This article describes the current language situation within the district of Ripky and its rural ... more This article describes the current language situation within the district of Ripky and its rural surroundings. This border area, part of the Polissian geographic macro-region, located between Ukraine and Belarus', and not far from the Russian Federation, presents a very interesting and intricate language picture. The language situation within this aerea, is characterized by an overlapping of different language codes, which are dependent on a series of more or less interrelated variables. In the first part of this study I am going to summarize, in a broader context, the results of previous studies on the language situation in the town of Ripky and its rural surroundings. The second part aims to illustrate and analyze the data derived from individual fieldwork research carried out in this area over the last few years.
Аннотация: В статье описывается современная языковая ситуация в посeлке городского типа Репки и примыкающих к нему сельских местностей, которые административно относятся к Репкинскому району Черниговской области Украины. Эта пограничная зона, являющаяся частью полесского географического макрорегиона между Украиной и Беларусью недалеко от Российской Федерации, представляет весьма интересную и многогранную языковую картину. Языковая ситуация данного региона характеризуется наслоением разных языковых кодов в зависимости от влияния ряда более или менее взаимосвязанных факторов. В первой части статьи кратко излагаются результаты предыдущих исследований языковой ситуации этой территории. Во второй части проиллюстрированы и проанализированы данные, собранные в
A study of the interrelation between Greek, in its early middle
and Byzantine varieties, Latin an... more A study of the interrelation between Greek, in its early middle and Byzantine varieties, Latin and Old Church Slavonic is significant for a more exact reconstruction of the influence Latin exerted on the early development of Slavic languages. The importance of Greek lexical-grammatical and literarystylistic patterns in the formation of Old Church Slavonic is underlined in the majority of traditional researches on this topic. The presence of "sporadic" Latinisms in Old Church Slavonic texts is traditionally interpreted as the result of translation activities accomplished in some regions of the "Slavia Romana", e.g. Great Moravia, Pannonia etc. The fallacy of such an assumption was already demonstrated in previous contributions in which we adopted an ethnolinguistic approach to clarify these aspects, suggesting a new insight into the problem. In the present article we aim at analyzing some lexical and, to a lesser extent, morpho-syntactic Latinisms occurring in one of the earliest translations of St. Mark’s Gospel (Zograph Gospel), emphasizing the fact that a certain number of Latin words and set phrases were already present in Greek, and other languages of the late antiquity, e.g. Proto-Slavic "dialects" etc., well before the appearance of Slavic writing. Therefore these Latinisms must have been known to the Slavic translators and might have directly entered the Old Church Slavonic texts not necessarily through the mediation of translation activities. Исходя из того, что влияние латинского языка на культурно-языковую панораму "славян" и других цивилизаций античности и раннего Средневековья было довольно существенным, мы предположили, что языки-посредники, как, например, греческий, по всей вероятности, могли уже содержать синтаксическо-стилистические образцы и лексемы латинского происхождения. Поэтому невозможно рассматривать все латинизмы, существующие в старославянских переводах, как исключительный результат переводческого процесса, связанного с областями, в которых были осуществлены переводы, как часто было предположено в исследованиях старославянского языка. В настоящем исследовании сопоставлены греческая версия Евангелия от Марка с латинской Вульгатой и старославянским переводом Евангелия (по изданиию Зогр. Ев.) с целью дальнейшего анализа лексических латинизмов и, в меньшей степени, оборотов (конструкций), возможного латинского происхождения, присущие в греческом тексте и повторяющиеся в старославянских переводах. Ключевые слова: латинизмы, Евангелие от Марка, старославянский язык. Введение Исследование соотношения греческого, латинского и старославянского языков (точнее, древнецерковнославянского, ввиду его функций) имеет большое значение в истории развития и точной реконструкции ранних стадий славянских языков. Прежде всего, оно способствует определению культурных связей народов, которые употребляли эти языки, а также
The reasons for writing an introduction to Ukrainian dialectology are multifold. The main motivat... more The reasons for writing an introduction to Ukrainian dialectology are multifold. The main motivation was to render available to a wide range of students of Slavic languages, and particularly of Ukrainian, an outline of Ukrainian dialectology. The lack of consistent introductory accounts of Ukrainian dialects in more accessible western European languages, with some fragmentary exceptions, represents a great limit to all those students of Slavic languages who wish to approach the fascinating world of geographical variation of contemporary Ukrainian. A basic knowledge of Ukrainian dialects is likewise important to complete the theoretical and practical background of a Slavist, especially if focusing on Ukrainian, Russian and Belarusian. It is also a valuable aid to a better understanding of diachronic and synchronic language processes, e.g. the Ukrainian-Russian mixed speech “Suržyk” as a few times underlined over the last decade.
The so called ‘Molise-Croatian’ is one of the Slavic minority languages existing on the Italian t... more The so called ‘Molise-Croatian’ is one of the Slavic minority languages existing on the Italian territory. The long-term absolute language contact, initially with the Italian dialects and later with Standard Italian, has caused considerable changes at grammar and lexical levels. The task of this contribution consists in highlighting and discussing some part of the Molise-Croatian vocabulary of Romance origin that has direct correspondences with the Neapolitan “language” (dialect).
This paper presents some results of our research on morphosyntactic
variation in Ukrainian Russia... more This paper presents some results of our research on morphosyntactic variation in Ukrainian Russian. We argue that the current sociolinguistic situation in Ukraine, primarily marked by Ukrainian-Russian bilingualism, is influencing the grammatical variation of this NDV in formation. This aspect is particularly important, as the continuous contact of Ukrainian with Russian is one of the factors determining the emergence of morphosyntactic variables in the NDV of Russian in Ukraine. We base our analysis of morphosyntactic variation in U-Russian on empirical data from a corpus of spontaneous Russian speech and a corpus of Russian press of Ukraine. Our findings support the necessity to differentiate U-Russian as a language variety with specific features on all levels. Although phonetic and lexical features are the most salient, it is possible to observe some trends in grammatical variation in this nondominant variety in formation.
Ukrainian Studies have undoubtedly assisted at a rapid international proliferation in the last de... more Ukrainian Studies have undoubtedly assisted at a rapid international proliferation in the last decades. Outside Ukraine, Austro-German and North American scholars have played an essential role in popularizing Ukrainian linguistic and sociolinguistic issues. The same cannot be said for the Italian Slavistic and Ukrainistic tradition, where, notwithstanding consistent contributions on Ukrainian culture, literature, history, language history and translation, papers devoted to linguistic issues and/or aimed at a formal description of the Ukrainian language are almost inexistent. Even among Italian linguists, and despite the large presence of Ukrainian communities in Italy, very little is known about this language. For the reasons just expressed, we undertake, in this article, the task to provide a preliminary description of Ukrainian aimed at Italian academic readers.
The last quarter of the18th c. and the first part of the 19th century are fundamental for the dev... more The last quarter of the18th c. and the first part of the 19th century are fundamental for the development of the ‘new’ Ukrainian literary language. A correct interpretation of the historic-linguistic facts that led to the emergence of modern Ukrainian, e.g. the interaction of the dialectal substratum with the Ukrainian literary language(s), is also essential to appraise contemporary language variation and phenomena like Suržyk. This article draws attention to the relationship existing between the formation of the ‘new’ Ukrainian literary language on its vernacular base and the role south-eastern dialects played in this crucial period. Specific dialectal features, typical of the Ukrainian literary works of the late 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries, are also examined.
ІТАЛІЗМИ У ТВОРАХ М. КОЦЮБИНСЬКОГО.
