What does Latin and Cyrillic mean. Fighting Cyrillic and Latin

25.12.2019

Cyrillic or Latin?

Cyrillic or Latin?

Until recently it seemed that throughout the USSR the question of the alphabet system had been finally resolved. From the 40s to the end of the 80s, everything was stable. Most languages \u200b\u200bused the Cyrillic alphabet, only in Georgia and Armenia they used their traditional alphabets, and in the Baltic republics they wrote in Latin. But the events of the last decade and a half have changed a lot. And now in Moldova, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan announced the transition to the Latin alphabet, in Tatarstan more and more demand for such a transition; and even for the Russian language, they begin to propose to abandon the Cyrillic alphabet and switch to the Latin alphabet. What's the matter here? To do this, you need to understand what the choice of writing system depends on.

IN modern world new writing systems are no longer being created. The "youngest" script in use today - Korean - appeared in the 15th century. We can only talk about using one of the existing writing systems for any language. If the language already has a written language, then the choice is made between preserving the old writing and switching to some other one.

What influences this choice? Four factors can be distinguished: linguistic, economic, psychological and political and cultural.

The least significant of these is the linguistic factor. Of course, there may be scripts adapted to some languages \u200b\u200band not adapted to others. However, it is often possible to somehow modify such writing. For example, traditional Arabic writing does not denote vowel sounds. This makes some sense for Arabic, but very inconvenient for Turkic languages. However, the outstanding Kazakh educator Akhmet Baitursunov found a very ingenious way to convey vowels in the Kazakh alphabet he created on the Arabic basis, after which similar alphabets were made for other Turkic languages. If they have not caught on, then not for linguistic reasons.

Often, however, they say and write that it seems that Latin is more suitable for some languages \u200b\u200bthan Cyrillic (in the 30s, the opposite was written for the same languages). Sometimes they go further. Famous ethnographer, corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences S.A. Arutyunov stated that the Cyrillic alphabet is "archaic" and has "many shortcomings" for any language, including Russian. He writes: “For example, such graphemes as I and yu are syllable graphemes and absolutely do not reflect phonemes,” citing the word uncle1 as an example. This is linguistically completely illiterate. The word uncle is written with full reflection of phonemes, the number of phonemes and graphemes is the same - four, while there are two syllables. The indicated graphemes are syllabic only at the beginning of the word and after the vowels, but the phonemic principle is also strictly observed there. With the same and even greater grounds, one could condemn the Latin alphabet for the use of the letter x, which always conveys a combination of two phonemes. This letter exists only by tradition, and in the Russian language there is a whole system of transmission of palatalized consonants and iota.

Another thesis of S.A. Arutyunov and many others is based on mixing graphics, writing systems and its specific application to a particular language. Of course, the Cyrillic alphabet is more associated with one of the languages \u200b\u200bfor which it is used, namely, with the Latin alphabet. Many people, far from linguistics, think that in any Cyrillic alphabet there should be letters I, u, s, b, etc., and in the Latin alphabet there can be nothing like that. However, this is not at all the case. For example, in Tajikistan, several years ago, the letters y, y, y, b, which were found only in borrowings from the Russian language, were canceled in the Cyrillic alphabet; thus, this alphabet has become more adapted to the structure of the Tajik language. The Cyrillic alphabets for Serbian and Bulgarian (and for Ukrainian) languages \u200b\u200bare also not at all identical to the Russian alphabet.

On the other hand, Latin equivalents of any Russian letters are also possible. In 1929-1930. a group of specialists headed by the outstanding scientist Nikolai Feofanovich Yakovlev proposed three versions of the Latin alphabet for the Russian language. These alphabets were scientifically very sophisticated. And in all three variants, equivalents were proposed for yu, i, soft sign (different for different variants)!

So there is no reason to believe that the Cyrillic alphabet is better for some language, and the Latin alphabet for some. Our other remarkable linguist of the 1920s and 1930s, Evgeny Dmitrievich Polivanov, was right when he wrote: "In the Russian script itself, there are no fundamental shortcomings (as well as advantages) in comparison with the Latin" 2. Linguistic arguments usually cover up arguments of a different kind.

The economic factor is also not very significant, although, of course, any change in writing is expensive: all textbooks and other literature must be re-printed, typographic fonts, signs, seals and much more must be changed. This factor is rather conservative and contributes to the preservation of the existing writing system. However, if a decision is made to change the alphabet, then it can usually at most slow down the speed of the alphabet change, but not stop it. In the USSR, in the 1920s, the Arabic alphabets were changed to Latin, and at the end of the 1930s - from Latin to Cyrillic, without skimping on financial expenses, although there was not enough money for a lot. We see similar examples now.

The main factor acting against any writing reforms is the psychological factor. Back in 1937, at the plenum of the All-Union Central Committee of the New Alphabet, the just words were pronounced: "When the alphabet changes, a huge number of the population becomes illiterate for a certain time." For an adult who has completed a school course, it is natural to desire not to sit down at the desk again, and with a radical change in writing, this is inevitable in one form or another. Even knowing the Latin alphabet, it takes time to get used to using it for, say, the Russian language. The greater the percentage of literate in a particular language and the richer the literary tradition in it, the more difficult it is to switch to a different writing system.

It is significant that not only a change in the writing system, but also a less radical change - spelling reform - is rarely carried out precisely because of a psychological factor. In countries of English and french languages speech, of course, is not about abandoning the Latin alphabet. But the spelling of both languages \u200b\u200bis extremely difficult and confusing; there really very often the letters "absolutely do not reflect phonemes" (which, of course, is not a vice of the Latin alphabet as such). However, any attempts to reform spelling in these languages \u200b\u200bare futile: centuries-old habits and cultural tradition interfere. Writer Bernard Shaw, constantly mocked at the shortcomings of the English spelling, bequeathed his fortune to someone who can reform it. The inheritance is not claimed to this day.

