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Surzhyk
Surzhyk (Ukrainian and Russian: суржик, Ukrainian pronunciation: [ˈsurʒek], Russian pronunciation: [ˈsurʐɨk]) is a mixture between Ukrainian and Russian languages, used in certain regions of Ukraine and the neighboring regions of Russia and Moldova.
The vocabulary mix of each of its constituent languages (Ukrainian and Russian) varies greatly from locality to locality, or sometimes even from person to person, depending on the degree of education, personal experience, rural or urban residence, the geographical origin of the interlocutors, etc. The percentage of Russian words and phonetic influences tends to be greatest in the east and south and in the vicinity of big Russian-speaking cities. It is commonly spoken in most of eastern Ukraine's rural areas, with the exception of the large metropolitan areas of Donetsk, Kharkiv, and Luhansk, where the majority of the population uses standard Russian. In rural areas of western Ukraine, the language spoken contains fewer Russian elements than in central and eastern Ukraine but has nonetheless been influenced by Russian.[citation needed]
The Ukrainian word surzhyk (from Proto-Slavic *sǫ — «with» + *rъžь — «rye») — originally referred to a mix of different grains that includes rye or a product like flour or bread made from such a mix. Another possible origin is that it is a shortened, colloquialized version of the word "surrogate" i.e. surrogate of Ukrainian and Russian.[citation needed]
According to Bilaniuk (2005), "Any perceived mixing of different languages may merit the label ["surzhyk"], and perceptions vary depending on individuals' linguistic backgrounds. The term can refer to a high degree of code-switching by bilinguals or to a linguistic code in which the elements of the two languages are inextricably fused. Thus the definition of "surzhyk" as a whole remains primarily ideological, although we can list the influences and forms that fall under this umbrella term". She distinguished five categories of surzhyk:
The first three forms represented the introduction of Russian elements on a Ukrainian base (the first two originally mostly involving 19th-century rural Ukrainians inside Imperial Russia), while in the last two forms, the mixing of languages went both ways, with the post-independence surzhyk (or "reverse surzhyk") mostly representing urban native Russian speakers trying to acquire better Ukrainian language proficiency in independent Ukraine.
More generally, "surzhyk" can refer to any mixed language, not necessarily including Ukrainian or Russian. For example, colloquial Ukrainian which is spoken in western Ukraine is often called incorrectly a Polish-Ukrainian surzhyk due to its loanwords which don't occur in standard Ukrainian,[citation needed] while in Moldova one may hear the Russian-Romanian pidgin.[citation needed] When used by non-Ukrainian speaking people of Ukraine, the word is most commonly used to refer to a mix of Ukrainian with another language, not necessarily Russian. When used in Russia, the word almost always specifically refers to a Ukrainian-Russian language mix. It differs from both Ukrainian and spoken "Ukrainian Russian", although it is impossible to draw a clear line between them and surzhyk.[citation needed]
According to data presented by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology in 2003, 11% to 18% of the people of Ukraine were found to communicate in Surzhyk. Specifically, in western Ukraine, Surzhyk is spoken by 2.5% of the population, while in the south, it is spoken by over 12.4% of the population. In the east, 9.6% of the population speaks Surzhyk. As Western Ukraine has a higher ratio of Ukrainian speakers to Russian speakers than the rest of Ukraine, the lesser proportion of Surzhyk speakers compared with the east and south is understandable.
One problem in analysing the linguistic status of Ukraine is that there is a tendency for code-switching errors to exist across the entire spectrum of languages. In other words, those who identify themselves as Russian-speaking or Ukrainian-speaking can often be found blending the two languages to some degree. Only a few of these individuals were found to acknowledge the non-standardness of the use of either or both languages, or the fact that they were actually blending Russian and Ukrainian in their speech at all.
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Surzhyk
Surzhyk (Ukrainian and Russian: суржик, Ukrainian pronunciation: [ˈsurʒek], Russian pronunciation: [ˈsurʐɨk]) is a mixture between Ukrainian and Russian languages, used in certain regions of Ukraine and the neighboring regions of Russia and Moldova.
The vocabulary mix of each of its constituent languages (Ukrainian and Russian) varies greatly from locality to locality, or sometimes even from person to person, depending on the degree of education, personal experience, rural or urban residence, the geographical origin of the interlocutors, etc. The percentage of Russian words and phonetic influences tends to be greatest in the east and south and in the vicinity of big Russian-speaking cities. It is commonly spoken in most of eastern Ukraine's rural areas, with the exception of the large metropolitan areas of Donetsk, Kharkiv, and Luhansk, where the majority of the population uses standard Russian. In rural areas of western Ukraine, the language spoken contains fewer Russian elements than in central and eastern Ukraine but has nonetheless been influenced by Russian.[citation needed]
The Ukrainian word surzhyk (from Proto-Slavic *sǫ — «with» + *rъžь — «rye») — originally referred to a mix of different grains that includes rye or a product like flour or bread made from such a mix. Another possible origin is that it is a shortened, colloquialized version of the word "surrogate" i.e. surrogate of Ukrainian and Russian.[citation needed]
According to Bilaniuk (2005), "Any perceived mixing of different languages may merit the label ["surzhyk"], and perceptions vary depending on individuals' linguistic backgrounds. The term can refer to a high degree of code-switching by bilinguals or to a linguistic code in which the elements of the two languages are inextricably fused. Thus the definition of "surzhyk" as a whole remains primarily ideological, although we can list the influences and forms that fall under this umbrella term". She distinguished five categories of surzhyk:
The first three forms represented the introduction of Russian elements on a Ukrainian base (the first two originally mostly involving 19th-century rural Ukrainians inside Imperial Russia), while in the last two forms, the mixing of languages went both ways, with the post-independence surzhyk (or "reverse surzhyk") mostly representing urban native Russian speakers trying to acquire better Ukrainian language proficiency in independent Ukraine.
More generally, "surzhyk" can refer to any mixed language, not necessarily including Ukrainian or Russian. For example, colloquial Ukrainian which is spoken in western Ukraine is often called incorrectly a Polish-Ukrainian surzhyk due to its loanwords which don't occur in standard Ukrainian,[citation needed] while in Moldova one may hear the Russian-Romanian pidgin.[citation needed] When used by non-Ukrainian speaking people of Ukraine, the word is most commonly used to refer to a mix of Ukrainian with another language, not necessarily Russian. When used in Russia, the word almost always specifically refers to a Ukrainian-Russian language mix. It differs from both Ukrainian and spoken "Ukrainian Russian", although it is impossible to draw a clear line between them and surzhyk.[citation needed]
According to data presented by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology in 2003, 11% to 18% of the people of Ukraine were found to communicate in Surzhyk. Specifically, in western Ukraine, Surzhyk is spoken by 2.5% of the population, while in the south, it is spoken by over 12.4% of the population. In the east, 9.6% of the population speaks Surzhyk. As Western Ukraine has a higher ratio of Ukrainian speakers to Russian speakers than the rest of Ukraine, the lesser proportion of Surzhyk speakers compared with the east and south is understandable.
One problem in analysing the linguistic status of Ukraine is that there is a tendency for code-switching errors to exist across the entire spectrum of languages. In other words, those who identify themselves as Russian-speaking or Ukrainian-speaking can often be found blending the two languages to some degree. Only a few of these individuals were found to acknowledge the non-standardness of the use of either or both languages, or the fact that they were actually blending Russian and Ukrainian in their speech at all.