У статті після оглядового параграфу, присвяченого біографії М... more ІТАЛІЗМИ У ТВОРАХ М. КОЦЮБИНСЬКОГО. У статті після оглядового параграфу, присвяченого біографії М. Коцюбинського та мотивам його перебування в Італії, проаналізовано вживання італізмів у таких відомих оповіданнях (нарисах), як «Сон», «Хвала Життю» та «На Острові», пов'язаних з італійською тематикою. Наш вибір мотивується тим, що італійська культура вразила автора і що саме в цих коротких творах очевидним є зв'язок між життєвим досвідом письменника й типовими італійськими реаліями. Водночас досліджено етимологію давно засвоєних італійських запозичень в українській мові, їх частотність та специфіку вживання. В статье после обзорного параграфа, посвященного биографии Н. Коцюбинского и мотивам его пребывания в Италии, проанализировано употребление итальянизмов в таких известных рассказах (очерках), как: «Сон», «Хвала Жизни» и «На Острове», связанных с итальянской тематикой. Наш выбор мотивируется тем, что итальянская культура впечатлила автора и что именно в этих кратких произведениях есть очевидная связь между жизненным опытом писателя и типичными итальянскими реалиями. В то же время исследовано этимологию давно усвоенных итальянских заимствований, их частотность и специфику употребления. In the article, after an initial overview of Kocjubyns'kyj's essential biography and the reasons of his sojourn in Italy, I analyzed the use of evident Italianisms in his works, concentrating on those short stories such as «Son», «Chvala Žyttju» and «Na Ostrovi». In these literary works devoted to Italian themes, the relation between the writer's life experience and some typical Italian realia is particularly evident. At the same time I also paid attention to the frequency and the context of usage of the most evident Italianisms without neglecting the etymology of those Italian loan-words which are already established in the Ukrainian lexicon.
This article is, to a certain extent, the continuation of a previous, not yet published paper, de... more This article is, to a certain extent, the continuation of a previous, not yet published paper, devoted to “a socio-linguistic characterization of Ukrainian”. One of the substantial differences between the two contributions consists in the descriptive character of the former paper, which was essentially addressed to a non-specialist reader. The present study instead intends to provide a theoretical framework in which to evaluate the place Ukrainian occupies among other Slavic languages. To this end, the first part of the contribution reviews the crucial linguistic debates which took place in the 19th and 20th centuries about the linguistic status to be attributed to the Ukrainian language within the Slavic family. A description accounting for the most typical linguistic features of Ukrainian compared with other Slavic languages, particularly East Slavic, follows. First, those historical traits commonly associated with East Slavic are dealt with, and then the distinctive features which make Ukrainian an autonomous language. The second part of the research focuses on more recent comparative and typological classifications of Ukrainian, providing interesting food for thought for future research. The conclusive section discusses the relevance of turning to a typology of Ukrainian based on a lexical parameter, since this is the most distinctive language part of standard Ukrainian. This study, still in the preliminary stages, has in fact confirmed that a classification of Ukrainian based on lexical criteria gives different outcomes than research based on phonetic, morphological or syntactic ones. The determination of the real degree of genetic and typological affinity may in fact be strongly affected by the language levels analyzed and by the criteria selected for comparison, showing typological similarity either towards one or another language. For example, although according to certain phonetic parameters, e.g. vocalism, lack of (or very limited) reduction, syllabic harmony, etc., Ukrainian tends to be closer to South Slavic, particularly to Serbian, lexically, a highly stylized variety of standard Ukrainian tends to be closer to West Slavic, particularly Polish, rather than to Russian. Overall the study confirmed that the language closest to Ukrainian is Belarusian, whichever parameters are used. This is followed, either by Polish and/or Russian, according to the criteria selected.
The question of different forms of real and/or presumed mixed speech, a consequence of the intera... more The question of different forms of real and/or presumed mixed speech, a consequence of the interaction between Ukrainian and Russian and widely known as “Suržyk,” remains central in much of contemporary Ukrainian and, more widely, East Slavic sociolinguistic and language contact research. This article pursues a twofold aim: first, I intend to reaffirm my personal hypothesis on the formation process of this mixed speech, which has at times been cited without attribution in the scholarly literature. Second, the paper aims to examine the functioning of Ukrainian-Russian Suržyk within a broader sociolinguistic framework that takes into account other forms of language interaction. Ukrainian-Russian mixed speech in fact has to be assessed and separated from other factors, such as the Ukrainian variety of Russian, dialects, etc. This approach has rarely been applied in previous studies on the topic. The role played by current language ideology is a further essential aspect in establishing which language elements should be attributed to Ukrainian-Russian Suržyk. This undoubtedly affects the average speaker’s judgment about the degree of authenticity of Ukrainian forms. One can note a tendency to restrict the synonymic potential of Ukrainian in favor of lexemes and constructions that are dissimilar to Russian. This situation tends to alter the language consciousness of younger generations of Ukrainian speakers, who are likely to perceive as Russian (and therefore part of the Ukrainian-Russian mix) elements that are in fact authentic Ukrainian speech elements. These and other related aspects will be the object of my discussion.
Дискусія про міжмовні відношення та мовні права є надзвичайно актуальною в нових
світових і європ... more Дискусія про міжмовні відношення та мовні права є надзвичайно актуальною в нових світових і європейських соціополітичних умовах і, зокрема, в Україні. Дослідження мовних прав має інтердисциплінарний характер і стосується ряду інших взаємопов’язаних галузей наук: соціолінгвістики, мовної політики, термінології, етномовної демаркації простору, екології мови тощо. У статті пропонуємо здійснювати аналіз мовних відношень в Україні в межах уже встановлених міжнародних стандартів щодо мовних прав. Також проводитимуться паралелі з італійською мовною ситуацією та з її досвідом у підході до міноритарних мов.
The language situation of the Post-Soviet states is particularly interesting
to the linguist and ... more The language situation of the Post-Soviet states is particularly interesting to the linguist and sociolinguist. Here, Russian has co-existed alongside several ethnic-historical languages, as the main language of ‘interethnic’ and / or ‘intranational’ communication, until well after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Yet, after initial enthusiasm for the revival of national languages, particularly active in the 1990s, a renewed awareness of the functioning of Russian can be attested. There are multiple extra-linguistic reasons for the attention paid to the current developments of Russian in the different Euro-Asian states. Nonetheless the fundamental common feature which characterize the new sociolinguistic panorama of the former CIS states is that Russian, even where it preserves an official status, is less subject to a Russian-Russian (Moscow) norm setting-centre than in the Soviet period. Such a circumstance accelerates the process of breaking-up of a ‘unitary’, well standardized Russian, thus creating the conditions for the forming of potential ‘national’ varieties of Russian-s (cf. Englishes). After an outline of convergent and divergent processes in the formation of possible non-dominant varieties of Russian, the case study will focus on the Russian of Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan.
The dialectological theoretical-descriptive apparatus and the
concept of "dialect" itself is not ... more The dialectological theoretical-descriptive apparatus and the concept of "dialect" itself is not uniform across European linguistics / dialectology. This is particularly evident in the study of Ukrainian, and, more generally, in Russian and Belarusian dialectal tradition and terminology. If the term "dialect" already implies a series of debatable issues in western European dialectal tradition, i.e. English, German, French, Italian etc., its definition is even more complex in Ukrainian, Belarusian and Russian. In these languages, in fact, it functions as a kind of hyperonym to which minor dialectal units are hierarchically subordinated. Many of these conceptual units remain misleading for the majority of readers approaching Ukrainian dialectology for the first time. For this reason, in this article, I will compare the essential terminological apparatus of Ukrainian and, to a lesser extent, of Russian and Belarusian dialectology with the English and other western European dialectal traditions with the aim of providing a useful working framework for the average European student of dialectology.
... Konjunktionen: да (27) = і / та; дак (79) = так; хоть (32) statt хоч. • Numerale: первий manc... more ... Konjunktionen: да (27) = і / та; дак (79) = так; хоть (32) statt хоч. • Numerale: первий manchmal statt перший. _____ 16 Der Roman Čorna Rada gilt als der erste ukrainische historische Roman. ... Tom 1 – 3, Kyjiv. BEVZENKO, S. Ukrajins'ka dialektolohija. Kyjiv, 1980. ...
