This lecture will discuss linguistic choices and interaction strategies of Ukrainian Facebook users and their underlying language ideologies. Post-Maidan democratic change and Russian aggression contribute, on the one hand, to the social legitimacy of Russian as one of the languages spoken by Ukraine’s citizens and, on the other, to the acknowledgment of the special role of Ukrainian as the national language. Accordingly, both languages are actively used and mostly accepted by Ukrainians as appropriate for social-network communication. At the same time, in many situations the choice of Russian is challenged, thus provoking heated discussions.
Volodymyr Kulyk is a specialist in Ukrainian national identity, language policy and language attitudes, ethnopolitics and media discourse. Dr. Kulyk is Head Research Fellow at the Institute of Political and Ethnic Studies, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, where he received his Candidate of Sciences (1999) and Doctor of Sciences (2010) degrees in political science. His research fields include the politics of language, memory and identity in contemporary Ukraine, language ideologies, nationalism and media discourse. Dr. Kulyk is the author of three books, the latest being Dyskurs ukraїns’kykh medii: identychnosti, ideolohiї, vladni stosunky (Ukrainian Media Discourse: Identities, Ideologies, Power Relations; Kyiv, 2010). Since 2013, he has been serving as Ukraine’s representative in the European Commission against Racism and Intolerance.
Sponsored by Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies and the Department of Modern Languages and Cultural Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of Alberta.
For further information, please call (780) 492-2026.