"And we will save you, the Russian language, the great Russian word…" - these are the words of the poetess Anna Akhmatova, which have not lost their relevance for several decades. The prosperity of the national culture directly depends on the attitude of the people to their history. The Russian language has come a long way of development. Today, when thinking about the international significance of the Russian language, it is enough to look at the statistics. More than 250 million speakers from all over the world - the figure is more than impressive.
Temporal boundaries of the concept of "modern Russian language"
Speaking of the modernity of a phenomenon, it is fair to reflect on when this modernity begins. Philologists have expressed three points of view on the concept of "modern Russian language". So, it starts:
- Since the time of A. S. Pushkin. The great Russian poet, according to researchers, gave Russia a variant of the literary Russian language, which everyone still uses today, even despite the presence of historicisms andarchaisms.
- After the victory of the October Revolution. Until 1917, the alphabet and writing features in Russian differed significantly from the current ones. A vivid example of this is the letter "erъ" ("ъ") at the end of some words, which is now called a hard sign.
- After the collapse of the USSR. In the last two decades, the Russian language has begun to change, which is explained by the rapidity of technological progress. International contacts also contributed to this - the vocabulary of one country was used in another. The significance of the modern Russian language is great for the world community, so linguists are making every effort to develop it.
Distribution in the world
The Russian language has become native for many people living in Russia, in the CIS countries and abroad, and takes eighth place in this aspect. In terms of the number of speakers, he entered the top five most common: 260 million people can freely think and express themselves on it. It is second only to English (1.5 billion), Chinese (1.4 billion), Hindi (600 million), Spanish (500 million) and Arabic (350 million). The visual map demonstrates the international significance of the Russian language, as it is spoken in Eastern Europe, the B altics and the Transcaucasus, Finland, Germany, China, Mongolia, the USA and Australia. In Russia, 99.5% of the total population owns it. This is a fairly convincing figure compared to other states.
Russian language in regions
The reason for the formation of dialects and sociolects is often a large area of distribution of one or another dialect. So, on the basis of Russian, the following mixed and derived languages arose: Surzhik (Ukraine), Trasyanka (Belarus), Russenorsk (Kola Peninsula) and many others. Dialects are typical for small territories. Vocabulary may differ significantly in different localities.
Abroad (Germany, USA, Israel) entire Russian-speaking neighborhoods are being formed, some of which exist quite isolated from the rest. This happens when the number of immigrants from Russia becomes sufficient to form a kind of community. Thanks to this, the interest of foreign citizens in the culture of the CIS countries is growing. The importance of the Russian language in the lives of Germans, Americans, and British is growing significantly.
Memorial Day
Under the initiative of UNESCO, humanity has been given the opportunity to preserve the tangible and intangible heritage of many peoples. So, every year on February 21, International Mother Language Day is celebrated for five years. It is events like this that allow you to think about the significance of the heritage of your own people and the merits on the world stage.
For Russians, the birthday of Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin became closer 5 years ago, when June 6 was proclaimed the Day of the Russian Language. This is due to the invaluable contribution of the writer to the development of culture. The international significance of the Russian language is recognized in many fraternal states, so this day is celebrated in schools and universities of the countriesCIS. In the building of the UN General Assembly, the celebration is accompanied by informative lectures, movie screenings, and reading contests.
Russian language in international cooperation
It is currently becoming difficult to find a single means of communication for 250 countries. Every citizen respects the cultural heritage of his state and prefers to speak exclusively in his own language. For the world community, this difficulty was eradicated with the approval of the so-called world languages, which include Russian. Today it is a means of communication on television, airlines, in trade. Of course, the great importance of the Russian language is due to the fact that it is spoken by millions of people from different points around the world. Every intelligent person would be honored to quote the great thoughts of Mikhail Vasilyevich Lomonosov, Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin, Leo Tolstoy and other leading writers of Russia.
The international meaning of the Russian language in numbers
There are about 2,000 nationalities in the world, each of which seeks to use their native speech in everyday life. For many people, Russian has become the second most important language for several reasons. After the collapse of the USSR, the inhabitants of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine and the Republic of Belarus did not abandon the Russian language as the official language, therefore, numerous television and radio broadcasts and negotiations are conducted in it. In the areas of international communication, it is used by scientists,diplomats, politicians.
Russian, along with English, French, Chinese, Arabic and Spanish, is one of the six official languages of the UN. This means that politicians from Russia have the opportunity to freely express their thoughts at international conferences. The global importance of the Russian language in the world is also explained by the fact that it ranks fifth in terms of the number of people who speak it.
Russian lexicography
Words of any dialect are recorded in dictionaries, which are built taking into account their use by foreign citizens. The significance of the Russian language in the world is so great that people of all countries enthusiastically learn all its subtleties, learn the meaning of new words and expressions from dictionaries, which can be divided into encyclopedic and linguistic ones. The most important are explanatory dictionaries, the first of which was published at the end of the 18th century in six volumes. Of course, from year to year such publications are updated. Of great value is the dictionary of the living Great Russian language, the first version of which was published in 1863, and in 2013 a school one-volume book was published. Thinking about the meaning of the Russian language, it is worth paying attention to the works of linguists, thanks to which the language improves and flourishes. Multi-volume dictionaries allow both native Russian citizens and foreigners to study all the features of phonetics and orthoepy.