Contemporary Ukrainian, especially in its scientific and administrative style, seems to be charac... more Contemporary Ukrainian, especially in its scientific and administrative style, seems to be characterized by a higher frequency in the use of loan-words from Latin, Romance and Germanic languages than other cognate languages such as Russian . Specific studies on Italian lexical borrowings in Ukrainian, and more generally, on Ukrainian-Italian language contacts are scanty both in the Italian and, to a lesser extent, in the Ukrainian linguistic tradition. In the second (2004) and third editions (2007) of the “Encyclopedia of the Ukrainian language”, for example, there is no mention of Ukrainian-Italian language contacts. The few available contributions on this topic belong to Ukrainian and Polish linguists. In this article, after an outline of the historical Italian loan-words, we characterize the recent trends which brought about the diffusion of a large number of Italianisms in Ukrainian, e.g. culinary sphere, commercial brands etc. In this connection it is important to underline that the Italian lexical element in Ukrainian is not only confined to the cultural field, (e.g. music, theatre, architecture etc.), as generally assumed, but it also affects other functional domains. Italianisms are treated both etymologically and according to their functional parameters. The innovative aspect of this research, compared to a previous one, consists in providing a first quantitative calculation, still obtained with traditional methods, of the approximate amount of Italianisms in Ukrainian complemented by a more clear-cut description of their degree of orthographic and grammatical adaption to the Ukrainian system.
The aim of this article (completed in 2007) is to offer a different reading key of those language... more The aim of this article (completed in 2007) is to offer a different reading key of those language elements contributing to the formation of this multilayered language phenomenon known as Suržyk. So far the majority of articles adopted either a prevalently socio-linguistic approach or, within a language contact theory (synchronic perspective), this so called mixed language has been interpreted as the result of Ukrainian-Russian language contact, where the latter acts as a powerful ad-mixing language, causing a sort of super interference on the latter. The Ukrainian dialectal substratum has been often disregarded. This aspect, in the author’s interpretation, is fundamental. It is likewise conceivable that the similarities between Russian forms and dialectal outcomes reinforced the convergence of several of the listed features into Suržyk.
In the artcle we compare the general features of the Ukrainian and Italian syllable. This contri... more In the artcle we compare the general features of the Ukrainian and Italian syllable. This contribution continues a series of contrastive researches between Ukrainian and Italian. The target audience of these studies is supposed to be the students of linguistics and translation departments.
This contribution compares the Latin Life of St. Vitus edited by G. Kappel "Magnum legendarium Au... more This contribution compares the Latin Life of St. Vitus edited by G. Kappel "Magnum legendarium Austriacum" (12th - 13th c.) with the Church Slavonic text edited by Sobolevskij "Uspenskij Sbornik" and aims at extending the morpho-syntactic analysis of the translation. Certain stylistic tropes and translation peculiarities, typical of the hagiographic genre, are also examined
This article describes the current language situation within the district of Ripky and its rural ... more This article describes the current language situation within the district of Ripky and its rural surroundings. This border area, part of the Polissian geographic macro-region, located between Ukraine and Belarus', and not far from the Russian Federation, presents a very interesting and intricate language picture. The language situation within this aerea, is characterized by an overlapping of different language codes, which are dependent on a series of more or less interrelated variables. In the first part of this study I am going to summarize, in a broader context, the results of previous studies on the language situation in the town of Ripky and its rural surroundings. The second part aims to illustrate and analyze the data derived from individual fieldwork research carried out in this area over the last few years.
Аннотация: В статье описывается современная языковая ситуация в посeлке городского типа Репки и примыкающих к нему сельских местностей, которые административно относятся к Репкинскому району Черниговской области Украины. Эта пограничная зона, являющаяся частью полесского географического макрорегиона между Украиной и Беларусью недалеко от Российской Федерации, представляет весьма интересную и многогранную языковую картину. Языковая ситуация данного региона характеризуется наслоением разных языковых кодов в зависимости от влияния ряда более или менее взаимосвязанных факторов. В первой части статьи кратко излагаются результаты предыдущих исследований языковой ситуации этой территории. Во второй части проиллюстрированы и проанализированы данные, собранные в
A study of the interrelation between Greek, in its early middle
and Byzantine varieties, Latin an... more A study of the interrelation between Greek, in its early middle and Byzantine varieties, Latin and Old Church Slavonic is significant for a more exact reconstruction of the influence Latin exerted on the early development of Slavic languages. The importance of Greek lexical-grammatical and literarystylistic patterns in the formation of Old Church Slavonic is underlined in the majority of traditional researches on this topic. The presence of "sporadic" Latinisms in Old Church Slavonic texts is traditionally interpreted as the result of translation activities accomplished in some regions of the "Slavia Romana", e.g. Great Moravia, Pannonia etc. The fallacy of such an assumption was already demonstrated in previous contributions in which we adopted an ethnolinguistic approach to clarify these aspects, suggesting a new insight into the problem. In the present article we aim at analyzing some lexical and, to a lesser extent, morpho-syntactic Latinisms occurring in one of the earliest translations of St. Mark’s Gospel (Zograph Gospel), emphasizing the fact that a certain number of Latin words and set phrases were already present in Greek, and other languages of the late antiquity, e.g. Proto-Slavic "dialects" etc., well before the appearance of Slavic writing. Therefore these Latinisms must have been known to the Slavic translators and might have directly entered the Old Church Slavonic texts not necessarily through the mediation of translation activities. Исходя из того, что влияние латинского языка на культурно-языковую панораму "славян" и других цивилизаций античности и раннего Средневековья было довольно существенным, мы предположили, что языки-посредники, как, например, греческий, по всей вероятности, могли уже содержать синтаксическо-стилистические образцы и лексемы латинского происхождения. Поэтому невозможно рассматривать все латинизмы, существующие в старославянских переводах, как исключительный результат переводческого процесса, связанного с областями, в которых были осуществлены переводы, как часто было предположено в исследованиях старославянского языка. В настоящем исследовании сопоставлены греческая версия Евангелия от Марка с латинской Вульгатой и старославянским переводом Евангелия (по изданиию Зогр. Ев.) с целью дальнейшего анализа лексических латинизмов и, в меньшей степени, оборотов (конструкций), возможного латинского происхождения, присущие в греческом тексте и повторяющиеся в старославянских переводах. Ключевые слова: латинизмы, Евангелие от Марка, старославянский язык. Введение Исследование соотношения греческого, латинского и старославянского языков (точнее, древнецерковнославянского, ввиду его функций) имеет большое значение в истории развития и точной реконструкции ранних стадий славянских языков. Прежде всего, оно способствует определению культурных связей народов, которые употребляли эти языки, а также
The reasons for writing an introduction to Ukrainian dialectology are multifold. The main motivat... more The reasons for writing an introduction to Ukrainian dialectology are multifold. The main motivation was to render available to a wide range of students of Slavic languages, and particularly of Ukrainian, an outline of Ukrainian dialectology. The lack of consistent introductory accounts of Ukrainian dialects in more accessible western European languages, with some fragmentary exceptions, represents a great limit to all those students of Slavic languages who wish to approach the fascinating world of geographical variation of contemporary Ukrainian. A basic knowledge of Ukrainian dialects is likewise important to complete the theoretical and practical background of a Slavist, especially if focusing on Ukrainian, Russian and Belarusian. It is also a valuable aid to a better understanding of diachronic and synchronic language processes, e.g. the Ukrainian-Russian mixed speech “Suržyk” as a few times underlined over the last decade.
The so called ‘Molise-Croatian’ is one of the Slavic minority languages existing on the Italian t... more The so called ‘Molise-Croatian’ is one of the Slavic minority languages existing on the Italian territory. The long-term absolute language contact, initially with the Italian dialects and later with Standard Italian, has caused considerable changes at grammar and lexical levels. The task of this contribution consists in highlighting and discussing some part of the Molise-Croatian vocabulary of Romance origin that has direct correspondences with the Neapolitan “language” (dialect).
