask any Russian if they ever had any issues speaking with a Ukrainian. The answer will be no. Same with Belarus, as that has differences too. But nobody feels the need to shout about it as the "independence" movement that precedes US led regime change hasn't happened there.
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #1 on: August 18, 2015, 03:04:25 PM »
Cufflinks, if you come to Britain and listen to a Scottish person speaking English you are unlikely to understand him. The UK is home to several languages but I did not refer to them as they were not germane.

You also understand, because you are not so stupid, that the US has dialects that are very hard to understand. Or maybe I am wrong.

So, the point has been made. Whilst I am one who believes that not all learning comes from experience you do, again, show that not travelling serves you ill.

Get yourself a passport and start saving for a flight ticket.
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #2 on: August 18, 2015, 03:13:31 PM »
Cufflinks, if you come to Britain and listen to a Scottish person speaking English you are unlikely to understand him. The UK is home to several languages but I did not refer to them as they were not germane.

You also understand, because you are not so stupid, that the US has dialects that are very hard to understand. Or maybe I am wrong.

So, the point has been made. Whilst I am one who believes that not all learning comes from experience you do, again, show that not travelling serves you ill.

Get yourself a passport and start saving for a flight ticket.

Scots' speaking English is well more different than Ukrainian and Russian! And Scot's has it's own modified spelling too, look at Rabbie Burns....

Quote
When biting Boreas, fell and doure,
Sharp shivers thro' the leafless bow'r;
When Phoebus gies a short-liv'd glow'r,
Far south the lift,
Dim-dark'ning thro' the flaky show'r,
Or whirling drift:

And the erstwhile Rab C Nesbitt and comedy character but famous of being unintelligible to the average Englishman, though through my 10 years living in Scotland I can follow it. And they do speak like this...

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Offline msmoby

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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #3 on: August 19, 2015, 02:25:08 AM »

[referring to the differences between Ukrainian and Russian ] More of a variation. A few extra letters (Ґ ґ і Ї ї ) and some variations in pronunciation.

This could be split off as a new thread - Ukrainian also uses ' - apostrof where the Russians use ъ

They omit ё, ъ, ы and э

The "differences" that some here speak of are more of a Ukrainian nationalist thing trying to be different to Russia.

Oh, Ple-ase... Manny - You are trying to 'lecture' Mike and making a fool of yourself.

Ukrainian has simply not evolved as much as Russian - it retains more of it's origins - from which Russian also evolved. Hence Ukrainian is closer to Serbian / Czech, etc  Russian has far less in common with old slavic languages than Ukrainian

I dated a Russian Professor of Language methodology - and whilst this doesn't necessarily make me 'right' - but I suspect she knew more about how languages work / evolved than we do

In reality, ask any Russian if they ever had any issues speaking with a Ukrainian. The answer will be no. Same with Belarus, as that has differences too. But nobody feels the need to shout about it as the "independence" movement that precedes US led regime change hasn't happened there.

Once again, you inject politics and ruin your argument - The vast majority of Ukrainians have no problem switching back and forwards - if you ever bothered to watch Ukrainian political talk shows - with Russian guests and those that favour at least autonomy for Donbas - you'd know that.  Their 'problem' is the portrayal of news from russian TV news outlets.

IF you bother to check back - long before the Kremlin physically intervened in Ukraine - you may remember that I have several times pointed out that many Russians I know - incl. my ex partner and Russian biz partner in Cyprus laughed when they heard UA lang adverts on satellite TV .. "It isn't as 'rich' as Russian - it sounds 'funny' - like a village language"... was something I heard SO many times.

I have never - yet- met a Ukrainian that objects to my using Russian  - they might just 'correct' me if I say Thank you in Russian  - by using the Ukrainian word.

If you think it is a good idea I can get the ball rolling on the differences between the two languages and we can hopefully educate  / inspire / learn from each other and avoid allowing the current situation to interfere ?
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #4 on: August 19, 2015, 03:09:55 AM »
I think that Cufflinks was getting confused about this:English and Continental Knitting
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #5 on: August 19, 2015, 04:21:35 AM »
My wife says Ukrainian is a different language from Russian and not just a Dialect of Russian.

Whole words are different sometimes.
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #6 on: August 19, 2015, 04:39:12 AM »
My wife says Ukrainian is a different language from Russian and not just a Dialect of Russian.

Whole words are different sometimes.

As they are in English, e.g. 'child' in standard English, 'bairn' in Northern English, here's some more Standard English - Northern/Scots English...