In Russia, the question of spelling reform was repeatedly raised, but radical reforms took place only twice: under Peter I and in 1917-1918. There is no need to explain what those epochs were. The pre-revolutionary Russian spelling was, although somewhat better than modern English or French, but also too complicated (just remember the spelling of words with the letter yat). The issue of its reform was discussed for about a century and a half, the rules adopted after the revolution were developed back in 1904, but there was too much opposition to the reform from people who had already learned spelling (and although they did not make up the majority, their opinion was the most weighty) ... Only during the revolution was the reform carried out. Later, it was possible to carry out only a relatively small reform of spelling in 1956, largely because it passed very imperceptibly: it affected teaching, normative reference books were changed, but adults were not forced to write in a new way. But even in the 40s, it was not possible to achieve, despite the rather strict measures taken, to make the use of the letter ё obligatory. And a new project of a rather private spelling reform (well thought out from a purely linguistic point of view) caused in 1964-1965. a whole storm. By that time, literacy had already become universal, and literate people did not want to learn to write with a mouse or a hare. The project failed. Now the draft of an even more limited spelling reform has caused a storm again. Dear people, including the Nobel laureates, saw in him an "attempt on the Russian language." This, of course, is not the case, but the example shows that you have to be careful with changes in spelling and even more in writing. And it is not surprising that Yakovlev's Latin script was not adopted: maybe it would have passed in 1917, but then they limited themselves to reforming the spelling, and in 1930 the project was late.

In calm historical epochs, the psychological factor, as shown by the examples given, is the most significant (it may be accompanied by an economic factor acting in the same direction). The situation may be different during periods of historical change: here the political factor comes to the fore, sometimes together with the cultural one.

In our country, in the 1920s, the question arose of creating alphabets for dozens of languages \u200b\u200bof national minorities. Many of them were generally unwritten, others used either the Arabic or the old Mongol alphabet, or the Cyrillic alphabet, in most cases created by Orthodox missionaries. For all these languages, there was a choice between the Latin and Cyrillic alphabet, for the languages \u200b\u200bof the Muslim peoples, a third option was also possible - the preservation of the Arabic alphabet with some modernization.

As already stated, from a purely linguistic point of view, all options were acceptable. But politically they were not equal. The Arabic script separated the peoples who used it from other peoples of the country. The Cyrillic alphabet was not accepted not because of its internal flaws, but because of its association with tsarist times. E. D. Polivanov wrote in 1923: “The era - of bad memory - of Russian colonialism left such hatred in the Turkish peoples (judging by the Turkestan) for Russification and its tool - missionary Russian transcriptions that the very reminder of the Russian script is painful as disturbing recent wounds from national oppression ; and therefore attempts to defend (for some theoretical reason) the possibility of using the Russian alphabet cannot be recommended at all. At the Second Congress of Uzbek Education Workers, which focused on the issue of Uzbek graphics, not a single voice was heard in favor of the Russian script ”4 (Turkish peoples mean the Turkic ones).

The Latin alphabet seemed to be the most politically neutral; its maximum prevalence in the world was also taken into account. And, defending the need for the romanization of the Russian language, N.F. Yakovlev wrote: "The Russian alphabet is an absolute anachronism - a kind of graphic barrier that separates the most numerous group of the peoples of the Union from both the revolutionary East and the working masses and the proletariat of the West." The Russian language (as well as the Ukrainian and Belarusian) retained the Cyrillic alphabet, but new alphabets were constructed for about seventy languages \u200b\u200bof the peoples of the USSR in the 1920s and 1930s.

In the second half of the 1930s, the situation changed. A course was taken to spread the Russian language, and the alphabets for the languages \u200b\u200bof the peoples of the USSR began to be built on the Cyrillic basis. Again I had to retrain, which led to considerable difficulties. Here's one example. The Tatar poet Musa Jalil wrote a famous book of poetry during the war in Hitler's prison; after his death, the poems were published. These verses are partly written in the Arabic alphabet, partly in the Latin. Their author learned to read and write in Arabic, then mastered the Latin alphabet, but did not lose the habit of Arabic writing. Even before the war, the Tatar language was translated into Cyrillic, but Musa Jalil did not have time to get used to it and did not write in it. Then, however, they got used to the new alphabets, and they firmly entered use.

The situation began to change dramatically in the late 1980s ... After 1991, the newly independent states embarked on a course of distancing themselves from Moscow. In several states, as mentioned at the beginning of the article, they decided to return to the Latin script. On this basis, sometimes whole "linguistic wars" arose. This happened in Moldova, where a decision was made to return to the Latin alphabet, but this was not accepted by a part of the new state - Transnistria. “In Moldovan schools of Transnistria, secondary specialized and higher educational institutions, instruction is still conducted in Cyrillic and, naturally, using textbooks that differ from those in Chisinau. Passions gradually ran high, going beyond the purely linguistic problems. Moldovan teachers, schools in general, who are noticed to be sympathetic to the Latin alphabet, are immediately accused of disloyalty to the local regime. Further, as a rule, reorganizations follow ”. And in Bendery, after the reorganization of the Moldovan school into a Russian-Moldovan lyceum using the Cyrillic alphabet, “the parents of Moldovan children were indignant, they began to picket the school, demanding that this decision be canceled. And when it did not help, they sat on the rails ”6.

Wherever romanization takes place, the transitional periods are delayed. For example, in Tashkent five years ago I had to see a New Year's street poster, where the words in Uzbek "Happy New Year!" were written in Latin, and the inscription on the drawn calendar "December 31" - in Cyrillic. Posters and slogans are already written in Latin, and books (including calendars), excluding textbooks for primary grades, are still printed in Cyrillic. Some of the street names are written in Latin letters, the other in Cyrillic. As I was told, little has changed in recent years. The authorities in these countries are striving to get closer to the countries of the West and to Turkey (the new Azerbaijani and Turkmen spellings are as close as possible to the Turkish one) and to move away from Russia and Russian culture. But this desire is spontaneously opposed by the traditions and habits of peoples who do not want to retrain. However, in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, the Cyrillic alphabet is still preserved.