This paper presents some results of our research on morphosyntactic
variation in Ukrainian Russia... more This paper presents some results of our research on morphosyntactic variation in Ukrainian Russian. We argue that the current sociolinguistic situation in Ukraine, primarily marked by Ukrainian-Russian bilingualism, is influencing the grammatical variation of this NDV in formation. This aspect is particularly important, as the continuous contact of Ukrainian with Russian is one of the factors determining the emergence of morphosyntactic variables in the NDV of Russian in Ukraine. We base our analysis of morphosyntactic variation in U-Russian on empirical data from a corpus of spontaneous Russian speech and a corpus of Russian press of Ukraine. Our findings support the necessity to differentiate U-Russian as a language variety with specific features on all levels. Although phonetic and lexical features are the most salient, it is possible to observe some trends in grammatical variation in this nondominant variety in formation.
Ukrainian Studies have undoubtedly assisted at a rapid international proliferation in the last de... more Ukrainian Studies have undoubtedly assisted at a rapid international proliferation in the last decades. Outside Ukraine, Austro-German and North American scholars have played an essential role in popularizing Ukrainian linguistic and sociolinguistic issues. The same cannot be said for the Italian Slavistic and Ukrainistic tradition, where, notwithstanding consistent contributions on Ukrainian culture, literature, history, language history and translation, papers devoted to linguistic issues and/or aimed at a formal description of the Ukrainian language are almost inexistent. Even among Italian linguists, and despite the large presence of Ukrainian communities in Italy, very little is known about this language. For the reasons just expressed, we undertake, in this article, the task to provide a preliminary description of Ukrainian aimed at Italian academic readers.
The last quarter of the18th c. and the first part of the 19th century are fundamental for the dev... more The last quarter of the18th c. and the first part of the 19th century are fundamental for the development of the ‘new’ Ukrainian literary language. A correct interpretation of the historic-linguistic facts that led to the emergence of modern Ukrainian, e.g. the interaction of the dialectal substratum with the Ukrainian literary language(s), is also essential to appraise contemporary language variation and phenomena like Suržyk. This article draws attention to the relationship existing between the formation of the ‘new’ Ukrainian literary language on its vernacular base and the role south-eastern dialects played in this crucial period. Specific dialectal features, typical of the Ukrainian literary works of the late 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries, are also examined.
ІТАЛІЗМИ У ТВОРАХ М. КОЦЮБИНСЬКОГО.
У статті після оглядового параграфу, присвяченого біографії М... more ІТАЛІЗМИ У ТВОРАХ М. КОЦЮБИНСЬКОГО. У статті після оглядового параграфу, присвяченого біографії М. Коцюбинського та мотивам його перебування в Італії, проаналізовано вживання італізмів у таких відомих оповіданнях (нарисах), як «Сон», «Хвала Життю» та «На Острові», пов'язаних з італійською тематикою. Наш вибір мотивується тим, що італійська культура вразила автора і що саме в цих коротких творах очевидним є зв'язок між життєвим досвідом письменника й типовими італійськими реаліями. Водночас досліджено етимологію давно засвоєних італійських запозичень в українській мові, їх частотність та специфіку вживання. В статье после обзорного параграфа, посвященного биографии Н. Коцюбинского и мотивам его пребывания в Италии, проанализировано употребление итальянизмов в таких известных рассказах (очерках), как: «Сон», «Хвала Жизни» и «На Острове», связанных с итальянской тематикой. Наш выбор мотивируется тем, что итальянская культура впечатлила автора и что именно в этих кратких произведениях есть очевидная связь между жизненным опытом писателя и типичными итальянскими реалиями. В то же время исследовано этимологию давно усвоенных итальянских заимствований, их частотность и специфику употребления. In the article, after an initial overview of Kocjubyns'kyj's essential biography and the reasons of his sojourn in Italy, I analyzed the use of evident Italianisms in his works, concentrating on those short stories such as «Son», «Chvala Žyttju» and «Na Ostrovi». In these literary works devoted to Italian themes, the relation between the writer's life experience and some typical Italian realia is particularly evident. At the same time I also paid attention to the frequency and the context of usage of the most evident Italianisms without neglecting the etymology of those Italian loan-words which are already established in the Ukrainian lexicon.
This article is, to a certain extent, the continuation of a previous, not yet published paper, de... more This article is, to a certain extent, the continuation of a previous, not yet published paper, devoted to “a socio-linguistic characterization of Ukrainian”. One of the substantial differences between the two contributions consists in the descriptive character of the former paper, which was essentially addressed to a non-specialist reader. The present study instead intends to provide a theoretical framework in which to evaluate the place Ukrainian occupies among other Slavic languages. To this end, the first part of the contribution reviews the crucial linguistic debates which took place in the 19th and 20th centuries about the linguistic status to be attributed to the Ukrainian language within the Slavic family. A description accounting for the most typical linguistic features of Ukrainian compared with other Slavic languages, particularly East Slavic, follows. First, those historical traits commonly associated with East Slavic are dealt with, and then the distinctive features which make Ukrainian an autonomous language. The second part of the research focuses on more recent comparative and typological classifications of Ukrainian, providing interesting food for thought for future research. The conclusive section discusses the relevance of turning to a typology of Ukrainian based on a lexical parameter, since this is the most distinctive language part of standard Ukrainian. This study, still in the preliminary stages, has in fact confirmed that a classification of Ukrainian based on lexical criteria gives different outcomes than research based on phonetic, morphological or syntactic ones. The determination of the real degree of genetic and typological affinity may in fact be strongly affected by the language levels analyzed and by the criteria selected for comparison, showing typological similarity either towards one or another language. For example, although according to certain phonetic parameters, e.g. vocalism, lack of (or very limited) reduction, syllabic harmony, etc., Ukrainian tends to be closer to South Slavic, particularly to Serbian, lexically, a highly stylized variety of standard Ukrainian tends to be closer to West Slavic, particularly Polish, rather than to Russian. Overall the study confirmed that the language closest to Ukrainian is Belarusian, whichever parameters are used. This is followed, either by Polish and/or Russian, according to the criteria selected.
The question of different forms of real and/or presumed mixed speech, a consequence of the intera... more The question of different forms of real and/or presumed mixed speech, a consequence of the interaction between Ukrainian and Russian and widely known as “Suržyk,” remains central in much of contemporary Ukrainian and, more widely, East Slavic sociolinguistic and language contact research. This article pursues a twofold aim: first, I intend to reaffirm my personal hypothesis on the formation process of this mixed speech, which has at times been cited without attribution in the scholarly literature. Second, the paper aims to examine the functioning of Ukrainian-Russian Suržyk within a broader sociolinguistic framework that takes into account other forms of language interaction. Ukrainian-Russian mixed speech in fact has to be assessed and separated from other factors, such as the Ukrainian variety of Russian, dialects, etc. This approach has rarely been applied in previous studies on the topic. The role played by current language ideology is a further essential aspect in establishing which language elements should be attributed to Ukrainian-Russian Suržyk. This undoubtedly affects the average speaker’s judgment about the degree of authenticity of Ukrainian forms. One can note a tendency to restrict the synonymic potential of Ukrainian in favor of lexemes and constructions that are dissimilar to Russian. This situation tends to alter the language consciousness of younger generations of Ukrainian speakers, who are likely to perceive as Russian (and therefore part of the Ukrainian-Russian mix) elements that are in fact authentic Ukrainian speech elements. These and other related aspects will be the object of my discussion.
Дискусія про міжмовні відношення та мовні права є надзвичайно актуальною в нових
світових і європ... more Дискусія про міжмовні відношення та мовні права є надзвичайно актуальною в нових світових і європейських соціополітичних умовах і, зокрема, в Україні. Дослідження мовних прав має інтердисциплінарний характер і стосується ряду інших взаємопов’язаних галузей наук: соціолінгвістики, мовної політики, термінології, етномовної демаркації простору, екології мови тощо. У статті пропонуємо здійснювати аналіз мовних відношень в Україні в межах уже встановлених міжнародних стандартів щодо мовних прав. Також проводитимуться паралелі з італійською мовною ситуацією та з її досвідом у підході до міноритарних мов.
