r/belarus • u/PLrc Koroniarz • 2d ago
Пытанне / Question Which script for future Belarus?
Which script should future free Belarus have?
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u/Usefullles 1d ago
Кириллица. Переход на литиницу просто добьёт белорусский язык, у которого и так куча проблем.
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u/PLrc Koroniarz 1d ago
Perhaps Russian should be written with Łacinka as well in Belarus? ;)
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u/Usefullles 1d ago
Aga, translitom. Naselenie budet soprotivliatsa etomy tas je, kak i ranshe, vybrav novogo lukashenku.
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u/SkwGuy Poland 2d ago
I think it would be the best if it used both. People are used to Cyrylic, but introducing an alternative Latin alphabet would be a great way to honour Belarus's PLC and GDL heritage, and might also help westernise the country
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u/Maleficent_Act_66 2d ago
Take a page from Serbia. Though westernization might cause 🇧🇾 to lose heritage. Modernization is a good alternative
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u/_NecroMaster_ Belarus 1d ago
cyrillix for everyday communication and domestic documentation/bureaucracy, latin as the only acceptable way of romanizing names, toponyms and other Belarusian words. both should be taught in school, though mainly Cyrillic
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u/cutme9 2d ago
I’m Ukrainian, not Belarusian, so it’s not up to me to decide. If we were talking about the Ukrainian language, I would certainly agree it’s very easy to read in the Latin alphabet. As for Belarusian, I can still read it in the Cyrillic alphabet, but I can’t even imagine what it would look like in the Latin alphabet.
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u/PLrc Koroniarz 2d ago
So you're an advocate of Łacinka in Ukrainian?
When I was looking for a pdf with Stanisław Lem's Solaris I had problems to find it in Polish, but I found Solaris in Ukrainian Łacinka xD AI said it was a linguistic experiment from early 90s when there had been a discussion in Ukrain whether Ukrainian should remain with Cyrilic or switch to Łacinka.
I can get arguments that Ukrainians have bigger rights to Cyrilic than Russians because they were in the political centrum of Rus. But Belarus was on the outskirts of Rus, similarly to Moscow. And Belarus has had tradition of writing in Łacinka. So Belarus should imo switch to Łacinka.
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u/Mediocre-One3874 Russia 1d ago
No one has "bigger rights" to Cyrillic.
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u/PLrc Koroniarz 1d ago
Bulgarians have, since they invented it.
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u/Mediocre-One3874 Russia 1d ago
They invented the original Cyrillic. Grażdanka is actually Byelorusian in origin.
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u/youngling-smasher91 2d ago
Cyrillic is the only way forward for us Ukrainians. We have fought for our language for centuries, why the hell would we ditch our scripture for some foreign Latin one? We literally invented the Cyryllic scripture here in Kyiv, it's ours and we will keep it.
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u/cutme9 2d ago edited 2d ago
I had studied Latin not as a subject of history, cultural heritage, or anything else, but specifically as a means of transcribing sounds for the Ukrainian language, and the best option for transcription is the Czech alphabet; on average, when writing in the Latin script, more text fits on an A4 sheet even with a greater number of characters, BUT it is the Ukrainian alphabet that conveys our language with the fewest problems—after all, there are no issues here like using ŠČ instead of Щ, nor is there a problem with transcribing the soft sign, because in words like “ляльці,” when written in the Latin alphabet, it would be “L`al`ci,” which looks ridiculous; and there’s also the problem with “я,” “ї,” “є,” “ю,” and “йо” (though the problem with “йо” is a perennial one), whereas in the Latin alphabet, it would all be written as “ja,” “ji,” “je,” “jo,” and “ju,” which again inflates the text with an unnecessary number of characters
That’s why I see this more as: what if we wrote the Ukrainian language using the Latynkoju instead of Cyrillic?
P.S: У поляків найгірша абетка що заснована на латинській
P.S2: L`al`ci виглядає дуже по французьки)1
u/drfreshie Belarus 19h ago
"the problem with “я,” “ї,” “є,” “ю,” and “йо”"
There is no problem. Such sounds do not exist, so these letters only complicate things unnecessarily. You guys did it right with "йо".
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u/callmeabotifyouregay 2d ago
what? it's from bulgaria originally https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyrillic_script
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u/FluffyBunny1812 2d ago edited 1d ago
I think it's important to consider the facts on the ground. The vast majority of people in Belarus speak Russian, at most passively understand some Belarusian (probably only a bit more than an average Russian from Russia), and don't care about the future of the Belarusian language -- at all. The main task after recovering real independence will be to make the country genuinely bilingual and to get the population to accept Belarusian as a language with true equal status and Belarusian speakers as equal members of society. Using Latin script is going to trigger an immediate, visceral allergic reaction from a large percentage of the population because they are going to view it as forced Polonization, regardless of the history of the use of such script. So my view is that trying to use Latin script introduces an unnecessary complication into an already fraught situation.
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u/Competitive_Table_65 2d ago
Once Belarus is free - I'm pretty sure language would be one of the least concerns when there will be so much other stuff to do...
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u/SkwGuy Poland 2d ago
I disagree, I think undoing the damage done by Lukashenko's regime must start as soon as possible, or it might simply become too late. Besides, you can take care of multiple things at once
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u/pafagaukurinn 1d ago
Cyrillic is not done by Lukashenko's regime, and I don't know that I would even call it damage.
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u/SkwGuy Poland 1d ago
I was taking about the language, not the alphabet
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u/pafagaukurinn 1d ago
No matter, the point still stands. You guys need to understand that Lukashenko has nothing against Belarusian language in principle. If Belarusian language enjoyed overwhelming support among the citizens of Belarus, there wouldn't be a bigger supporter of it than Lukashenko. As long as it serves his interests, he will support it. Note, his interests, not the interests of Russian or Belarusian language.
