The 20th century writer K.I. Chukovsky raises the problem of attitude towards the native language.
First, the author analyzes the statements of scientists about whether an individual can influence the preservation of his purity. K. Chukovsky is not satisfied with the “philosophy of inaction”, and he asks the question of how to counter the negative phenomena that occur in this area. What to do? K. Chukovsky writes that the life of a language is influenced by radio, cinema, and television. He also suggests raising the person’s own general culture, including the culture of speech.
The author’s position is as follows: he is concerned about a very serious problem - how not only specialists, but also all other people relate to their native language. At the beginning of the discussion, the author uses vocabulary that expresses pessimism in solving this problem - “blind element”, “joyless and hopeless aphorism”.
Contrary to the opinions of major scientists, the writer believes that everyone together, and each individual person, is able to decide their fate native language.
I agree with the author’s opinion that the fate of a language depends not only on linguists, teachers, cultural workers, but also on each specific individual. To maintain the purity of the language, it is necessary to work hard during school years to develop your speech, read dictionaries, classical literature, and avoid the use of uncultured words. Probably no one wants to be like main character comedy by D.I. Fonvizin “The Minor” Mitrofanushka Prostakov, who could not distinguish parts of speech. He explained that the word “door” refers to the adjective, since it is “attached to its place.” But in the closet the door has not yet been hung, so it is “for now a noun.”
The main character of A.S. Griboedov’s comedy “Woe from Wit,” Alexander Andreevich Chatsky, fights for the purity of the national language. It is known that in the first quarter of the 19th century the Russian nobility showed interest in French, and treated the family with contempt. A.A. Chatsky was concerned about the fate of the national language. In one of his monologues, he talks about a Frenchman who came to Moscow and did not hear a single Russian word. Chatsky wants the spirit of this thoughtless, “...blind imitation” to disappear. He is concerned about the “mixture of languages, French and Nizhny Novgorod.” The nobleman Chatsky has cultural speech and knowledge of his native language. He is also familiar with popular speech. He uses both proverbs and literary expressions.
The life of the native language depends on the slightest efforts of each person, on his efforts to make his speech cultural, expressive, on the desire to enrich his vocabulary, develop grammatical skills, know and apply spelling norms.
Updated: 2017-12-27
Attention!
Thank you for your attention.
If you notice an error or typo, highlight the text and click Ctrl+Enter.
By doing so, you will provide invaluable benefit to the project and other readers.
Useful material on the topic
- Our language is still felt by many as a kind of blind element that cannot be controlled. According to K.I. Chukovsky
Chapter Seven
DESPITE THE ELEMENTS
The one who lives real life,
Who has been accustomed to poetry since childhood,
Eternally believes in the life-giving one,
The Russian language is full of intelligence.
H. Zabolotsky
Some “lady with a dog,” dressed elegantly and tastefully, wanted to show her new acquaintances what a trained poodle she had, and shouted to him imperiously:
- Lie down!
This alone lie down It turned out to be enough to indicate to me the low level of her spiritual culture, and in my eyes she immediately lost the charm of grace, prettiness, and youth.
And I immediately thought that if Chekhov’s “lady with a dog” said to her white Spitz in front of Dmitry Gurov:
- Lie down! -
Gurov, of course, could not fall in love with her and would hardly even begin the conversation with her that led them to rapprochement.
In that lie down(instead of lie down) is an imprint of such a dark environment that a person claiming to be involved in a culture will immediately reveal his imposture as soon as he utters this word.
For example, what good could I think about that elderly teacher who suggested to first-graders:
Who doesn't have an inkwell front, wet back!
And about the student who said from behind the door:
Now I I'll fight and I'll go out!
And about that loving mother who, at a magnificent dacha, shouted to her daughter from the balcony:
- Don't take off your coat!
And about the prosecutor who said in his speech:
Comrades! We've gathered here together with you to end the ugliness of our lives forever. Here here in front of you is a young man...
And about that plant director who repeated several times in his address to the workers:
Need to accept virgin measures.
Tambov engineer S.P. Merzhanov tells me about the hostility that he felt towards one of his colleagues when he wrote in a memo:
“Otsedova a conclusion can be drawn.”