The language situation of the Post-Soviet states is particularly interesting
to the linguist and ... more The language situation of the Post-Soviet states is particularly interesting to the linguist and sociolinguist. Here, Russian has co-existed alongside several ethnic-historical languages, as the main language of ‘interethnic’ and / or ‘intranational’ communication, until well after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Yet, after initial enthusiasm for the revival of national languages, particularly active in the 1990s, a renewed awareness of the functioning of Russian can be attested. There are multiple extra-linguistic reasons for the attention paid to the current developments of Russian in the different Euro-Asian states. Nonetheless the fundamental common feature which characterize the new sociolinguistic panorama of the former CIS states is that Russian, even where it preserves an official status, is less subject to a Russian-Russian (Moscow) norm setting-centre than in the Soviet period. Such a circumstance accelerates the process of breaking-up of a ‘unitary’, well standardized Russian, thus creating the conditions for the forming of potential ‘national’ varieties of Russian-s (cf. Englishes). After an outline of convergent and divergent processes in the formation of possible non-dominant varieties of Russian, the case study will focus on the Russian of Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan.
The dialectological theoretical-descriptive apparatus and the
concept of "dialect" itself is not ... more The dialectological theoretical-descriptive apparatus and the concept of "dialect" itself is not uniform across European linguistics / dialectology. This is particularly evident in the study of Ukrainian, and, more generally, in Russian and Belarusian dialectal tradition and terminology. If the term "dialect" already implies a series of debatable issues in western European dialectal tradition, i.e. English, German, French, Italian etc., its definition is even more complex in Ukrainian, Belarusian and Russian. In these languages, in fact, it functions as a kind of hyperonym to which minor dialectal units are hierarchically subordinated. Many of these conceptual units remain misleading for the majority of readers approaching Ukrainian dialectology for the first time. For this reason, in this article, I will compare the essential terminological apparatus of Ukrainian and, to a lesser extent, of Russian and Belarusian dialectology with the English and other western European dialectal traditions with the aim of providing a useful working framework for the average European student of dialectology.
... Konjunktionen: да (27) = і / та; дак (79) = так; хоть (32) statt хоч. • Numerale: первий manc... more ... Konjunktionen: да (27) = і / та; дак (79) = так; хоть (32) statt хоч. • Numerale: первий manchmal statt перший. _____ 16 Der Roman Čorna Rada gilt als der erste ukrainische historische Roman. ... Tom 1 – 3, Kyjiv. BEVZENKO, S. Ukrajins'ka dialektolohija. Kyjiv, 1980. ...
Contemporary Ukrainian, especially in its scientific and administrative style, seems to be charac... more Contemporary Ukrainian, especially in its scientific and administrative style, seems to be characterized by a higher frequency in the use of loan-words from Latin, Romance and Germanic languages than other cognate languages such as Russian . Specific studies on Italian lexical borrowings in Ukrainian, and more generally, on Ukrainian-Italian language contacts are scanty both in the Italian and, to a lesser extent, in the Ukrainian linguistic tradition. In the second (2004) and third editions (2007) of the “Encyclopedia of the Ukrainian language”, for example, there is no mention of Ukrainian-Italian language contacts. The few available contributions on this topic belong to Ukrainian and Polish linguists. In this article, after an outline of the historical Italian loan-words, we characterize the recent trends which brought about the diffusion of a large number of Italianisms in Ukrainian, e.g. culinary sphere, commercial brands etc. In this connection it is important to underline that the Italian lexical element in Ukrainian is not only confined to the cultural field, (e.g. music, theatre, architecture etc.), as generally assumed, but it also affects other functional domains. Italianisms are treated both etymologically and according to their functional parameters. The innovative aspect of this research, compared to a previous one, consists in providing a first quantitative calculation, still obtained with traditional methods, of the approximate amount of Italianisms in Ukrainian complemented by a more clear-cut description of their degree of orthographic and grammatical adaption to the Ukrainian system.
The aim of this article (completed in 2007) is to offer a different reading key of those language... more The aim of this article (completed in 2007) is to offer a different reading key of those language elements contributing to the formation of this multilayered language phenomenon known as Suržyk. So far the majority of articles adopted either a prevalently socio-linguistic approach or, within a language contact theory (synchronic perspective), this so called mixed language has been interpreted as the result of Ukrainian-Russian language contact, where the latter acts as a powerful ad-mixing language, causing a sort of super interference on the latter. The Ukrainian dialectal substratum has been often disregarded. This aspect, in the author’s interpretation, is fundamental. It is likewise conceivable that the similarities between Russian forms and dialectal outcomes reinforced the convergence of several of the listed features into Suržyk.
In the artcle we compare the general features of the Ukrainian and Italian syllable. This contri... more In the artcle we compare the general features of the Ukrainian and Italian syllable. This contribution continues a series of contrastive researches between Ukrainian and Italian. The target audience of these studies is supposed to be the students of linguistics and translation departments.
This contribution compares the Latin Life of St. Vitus edited by G. Kappel "Magnum legendarium Au... more This contribution compares the Latin Life of St. Vitus edited by G. Kappel "Magnum legendarium Austriacum" (12th - 13th c.) with the Church Slavonic text edited by Sobolevskij "Uspenskij Sbornik" and aims at extending the morpho-syntactic analysis of the translation. Certain stylistic tropes and translation peculiarities, typical of the hagiographic genre, are also examined
La lingua ucraina moderna. Fasi di formazione nel contesto slavo orientale. Evento organizzato da... more La lingua ucraina moderna. Fasi di formazione nel contesto slavo orientale. Evento organizzato dal Centro di Ricerca sulle Minoranze (CERM) dell'Università degli Studi dell'Insubria
Italian-Ukrainian Contrastive Studies: Linguistics, Literature, Translation This collective monog... more Italian-Ukrainian Contrastive Studies: Linguistics, Literature, Translation This collective monograph represents a selection of the contributions presented at the "1st International Symposium on Italian-Ukrainian Contrastive Studies". The thematic range of the articles includes linguistic topics such as contrastive grammar, sociolinguistics, semantics and lexicology, followed by literary/ cultural and translation studies.
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Аннотация: В статье описывается современная языковая ситуация в посeлке городского типа Репки и примыкающих к нему сельских местностей, которые административно относятся к Репкинскому району Черниговской области Украины. Эта пограничная зона, являющаяся частью полесского географического макрорегиона между Украиной и Беларусью недалеко от Российской Федерации, представляет весьма интересную и многогранную языковую картину. Языковая ситуация данного региона характеризуется наслоением разных языковых кодов в зависимости от влияния ряда более или менее взаимосвязанных факторов. В первой части статьи кратко излагаются результаты предыдущих исследований языковой ситуации этой территории. Во второй части проиллюстрированы и проанализированы данные, собранные в
and Byzantine varieties, Latin and Old Church Slavonic is
significant for a more exact reconstruction of the influence Latin
exerted on the early development of Slavic languages.
The importance of Greek lexical-grammatical and literarystylistic
patterns in the formation of Old Church Slavonic is
underlined in the majority of traditional researches on this topic.
The presence of "sporadic" Latinisms in Old Church Slavonic
texts is traditionally interpreted as the result of translation activities
accomplished in some regions of the "Slavia Romana", e.g. Great
Moravia, Pannonia etc. The fallacy of such an assumption was
already demonstrated in previous contributions in which we
adopted an ethnolinguistic approach to clarify these aspects,
suggesting a new insight into the problem. In the present article we aim at analyzing some lexical and, to a
lesser extent, morpho-syntactic Latinisms occurring in one of the
earliest translations of St. Mark’s Gospel (Zograph Gospel),
emphasizing the fact that a certain number of Latin words and set
phrases were already present in Greek, and other languages of the
late antiquity, e.g. Proto-Slavic "dialects" etc., well before the
appearance of Slavic writing. Therefore these Latinisms must have
been known to the Slavic translators and might have directly
entered the Old Church Slavonic texts not necessarily through the
mediation of translation activities.
