004: Languages and Wars

Ethnic Russians are nearly 40% of the Donbass region in south-eastern Ukraine. In 1994, a referendum supported making Russian an official language, but the Kyiv government annulled it. Ukrainian is the only official language in Ukraine. Over the past thirty years, several Russian language schools were shut. A 2017 law made Ukrainian  mandatory at almost all levels of education. 

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Gender, race, religion and language are the four key pillars of classifying people. Religion and language are man-made. Over centuries, they have served as a source of conflict and wars. 

 

After its birth as a nation, the Pakistani government in the west tried to thrust Urdu on the Bengali population in the East. Urdu belongs to the Islamic group of languages; Bengali is an Indian language. West Pakistanis read from right to left, east Pakistanis from left to right. The Bengali Muslims revolted, west Pakistanis caused genocide, rapes and devastation comparable to the holocaust. The east wing fell apart, and in 1971, a new nation Bangladesh was formed. That war showed that language can be a stronger divisive and nationalist force than religion. 

 

Before 1947, neither Pakistan nor Bangladesh existed, except as a part of British India. For both, the imperialist power was Britain. With Ukraine and Russia, the history is far more complicated. In the 19^th century, Ukraine was the biggest part of the Russian empire. Despite that; in Central, Eastern and Southern Ukraine, the Ukrainian language was banned from schools. 

 

Russian imperialists referred to the Russian language as the “Great Russian” and Ukrainian as the “Little Russian”. (Just like Great Britain. There was nothing great about it except the size of the island. The island of Ireland is thought to be little Britain). 

 

This is not the first time Ukrainians are fighting for their independence from Russia. After the 1917 October revolution, Ukraine started its independence war. Ukrainian people’s republic (UPR) existed between 1917 and 1920 as an independent nation, before the Bolsheviks defeated and incorporated Ukraine into the Soviet Union. 

 

This slice of history is simply to show why Ukraine is so fanatic about retaining its independence. Language is one of the tools in that fight. 

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Let me give you more parallels from India, a nation of hundreds of languages. 

 

Maharashtra, my state, (language Marathi) shares a border with Karnataka (language Kannada), my wife’s state. There is a border area of hundreds of miles, historically Marathi speaking, now in Karnataka. For the past 70 years, a protest movement exists that is named ‘the border issue’. Meanwhile, the Karnataka government has closed Marathi schools. In my wife’s village, the parents speak in Marathi, and the children speak in Kannada. For the past ten years, I go for my morning runs when in the village. Two years ago, suddenly, all the milestones were converted to Kannada, making it difficult for me to know how much I had run. 

 

I understand the emotional issue of imposition of another language. The Russians in Ukraine, in the Donbass region, probably feel what Marathi speakers in the Karnataka border region feel. 

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However, the problem is acute, because Russian is an imperialistic language like English.

 

Britain is no longer an empire, but the supremacy associated with the English language and accent reside in the corner of the British mental make-up. When I worked in a British multinational, in the meetings, dozens of local people had to converse in English because of the one or two English gentlemen unwilling to learn a local language. In the evenings, in multinational groups, some Brits would discuss cricket as if everyone in the world knew that sport. Accent equally decides who is superior. If Rishi Sunak, a possible future Prime Minister of UK, or Priti Patel, the current home secretary spoke in an Indian accent, they would not be anywhere close to Westminster. 

 

India, after freeing itself from the British empire, had decided to eliminate English in 1962. Hindi was going to be the only official language. That didn’t happen. Till today, India’s Supreme Court conducts its affairs only in English. Indian banknotes have everything written in 22 languages. 

 

Am I unhappy about it? No, I am not. I look at language as a way of communicating, rather than a source of hatred or conflict. The Ukrainian state has not been so charitable. It continues to have Ukrainian as the only official language. After Russia grabbed Crimea, Ukraine became even more determined. In 2016, it specified that 35% of the songs on TV and radio must be in Ukrainian (it was 3% at the time). Russian films and TV serials were banned. Language continues to be associated with the imperialists who speak it. 

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Is there a solution? I have always been an advocate of a borderless world. The nation-state concept is outdated. All astronauts and cosmonauts tried to identify their country when in space. Nobody could; maps with nations are another man-made fiction. 

 

European Union and the Schengen agreement are a great example of how people can tolerate co-existence of languages. So is India. 

 

If you think a borderless world is an Utopian concept, Facebook has already done it. If you noticed, its algorithms automatically translate messages into your language. Assuming future generations will live more and more in the virtual world, a day will come when everyone can talk in their own language, and the listener will hear it in their own language. Technology can diminish the power of language as a source of war. 

 

Until that happens, Ukraine and Russia can solve this issue only if they both become democratic (ideally part of the European Union). Civilised world must work towards this endgame, no matter how many years it takes. 

 

Ravi 

(Next part on Monday. I hope the Russian tanks remain stuck in the mud until then).