“I also understand well,” continues Comrade. Merzhanov, a student I know, who immediately lost interest in his beloved girl after receiving from her a tender letter with many spelling errors.”
Previously, about forty-five years ago, it would have been a sin to be angry with the Russian people for such perversions of speech: they were forcibly kept in the dark. But now that school education became universal and illiteracy was ended once and for all, all these lie down And wet do not deserve any leniency.
“In our country,” Pavel Nilin rightly says, “where the doors of schools, both daytime and evening, are wide open, no one can find an excuse for their illiteracy” [ P. Nilin, The danger is not there. “New World”, 1958, No. 4, p. 2.].
Therefore, it is in no way possible to allow Russian people to continue to retain in their everyday life such ugly verbal forms as bulgakhter, likes, rush, want, worse, obnakovanny, wants, kalidor. Or weeds of a later time: reservation, incident, I'll drop by for a couple of minutes etc.
True, our language is still felt by many as a kind of blind element that is impossible to fight.
One of the first to approve this idea was the brilliant scientist W. Humboldt (Brother of the famous naturalist and traveler Alexander von Humboldt - Wilhelm (1767-18535) - was a very versatile person - philologist, philosopher, linguist, statesman, diplomat. . - V.V. )
“Language,” he wrote, “is completely independent of the individual subject... Before the individual, language stands as a product of the activity of many generations and the property of an entire nation, therefore the power of the individual is insignificant compared to the power of language.”
This view has survived to our era.
“No matter how much you say sensible words against stupid and arrogant words, like suitor or dance, they - we know this - will not disappear because of this, and if they disappear, it will not be because aesthetes or linguists were indignant,” as one insightful and gifted scientist wrote back in the twenties [ D.G. Gornfeld, The torment of words. M. - L., 1927, pp. 203-204].
“That’s the trouble,” he said sadly, “that no one wants to hear the zealots of the purity and correctness of their native speech, as well as the zealots of good morals... Grammar and logic, common sense and good taste, euphony and decency speak for them , but nothing comes of all this onslaught of grammar, rhetoric and stylistics on reckless, ugly, reckless living speech” [ D.G. Gornfeld, The torment of words. M. - L., 1927, p. 195.] Having given examples of all kinds of speech “disgraces,” the scientist embodied his sadness in a joyless and hopeless aphorism: “Arguments from reason, science and good form have no more effect on the existence of such words than courses geology for earthquakes.” In the past, such pessimism was completely justified. There was no point in even thinking about how to amicably, systematically, and with united forces intervene in the ongoing linguistic processes and direct them in the desired direction.
Old Karamzin very accurately expressed this general feeling of humble submission to the elemental forces of his language: “Words enter our language autocratically.” At that time, people imagined this: as if a mighty river of speech was flowing past them, and they stood on the shore and watched with helpless indignation how much rubbish and rubbish its waves carried on them.
There is no need, they said, to fume and fight. Until now, there has never been a case where an attempt by the guardians of the purity of language to correct the linguistic errors of any significant mass of people was crowned with even the slightest success.
But can we agree with such a philosophy of inaction and non-resistance to evil?
Can we really, writers, teachers, linguists, only grieve, be indignant, be horrified, watching how the Russian language is deteriorating, but dare not even think about subordinating it to our collective mind through powerful efforts of will?
Let the philosophy of inaction have its meaning in past eras, when the creative will of people was so often powerless in the fight against the elements - including the element of language. But in the era of the conquest of space, in the era of artificial rivers and seas, do we really not have the slightest opportunity to at least partially influence the elements of our language?
It is clear to everyone that we have this power, and one should only be surprised that we use it so little.
After all, in our country there are such super-powerful levers of education as radio, cinema, television, ideally coordinated with each other in all their tasks and actions.
I'm not even talking about the multitude of newspapers and magazines - district, regional, all-Union - subordinated to a single ideological plan, completely mastering the minds of millions of readers.
Once this whole purposeful complex of forces unitedly, systematically, resolutely rebels against the deformities of our current speech, loudly branding them with national disgrace - and there is no doubt that many of these deformities, if not disappear completely, then, in any case, will forever lose their mass appeal. , epidemic nature *.
