Editor’s Note: To a great deal of public debate, the Ukrainian parliament has passed at first reading a new bill on Ukraine’s state language. The document proposes to set up a national commission on state language standards and appoint an ombudsman on the protection of the state language. But its most controversial article requires the media to either broadcast entirely in Ukrainian or produce Ukrainian versions of all non-Ukrainian language programs. This especially impacts the Russian language media, which see the bill as a direct political attack against them. The Kyiv Post asked people in Kyiv if the state should attempt to influence the language people use with laws.
Dmytro Vlasiuk
serviceman
If the state wants to preserve itself, it should enforce the use of the state language. If it doesn’t plan on remaining a state – then it shouldn’t. I support the new language bill and think that it would be good if all print media in Ukraine had versions in Ukrainian. As for the TV channels, I think there should be some channels in Russian, and some in Ukrainian. There should not be this constant switching from one language to the other, which kind of bugs me.
Tetiana Hroniuk
tourism manager
I think there should be equal conditions for all languages. Naturally, the state should position its language as the main one, but to prohibit someone from talking or watching TV in another language is a measure that creates unequal conditions.
Andriy Oryshchenko
history student
Yes. And I support the new bill completely. There is a language problem in Ukraine that has been particularly acute over the past four years. These are the right steps by the state. I think it’s a much better law than the one by Kolisnychenko-Kivalov (a 2012 law that provided for the possibility of official bilingualism in regions where the number of national minorities exceeded 10 percent of the population). The new law spells out everything point by point, and there is a precise definition of the state language and its role in society.
Tetiana Stroy
NGO executive
It should. Because language is a part of a culture, a part of politics, a part of the state. And when the positions of the language weaken – everything erodes and makes us weaker as well. When probably 60 to 70 percent of the capital speak Russian, isn’t that a sign that the language can lose its position?
Valdemar Vitlinskyi
university professor
This is our country, we have to speak Ukrainian. Especially in parliament, and all the ministers should. But this should be recommended, not enforced. The last bill is somewhat controversial. It should be softer and should be advisory, not coercive and aggressive. Any action leads to counteraction. Always. God gave us freedom, but we take it away from one another.
Veronika Chekaliuk
PR specialist
It’s a sensitive issue. But in Israel, Hebrew was a dead language, and the state revived it. Perhaps it was done through violence, perhaps some disagreed. Today every person living in Israel is obliged to use it as the official language. We also have to live through difficult times, but we have to overcome it. And perhaps someday all of our grandchildren will speak Ukrainian.