Исходя из того, что влияние латинского языка на культурно-языковую панораму "славян" и других цивилизаций античности и раннего Средневековья было довольно существенным, мы предположили, что языки-посредники, как, например, греческий, по всей вероятности, могли уже содержать синтаксическо-стилистические образцы и лексемы латинского происхождения. Поэтому невозможно рассматривать все латинизмы, существующие в старославянских переводах, как исключительный результат переводческого процесса, связанного с областями, в которых были осуществлены переводы, как часто было предположено в исследованиях старославянского языка. В настоящем исследовании сопоставлены греческая версия Евангелия от Марка с латинской Вульгатой и старославянским переводом Евангелия (по изданиию Зогр. Ев.) с целью дальнейшего анализа лексических латинизмов и, в меньшей степени, оборотов (конструкций), возможного латинского происхождения, присущие в греческом тексте и повторяющиеся в старославянских переводах. Ключевые слова: латинизмы, Евангелие от Марка, старославянский язык. Введение Исследование соотношения греческого, латинского и старославянского языков (точнее, древнецерковнославянского, ввиду его функций) имеет большое значение в истории развития и точной реконструкции ранних стадий славянских языков. Прежде всего, оно способствует определению культурных связей народов, которые употребляли эти языки, а также
The lack of consistent introductory accounts of Ukrainian dialects in more accessible western European languages, with some fragmentary exceptions, represents a great limit to all those students of Slavic languages who wish to approach the fascinating world of geographical variation of contemporary Ukrainian.
A basic knowledge of Ukrainian dialects is likewise important to complete the theoretical and practical background of a Slavist, especially if focusing on Ukrainian, Russian and Belarusian.
It is also a valuable aid to a better understanding of diachronic and synchronic language processes, e.g. the Ukrainian-Russian mixed speech “Suržyk” as a few times underlined over the last decade.
The long-term absolute language contact, initially with the Italian dialects and later with Standard Italian, has caused considerable changes at grammar and lexical levels.
The task of this contribution consists in highlighting and discussing some part of the Molise-Croatian vocabulary of Romance origin that has direct correspondences with the Neapolitan “language” (dialect).
variation in Ukrainian Russian. We argue that the current sociolinguistic
situation in Ukraine, primarily marked by Ukrainian-Russian
bilingualism, is influencing the grammatical variation of this NDV in
formation. This aspect is particularly important, as the continuous
contact of Ukrainian with Russian is one of the factors determining the
emergence of morphosyntactic variables in the NDV of Russian in
Ukraine.
We base our analysis of morphosyntactic variation in U-Russian on
empirical data from a corpus of spontaneous Russian speech and a
corpus of Russian press of Ukraine. Our findings support the necessity to
differentiate U-Russian as a language variety with specific features on all
levels. Although phonetic and lexical features are the most salient, it is
possible to observe some trends in grammatical variation in this nondominant
variety in formation.
A correct interpretation of the historic-linguistic facts that led to the emergence of modern Ukrainian, e.g. the interaction of the dialectal substratum with the Ukrainian literary language(s), is also essential to appraise contemporary language variation and phenomena like Suržyk.
This article draws attention to the relationship existing between the formation of the ‘new’ Ukrainian literary language on its vernacular base and the role south-eastern dialects played in this crucial period. Specific dialectal features, typical of the Ukrainian literary works of the late 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries, are also examined.
У статті після оглядового параграфу, присвяченого біографії М. Коцюбинського та мотивам його перебування в Італії, проаналізовано вживання італізмів у таких відомих оповіданнях (нарисах), як «Сон», «Хвала Життю» та «На Острові», пов'язаних з італійською тематикою. Наш вибір мотивується тим, що італійська культура вразила автора і що саме в цих коротких творах очевидним є зв'язок між життєвим досвідом письменника й типовими італійськими реаліями. Водночас досліджено етимологію давно засвоєних італійських запозичень в українській мові, їх частотність та специфіку вживання.
В статье после обзорного параграфа, посвященного биографии Н. Коцюбинского и мотивам его пребывания в Италии, проанализировано употребление итальянизмов в таких известных рассказах (очерках), как: «Сон», «Хвала Жизни» и «На Острове», связанных с итальянской тематикой. Наш выбор мотивируется тем, что итальянская культура впечатлила автора и что именно в этих кратких произведениях есть очевидная связь между жизненным опытом писателя и типичными итальянскими реалиями. В то же время исследовано этимологию давно усвоенных итальянских заимствований, их частотность и специфику употребления.
In the article, after an initial overview of Kocjubyns'kyj's essential biography and the reasons of his sojourn in Italy, I analyzed the use of evident Italianisms in his works, concentrating on those short stories such as «Son», «Chvala Žyttju» and «Na Ostrovi». In these literary works devoted to Italian themes, the relation between the writer's life experience and some typical Italian realia is particularly evident. At the same time I also paid attention to the frequency and the context of usage of the most evident Italianisms without neglecting the etymology of those Italian loan-words which are already established in the Ukrainian lexicon.
The present study instead intends to provide a theoretical framework in which to evaluate the place Ukrainian occupies among other Slavic languages. To this end, the first part of the contribution reviews the crucial linguistic debates which took
place in the 19th and 20th centuries about the linguistic status to be attributed to the Ukrainian language within the Slavic family.
A description accounting for the most typical linguistic features of Ukrainian compared with other Slavic languages, particularly
East Slavic, follows. First, those historical traits commonly associated with East Slavic are dealt with, and then the distinctive features which make Ukrainian an autonomous language.
The second part of the research focuses on more recent comparative and typological classifications of Ukrainian, providing interesting food for thought for future
research.
The conclusive section discusses the relevance of turning to a typology of Ukrainian based on a lexical parameter, since this is the most distinctive language part of standard Ukrainian. This study, still in the preliminary stages, has in fact confirmed
that a classification of Ukrainian based on lexical criteria gives different outcomes than research based on phonetic, morphological or syntactic ones. The determination
of the real degree of genetic and typological affinity may in fact be strongly affected by the language levels analyzed and by the criteria selected for comparison, showing typological similarity either towards one or another language. For example,
although according to certain phonetic parameters, e.g. vocalism, lack of (or very limited) reduction, syllabic harmony, etc., Ukrainian tends to be closer to South Slavic, particularly to Serbian, lexically, a highly stylized variety of standard Ukrainian
tends to be closer to West Slavic, particularly Polish, rather than to Russian.
Overall the study confirmed that the language closest to Ukrainian is Belarusian, whichever parameters are used. This is followed, either by Polish and/or Russian, according
to the criteria selected.
in fact has to be assessed and separated from other factors, such as the Ukrainian variety of Russian, dialects, etc.
This approach has rarely been applied in previous
studies on the topic. The role played by current language ideology is a further essential aspect in establishing which language elements should be attributed to Ukrainian-Russian Suržyk. This undoubtedly affects the average speaker’s judgment about the degree of authenticity of Ukrainian forms. One can note a tendency to restrict the synonymic potential of Ukrainian in favor of lexemes and constructions that are dissimilar to Russian. This situation tends to alter the language consciousness of younger generations of Ukrainian speakers, who are likely to perceive as Russian (and therefore part of the Ukrainian-Russian mix) elements that are in fact authentic Ukrainian speech elements. These and other related aspects will be the object of my discussion.