And what about Russia? So far, if we exclude Chechnya, where under Dudaev the romanization of the Chechen writing took place, and then ceased (not before?), Most of all talk about romanization in Tatarstan. On several central streets of Kazan, plates were even replaced: now there is an inscription in the Tatar language in the Latin alphabet, the inscription in Russian, of course, has remained Cyrillic. However, unlike Uzbekistan or Azerbaijan, Tatarstan remains a part of Russia, therefore, in the struggle to preserve the Cyrillic alphabet here, there is, in addition to the psychological, and political component. The slogan of the transition of the Tatar language to the Latin script has not been removed, but so far there is no real transition.

With regard to the Russian language, the already mentioned S.A. Arutyunov expresses, in addition to linguistic, completely different arguments, of course, the main ones for him: “The general transition to the Latin alphabet is an indispensable civilizational requirement of the global processes of globalization. And if Russia wants to keep up with the progressive world, wants to be a part of Europe, Russia must completely switch to the Latin alphabet, and sooner or later it will come to this ”7. In his opinion, if the Tatar language switches to the Latin alphabet, then it "will be ahead of the Russian people in its civilizational development" 8. The argumentation is quite similar to that of N.F. Yakovlev (although he was linguistically much more literate), only the place of the world revolution is taken by globalization. But there is no one-to-one correspondence between the level of civilization and the choice of the alphabet. Greece has long been a part of Europe, despite its special writing system. In Japan and China, no one seriously discusses switching to Latin. And in most countries of Tropical Africa, if they write at all, then only in Latin.

So far, the question of the romanization of the Russian language is not seriously raised. Formed over the centuries and took its final form in 1917-1918. the Russian writing system resisted Yakovlev's project (I repeat once again: linguistically good, but psychologically too radical), survived in 1991 and is still stable. The point here is primarily in the centuries-old traditions and habits of people.

May 26, 2014

On May 24, the Day of Slavic Culture and Writing was celebrated. The Solun brothers Cyril and Methodius created the Cyrillic alphabet, which to this day is the stronghold of the Slavic cultural code. Although attempts at romanization have been made more than once.

The case of Cyril and Methodius

The educational mission of the two brothers to Moravia in 863 finally formalized a new cultural community - Slavism. Cyril and Methodius and their students actually did what entire institutes were doing during the Soviet years. Initially, the Cyrillic alphabet was intended for the needs of the church, the main purpose of its creation was to translate the Greek Bible and liturgical texts into the language of the Slavs. But, as it turned out, this was not just a unique experiment, but, of course, a divinely inspired work, therefore Cyril and Methodius were recognized as Equal to the Apostles. Slavic literacy became the basis of a new culture, different from European and Greek.

Peter's reforms

The Catholic Church initially actively resisted the introduction of the Cyrillic alphabet, but later was forced to recognize it. Subsequently, in the Slavic countries that converted to Catholicism, the Latin alphabet replaced the Cyrillic alphabet and the verb that preceded it.

In Russia, however, attempts to translate the Cyrillic alphabet into Latin have been made several times. It began even under Peter I with the reform of the civil alphabet, when the Cyrillic spelling was brought closer to the Latin one and both the "Greek" letters - xi, psi, omega, and some Slavic letters - yus large and small disappeared from the alphabet.

In addition, initially Peter threw out the letters "i" and "z" from the alphabet, leaving their Latin counterparts - i (and decimal) and s (green), but then returned. Ironically, the Latin letters subsequently disappeared from the Russian alphabet.

Reform of the People's Commissariat for Education

In the 19th century, the issues of translating the Cyrillic into Latin were raised mainly by immigrants from Poland, which became part of the Russian Empire, explaining this by the "ugliness, inconvenience of the Russian script", fortunately, few people listened to them. Under Nicholas I, a reverse reform was invented - the Polish Cyrillic alphabet, but in the end everyone remained with their own.

The creeping romanization received a new impetus after the revolution. The People's Commissariat for Education under the leadership of Lunacharsky developed a whole program to translate the languages \u200b\u200bof the peoples of Russia into the Latin alphabet. He even received Lenin's support on this issue, since unification is one of the main components of communist ideology. So, for example, during the establishment of Soviet power, the European system of measures and weights was immediately adopted, the country switched to the European calendar.

Stalin's choice

Stalin did not like the idea of \u200b\u200busing the Latin alphabet in the Russian language, and in 1930 a short decree was issued on this matter: "To propose to the Glavnauka to stop working on the issue of romanizing the Russian alphabet." However, the translation of the languages \u200b\u200bof the peoples of the USSR into the Latin alphabet continued. In total, in the period from 1923 to 1939, more than 50 languages \u200b\u200bwere translated into the Latin alphabet (in total, in 1939, 72 peoples had a written language in the USSR).

Among them were not only languages \u200b\u200bthat did not have a written language at all and needed it, but also, for example, the Komi-Zyryan language, which already had its own alphabet on the Cyrillic basis, compiled back in the 14th century by St. Stephen of Perm. But this time everything worked out well. After the adoption of the Constitution of 1936, it was decided to return to the Cyrillic alphabets, and put an end to the Latin alphabet.

Restructuring

After the collapse of the USSR, some of the newly independent republics switched to the Latin alphabet. In this reform, Moldova was guided by the Latinized Romania, which, by the way, had a Cyrillic script until the end of the 19th century. Some Turkic-speaking republics - Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, have also switched to the Latin alphabet, and Turkey has become a reference point for them.

Declares a phased transition to the Latin alphabet and Kazakhstan. Rumor has it that the new Ukrainian authorities are planning to translate the Ukrainian language into the Latin alphabet.

Why don't we go over?

Why, then, in Russia they hold on to their writing and do not change it to the more widespread and seemingly more convenient Latin alphabet?

Firstly, the Latin alphabet is simply not suitable for conveying the sound structure of the Russian and Slavic languages \u200b\u200bin general. It has only 26 characters, in Cyrillic - 33. Slavic peoples, for example, the Poles, who have switched to the Latin alphabet, have to additionally use diacritics. In addition, digraphs are widespread, that is, letters that have a double spelling. So, for example, in the Latin alphabet there is no separate letter to convey the sound "sh".

The system of Latin and Cyrillic vowels is also different, the vowels - yu, i, e, e, s - have no Latin counterparts, to write them you will have to use either diacritical marks or double spelling, which will significantly complicate the language.