It is in vain that fighters for the purity of the language still feel like loners, without the slightest support in the environment that surrounds them, and too often fall into despondency.
“Hands give up,” rural teacher F.A. writes to me. Sharabanova. - No matter how much I explain to the guys that they can’t say what time is it?, my last name, ten chickens, he came home from school, I took off my boots, they stubbornly refuse to part with these terrible words. Are there really no ways to make the speech of the younger generation cultural?”
There are ways, and they are not bad at all. There is a serious magazine “Russian Language at School”, where many different methods are offered. The magazine very well reflected the ardent attempts of advanced teachers to improve the speech culture of children.
But can a school - alone - eradicate the remnants of lack of culture?
No, what is needed here is the united efforts of all the scattered fighters for the purity of the language - and can there be any doubt that if we, as a whole “hulk”, get down to business in unison and passionately, we will be able in the near future, if not completely, but to a significant extent, to cleanse our language of this filth.
Last year I published a short article in Izvestia, which outlined several practical measures for the public fight against perversions and deformities of speech. In this article, I proposed, among other things, to hold annually on an all-Union scale a “Week (or month) of struggle for the purity of language” under the auspices of the USSR Academy of Sciences and the Writers’ Union.
This project evoked lively responses that amazed me with its extraordinary passion. Letters from readers poured to me in an avalanche from Leningrad, from Moscow, from Kiev, from Ufa, from Perm, from Pereslavl-Zalessky, from Novosibirsk, from Dzhambul, from Gus Khrustalny - and only then did I truly understand how tenderly and devotedly love their great language soviet people and what aching pain is caused to them by those distortions that disfigure and spoil it>
Almost every one of these letters (and there are eight hundred and twelve of them!) indicates some specific means of eradicating this evil.
A resident of the city of Riga, K. Barantsev, suggests, for example, printing lists of incorrect and correct words on the covers of penny school notebooks, which are distributed among millions of children.
Lvov University student Valery Uzhvenko suggests, for his part, “indicating words that cripple your language on postcards, on envelopes... While watching films,” he writes, “one should show the film magazine “Why do we say that?” or “Learn to speak correctly.” “How not to talk” should be printed on stickers on matchboxes, candy and biscuit boxes.”
“I am convinced,” writes A. Kulman, a university teacher, “that the mass press, especially Komsomolskaya Pravda and the Ogonyok magazine, will greatly benefit if they establish a permanent department on “How not to speak and write.” Such publications will be useful to a wide range of people, especially to us, teachers.”
“I propose,” writes Colonel-Engineer A.V. Zagoruiko (Moscow), - to establish the All-Union Society of Russian Language Lovers. The society must have republican, regional, regional, city, village branches and primary organizations at all institutions, enterprises, schools, universities, etc. without exception. The society must be a mass organization, and access to members of the society is unlimited.”
“We need an organizing committee or an initiative group,” writes E. Grinberg from the city of Vendors, “in a word, an organization that would have the ability to organize and steadily conduct its business according to a pre-thought-out plan. Such an organization will probably be attended by not thousands, but hundreds of thousands of active fighters for high speech culture.”
Graphic artist Mikhail Terentyev proposes to establish an annual holiday - following the example of the Bulgarian Day Slavic writing. “You can save its name and date - May 25. This holiday will be celebrated on the collective farm, and in the sanatorium, and on the ship, and in the factory, and in the family. Belarusians and Ukrainians will celebrate it together with Russians...”
Mine hauler No. 51 F.F. Shevchenko writes: “We have a gigantic network of red corners, which should become centers for planting the culture of the native language in enterprises, construction sites, and agriculture... Using a hot iron, burn out the obscenity that still exists here and there in our speech... Through the eyes of love look at the matter of educating the younger generation...”
Engineer M. Hartmann shares his long experience of “fighting illiteracy.”
