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Russian Purists Against Western Loanwords: Shared Characteristics Through Time

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Russian Purists Against Western Loanwords: Shared Characteristics Through Time Russian Purists Against Western Loanwords: Shared Characteristics Through Time Susan Anderson A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for the degree of Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics. Bryn Mawr College December 2015 Abstract The following analyzes the opinions of Russian language purists, those who wish to preserve Russian language from change, and their opinions on loanwords from Western Europe and America. It compares the logic of purists from various time periods before the fall of the Soviet Union to that of purists writing after 1991 to the present day. In each previous time period, Pre-Revolutionary Russia, the Early Soviet Period, and the Mid-Soviet Period, the main arguments against loanwords correspond to arguments used against loanwords today. Purist opinions arise in times of sizable social change and increased levels of loanword creation. In the Imperial Period (1682-1917), the reforms of Peter the Great forced upper class Russians to conform to European norms in order to make Russian culture appear more civilized in the eyes of Western Europe. Many loanwords entered the language at this time, the majority of which became part of the educated dialect. Purists of the time dismissed loanwords as unnecessary and incomprehensible. In some cases the loanwords had a synonym of Russian-origin, like the more Russian sounding 1 mokrostupy "galoshes" instead of the foreign galosy "galoshes". Purists of the time pushed for the use of the Russian word over the foreign equivalent. In the Early Soviet Period (1917-1929), the Bolshevik govermnent made language policy decisions that resulted in the increased use of new social, political, and economic loanwords amongst the educated elite. The loanwords, such as privilegia "privilege", were used frequently in the newspapers, which caused frustration amongst the uneducated population, who did not understand them. There was a less monumental purist movement in this time period due to the fact that the govermnent ignored their complaints about the new language and forced the uneducated to learn these new words. In the Mid-Soviet Period (1940s-1960s) there appeared a subculture called the stilyagi, a group of young people who valued individualism over the Soviet ideal of communalism. This manifested itself in conduct that the mainstream Soviet would not approve of, such as wild dancing, jazz music, and eccentric clothing all based on perceptions of American culture. The stilyagi's slang mostly consisted of loanwords, and Soviet purists feared that their slang was permeating too far into the speech of the educated populations. Modern language purists are those who write after the fall of the Soviet Union. This time period is marked by the increased influence of Western culture on Russia after the drawing of the Iron Curtain. Along with the plethora of loanwords that have come into Russian language there are many arguments against their use. Purists today also argue on the subject of the harm of using loanwords when there is a Russian equivalent, of the incomprehensibility of loanwords, and of slang being used in formal situations. 2 Even though these movements are separated by time, they are not unique and show a pattern of how nationalists react to language changes, and therefore cultural changes. 3 Table of Contents 1 Introduction ....................................................................................... 5 l.1 General Background: Defining the Tenus "Purist" and "Loanword ............. 5 l.2 Background on Purists After the Fall of the Soviet Union ........................ 5 l.3 Methodo10gy ............................................................................ 6 2 Analysis ofCrlticisms of Loanwords ........................................................ 8 2.1 Loanwords with Russian Equivalents ................................................ 8 2.l.l Imperial Russia (1682-1917) ............................................... 8 2.l.2 Equivalents After the Fall of the Soviet Union (1991-Present Day)10 2.2 Incomprehensibility of Loanwords in Media ...................................... 12 2.2.1 Early Soviet Period (1917-1929) ........................................ 12 2.2.2 Incomprehensibility After the Fall of the Soviet Union (1991-Present Day) ................................................................................. 14 2.3 Reactions to Slang ..................................................................... 15 2.3.1 Mid-Soviet Period (1940-1960) ......................................... 15 2.3.2 Slang After the Fall of the Soviet Union (1991-Present Day) ........ 17 3 Conclusions ....................................................................................... 19 References .......................................................................................... 21 4 1 Introduction 1.1 General Background: Derming The Terms "Purist" and "Loanword" Russian language purists believe that the Russian language must be spoken and written according to the standards of prescriptive grammar. This way of thinking can condemn everything from improper syntax to informal word use to improper stressing of words. The particular set of rules of each language purist values may vary, but doing these things spoils the language, from a purist's point of view (Gorham 2006: 18). The most common reason that a loanword is borrowed is that a new idea appears in the society of the speakers. The word is borrowed usually from the language community where the idea came from or from the language community where the speakers learned about it. Thus, completely new words come into the language. Another reason for borrowing is that a borrowed word may have more prestige than a word in the receiver language, which has the same meaning (Campbell, 58). 1.2 Background on Purists After the Fall of the Soviet Union I discuss the cultural factors that affect all the other periods ofloanwords in the sections designated above. However, since I discuss the modern purists in every one of those sections, I will explain the cultural elements that affected their ideologies in the introduction. With the fall of the Soviet Union came a new government, a switch from a communist economy to a capitalist one, and, as a result, a new way of life for the citizens of the Russian Federation. 5 In the early 1990s, Russians were welcome to change: "After the fall of the Soviet Union, there was a deference to the liberal point of view" (Gorham 2006: 22). In the sphere of linguistics, there was "a kind of linguistic revolt against the cliched and tightly controlled language of the Soviet state" (Gorham 2003: 19). Given this liberal atmosphere, purists were not given much attention during the first years after the Soviet Union (Gorham 2006: 21). However, starting with the economic crisis in the 1990s in Russia, purists began to gain more traction in public opinion, due to "[the intensification of] the feeling that Russia had lost her way" (Gorham 2006: 23). Ideas oflanguage purism have had considerable effects on policy since that time. In 1995, Boris Yeltsin created the President's Russian Language Council, "a body made up of distinguished writers, philologists, university administrators and state officials relating to the support and development of the Russian language" (Gorham 2006: 23). This council was renewed and given even more funding by President Vladimir Putin in the year 2000 (Gorham 2006: 28). Putin's administration has even given approval for the television program '''Russian Language' for 2002-2005, with an allotted budget of80 million rubles for. .. a series of TV and radio programs 'propagandizing Russian language and culture." (Gorham 2006: 28). 1.3 Methodology The data I collected are mostly words that language purists condemn in their articles on the subject. 6 Because "periods of radical social change tend to share a basic dynamic in the evolution of a language culture ... [which] spawn a round of reaction, most commonly in some form oflanguage purism" (Gorham 2006: 19) I am looking at three periods of great social change in Russian culture and the similarities of how purists react to the new loanwords of their time. The modern purists, from the Fall of the Soviet Union to the present day, share qualities with all of the other period's reactions to new loanwords. Therefore, I show the similarities between the modern period's and each past period's criticism of loanwords. First, I discuss the Europeanization of Russia under Peter the Great and how purists of the nineteenth century reacted to this with nationalistic demands to choose Russian-rooted words over their European counterparts. Secondly, in the early years of the Soviet Union, there were many peasants who were frustrated at journalists in the newspaper for writing incomprehensibly because of the large number of new loanwords they use. In the third period, purists react to the spread of loanword slang of the stilyagi to the dialects of the educated. The origins of these words may vary, but they are all from Western Europe or America. What is important is the fact that they are from the West, and how that element affects the usage and meaning of the word. What Russians refer to when they talk about the West depends on the time period they are speaking about. In the Imperial times, it was generally considered Western Europe, and, therefore, there the words from this time are generally of French or German origin (Ruttl-Worth 1963: 8-20). It was only during the Soviet Union that the United States began to be a key
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