Secondly, it is equally important that the Cyrillic alphabet is part of the national cultural code. For more than a thousand-year history of its existence, a huge number of cultural monuments have been created on it. After replacing the Cyrillic alphabet with the Latin alphabet, the Cyrillic texts will be transformed into foreign texts for native speakers, and special education is required to read them.

From a spiritual point of view, everything visible and embodied is some kind of invisible and incorporeal content. A word written either by sound waves in the ether, or by inscriptions on a denser basis, carries an internal image, and in the image - a certain meaning, spirit. A person's handwriting expresses the peculiarities of his mental world, disposition. The handwriting of the people is its writing - the outline of the letters that make up the alphabet. It is possible to believe or not to believe in the accident or not the accident of the emergence of a certain people exactly what it is, and not another letter. But in any case, it is undoubted that its use, which has arisen over the centuries, millennia, is saturated with the meanings of all verbal creations created by a given people, and serves both for itself and for other peoples as a kind of signature certifying the catholic identity. That is why any people are very wary of changes in their signatures, their letters, believing, not without reason, that these seemingly external changes arise in connection with internal changes: either because of them, or by causing them, and most likely - in the interaction of both.

It is good if the changes in the letter are associated with the internal spiritual development of the people, although such development is not always for the good and not even always for development, and sometimes for the destruction of the best. It is also good if a peaceful and, one might say, amicable interaction of written cultures of different peoples, close in spirit and faith, takes place.

Changing the letter truncates the identity of the people, sets the stage for its dissolution in other nations

If the changes in the letter are associated with external influences from a completely foreign, alien letter and the spirit worn by it, then such an effect is ultimately harmful for the receiving people, because it truncates its originality, reduces the living space available to it, and initiates dissolution in another people. In history, there are cases of almost complete replacement of the letter of a weaker people with a letter of a stronger one. As a rule, such a replacement is a kind of signature that seals the agreement on multilateral dependence and subordination, which can be both for the good and for the detriment of the yielding people. Within one written culture, peoples can live amicably, or they can compete - the weak become strong and vice versa, but the very commonality of the writing will always testify, remind of the originally established spiritual hierarchy accepted by all these peoples. If any nation wants to get rid of being included in its written hierarchy, it breaks out of it by replacing the current letter with another, but then inevitably - willingly or unwillingly - falls into the power of another hierarchy. However, it is often not the people themselves who make such a decision, but only a part of their ruling elite, who seized power and forcing them to follow them.

The letter in its primordial, main purpose reflects the image of God and the image of a person serving God

According to the teachings of the Church Fathers, the whole world is an icon of God - it reflects its Creator. In this sense, everything in the world is iconic to one degree or another, if we use the concept deeply developed in the works of V.V. Lepakhin. The iconic approach allows one to see in everything temporal a connection with Eternity, in everything created - a connection with the Creator, in everything visible - the innermost. The deeper this connection, the more iconic the image, object, creation. And, of course, such an amazing phenomenon of human culture as writing is purely iconic. In its main service, it is called upon to express the spiritual understanding of the world, the religion of people, nations, their service to God, their idea of \u200b\u200bEternity. The letter in its primordial, main purpose reflects the image of God and the image of a person serving God. It is no coincidence that the inscription of the name necessarily crowns the creation of an icon as a sacred image. Without an inscription, there is no icon.

So it should be, and so it is, but there is only partly, because man is a special creature: he is endowed with free will, freedom of creativity, and in creativity - the freedom to choose between worship and resistance to God. Different historically developed types of writing express the relationship between a person (and in a generalized essence - whole nations) and God in very different ways.

In the history of mankind, only a few powerful spiritual and religious directions of the world outlook have developed, associated with certain types of writing. In the history of European culture, there are essentially two such types of writing. One is Latin, and as a result of its development, it can be called Western, since it is used primarily by Western European languages. Serving at first to express Roman pagan spirituality, the Latin script in the first centuries A.D. began to simultaneously express Christian spirituality in its Western European manifestation. Barely gaining strength by the 4th-5th centuries, the Christian ministry of the Latin alphabet later began to weaken more and more under the onslaught of a reviving pagan culture. The Western European mixture of Christian and magical spirituality reached an intermediate peak in the Renaissance of the XIV-XVI centuries and further, in the New Time, only intensified, forming what began to be called the New Babylon of the West. This Western community, magical in its deep spiritual essence, was made up of peoples whose writing developed on the basis of the Latin alphabet (including peoples not at all Western and not at all European, which are still being dragged out by the worldwide whirlpool of the Western spirit and Latin writing).

Another, relatively speaking, eastern, type of European writing is formed by the dual unity of the Greek and Slavic-Cyrillic writing, created partly on its basis. This letter, in its Greek component, at first expressed Hellenic, then Hellenistic pagan spirituality, and according to R.H. - with increasing power - the Christian Orthodox faith. At the peak of its mystical growth, Greek writing served as material for the creation of a new one, created and disseminated by the works of the holy enlighteners Cyril and Methodius, primarily for serving the sacred Orthodox worship. The original purpose of the Cyrillic alphabet has been preserved as the main one for several centuries, but in fact it has been preserved to this day, since the civil simplified Cyrillic script introduced by Peter I in 1708 only strengthened its liturgical use for Church Slavonic Cyrillic. During historical development In Europe, the Greek letter proper lost more and more significance and strength as Byzantium weakened, and the Slavic Cyrillic alphabet, on the contrary, became more and more established, mainly due to Russia, Russia.

The struggle between the Cyrillic and Latin alphabet flared up immediately after the birth of the Cyrillic alphabet: in the 860s-870s

The struggle between the Cyrillic and Latin alphabet flared up immediately after the birth of the Cyrillic alphabet: in the 860s – 870s. Then the West, in spite of the widespread trilingual heresy, was nevertheless forced to recognize the Cyrillic alphabet as having the right to liturgical use and to translate holy Christian books. Since then, this struggle has never died out, retaining its main features, techniques, and the success of the parties from era to era.