“Eight years ago,” he says, “we began compiling and distributing at our workplace a list of words that were most often misspelled and pronounced. From year to year the list increased and by the end of construction it was brought to 165 words. Everyone showed interest in it - from ordinary workers to major specialists. Workers and lower technical personnel easily came and asked for blueprints of the list, but more qualified comrades, unable to overcome the “barrier of modesty,” obtained lists through others, and sometimes under a plausible pretext - for their son or granddaughter.”
Attached to the letter is a large table “ Correct writing words”, skillfully and intelligently composed.
All these projects, wishes, advice should be carefully considered in some authoritative team, and when the best of them are implemented in practice, they, one might think, will not be completely useless.
True, I understand very well that all these measures are not enough.
After all, the culture of speech is inseparable from general culture. To improve the quality of your language, you need to improve the quality of your intellect. It's not enough to stop people from talking choice A or I like it. Some people write and speak without mistakes, but what a poor vocabulary he has, what tired phrases! How skinny mental life is reflected in those moldy patterns that make up his speech!
Meanwhile, only that speech can truly be called cultural, which has a rich vocabulary and many different intonations. This culture cannot be achieved by any campaign for the purity of the language. Here we need other, longer, broader methods. These methods are used in our country, where the people have created so many libraries, schools, universities, institutes, academies of sciences, etc., for their true and comprehensive education. Raising their common culture, Soviet people thereby raising the culture of its language.
But, of course, this does not exempt any of us from participating as much as we can in the hot struggle to improve our verbal culture.
Or weeds of a later time:
True, our language is still felt by many as a kind of blind element that cannot be controlled.
One of the first to approve this idea was the brilliant scientist W. Humboldt.
“Language,” he wrote, “is completely independent of the individual subject... Before the individual, language stands as a product of the activity of many generations and the property of an entire nation, therefore the power of the individual is insignificant compared to the power of language.”
This view has survived to our era.
“No matter how much you say sensible words against stupid and arrogant words, how suitor or dance, they - we know this - will not disappear because of this, and if they disappear, it will not be because aesthetes or linguists were indignant,” as one gifted scientist wrote back in the 1920s.
“That’s the trouble,” he said sadly, “that no one wants to hear the zealots of the purity and correctness of their native speech, as well as the zealots of good morals... Grammar and logic, common sense and good taste, euphony and decency speak for them, but Nothing comes of all this onslaught of grammar, rhetoric and stylistics on reckless, ugly, reckless living speech.”
Having cited examples of all kinds of speech “disgraces,” the scientist embodied his sadness in a joyless and hopeless aphorism:
“Arguments from reason, science and good form have no more effect on the existence of such words than geology courses on an earthquake.”
In the past, such pessimism was completely justified. There was no point in even thinking about how to amicably, systematically, and with united forces intervene in the ongoing linguistic processes and direct them in the desired direction.
Old Karamzin very accurately expressed this general feeling of humble submission to the elemental forces of language:
“Words enter our language autocratically.”
Since then, our greatest linguists have constantly pointed out that the will of individual people, unfortunately, is powerless to consciously control the processes of formation of our speech.
This is how everyone imagined it: as if a mighty river of speech was flowing past them, and they stood on the shore and watched with impotent indignation how much rubbish and rubbish its waves carried on them.
There is no need, they said, to fume and fight. Until now, there has never been a case where an attempt by the guardians of the purity of language to correct the linguistic errors of any significant mass of people was crowned with even the slightest success.
But can we agree with such a philosophy of inaction and non-resistance to evil?
Can we really, writers, teachers, linguists, only grieve, be indignant, be horrified, watching how the Russian language is deteriorating, but dare not even think about subordinating it to the collective mind through powerful efforts of will?
Let the philosophy of inaction have its meaning in past eras, when the creative will of people was so often powerless in the fight against the elements - including the element of language. But in the era of the conquest of space, in the era of artificial rivers and seas, do we really not have the slightest opportunity to at least partially influence the elements of our language?
It is clear to everyone that we have this power, and one should only be surprised that we use it so little.
After all, in our country there are such super-powerful levers of education as radio, cinema, television, ideally coordinated with each other in all their tasks and actions.
I'm not even talking about the multitude of newspapers and magazines - district, regional, city - subordinated to a single ideological plan, completely mastering the minds of millions of readers.