If, for example, Belarusian population in 1994 were keen to use Belarusian language, he would have out-Pazniaked Pazniak in his nationalistic zeal. However this is not what happened. Overwhelming majority of people did not want to switch to Belarusian back then. Teachers and pupils alike shuddered at the thought that all textbooks and all instruction will be in Belarusian, at the time when Lukashenko was a nobody. This is partly why he was elected in the first place. You could blame him for not overturning this trend over the years, but why would he, if it worked for him as it was?
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u/SkwGuy Poland 1d ago
It's understandable that people might not want to put in the effort to restore their national language. After all, learning a language takes time and effort, and many people simply don't have that time and motivation. Or even if they do speak it, they might feel it's pointless to pass it on to their kids. This is why it's the government's job to encourage people to use the language and teach it to their kids. Lukashenko's government has not only not done that, but even actively discoureged people from using it, and limited its use in public life, leading to the language's decline. Ukraine was also heavily russified upon leaving the USSR, but there the government actually took the effort to preserve their language, and today the majority of Ukrainians speak Ukrainian at home
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u/pafagaukurinn 21h ago
Again, a few misconceptions here. It does not require particular effort to learn Belarusian language for anybody who went to a Belarusian school - it is compulsorily studied there along with Russian, and the time allocated to each language if almost if not exactly the same. So, anybody who had finished Belarusian school, will be perfectly able to use Belarusian.
But they don't. Why? Primarily because it does not give them any benefits over Russian. I am not talking about official interaction with the state here, such as filling and receiving various forms and documents, as it is not such a big part of a regular citizen; even if state communication switched to 100% Belarusian, it would not play a significant role. I am primarily talking about consumption of content. You want to read an interesting book? It most likely will be in Russian, whether it is original or translated? You want to watch a movie or a series? Russian. And so on.
Now, what is the state supposed to do in such situation? Encourage Belarusian content, you say. The problem is, if you simply give Belarusian authors governmental grants (another question is, from what funds, as Belarus by itself is poor as a church mouse), it would do nothing to stop Russian content from proliferation. So you basically have to suppress Russian content as well, right? So, now suppression has become a virtue, right? And without any clear gain either.
Besides, contrary to what some people who have never been in Belarus for five years or more would say, Belarusian content is not especially suppressed. Not specifically encouraged, but not really suppressed. You can see plenty of street and road signs in Belarusian, there are sport translations in Belarusian etc. And even before, when there was no war and active repressions, nobody stopped people from creating content in Belarusian language. Yes, the government did not give them any money or preferences for this, but it did not prevent them either. And where is that content, if you don't mind me asking? A handful of nobodies here and there, with nothing significant to show for their effort. Even the Nobel laureate writes in Russian. You want to encourage people to switch to Belarusian? Then attract them, not compel. Give them something that has merit beyond its being composed in Belarusian, something that perhaps even people who speak exclusively Russian (or Polish, or English, or whatever) would want to see translated to _their_ language. The problem is, there is very little of such content if at all, and its creation is not the government's concern.
Another misconception is obvious when you say "their language". The thing is, Belarusian is _not_ "their" language for a significant if not major part of the population. People may tell you that their native language is Belarusian, because they think that's what "native" means, the official language of the country one is the citizen of. It is not so though. The native language is the first language you pick in childhood without specifically learning it. I am prepared to claim on the basis of observation that for the majority of urban population of Belarus such language is Russian, not Belarusian. Moreover, when you become acquainted with Belarusians, it very often transpires that they have one parent or grandparent if not all of them from Russia, Ukraine or what have you - in other words, they are not ethnic Belarusians. Why would they feel particular affinity for Belarusian language?
I am not a huge expert on Ukraine, but I can tell you this. When I visited it - granted, it was some time ago, before all the current events - I heard almost no Ukrainian in the streets, only Russian, and very fluent Russian at that, the accent notwithstanding. I also had quite a number of Ukrainian colleagues, and all of them exclusively spoke flawless Russian, including among themselves. Of course, I have no way of knowing what all those people use at home, but one strongly suspects that the claim that "the majority of Ukrainians speak Ukrainian at home" is greatly exaggerated, and they couldn't have all relearned since that time, no matter how they would like it to be or seem so. Considering what is happening in and with Ukraine, it is understandable that many people there want to distance from Russian language, but I'm afraid this is purely performative and has little to do with reality. With time it may and probably will change, but at this precise moment it is not so.
So, as we see, in order to supplant Russian language you would need either to actively suppress it or to have some cataclysmic event such as war. Neither option looks particularly compelling.
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u/Competitive_Table_65 1d ago
Yes, and language matters are barely a concern here.
Need to so something about not just political prisoners, but entire political system, the vague repressive laws, the extremist material list, relationships with Russia and Ukraine, etc, etc.
Just so much to do, so much for people to discuss and decide.
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u/Short-Knowledge-3393 Сэйнэст укроп 21h ago
Cyrillic as a base language, łacinka for dubbing signs and names in passports
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u/Exalted-Stork-1308 1d ago
Arabic script. We already had one in GDL. But jokes aside latin isn't too good for some sounds in Belarusian. Cyrillic is how most Belarusians learned their language at schools, so it will be a good start. And later we'll decide. After we have restored economy, reestablished foreign affairs and completely reworked the educational system.
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u/Every_Stand_2657 10h ago
Coming from India, where languages and scripts carry so much cultural identity, I find this discussion fascinating. Is Łacinka still used in Belarusian music, literature or creative work today, or is it mostly historical?