Western Catholic Rome gradually imposed the Latin alphabet on the dependent Slavic peoples: from the 12th century on to the Croats (and their Cyrillic resistance ceased only in the 19th century), from the 13th century on the Czechs, from the 14th century on the Poles. Orthodox Romanians began to switch to the Latin alphabet only in 1860.

In recent history, the case of Serbia is indicative: under powerful Western pressure since the 1990s, it has experienced a rapid Latinization of writing. At the state level, the Cyrillic alphabet is still the only alphabet, but in everyday life the Latin alphabet is used very widely, a number of newspapers are published only in the Latin alphabet, and it also prevails in the electronic network. In Montenegro, which broke away from Serbia in 2006, the Latin and Cyrillic alphabet are legally equal in rights, and in everyday life, Latinization is growing.

In Russia, some movement of writing towards the Latin alphabet was initiated by Peter I

In Russia, some movement of writing towards the Latin alphabet was initiated by Peter I, when, in 1708, he began to introduce, in addition to Church Slavonic Cyrillic, a simplified civil alphabet designed to serve non-church literature. According to many, the appearance of the new Cyrillic alphabet began to somewhat resemble the Latin alphabet: “<…> angular letters began to converge with rounded Latin letters. However, foreigners and local Westerners continued to consider the updated Russian writing insufficiently perfect, seeing pure perfection in the Latin alphabet.

A certain revival of Orthodox spirituality in the era of Elizabeth Petrovna gave rise to attempts by prominent philologists and writers such as Lomonosov, Trediakovsky, Sumarokov to somehow delimit the new civil letter from Latin. It was noted that the emphatically Latin-like appearance of the new civil letters deepened the gap between Church Slavonic and the new Russian language, emphasized the weakening of the Orthodox spirit in modern Russian, along with the strengthening of the Western spirit. This was already noticed by I.-V. Paus in "Slavic-Russian" grammar (1724‒1729), and then, in 1748, was confirmed by Trediakovsky.

Since the end of the 18th century, under the conditions of Masonic influence, attacks on "superfluous" letters of the Russian alphabet that do not match in the Latin alphabet have intensified.

Understanding the spiritual significance of the letterforms prompted the West to offer the Latin alphabet to Russians again and again. Since the end of the 18th century, under the conditions of Masonic influence, attacks on "superfluous" letters of the Russian alphabet that do not match in the Latin alphabet have intensified. V.V. Lazarevich in 1780 spoke about such letters as follows: "You did not bring any benefit at all / And only the Russian alphabet was weighed down." Mason A.F. Labzin hated the letter "b" and signed the letters "Bezierov".

Cyrillic supporters resisted truncation. When in 1832 A. Humboldt in St. Petersburg at the evening with A.N. Olenin expressed an opinion about the "complete excess of the era", to him in a special letter on behalf of the "letter b", and signed: "b", objected AA. Perovsky (Anthony Pogorelsky). This letter was republished four times in the Russian press until 1865.

In the heyday of the reign of Nicholas I, when in 1833 the development of state life in the spirit of "Orthodoxy, autocracy, nationality" was proclaimed, the attacks of the opponents of the Cyrillic alphabet only intensified. So, in the same 1833 in Moscow, an unnamed "experience of improving the letter for the Russian alphabet" ("OPYPT WEDENIA NEW RUSSKIH LITER)" was published. In "Predislovii" the author admits: "The enjoyment of possible happiness is a consequence of real and final enlightenment, and being a participant at least a little in helping to achieve this goal is the reason for the publication of this brochure." A means to achieving the goal is also proposed - the all-round approximation of the barbaric Russian letter to the European one: a mixture of Latin and Cyrillic based on the predominance of the Latin alphabet gives "beautiful fonts", when introduced, "foreigners will not look at our letters as half-Asian." A similar idea was repeated by Zasyadko in the book "On the Russian Alphabet" (Moscow, 1871).

Then came the Pole K.M. Kodinsky, who published the brochure "Simplification of Russian grammar" (St. Petersburg, 1842), where he proposed a complete replacement of the Cyrillic alphabet with the Latin alphabet, justifying this "by the ugliness, inconvenience of the Russian script." V.G. In analyzing this book, Belinsky called it a "difficulty" in the Russian literacy, however, being a Westerner himself, he proposed replacing "Y" with "J".

For their part, the defenders of the Cyrillic alphabet strove to reveal the spiritual causes of the Latin invasion. So, in 1840, I. Kulzhinsky (who once taught N.V. Gogol at the Nizhyn gymnasium) wrote: “From the alphabet you can go to the formation of a language, to the forms of civil existence and even to the divine service sent by Western Slavs to latin". In the cumbersomeness of the Polish Latin alphabet, the author sees evidence of the unnaturalness of the connections between the Slavic spirit and Catholicism, disposed to Orthodoxy: "Look at this phalanx of Latin letters (SZCZ), collected only to express one Slavic sound: Щ".

Most Russian writers and philologists of the first half of the 19th century adhered to the question of writing moderately protective views: the Latin alphabet was rejected, but the introduction of the Petrine civil letter was welcomed. So, M.P. Pogodin in his note "Slavic News" (1836) opposed Lozinsky's article "On the need to use Latin-Polish letters in Russian writing": "Now no one doubts the urgent need for the Slavic alphabet for Russian writing, and everyone recognizes its superiority over the inadequacy of someone else's alphabet" ... But Pogodin immediately spoke out against the "Russian clergy" who wanted to restore the "primitive Cyrillic" instead of the "civil letter", which the author likes "for its beauty and convenience." It is inappropriate for Russians to learn from Latin Poles, since “all Polish literature is spoiled ruschinkabecause the Poles, as before and now, correct their own with our language ”.

Attempts to Latinize the Russian writing have been crowned with lasting success in at least one area: in the language of scientific research, when transmitting the sound of foreign words (in transcription, transliteration), the Latin alphabet almost completely prevailed, and this unwritten rule has been preserved to this day. With the help of the Latin alphabet, they convey the sound not only of the words of Western European, actually Latin writing, but also of any other, for example, Sanskrit, Hebrew, and even ancient Greek. In addition, since the 18th century, the custom has spread not to translate names, names and whole extracts from foreign-language Western sources into Russian. Attention was drawn to this attack in the 19th century. So, in 1843 I. Markov complained: "Quite many of our writers write foreign words and expressions in foreign letters."

