Spoken Resistance: Language Policy in Wartime Ukraine

• In Event: The Transformation of Language and Nation in Wartime Ukraine

Abstract

Language policy has long figured as a fraught issue in Ukrainian public discourse, and has gained evermore resonance since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022. Successive legislative efforts to secure the prominence of the Ukrainian language have attracted much scrutiny – including the 2019 Law on State Language, which removed the teaching of Russian in high schools and onward, spurred by concern about the rights of minority language speakers. In the aftermath of the full-scale invasion in 2022, the Ukrainian parliament also passed laws imposing restrictions on Russian books, music, and media, reflecting widespread acknowledgement in the country of the threats posed by the “language of the oppressor” and the need to preserve and weaponize Ukrainian as a language of resistance.Yet many international observers stress that longstanding repression of the Ukrainian language does not justify the marginalization of minority languages. Indeed, the issue of national minority legislation is among the seven priority reforms outlined by the European Commission in its offer of candidate status for Ukraine’s path to EU accession. How are these expectations perceived and discussed among domestic actors, and how are they weighed in relation to the existential pressures that wartime produces? What developments have emerged since amendments were made to Ukraine’s national minority law in late 2023? Finally, how do colonial legacies impact the approach of domestic actors to diversity governance in Ukraine, and how has the potency of these legacies evolved since the start of the war in 2014?

Author

• Anastasia Leshchyshyn, McGill U (Canada)