Ukrainian belongs to the family of Slavic languages, namely Eastern Slavic, being an Indo-European language. It’s official in Ukraine and at a regional level in Moldova (Transnistria). Ukrainian is spoken by about 40 million people all over the world, especially in significant immigrant communities in Canada, Brazil, the USA. and also in nearby countries such as Romania, Russia and Moldova. Along its history of non-recognition and bans, Ukrainian survived in the folklore and national identity to rank today at the 26th position in the world.
Origins
Ukrainian derives from the Old Slavic language, having developed from its eastern dialects. It’s a direct descendant of the Eastern Slavic language spoken in the Medieval area of Kievan Rus. Ukrainian suffered the strong impact of neighboring languages, most considerably Russian, Belarusian, Polish and Slovak.
Official Language
Ukrainian is the official language of Ukraine. It’s also official at a regional level in Transnistria, in Moldova. All through its history, the Ukrainian language has been non-recognized as official or banned, but today it’s spoken by about 40 million people. Ukrainian ethnic groups inhabit areas in Romania, Moldova, Russia, and significant immigrants' communities have been formed in the USA, Canada and Brazil.
Brief History
The Ukrainian language can be traced back to the times of Kievan Rus, which united Ukraine, Russia and Moldova into one state between the 9th and 13th Centuries. At that time, two languages co-existed, Old Church Slavic and Old Eastern Slavic, the second being popular among the people. Around the 13th Century, a large area of Kievan Russ including Moscow came to be dominated by the Tatars. Soon, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania was to include the area of today's Ukraine.
It’s though that a considerable differentiation between Russian and Ukrainian started around the end of the 16th Century, when the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was established. Then, Ukraine came under the domination of Poland, and the language suffered a considerable impact from Polish.
The first written documents of Ukrainian can be dated back to the 16th Century, but in fact there are many theories about the formation of the language and its definitive separation from Russian. It’s quite difficult to trace and prove the real one, as for several centuries, Ukrainian existed in two forms, written and spoken, which were quite different. Therefore, it’s hard to form an undisputable theory of the language’s history.
The most important period in the history of Ukrainian is the époque of the Soviet Union, when Russian was declared official and Ukrainian was banned. People kept it alive with folklore and by speaking it at home. After the collapse of the USSR and the Communist regime, the official status of Ukrainian was restored and regained its popularity as a symbol of national identity.
Did you know?
Ukrainian has no clear theory for its development, though it clearly derived from Eastern Slavic and is today close to both Russian and Polish. The Ukrainian language uses the Cyrillic alphabet, though a version of it which best suits its linguistic specifics. Ukrainian is spoken by almost 40 million people in the world, and ranks at the 26th position among world languages.