Crying - Greeting or Scrycking

Effete - Nesh

Alley - Ginnell

Wasp - Jasper

Young girl - Lass

Would be churlish to call them different languages, but English and Welsh though - totally different yet live next door to each other. Nothing will convince me that Russian and Ukrainian aren't just dialects of each other but I will ask the Mrs. since she's a professional linguist but ensconced in Munich at the moment.....

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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #7 on: August 19, 2015, 04:51:30 AM »
The difference is political, not real.

One of the purposes of language is to identify 'us'  as distinct from 'them'; if a newcomer can not speak the language then he is not one of 'us' and can be killed.

Some languages are very difficult to speak correctly, Finnish for example. Finnish, as it happens is a pretty modern language,  only become formalised and written down in the 19th century at roughly the same time as Ukrainian. Finnish was made difficult in order to promote the identity of Finns as distinct from Swedes and Russians. Ukrainian is different, in its current form it is wholly understandable to Russians and vice versa. The purpose, when formalising the language was to show that Russian and Ukrainian speakers and people were essentially the same. Thus Ukraine formed an identity, at the same time as others did,  but chose to remain an identifiable part of that group of people called Russians.

This is interesting stuff for me,  although I am not a speaker. The process of identity by use of language is a thing that English speakers do not really come across.  I certainly had not until I went to Finland and came to understand the historical basis for the nationality movement in Europe in the 19th century. Fascinating times. I bet Volshe knows plenty about this topic.
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Offline msmoby

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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #8 on: August 19, 2015, 05:58:13 AM »
The difference is political, not real.


This is interesting stuff for me,  although I am not a speaker.


Do you think someone just 'dreamed up' Ukrainian to annoy Russians?  :chuckle:

Please note Ukrainian is most probably derived form Eastern Slavonic - which give roots to many tongues - including Russian / Czech / Serbo-Croat..

Russian has simply evolved more.

Was it not 'political' to ban the teaching of Ukrainian during occupation / rule of Imperial Russia / Soviet Union at schools ?


Let's be properly honest - if you are going to try your version of 'history' on us..


For sure, the use of one language over another at school  is political - I saw it in Schools in Ireland - some spent a lot of their time learning Irish and studying Irish history - I learnt British history and did not study Irish.

That so many young Ukrainians are now proud of their Ukrainian roots is a by product of the same process - but - again - speaking Russian - for most Ukrainians is not a 'bad' thing.
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #9 on: August 19, 2015, 09:55:13 AM »
My wife says Ukrainian is a different language from Russian and not just a Dialect of Russian.

Whole words are different sometimes.

It is a language, not a dialect. Ditto, it's Slavic and from the same language family, but while I speak Russian (fluently, close-to-native), i understand Ukrainian to the extent i understand all other Slavic languages which i haven't studied, not more (ie. i have an idea what's been said, but i can't interpret from the language or to the language.) Russians don't have issues speaking to Ukrainians because Ukrainians can speak Russian language, not because it's the same language.
In fact, i understand more of Spanish via Italian, than i do Ukrainian via Russian.  :biggrin:


p.s. there is Surzhyk which is a dialect indeed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surzhyk

and here:

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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #10 on: August 19, 2015, 10:13:27 AM »
The difference is political, not real.

One of the purposes of language is to identify 'us'  as distinct from 'them'; if a newcomer can not speak the language then he is not one of 'us' and can be killed.

Some languages are very difficult to speak correctly, Finnish for example. Finnish, as it happens is a pretty modern language,  only become formalised and written down in the 19th century at roughly the same time as Ukrainian. Finnish was made difficult in order to promote the identity of Finns as distinct from Swedes and Russians. Ukrainian is different, in its current form it is wholly understandable to Russians and vice versa. The purpose, when formalising the language was to show that Russian and Ukrainian speakers and people were essentially the same. Thus Ukraine formed an identity, at the same time as others did,  but chose to remain an identifiable part of that group of people called Russians.

This is interesting stuff for me,  although I am not a speaker. The process of identity by use of language is a thing that English speakers do not really come across.  I certainly had not until I went to Finland and came to understand the historical basis for the nationality movement in Europe in the 19th century. Fascinating times. I bet Volshe knows plenty about this topic.

In fact, i was about to ask you about Estonian and Finnish, how similar are they and what's the distinction.

