6 ms·

Like Kazakhstan, which decided to switch from Cyrillic to the Latin alphabet [1] in order to align more with Europe and less with Russia. I wonder if Ukraine w

by reddalo 3mo ago

Like Kazakhstan, which decided to switch from Cyrillic to the Latin alphabet [1] in order to align more with Europe and less with Russia. I wonder if Ukraine will do the same in a distant future... [1] https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20180424-the-cost-of-changing-an-entire-countrys-alphabet https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20180424-the-cost-of-ch...

cynicalsecurity 3mo ago
Ukraine absolutely must ditch Cyrillic alphabet, after the war. There will be plenty of things to change.
- jagaerglad 3mo ago
  I sometimes hear the same in my circles about Persian ditching the perso-arabic script. I don't get it, why can't you align a country however you like without creating a huge rift between a big population and years of literature, material etc etc? One can learn multiple scripts and almost all literate people know the latin script globally nowadays. Besides, sad to see the whole world just use the latin script in the end but that's not the point
  - toast0 3mo ago
    Sharing a writing system helps with communication across cultures, even when there isn't a shared language. > One can learn multiple scripts and almost all literate people know the latin script globally nowadays. If almost all literate people know the latin script, there's a benefit to writing your language in it. Of course, the switching cost is high.
    - jagaerglad 3mo ago
      Language in the scope of a cultural phenomenon is something way beyond just cost or efficiency in communication thats way wi dont rayt English veri efishent ither
    - oneshtein 3mo ago
      Latin script creates lot of confusion in mixed environments. For example, even native speakers of English language, major language of the world, have no clue how to read aloud random texts written using Latin alphabet.
      - toast0 3mo ago
        Certainly, I don't expect the average English only speaker to be able to properly pronounce Gaelic, Polish, or Vietnamese words, or frankly even obscure English words by sight. The results are likely much better than random texts using cyrillic, greek, arabic, hangul, etc. Otoh, If they're typists, I expect they can likely type them into a search, probably sans diacritics, but that's likely good enough for searching or looking through a translation dictionary. Greek and Cyrillic may share enough symbols that a latin script user can make due with an onscreen keyboard or a dictionary with great effort. But a completely different script would need even more effort.
  - xdennis 3mo ago
    Probably because Persian is an Indo-European language, and alphabets are better than abjads (alphabet without vowels) for it. Semitic languages are easy to write without vowels because the meaning is very obvious even if you omit the vowels, but in many languages you have a great deal of collisions if you omit vowels. It's the same reason Chinese characters are a poor fit for Korean and Japanese. Chinese is not an inflected language so one symbol for a word works quite nicely, but other languages need a way to add prefixes and suffixes to works.
    - jagaerglad 3mo ago
      You are entirely free to put vowel diacritics when writing with the perso-arabic script and it's done in children's books. By that logic Vietnamese shouldn't be written with the latin script since it's sino-tibetian Also, middle persian had a native abjad [1]. (As well as a derived alphabet [2]) 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pahlavi_scripts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pahlavi_scripts 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avestan_alphabet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avestan_alphabet
  - jmalicki 3mo ago
    > without creating a huge rift between a big population and years of literature, material etc etc Sometimes, that is the point.
  - woozlewuzzle 3mo ago
    Out of curiosity, what's the proposed replacement script?
    - jagaerglad 3mo ago
      mostly latin with a sprinkle of proposals to revive the avestan alphabet or middle persian script. I wouldn't say it's a huge debate at all in general though