Once this whole purposeful complex of forces unitedly, systematically, resolutely rebels against the deformities of our current speech, loudly branding them with national disgrace - and there is no doubt that many of these deformities, if not disappear completely, then, in any case, will forever lose their mass appeal. , epidemic nature.
“In the history of literary languages,” recalls the scientist V. M. Zhirmunsky, “the role of grammarians-normalizers, the conscious efforts of language theorists who came up with a certain language policy and fought for its implementation were repeatedly noted. The struggle of Tredyakovsky and Lomonosov, Shishkovites and Karamzinists in the history of Russian literary language and Russian grammar... and many others. etc. testifies to the repeated influence of the creators of language policy on language practice.”
Back in 1925, Professor L. Yakubinsky wrote:
“One should hardly sit idly by and wait for the weather by the sea, relying on the “natural” course of things. Necessary lead unfolding process, taking into account all its features... The task of the state in this regard is to provide real support research work linguists", etc.
This was also the opinion of another scientist in the 20s - Professor G. Vinokur.
“In the possibility of a conscious active relationship to the linguistic tradition,” he wrote, “in the possibility household styling- in the broadest sense of this term, - and therefore, the writer of these lines has no doubt about the possibility of language policy...
Language policy is nothing more than the guidance of social linguistic needs based on an accurate, scientific understanding of the matter.”
Many years have passed since then. The “linguistic policy” of the state was first of all expressed in the fact that its two hundred million population learned to read and write in an amazingly short time.
The main thing is done. And now, I repeat, our public faces another task - a seemingly easier one: to increase the culture of our everyday and literary speech by all possible means.
It cannot be said that our society has not shown proper activity in the struggle for the purity of the language: as we have seen, many books and brochures, as well as newspaper and magazine articles, are published trying to accomplish this task. Countless schools in our country are working especially hard and persistently to implement it. But there is still a lot of work, and it is so hard that even the best of our teachers sometimes become despondent.
“Hands give up,” rural teacher F.A. Sharabanova writes to me. - No matter how much I explain to the guys that they can’t say what time is it, my last name, ten chickens, he came home from school, I took off my boots, they stubbornly refuse to part with these terrible words. Are there really no ways to make the speech of the younger generation cultural?”
There are ways, and they are not bad at all. There is a serious magazine “Russian Language at School”, where many different methods are offered. The magazine, with all its shortcomings, which we have already discussed, very well reflected the ardent attempts of advanced teachers to improve the speech culture of children.
But can a school - alone - eradicate the remnants of lack of culture?
No, what is needed here is the united efforts of all the scattered fighters for the purity of the language, and is there any doubt that if we, as a whole “hulk”, get down to business in unison and passionately, we will be able in the near future, if not completely, but to a significant extent, to cleanse our language of this filth?
About eight years ago I published a short article in Izvestia, which outlined several practical measures for the public fight against perversions and deformities of speech. In this article, I proposed, among other things, to hold annually on an all-Union scale a “Week (or month) of struggle for the purity of language” under the auspices of the USSR Academy of Sciences and the Writers’ Union.
This project evoked lively responses that amazed me with its extraordinary passion. Letters from readers poured to me in an avalanche from Leningrad, from Moscow, from Kiev, from Ufa, from Perm, from Pereslavl-Zalessky, from Novorossiysk, from Dzhambul, from Gus-Khrustalny - and only then did I truly understand how tenderly and Soviet people devotedly love their great language and what aching pain is caused to them by the distortions that disfigure and spoil it.
Almost every one of these letters (and there are more than eight hundred of them) indicates some specific ways to eradicate this evil.
A resident of the city of Riga, K. Barantsev, advises, for example, to print lists of incorrect and correct words on the covers of cheap school notebooks, which are distributed among millions of children.
Comrades! We've gathered here together with you to end the ugliness of our lives forever. Here here in front of you is a young man...
And about that plant director who repeated several times in his address to the workers:
Need to accept virgin measures.
Tambov engineer S.P. Merzhanov tells me about the hostility that he felt towards one of his colleagues when he wrote in a memo:
“Otsedova a conclusion can be drawn.”