Followed by adherents of the Cyrillic alphabet and completely secretive, echo-like echoes of Latin influence. For example, V. Dal in 1852, in his discourse "On the adverbs of the Russian language," noted the custom of "double consonants" as unnatural for us when transmitting foreign wordssuch as "allopathy" "assessor": "<…> it is contrary to our language. "

On the whole, during the 19th century, Russia was relatively successful, although with varying success in restraining the onslaught of the Latin alphabet. In the 20th century, the struggle continued, and here there are two epochs of a relatively successful advance of the Latin script, however, in both cases it was still stopped. Both offensives coincide with the waves of Western influence on the whole of Russian life that arose in the context of coups d'état.

In 1919, the People's Commissariat for Education proposed to translate the letter of all the peoples of Russia, including the Russians, into the Latin alphabet. Lenin sympathized with this

In the first case, this is the decade of the early Soviet era (our socialism was a manifestation of philosophical and political Westernism). In 1919, the Scientific Department of the People's Commissariat for Education and personally the People's Commissar A.V. Lunacharsky propose to translate the letter of all the peoples of Russia, including Russians, into the Latin alphabet. Lenin sympathized with this, but for tactical reasons he suspended the matter in the part of the Russian language. In the newly created USSR, they began with the Latinization of the languages \u200b\u200bof national minorities, and among the Turkic peoples, the Arabic script was supplanted by the Latin alphabet. In the 1920s, the business progressed successfully. Since 1928, there has been a commission for the romanization of the Russian alphabet. However, already on January 25, 1930, the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks), chaired by Stalin, instructed Glavnauka to stop working on this issue. Since the mid-1930s, under the leadership of Stalin, a pro-Russian state turn has been made, and those alphabets of small peoples for which the Latin alphabet has already been developed are being translated into Cyrillic. In the next half century, they tried to write down even mathematical formulas, programming languages \u200b\u200band carry out scientific transliteration of foreign words in Cyrillic.

A new wave of romanization naturally begins after the 1991 coup. It is supported in various ways from the outside, in particular, by the rapid growth of the dominance of the English-speaking Latin alphabet in the global electronic network. Latin script captures advertising in all its forms, fence and wall inscriptions different levels morality and artistry.

The draft law "On the development and use of languages \u200b\u200bin Ukraine" involves the gradual abandonment of the use of the Cyrillic alphabet in the country

In the 1990s, a reverse translation was made from Cyrillic to Latin in the languages \u200b\u200bof a number of former Soviet republics that had already gone through the first Latinization in the 1920s. In some cases, the case was crowned with success (for example, in Moldova, Azerbaijan), in others (for example, in Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan) it slowed down due to the multidimensional difficulties that arose. Some new states, such as Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, not to mention Belarus, then remained faithful to the Cyrillic alphabet, but they are still restless. In Ukraine, at the very beginning of the leadership of the pro-Western President Yushchenko, in 2005, “a draft Decree of the President of Ukraine on the gradual translation of the national script from Cyrillic to Latin was prepared.<…> The decree provides for the replacement of the Ukrainian alphabet, created on the basis of the Cyrillic alphabet, with the Latin alphabet in the education and office work system in Ukraine during 2005-2015. The transition to the Latin alphabet is carried out “with the aim of enhancing Ukraine's integration into the European Community, expanding the communicative functions of the Ukrainian language ... strengthening versatile ties with the states that make up the bulwark of modern civilization”. The implementation of the plan then slowed down, but after the coup d'etat in early 2014, one of the first legislative movements of the self-proclaimed pro-Western government was a new formulation of the question of the Latinization of writing. In March it became known that "a temporary special commission for the preparation of the draft law" On the development and use of languages \u200b\u200bin Ukraine "is considering a gradual abandonment of the use of the Cyrillic alphabet in the country."

In December 2012, the President of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev, in his next “Message to the people” said: “It is necessary to start preparatory work already now on the translation of the Kazakh alphabet into the Latin script from 2025. This will serve not only the development of the Kazakh language, but also turn it into the language of modern information. "

Similar aspirations for romanization were initiated in the 1990s within the newly formed Russia, both at the national level and at the level of individual subjects of the federation. Already in 1992, the parliament of the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria allowed the Latin alphabet of the Chechen language, created in 1925 (and replaced by the Cyrillic alphabet in 1938). The Chechen Latin alphabet was used to a limited extent (in addition to the Cyrillic alphabet) during the times of the republic's greatest isolation from Russia (1992-1994, 1996-2000). True, the use was reduced to the inscriptions in in public places.

Similarly, in 1999, Tatarstan adopted a law on the restoration of the Latin script of the Tatar alphabet.

During the 1990s - early 2000s, the number of scientific and journalistic articles increased, the authors of which, to one degree or another, expressed their love for the Latin alphabet and tried to convince of the need to introduce it in Russia. So, M.V. Arapov proves the beneficialness of "giving the Latin alphabet the status of an officially recognized alternative alphabet." An ardent preacher of the transition to the Latin alphabet is S.A. Arutyunov: “Russia must integrate into Europe. And one of the necessary conditions for this, in my deep conviction, is the translation of the written language of all the peoples of Russia into the Latin alphabet. Unfortunately, judging by the mood of some, the Russian language will switch to this schedule, apparently one of the last, which will only lead to the fact that other, non-Slavic, peoples of Russia will be ahead of the Russian people in their civilizational development. "

The seemingly inevitable all-Russian movement towards the Latin alphabet was suspended in 2002 by a half-hearted decision of the State Duma of the Russian Federation, which demanded the obligatory use of the Cyrillic alphabet at the levels of the state languages \u200b\u200bof the Federation and individual republics-subjects, but retained the possibility of Latinization in the future, subject to the adoption of the corresponding law.