- reddalo 3mo ago
  Yes. They have to change a lot of things to better align with Europe, especially if they join the EU. They're already working on moving to the European train gauge, they set Christmas to December 25th, etc. but there's still a long way to go.
  - demetrius 3mo ago
    Cyrillic didn't prevent Bulgaria from joining EU, why should it be a problem for Ukraine?
    - reddalo 3mo ago
      Cyrillic is not a problem for joining the EU. But adopting Latin script would help Ukraine "move away" from Russia even more.
      - oneshtein 3mo ago
        Ukraine is the Russia (882-1237), Russian Empire and Russian Federation are Russian. It's like to say that Britain must adopt Cyrillic to move away from USA because they both use English language. :-/
        demetrius 3mo ago
        > Ukraine is the Russia (882-1237) Only in the world where Britain is in France. Ukraine traces its lineage to Ruthenia (Русь), not to Russia (Росія). These words are related etymologically, but so are Brittany and Britain, or Cornouaille and Cornwall. You can’t just treat Ruthenia and Russia as the same thing — just like you can’t treat Brittany and Britain as the same thing.
        oneshtein 3mo ago
        Quote: > During its existence, Kievan Rus' was known as rusĭskaja zemlja, translated as the "land of Rus'",[21] or the "Rus' land" (Old East Slavic: роу́сьскаꙗ землꙗ́), with Rus' being derived from the ethnonym Роусь, Rusĭ (Medieval Greek: Ῥῶς, romanized: Rhos; Arabic: الروس, romanized: ar-Rūs), in Greek as Ῥωσία, Rhosia, in Old French as Russie, Rossie, in Latin as Rusia or Russia (with local German spelling variants Ruscia and Ruzzia), and from the 12th century also as Ruthenia or Rutenia.[22][23] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kievan_Rus%27 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kievan_Rus%27
- Yizahi 3mo ago
  As a Ukrainian learning Polish right now - absolutely not. Until any scientist actually proves with numbers that latinization of a Slavic language script provides ANY benefit AT ALL, let alone outweighing the negatives of conversion. If I had to guess the purported benefits of such switch are a pure fantasy and an urban myth repeated by people without any basis in reality.
xdennis 3mo ago
Curiously enough, Romanian, though a Romance language, was also spelt with the Cyrillic alphabet. Probably because we were under the Bulgarian empire (the ones who invented Cyrillic). In the 1800s when we switched to Latin, it didn't happen abruptly, there were several intermediary alphabets which mixed Latin an Cyrillic[1]. Example: ши се варсъ (Cyrillic) шi se вapsъ (transition alphabet) și se varsă (Latin) ʃi se varsə (IPA for reference) When Russia annexed eastern Moldova, it forced them to switch back to Cyrillic, but with a monstrous alphabet derived from Russian instead of the old Romanian alphabet. The Russians forced Romanians to use this: ши се варсэ [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_transitional_alphabet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_transitional_alphabet
pndy 3mo ago
Somehow related: there's browser extension called "Ukraïnsjka Latynka" [1] that transliterates on the fly Cyrillic script to Latin using various systems. It's quite helpful (especially nowadays) for someone who never had chance to familiarize with that script. [1] - https://paiv.github.io/latynka/en/ https://paiv.github.io/latynka/en/
brachkow 3mo ago
Kazakhstan decided to do so, but Poland always had Latin alphabet. Ukraine always had Cyrillic alphabet. There is no way, they will reject their culture just to punish foe. Also Cyrillics is tied to orthodox Christianity which has very big role in Ukraine. In that context is more interesting that way more pro-russian Belarus, has some use of Latin (mostly in geographical standards) based on Latin variant, heavily inspired by Polish language. By the way, parent of Belarusian and Ukrainian, the Ruthenian language (not related to Russian, Ruthenian was the second language of PLC), has a lot of alphabets including Latin and Arabics. First was caused by spread of Polish language, and second by large number of Tatar Muslims settled there.