As per Ukrainian/ Russian, it's way bigger difference than between Bulgarian/ Macedonian, Check / Slovak, Croatian/ Serbian/ Montenegrin. The difference between these pairs/ triplets is like between English spoken in UK and US for example, wasn't it for political reasons, they could be grouped as one language. Ukrainian and Russian are way more distinct from each other (in comparison to those), maybe like Spanish and Italian? I think that's the closest comparison.

If Markje is reading, he can tell about Dutch/ Flemish, what's the difference and is there a difference, it's another pair that really interests me.
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #11 on: August 19, 2015, 10:24:30 AM »
I remembered being told about a formula for measuring / comparing languages from said Russian Professor and searched it on the internet


Here is an interesting Lexcical Distance chart

You'll note Ukrainian is closer to Bulgarian, Polish, Belarusian than Russian - for example


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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #12 on: August 19, 2015, 10:27:49 AM »

I remembered being told about a formula for measuring / comparing languages from said Russian Professor and searched it on the internet


Here is an interesting Lexcical Distance chart

You'll note Ukrainian is closer to Bulgarian, Polish, Belarusian than Russian - for example




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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #13 on: August 19, 2015, 10:29:51 AM »
They are similar but Finland, like France, has a language board, Estonia does not. That means that whereas Finnish is full of crazy invented portmanteau words Estonian tends to use an Estonianisation of the original word so we have noticeably Russian words as well as English, German and loads I'd not recognise if they hit me with a stick.

Some folks say that the two are quite different, others that they are very similar. Funnily enough it is often Finns who say how different they are and Estonians who say they are very similar. I think there is a degree of cultural snobbery involved because I know quite a few Estonians who manage to hit fluency in Finnish in just a couple of weeks.

The Finnish case though,  as I was taught yonks ago, was explicitly one of wanting to make the language so complex that no foreigner could ever pass for a Finn. For what it's worth the bloke who taught us about this stuff was himself a linguist and absolutely excellent in English. He could pass what I refer to as the 30 minute test. That is, he could speak on any topic for at least 30 minutes without giving himself away as not being a native English speaker.

He was a Swede, I understand that his Finnish was at least as good as his English.
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #14 on: August 19, 2015, 10:36:25 AM »
In fact, i was about to ask you about Estonian and Finnish, how similar are they and what's the distinction.

I know this as I have had the discussion with folk in Estonia. Similar to Ukrainian and Russian in closeness, they tend to understand each other, if not every word. I gather the same can be said of Dutch and German, but the Dutch folks here will know better.

Quote from: Moby
You'll note Ukrainian is closer to Bulgarian, Polish, Belarusian than Russian - for example

Interesting twist here as you mention Bulgarian. When my wife first came here, she used to find American accents on TV hard to grasp. Not all discs have Russian subtitles, but many have Bulgarian. What she got from the Bulgarian ones seemed to make up for what she missed in the English.

Looking at your chart, explains why she managed to make herself understood when we were in Czech and Poland (less in Poland though) and made sense of menus, etc. She finds the Baltic languages unfathomable, again the chart explains why.



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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #15 on: August 19, 2015, 10:38:56 AM »

You'll note Ukrainian is closer to Bulgarian

This is false. Bulgarian has no cases, does have definite article, does not have infinitive, besides  lexically it's very distinct.
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #16 on: August 19, 2015, 10:40:21 AM »
They are similar but Finland, like France, has a language board, Estonia does not. That means that whereas Finnish is full of crazy invented portmanteau words Estonian tends to use an Estonianisation of the original word so we have noticeably Russian words as well as English, German and loads I'd not recognise if they hit me with a stick.

Some folks say that the two are quite different, others that they are very similar. Funnily enough it is often Finns who say how different they are and Estonians who say they are very similar. I think there is a degree of cultural snobbery involved because I know quite a few Estonians who manage to hit fluency in Finnish in just a couple of weeks.

The Finnish case though,  as I was taught yonks ago, was explicitly one of wanting to make the language so complex that no foreigner could ever pass for a Finn. For what it's worth the bloke who taught us about this stuff was himself a linguist and absolutely excellent in English. He could pass what I refer to as the 30 minute test. That is, he could speak on any topic for at least 30 minutes without giving himself away as not being a native English speaker.

He was a Swede, I understand that his Finnish was at least as good as his English.

Thanks for explaining, Andy!
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #17 on: August 19, 2015, 10:44:33 AM »

Interesting twist here as you mention Bulgarian. When my wife first came here, she used to find American accents on TV hard to grasp. Not all discs have Russian subtitles, but many have Bulgarian. What she got from the Bulgarian ones seemed to make up for what she missed in the English.