Despite the fact that calls for romanization persist to this day, in general, the beginning of the 21st century is marked by a gradual restoration of the rights and influence of the Cyrillic alphabet, not only in Russia, but throughout the world. Many modern linguists strongly oppose the defenders of the Latin alphabet.

In 2013, Russian became the second most used language on the Internet.

In 2013, the Russian language came in second in terms of use on the Internet: about 6.3%, and if you add the rest of the Cyrillic languages, you get over 7%. For comparison: German Latin - 5.6%, Chinese - 4%, Japanese - 4.9%. However, the English Latin alphabet still has an overwhelming advantage: 55.5%.

The Russian government led the growing global movement for domain names in languages \u200b\u200bwith non-Latin alphabets, and this is the guarantee of non-Latin designation of all email addresses. The forced decision to allow the use of non-Latin domain names was made in October 2009 by Icann (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers), a regulatory body headquartered in the United States. Most of the 1.6 billion Internet users have native languages \u200b\u200bwithout Latin alphabets, Icann said.

Since 2013, there are already three Cyrillic top-level domains: Russian (with the name ".рф",), Serbian and Kazakh.

Since 2007, the Cyrillic alphabet has become one of the three official alphabets of the European Union (thanks to the accession of Bulgaria). Gradually, conditions are being created for a real, and not just a verbal change in the entire written record of the European Union.

In 2013, Cyrillic inscriptions (in addition to Latin and Greek) appear on the banknotes of the new Eurocurrency series.

However, SMS messages in the Cyrillic alphabet, according to some "world standards", are still priced more than twice as expensive as in the Latin alphabet, which is a method of soft but effective coercion to romanize the Cyrillic world.

The fight continues.

In the confusion of its own reforms, Russia did not seem to notice that a number of former Soviet republics abandoned the use of the Cyrillic alphabet and translated the national alphabets into the Latin alphabet. And when in 1999 such an intention was expressed by the leadership of Tatarstan, it had the effect of a bomb exploding. But they all reacted in different ways. Some have begun a struggle to preserve the "single alphabetic space". Others wondered if the same would happen to Russia? Will you have to abandon the original Cyrillic alphabet in favor of the Latin script?

Such reflections were spurred on by the spread of computers and mobile communications, with the Russification of which there were still some problems. Some scholars, for example Mikhail Epstein, professor of Slavic studies at Emory University (USA), feared that the problem was rooted deeper: “The possible romanization of the Russian language is only a projection of an accelerating barbarization. The Russian language is flooding english words... The ratio of foreign and native words is rapidly changing in favor of borrowings, and it is possible that soon they will quantitatively prevail in the Russian language. Then the question will arise, which alphabet is more natural for the language. "

But there are no precedents for such a process. And in the Russian language, the scheme of "Russification" of borrowings is quite worked out. We still use a huge number of words of Greek, German or French origin, without even knowing it.

But perhaps the most radical point of view was expressed by the orientalist Sergei Aleksandrovich Arutyunov, Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Head of the Caucasus Department of the Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russian Academy of Sciences: “I believe that globalization and computerization of our life will ultimately lead to the fact that the Latin alphabet will move to the Russian writing system. The Latin alphabet itself is much more convenient than the Cyrillic alphabet, which has many shortcomings. And if Russia wants to keep up with the progressive world, wants to be a part of Europe, Russia must completely switch to the Latin alphabet, and sooner or late she will come to this. "

Meanwhile, in most languages \u200b\u200bthat use the Latin alphabet, to designate certain sounds, there are letters with so-called diacritics (dashes, dots over letters, etc.), with the correct display of which in computer systems (which Arutyunov blames) there are serious Problems.

Actually, English is one of the few languages \u200b\u200bthat can manage with only 26 graphemes. At the same time, the British themselves say about their confused spelling: "the exception is the rule." Over the past hundred years, many proposals have been made on how to remedy this situation. George Bernard Shaw bequeathed $ 25,000 to develop a new alphabet for of English language... By 1962, the work was completed. The alphabet, consisting of 48 characters, ideally corresponds to English phonetics, but is so different from the usual that the prospects for its implementation in life are more than vague.

But the "educational alphabet for beginners" of 44 characters (24 - traditional, the rest - their modifications or combinations), created with the aim of teaching children and foreigners to read correctly, is already used in the first grades of British primary schools... But by the end of the first school year it is replaced by the standard one when the average student already reads and writes over 1,500 words correctly.

Fundamentally new writing systems, according to linguists, most likely will not be created in the near future. But there is always a partial change in writing systems (adding, excluding signs, changing their spelling) and redistribution of written areas. For example, switching from Latin to Cyrillic or vice versa.

Doctor of Philology, Deputy Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences Vladimir Mikhailovich Alpatov identifies four types of factors influencing the choice of the writing system: linguistic, economic, psychological and political and cultural. In this case, linguistic considerations are the least significant.

The differences between different systems letters, emphasizes Vladimir Mikhailovich. The concrete application of one or another alphabet to a language may turn out to be unsuccessful, but this does not mean at all that they are incompatible. Even the shortcomings of the Arabic script (which is considered poorly suited to non-Semitic languages) have proven to be quite surmountable. For example, A. Baitursunov in the 1920s perfectly adapted the Arabic alphabet to the Kazakh language, if this system did not take root, then it was not at all for reasons of "quality".

Talking about the significant differences between the Cyrillic and Latin alphabet is generally difficult. Domestic linguist E.D. Polivanov wrote that the Cyrillic alphabet itself is no worse or better than the Latin one. When they talk about the (in) adaptability of the Cyrillic or Latin alphabet to a particular language, they either confuse the writing system with its specific version, or simply cover up the real reasons for their choice with pseudoscientific arguments.

Any change of writing is an expensive undertaking. It is necessary to re-publish a significant amount of literature, prepare new textbooks, change signs and inscriptions, make changes in office work, etc. And therefore, the economy is a conservative factor. For example, Mongolia, which announced the transition from the Cyrillic alphabet to the old Mongolian script, which was used until the middle of the 20th century, did not make this transition - the project turned out to be too expensive.