by reddalo 3mo ago

cynicalsecurity 3mo ago

Ukraine absolutely must ditch Cyrillic alphabet, after the war. There will be plenty of things to change.

jagaerglad 3mo ago
I sometimes hear the same in my circles about Persian ditching the perso-arabic script. I don't get it, why can't you align a country however you like without creating a huge rift between a big population and years of literature, material etc etc? One can learn multiple scripts and almost all literate people know the latin script globally nowadays. Besides, sad to see the whole world just use the latin script in the end but that's not the point
- toast0 3mo ago
  Sharing a writing system helps with communication across cultures, even when there isn't a shared language. > One can learn multiple scripts and almost all literate people know the latin script globally nowadays. If almost all literate people know the latin script, there's a benefit to writing your language in it. Of course, the switching cost is high.
  - jagaerglad 3mo ago
    Language in the scope of a cultural phenomenon is something way beyond just cost or efficiency in communication thats way wi dont rayt English veri efishent ither
  - oneshtein 3mo ago
    Latin script creates lot of confusion in mixed environments. For example, even native speakers of English language, major language of the world, have no clue how to read aloud random texts written using Latin alphabet.
    - toast0 3mo ago
      Certainly, I don't expect the average English only speaker to be able to properly pronounce Gaelic, Polish, or Vietnamese words, or frankly even obscure English words by sight. The results are likely much better than random texts using cyrillic, greek, arabic, hangul, etc. Otoh, If they're typists, I expect they can likely type them into a search, probably sans diacritics, but that's likely good enough for searching or looking through a translation dictionary. Greek and Cyrillic may share enough symbols that a latin script user can make due with an onscreen keyboard or a dictionary with great effort. But a completely different script would need even more effort.
- xdennis 3mo ago
  Probably because Persian is an Indo-European language, and alphabets are better than abjads (alphabet without vowels) for it. Semitic languages are easy to write without vowels because the meaning is very obvious even if you omit the vowels, but in many languages you have a great deal of collisions if you omit vowels. It's the same reason Chinese characters are a poor fit for Korean and Japanese. Chinese is not an inflected language so one symbol for a word works quite nicely, but other languages need a way to add prefixes and suffixes to works.
  - jagaerglad 3mo ago
    You are entirely free to put vowel diacritics when writing with the perso-arabic script and it's done in children's books. By that logic Vietnamese shouldn't be written with the latin script since it's sino-tibetian Also, middle persian had a native abjad [1]. (As well as a derived alphabet [2]) 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pahlavi_scripts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pahlavi_scripts 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avestan_alphabet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avestan_alphabet
- jmalicki 3mo ago
  > without creating a huge rift between a big population and years of literature, material etc etc Sometimes, that is the point.
- woozlewuzzle 3mo ago
  Out of curiosity, what's the proposed replacement script?
  - jagaerglad 3mo ago
    mostly latin with a sprinkle of proposals to revive the avestan alphabet or middle persian script. I wouldn't say it's a huge debate at all in general though
reddalo 3mo ago
Yes. They have to change a lot of things to better align with Europe, especially if they join the EU. They're already working on moving to the European train gauge, they set Christmas to December 25th, etc. but there's still a long way to go.
- demetrius 3mo ago
  Cyrillic didn't prevent Bulgaria from joining EU, why should it be a problem for Ukraine?
  - reddalo 3mo ago
    Cyrillic is not a problem for joining the EU. But adopting Latin script would help Ukraine "move away" from Russia even more.
    - oneshtein 3mo ago
      Ukraine is the Russia (882-1237), Russian Empire and Russian Federation are Russian. It's like to say that Britain must adopt Cyrillic to move away from USA because they both use English language. :-/
      - demetrius 3mo ago
        > Ukraine is the Russia (882-1237) Only in the world where Britain is in France. Ukraine traces its lineage to Ruthenia (Русь), not to Russia (Росія). These words are related etymologically, but so are Brittany and Britain, or Cornouaille and Cornwall. You can’t just treat Ruthenia and Russia as the same thing — just like you can’t treat Brittany and Britain as the same thing.
        oneshtein 3mo ago
        Quote: > During its existence, Kievan Rus' was known as rusĭskaja zemlja, translated as the "land of Rus'",[21] or the "Rus' land" (Old East Slavic: роу́сьскаꙗ землꙗ́), with Rus' being derived from the ethnonym Роусь, Rusĭ (Medieval Greek: Ῥῶς, romanized: Rhos; Arabic: الروس, romanized: ar-Rūs), in Greek as Ῥωσία, Rhosia, in Old French as Russie, Rossie, in Latin as Rusia or Russia (with local German spelling variants Ruscia and Ruzzia), and from the 12th century also as Ruthenia or Rutenia.[22][23] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kievan_Rus%27 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kievan_Rus%27
Yizahi 3mo ago
As a Ukrainian learning Polish right now - absolutely not. Until any scientist actually proves with numbers that latinization of a Slavic language script provides ANY benefit AT ALL, let alone outweighing the negatives of conversion. If I had to guess the purported benefits of such switch are a pure fantasy and an urban myth repeated by people without any basis in reality.

xdennis 3mo ago

Curiously enough, Romanian, though a Romance language, was also spelt with the Cyrillic alphabet. Probably because we were under the Bulgarian empire (the ones who invented Cyrillic). In the 1800s when we switched to Latin, it didn't happen abruptly, there were several intermediary alphabets which mixed Latin an Cyrillic[1]. Example: ши се варсъ (Cyrillic) шi se вapsъ (transition alphabet) și se varsă (Latin) ʃi se varsə (IPA for reference) When Russia annexed eastern Moldova, it forced them to switch back to Cyrillic, but with a monstrous alphabet derived from Russian instead of the old Romanian alphabet. The Russians forced Romanians to use this: ши се варсэ [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_transitional_alphabet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_transitional_alphabet

pndy 3mo ago

Somehow related: there's browser extension called "Ukraïnsjka Latynka" [1] that transliterates on the fly Cyrillic script to Latin using various systems. It's quite helpful (especially nowadays) for someone who never had chance to familiarize with that script. [1] - https://paiv.github.io/latynka/en/ https://paiv.github.io/latynka/en/

brachkow 3mo ago

Kazakhstan decided to do so, but Poland always had Latin alphabet. Ukraine always had Cyrillic alphabet. There is no way, they will reject their culture just to punish foe. Also Cyrillics is tied to orthodox Christianity which has very big role in Ukraine. In that context is more interesting that way more pro-russian Belarus, has some use of Latin (mostly in geographical standards) based on Latin variant, heavily inspired by Polish language. By the way, parent of Belarusian and Ukrainian, the Ruthenian language (not related to Russian, Ruthenian was the second language of PLC), has a lot of alphabets including Latin and Arabics. First was caused by spread of Polish language, and second by large number of Tatar Muslims settled there.