For Some Ukrainians, Russian Language Triggers Trauma Response

Putin claimed to have been protecting Russian-speakers in Ukraine from "genocide." Instead, they flock to Ukrainian-language classes and embrace multi-ethnic Ukrainian identity

Until a few years ago, it seemed normal to hear the Ukrainian and Russian languages used interchangeably in Ukraine. For example, a TV interviewer might pose a question in Ukrainian, the interviewee responds in Russian, and they understand each other, as in this May 2023 interview in Odesa https://www.youtube[.]com/watch?v=9_PDOk82Gr8&t=944s). No big deal, right?

However, as historian Timothy Snyder pointed out, the coexistence of two languages reflects the colonial relationship between Russia and Ukraine; the colonized population has to learn the colonizer’s language, but not vice versa. Ukrainians under the Russian and Soviet empires needed to become bilingual in order to advance their careers; Russians denigrated the Ukrainian language as an uncultured peasant dialect. Now, during open war, bilingualism gives Ukrainians an edge. They can understand the language of the Russian aggressors, but Russians cannot understand them when they speak Ukrainian. Bilingualism also gives Ukrainian…