Ukrainian Language Day, 9 November 2009
A day for writing as well as speech, and for the people who made the alphabet legible.
The full name of the day includes writing, and that is not decoration. Standard spelling, grammar and terminology are somebody's work, done over decades by people whose names are known mostly to specialists.
A language with a settled written standard can carry a legal code, a textbook and a technical manual. One without has to borrow, and what it borrows brings its own habits.
I am a foreigner and I use this standard every time I sign something here, which is a debt I had not thought about until I tried to write in it.
Happy Ukrainian Language and Writing Day.
Share this analysis
Comments