світових і європейських соціополітичних умовах і, зокрема, в Україні. Дослідження мовних прав
має інтердисциплінарний характер і стосується ряду інших взаємопов’язаних галузей наук:
соціолінгвістики, мовної політики, термінології, етномовної демаркації простору, екології мови
тощо. У статті пропонуємо здійснювати аналіз мовних відношень в Україні в межах уже встановлених
міжнародних стандартів щодо мовних прав. Також проводитимуться паралелі з італійською мовною ситуацією
та з її досвідом у підході до міноритарних мов.
to the linguist and sociolinguist. Here, Russian has co-existed alongside
several ethnic-historical languages, as the main language of ‘interethnic’
and / or ‘intranational’ communication, until well after the dissolution of
the Soviet Union. Yet, after initial enthusiasm for the revival of national
languages, particularly active in the 1990s, a renewed awareness of the
functioning of Russian can be attested. There are multiple extra-linguistic
reasons for the attention paid to the current developments of Russian in
the different Euro-Asian states. Nonetheless the fundamental common feature
which characterize the new sociolinguistic panorama of the former
CIS states is that Russian, even where it preserves an official status, is less
subject to a Russian-Russian (Moscow) norm setting-centre than in the Soviet
period. Such a circumstance accelerates the process of breaking-up of a
‘unitary’, well standardized Russian, thus creating the conditions for the
forming of potential ‘national’ varieties of Russian-s (cf. Englishes). After an
outline of convergent and divergent processes in the formation of possible
non-dominant varieties of Russian, the case study will focus on the Russian
of Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan.
concept of "dialect" itself is not uniform across European linguistics /
dialectology. This is particularly evident in the study of Ukrainian, and,
more generally, in Russian and Belarusian dialectal tradition and
terminology.
If the term "dialect" already implies a series of debatable issues in
western European dialectal tradition, i.e. English, German, French, Italian
etc., its definition is even more complex in Ukrainian, Belarusian and
Russian. In these languages, in fact, it functions as a kind of hyperonym to
which minor dialectal units are hierarchically subordinated. Many of these
conceptual units remain misleading for the majority of readers approaching
Ukrainian dialectology for the first time.
For this reason, in this article, I will compare the essential
terminological apparatus of Ukrainian and, to a lesser extent, of Russian
and Belarusian dialectology with the English and other western European
dialectal traditions with the aim of providing a useful working framework
for the average European student of dialectology.
Specific studies on Italian lexical borrowings in Ukrainian, and more generally, on Ukrainian-Italian language contacts are scanty both in the Italian and, to a lesser extent, in the Ukrainian linguistic tradition. In the second (2004) and third editions (2007) of the “Encyclopedia of the Ukrainian language”, for example, there is no mention of Ukrainian-Italian language contacts. The few available contributions on this topic belong to Ukrainian and Polish linguists.
In this article, after an outline of the historical Italian loan-words, we characterize the recent trends which brought about the diffusion of a large number of Italianisms in Ukrainian, e.g. culinary sphere, commercial brands etc. In this connection it is important to underline that the Italian lexical element in Ukrainian is not only confined to the cultural field, (e.g. music, theatre, architecture etc.), as generally assumed, but it also affects other functional domains.
Italianisms are treated both etymologically and according to their functional parameters. The innovative aspect of this research, compared to a previous one, consists in providing a first quantitative calculation, still obtained with traditional methods, of the approximate amount of Italianisms in Ukrainian complemented by a more clear-cut description of their degree of orthographic and grammatical adaption to the Ukrainian system.
Аннотация: В статье описывается современная языковая ситуация в посeлке городского типа Репки и примыкающих к нему сельских местностей, которые административно относятся к Репкинскому району Черниговской области Украины. Эта пограничная зона, являющаяся частью полесского географического макрорегиона между Украиной и Беларусью недалеко от Российской Федерации, представляет весьма интересную и многогранную языковую картину. Языковая ситуация данного региона характеризуется наслоением разных языковых кодов в зависимости от влияния ряда более или менее взаимосвязанных факторов. В первой части статьи кратко излагаются результаты предыдущих исследований языковой ситуации этой территории. Во второй части проиллюстрированы и проанализированы данные, собранные в
and Byzantine varieties, Latin and Old Church Slavonic is
significant for a more exact reconstruction of the influence Latin
exerted on the early development of Slavic languages.
The importance of Greek lexical-grammatical and literarystylistic
patterns in the formation of Old Church Slavonic is
underlined in the majority of traditional researches on this topic.
The presence of "sporadic" Latinisms in Old Church Slavonic
texts is traditionally interpreted as the result of translation activities
accomplished in some regions of the "Slavia Romana", e.g. Great
Moravia, Pannonia etc. The fallacy of such an assumption was
already demonstrated in previous contributions in which we
adopted an ethnolinguistic approach to clarify these aspects,
suggesting a new insight into the problem. In the present article we aim at analyzing some lexical and, to a
lesser extent, morpho-syntactic Latinisms occurring in one of the
earliest translations of St. Mark’s Gospel (Zograph Gospel),
emphasizing the fact that a certain number of Latin words and set
phrases were already present in Greek, and other languages of the
late antiquity, e.g. Proto-Slavic "dialects" etc., well before the
appearance of Slavic writing. Therefore these Latinisms must have
been known to the Slavic translators and might have directly
entered the Old Church Slavonic texts not necessarily through the
mediation of translation activities.
Исходя из того, что влияние латинского языка на культурно-языковую панораму "славян" и других цивилизаций античности и раннего Средневековья было довольно существенным, мы предположили, что языки-посредники, как, например, греческий, по всей вероятности, могли уже содержать синтаксическо-стилистические образцы и лексемы латинского происхождения. Поэтому невозможно рассматривать все латинизмы, существующие в старославянских переводах, как исключительный результат переводческого процесса, связанного с областями, в которых были осуществлены переводы, как часто было предположено в исследованиях старославянского языка. В настоящем исследовании сопоставлены греческая версия Евангелия от Марка с латинской Вульгатой и старославянским переводом Евангелия (по изданиию Зогр. Ев.) с целью дальнейшего анализа лексических латинизмов и, в меньшей степени, оборотов (конструкций), возможного латинского происхождения, присущие в греческом тексте и повторяющиеся в старославянских переводах. Ключевые слова: латинизмы, Евангелие от Марка, старославянский язык. Введение Исследование соотношения греческого, латинского и старославянского языков (точнее, древнецерковнославянского, ввиду его функций) имеет большое значение в истории развития и точной реконструкции ранних стадий славянских языков. Прежде всего, оно способствует определению культурных связей народов, которые употребляли эти языки, а также
The lack of consistent introductory accounts of Ukrainian dialects in more accessible western European languages, with some fragmentary exceptions, represents a great limit to all those students of Slavic languages who wish to approach the fascinating world of geographical variation of contemporary Ukrainian.
A basic knowledge of Ukrainian dialects is likewise important to complete the theoretical and practical background of a Slavist, especially if focusing on Ukrainian, Russian and Belarusian.
It is also a valuable aid to a better understanding of diachronic and synchronic language processes, e.g. the Ukrainian-Russian mixed speech “Suržyk” as a few times underlined over the last decade.
The long-term absolute language contact, initially with the Italian dialects and later with Standard Italian, has caused considerable changes at grammar and lexical levels.
The task of this contribution consists in highlighting and discussing some part of the Molise-Croatian vocabulary of Romance origin that has direct correspondences with the Neapolitan “language” (dialect).
variation in Ukrainian Russian. We argue that the current sociolinguistic
situation in Ukraine, primarily marked by Ukrainian-Russian
bilingualism, is influencing the grammatical variation of this NDV in
formation. This aspect is particularly important, as the continuous
contact of Ukrainian with Russian is one of the factors determining the
emergence of morphosyntactic variables in the NDV of Russian in
Ukraine.
We base our analysis of morphosyntactic variation in U-Russian on
empirical data from a corpus of spontaneous Russian speech and a
corpus of Russian press of Ukraine. Our findings support the necessity to
differentiate U-Russian as a language variety with specific features on all
levels. Although phonetic and lexical features are the most salient, it is
possible to observe some trends in grammatical variation in this nondominant
variety in formation.