But the factor of psychology has even greater influence. Vladimir Alpatov cites as an example China and Japan, where the question of romanization was raised more than once (and in Japan, the transition to the national alphabet was also proposed as an alternative). However, hieroglyphic writing has survived and is unlikely to be canceled, primarily for psychological reasons. There has never been an example in history of changing the writing system for a language with such a volume of literature as Japanese, Chinese or Russian. For this reason alone, Alpatov believes, the ideas of the romanization of Russian writing are unrealistic.

Even spelling reform - and that can only be carried out during a period of serious social shifts, as it was in Peter's time and in 1917-1918. And an attempt at a rather "private" reform of 1964-1965. failed, not accepted by native speakers.

True, much depends on the level of literacy of the population. Largely due to the fact that 90% of the adult population of Turkey was illiterate, Ataturk's reform was a success. The translation of the Turkish script from Arabic to Latin in 1928 marked the transformation of the country into a secular state. As well as the abolition of religious courts, the liquidation of Muslim schools, the transition to the Gregorian calendar and the ban on wearing fez.

Russia almost also took the path of romanization, although for different reasons: they were waiting for a world revolution, and only Latin could be considered the world alphabet.

In the 1920s, it was believed in our country that the smallest people should develop their own and master the world culture in their own language. Many of these peoples did not have a written language at all, while others used systems of writing considered "reactionary" - Arabic or Old Mongolian. And then the work that was called "language construction" began. It was headed by Professor Nikolai Feofanovich Yakovlev. He and his colleagues designed about seventy new alphabets. In the period from 1923 to 1939, 50 languages \u200b\u200bwere translated into the Latin alphabet (despite the fact that by that time there were only 72 written languages \u200b\u200bin the USSR). And in January 1930, work was completed on the development of the romanization of the Russian language. Yakovlev's group proposed three alternative options, which, however, differed from each other only in a few letters.

According to Vladimir Alpatov, the project was undoubtedly good. The writing system is scientifically grounded, not too complicated and is designed for the sound presentation of native speakers of the Russian language (in contrast to most transcriptions of the Cyrillic alphabet in Latin letters, aimed at foreigners). A.V. Lunacharsky, who remembered that Vladimir Ilyich once said that it would be necessary to switch to the Latin alphabet "in more quiet timewhen we get stronger. "

But in the 1929-1930s, several factors worked against the change of the Russian alphabet, according to Vladimir Alpatov: the richest written tradition, the psychology of millions of literate native speakers, the high cost of the project. But the main thing is a change in state policy. Stalin abandoned the idea of \u200b\u200ba world revolution, the country became more and more isolated from the rest of the world.

With a new turn of state policy, all the languages \u200b\u200bof the peoples of the USSR, except for a few that had long had a written language, were translated into Cyrillic in 1937-1941. Of the seven dozen new alphabets, none survived. As a result of the Stalinist "counter-reform" in the USSR, in two decades, 21 languages \u200b\u200bchanged the alphabet twice, and 13 languages \u200b\u200b- three times.

Stalin once again confirmed that the alphabet can be an ideological weapon. But he could hardly imagine that this weapon would be used against the fragments of his empire.

Although there was a precedent. For almost a century and a half, Russia patronized the Orthodox principalities of Wallachia and Moldova, protecting them from Turkey. Established in this territory in 1860, Romania first of all renounces the Cyrillic alphabet, which has been in common use in this country since the 16th century. - to demonstrate their independence. So for the first time, the change of the alphabet was tested as a form of political demonstration. After the collapse of the USSR, Moldova (except for Transnistria) naturally repeated this path.

From Cyrillic to Latin letters were switched in Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. They are seriously discussing the issue of Romanization in Bulgaria in connection with the desire of a part of society to quickly break not only with a political, but also with a cultural orientation towards Russia.

Within Russia, Chechnya was the first to proclaim the romanization of Chechnya under Dudaev, and in 1999, Tatarstan announced a gradual romanization. However, this program has stalled so far.

The State Duma of the Russian Federation adopted, and President Putin at the end of 2002 signed a law that requires that the state language of the republic within the Russian Federation must use the Cyrillic alphabet. However, such attempts to combat "unpleasant" tendencies seem not only ridiculous, but also dangerous. Thus, the situation in the second half of the 19th century is being recreated, when the government of the Russian Empire waged "alphabet wars" with its Polish, Ukrainian, Lithuanian, and Belarusian subjects. They were forbidden to teach and generally write in their native language. Such wars did not turn out to be "the presence of a single alphabetical space", which supposedly "is an essential indicator of the integrity of our state," but the growth of separatist sentiments. We already know how it ended in 1991.

The question of the alphabet system. Choosing a writing system. Linguistic, economic, psychological and political and cultural factors of influence. System of transmission of palatalized consonants and iota. Discussion of the need for romanization of the Russian language.

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V. M. Alpatov

romanization russian language linguistic

Cyrillic or Latin?

In the modern world, new writing systems are no longer being created. The "youngest" script in use today - Korean - appeared in the 15th century. We can only talk about using one of the existing writing systems for any language. If the language already has a written language, then the choice is made between preserving the old writing and switching to some other one.

What influences this choice? Four factors can be distinguished: linguistic, economic, psychological and political and cultural.

It is significant that not only a change in the writing system, but also a less radical change - spelling reform - is rarely carried out precisely because of a psychological factor. In the countries of the English and French languages, of course, there is no question of abandoning the Latin alphabet. But the spelling of both languages \u200b\u200bis extremely difficult and confusing; there really very often the letters "absolutely do not reflect phonemes" (which, of course, is not a vice of the Latin alphabet as such). However, any attempts to reform spelling in these languages \u200b\u200bare futile: centuries-old habits and cultural tradition interfere. Writer Bernard Shaw, constantly mocked at the shortcomings of English spelling, bequeathed his fortune to someone who can reform it. The inheritance is not claimed to this day.

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What does Latin and Cyrillic mean. Fighting Cyrillic and Latin

Cyrillic or Latin?

The question of the alphabet system. Choosing a writing system. Linguistic, economic, psychological and political and cultural factors of influence. System of transmission of palatalized consonants and iota. Discussion of the need for romanization of the Russian language.

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