She's gifted for languages, Mrs Manny (i have MA in both Russian and Bulgarian, trust me on this one). Obviously she could read the alphabet easily, only several letters are different from Russian, but to make sense of it, without having studied the language which is analytic and very different from all Slavic languages (except Macedonian), that's talent.  :)
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #18 on: August 19, 2015, 10:45:55 AM »

You'll note Ukrainian is closer to Bulgarian [looking at the image posted ] 


This is false. Bulgarian has no cases, does have definite article, does not have infinitive, besides  lexically it's very distinct.



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Edited to add - the image data was quite correct - I just didn't put on my glasses and BLR became BUL  :-[

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_language
Lexically, the closest language to Ukrainian is Belarusian (84% of common vocabulary), followed by Polish (70%), Serbo-Croatian (68%), Slovak (66%) and Russian (62%).The Ukrainian language retains a degree of mutual intelligibility with Belarusian and Russian.

How's that for accuracy ?
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #19 on: August 19, 2015, 11:06:27 AM »
I just didn't put on my glasses and BLR became BUL  :-[

Lol, it's ok. I was surprised you wrote Bulgarian, because it is indeed very different from the rest of Slavic languages (forgot about the glasses situation.)  :)
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #20 on: August 19, 2015, 11:13:26 AM »
When did we stop calling Bulgarians 'Bulgars'?
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #21 on: August 19, 2015, 11:18:18 AM »
When did we stop calling Bulgarians 'Bulgars'?

I don't know, but the latter would be closer phonetically to the original Българи (Болгары in Russian, Bugari in my language.) 
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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #22 on: August 19, 2015, 11:23:54 AM »
When did we stop calling Bulgarians 'Bulgars'?

I don't know, but the latter would be closer phonetically to the original Българи (Болгары in Russian, Bugari in my language.)

There was a Spike Milligan joke from the Goon Show I think;

"My wife's a Bulgar!"

"Why, what did she do?"


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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #23 on: August 19, 2015, 01:36:22 PM »
If Markje is reading, he can tell about Dutch/ Flemish, what's the difference and is there a difference, it's another pair that really interests me.
Flemish is a dialect of Dutch. Although Dutch and Belgians can understand eachother perfectly in their own language, only Belgians can speak dutch, but Dutch would find it hard to speak perfect Flemish.

Flemish is in fact, closer to Dutch than some of the local Dutch dialects (like Frysian).

Flemish also has a tendency to "Dutchify" words to not have English creep into the language.

For Example:
Skateboard in Dutch = Skateboard
Skateboard in Flemish = Rolplankje

Flemish speakers (famous actors) also take part in a Dutch TV show pitting the Dutch against Flemish and questioning their ability to Read/Write Dutch... To everyone's amusement, the Flemish win more than the Dutch  :popcorn:

If I think more, I will write it, or maybe AhvdB or Herrie can comment some more.

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Re: The difference Between Russian and Ukrainian Language
« Reply #24 on: August 19, 2015, 02:06:39 PM »
When did we stop calling Bulgarians 'Bulgars'?

I don't know, but the latter would be closer phonetically to the original Българи (Болгары in Russian, Bugari in my language.)

There was a Spike Milligan joke from the Goon Show I think;

"My wife's a Bulgar!"

"Why, what did she do?"




In exchange, i can tell you a real life story; once upon a time, when the East was only learning about Western brands, an acquaintance of mine gets a present from a suitor, an exquisite Bvlgari/ Bulgari watch and she's like  :eeekk: wtf , a Bulgarian watch?!  ;D

If Markje is reading, he can tell about Dutch/ Flemish, what's the difference and is there a difference, it's another pair that really interests me.
Flemish is a dialect of Dutch. Although Dutch and Belgians can understand eachother perfectly in their own language, only Belgians can speak dutch, but Dutch would find it hard to speak perfect Flemish.

Flemish is in fact, closer to Dutch than some of the local Dutch dialects (like Frysian).

Flemish also has a tendency to "Dutchify" words to not have English creep into the language.

For Example:
Skateboard in Dutch = Skateboard
Skateboard in Flemish = Rolplankje

Flemish speakers (famous actors) also take part in a Dutch TV show pitting the Dutch against Flemish and questioning their ability to Read/Write Dutch... To everyone's amusement, the Flemish win more than the Dutch  :popcorn:

If I think more, I will write it, or maybe AhvdB or Herrie can comment some more.

Markje.


Thanks, Markje!  :thumbsup:
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