A correct interpretation of the historic-linguistic facts that led to the emergence of modern Ukrainian, e.g. the interaction of the dialectal substratum with the Ukrainian literary language(s), is also essential to appraise contemporary language variation and phenomena like Suržyk.
This article draws attention to the relationship existing between the formation of the ‘new’ Ukrainian literary language on its vernacular base and the role south-eastern dialects played in this crucial period. Specific dialectal features, typical of the Ukrainian literary works of the late 18th and beginning of the 19th centuries, are also examined.
У статті після оглядового параграфу, присвяченого біографії М. Коцюбинського та мотивам його перебування в Італії, проаналізовано вживання італізмів у таких відомих оповіданнях (нарисах), як «Сон», «Хвала Життю» та «На Острові», пов'язаних з італійською тематикою. Наш вибір мотивується тим, що італійська культура вразила автора і що саме в цих коротких творах очевидним є зв'язок між життєвим досвідом письменника й типовими італійськими реаліями. Водночас досліджено етимологію давно засвоєних італійських запозичень в українській мові, їх частотність та специфіку вживання.
В статье после обзорного параграфа, посвященного биографии Н. Коцюбинского и мотивам его пребывания в Италии, проанализировано употребление итальянизмов в таких известных рассказах (очерках), как: «Сон», «Хвала Жизни» и «На Острове», связанных с итальянской тематикой. Наш выбор мотивируется тем, что итальянская культура впечатлила автора и что именно в этих кратких произведениях есть очевидная связь между жизненным опытом писателя и типичными итальянскими реалиями. В то же время исследовано этимологию давно усвоенных итальянских заимствований, их частотность и специфику употребления.
In the article, after an initial overview of Kocjubyns'kyj's essential biography and the reasons of his sojourn in Italy, I analyzed the use of evident Italianisms in his works, concentrating on those short stories such as «Son», «Chvala Žyttju» and «Na Ostrovi». In these literary works devoted to Italian themes, the relation between the writer's life experience and some typical Italian realia is particularly evident. At the same time I also paid attention to the frequency and the context of usage of the most evident Italianisms without neglecting the etymology of those Italian loan-words which are already established in the Ukrainian lexicon.
The present study instead intends to provide a theoretical framework in which to evaluate the place Ukrainian occupies among other Slavic languages. To this end, the first part of the contribution reviews the crucial linguistic debates which took
place in the 19th and 20th centuries about the linguistic status to be attributed to the Ukrainian language within the Slavic family.
A description accounting for the most typical linguistic features of Ukrainian compared with other Slavic languages, particularly
East Slavic, follows. First, those historical traits commonly associated with East Slavic are dealt with, and then the distinctive features which make Ukrainian an autonomous language.
The second part of the research focuses on more recent comparative and typological classifications of Ukrainian, providing interesting food for thought for future
research.
The conclusive section discusses the relevance of turning to a typology of Ukrainian based on a lexical parameter, since this is the most distinctive language part of standard Ukrainian. This study, still in the preliminary stages, has in fact confirmed
that a classification of Ukrainian based on lexical criteria gives different outcomes than research based on phonetic, morphological or syntactic ones. The determination
of the real degree of genetic and typological affinity may in fact be strongly affected by the language levels analyzed and by the criteria selected for comparison, showing typological similarity either towards one or another language. For example,
although according to certain phonetic parameters, e.g. vocalism, lack of (or very limited) reduction, syllabic harmony, etc., Ukrainian tends to be closer to South Slavic, particularly to Serbian, lexically, a highly stylized variety of standard Ukrainian
tends to be closer to West Slavic, particularly Polish, rather than to Russian.
Overall the study confirmed that the language closest to Ukrainian is Belarusian, whichever parameters are used. This is followed, either by Polish and/or Russian, according
to the criteria selected.
in fact has to be assessed and separated from other factors, such as the Ukrainian variety of Russian, dialects, etc.
This approach has rarely been applied in previous
studies on the topic. The role played by current language ideology is a further essential aspect in establishing which language elements should be attributed to Ukrainian-Russian Suržyk. This undoubtedly affects the average speaker’s judgment about the degree of authenticity of Ukrainian forms. One can note a tendency to restrict the synonymic potential of Ukrainian in favor of lexemes and constructions that are dissimilar to Russian. This situation tends to alter the language consciousness of younger generations of Ukrainian speakers, who are likely to perceive as Russian (and therefore part of the Ukrainian-Russian mix) elements that are in fact authentic Ukrainian speech elements. These and other related aspects will be the object of my discussion.
світових і європейських соціополітичних умовах і, зокрема, в Україні. Дослідження мовних прав
має інтердисциплінарний характер і стосується ряду інших взаємопов’язаних галузей наук:
соціолінгвістики, мовної політики, термінології, етномовної демаркації простору, екології мови
тощо. У статті пропонуємо здійснювати аналіз мовних відношень в Україні в межах уже встановлених
міжнародних стандартів щодо мовних прав. Також проводитимуться паралелі з італійською мовною ситуацією
та з її досвідом у підході до міноритарних мов.
to the linguist and sociolinguist. Here, Russian has co-existed alongside
several ethnic-historical languages, as the main language of ‘interethnic’
and / or ‘intranational’ communication, until well after the dissolution of
the Soviet Union. Yet, after initial enthusiasm for the revival of national
languages, particularly active in the 1990s, a renewed awareness of the
functioning of Russian can be attested. There are multiple extra-linguistic
reasons for the attention paid to the current developments of Russian in
the different Euro-Asian states. Nonetheless the fundamental common feature
which characterize the new sociolinguistic panorama of the former
CIS states is that Russian, even where it preserves an official status, is less
subject to a Russian-Russian (Moscow) norm setting-centre than in the Soviet
period. Such a circumstance accelerates the process of breaking-up of a
‘unitary’, well standardized Russian, thus creating the conditions for the
forming of potential ‘national’ varieties of Russian-s (cf. Englishes). After an
outline of convergent and divergent processes in the formation of possible
non-dominant varieties of Russian, the case study will focus on the Russian
of Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan.
concept of "dialect" itself is not uniform across European linguistics /
dialectology. This is particularly evident in the study of Ukrainian, and,
more generally, in Russian and Belarusian dialectal tradition and
terminology.
If the term "dialect" already implies a series of debatable issues in
western European dialectal tradition, i.e. English, German, French, Italian
etc., its definition is even more complex in Ukrainian, Belarusian and
Russian. In these languages, in fact, it functions as a kind of hyperonym to
which minor dialectal units are hierarchically subordinated. Many of these
conceptual units remain misleading for the majority of readers approaching
Ukrainian dialectology for the first time.
For this reason, in this article, I will compare the essential
terminological apparatus of Ukrainian and, to a lesser extent, of Russian
and Belarusian dialectology with the English and other western European
dialectal traditions with the aim of providing a useful working framework
for the average European student of dialectology.
Specific studies on Italian lexical borrowings in Ukrainian, and more generally, on Ukrainian-Italian language contacts are scanty both in the Italian and, to a lesser extent, in the Ukrainian linguistic tradition. In the second (2004) and third editions (2007) of the “Encyclopedia of the Ukrainian language”, for example, there is no mention of Ukrainian-Italian language contacts. The few available contributions on this topic belong to Ukrainian and Polish linguists.
In this article, after an outline of the historical Italian loan-words, we characterize the recent trends which brought about the diffusion of a large number of Italianisms in Ukrainian, e.g. culinary sphere, commercial brands etc. In this connection it is important to underline that the Italian lexical element in Ukrainian is not only confined to the cultural field, (e.g. music, theatre, architecture etc.), as generally assumed, but it also affects other functional domains.
Italianisms are treated both etymologically and according to their functional parameters. The innovative aspect of this research, compared to a previous one, consists in providing a first quantitative calculation, still obtained with traditional methods, of the approximate amount of Italianisms in Ukrainian complemented by a more clear-cut description of their degree of orthographic and grammatical adaption to the Ukrainian system.