“I also understand well,” continues Comrade. Merzhanov, a student I know, who immediately lost interest in his beloved girl after receiving from her a tender letter with many spelling errors.”
Previously, about forty-five years ago, it would have been a sin to be angry with the Russian people for such perversions of speech: they were forcibly kept in the dark. But now that schooling has become universal and illiteracy has been eliminated once and for all, all these lie down And wet do not deserve any leniency.
“In our country,” Pavel Nilin rightly says, “where the doors of schools, both daytime and evening, are wide open, no one can find an excuse for their illiteracy” [ P. Nilin, The danger is not there. “New World”, 1958, No. 4, p. 2.].
Therefore, it is in no way possible to allow Russian people to continue to retain in their everyday life such ugly verbal forms as bulgakhter, likes, rush, want, worse, obnakovanny, wants, kalidor. Or weeds of a later time: reservation, incident, I'll drop by for a couple of minutes etc.
True, our language is still felt by many as a kind of blind element that is impossible to fight.
One of the first to approve this idea was the brilliant scientist W. Humboldt (Brother of the famous naturalist and traveler Alexander von Humboldt - Wilhelm (1767-18535) - was a very versatile person - philologist, philosopher, linguist, statesman, diplomat. . - V.V. )
“Language,” he wrote, “is completely independent of the individual subject... Before the individual, language stands as a product of the activity of many generations and the property of an entire nation, therefore the power of the individual is insignificant compared to the power of language.”
This view has survived to our era.
“No matter how much you say sensible words against stupid and arrogant words, like suitor or dance, they - we know this - will not disappear because of this, and if they disappear, it will not be because aesthetes or linguists were indignant,” as one insightful and gifted scientist wrote back in the twenties [ D.G. Gornfeld, The torment of words. M. - L., 1927, pp. 203-204].
“That’s the trouble,” he said sadly, “that no one wants to hear the zealots of the purity and correctness of their native speech, as well as the zealots of good morals... Grammar and logic, common sense and good taste, euphony and decency speak for them , but nothing comes of all this onslaught of grammar, rhetoric and stylistics on reckless, ugly, reckless living speech” [ D.G. Gornfeld, The torment of words. M. - L., 1927, p. 195.] Having given examples of all kinds of speech “disgraces,” the scientist embodied his sadness in a joyless and hopeless aphorism: “Arguments from reason, science and good form have no more effect on the existence of such words than courses geology for earthquakes.” In the past, such pessimism was completely justified. There was no point in even thinking about how to amicably, systematically, and with united forces intervene in the ongoing linguistic processes and direct them in the desired direction.
Old Karamzin very accurately expressed this general feeling of humble submission to the elemental forces of his language: “Words enter our language autocratically.” At that time, people imagined this: as if a mighty river of speech was flowing past them, and they stood on the shore and watched with helpless indignation how much rubbish and rubbish its waves carried on them.
There is no need, they said, to fume and fight. Until now, there has never been a case where an attempt by the guardians of the purity of language to correct the linguistic errors of any significant mass of people was crowned with even the slightest success.
But can we agree with such a philosophy of inaction and non-resistance to evil?
Can we really, writers, teachers, linguists, only grieve, be indignant, be horrified, watching how the Russian language is deteriorating, but dare not even think about subordinating it to our collective mind through powerful efforts of will?
Let the philosophy of inaction have its meaning in past eras, when the creative will of people was so often powerless in the fight against the elements - including the element of language. But in the era of the conquest of space, in the era of artificial rivers and seas, do we really not have the slightest opportunity to at least partially influence the elements of our language?
It is clear to everyone that we have this power, and one should only be surprised that we use it so little.
After all, in our country there are such super-powerful levers of education as radio, cinema, television, ideally coordinated with each other in all their tasks and actions.
I'm not even talking about the multitude of newspapers and magazines - district, regional, all-Union - subordinated to a single ideological plan, completely mastering the minds of millions of readers.
Once this whole purposeful complex of forces unitedly, systematically, resolutely rebels against the deformities of our current speech, loudly branding them with national disgrace - and there is no doubt that many of these deformities, if they do not disappear completely, then, in any case, will forever lose their mass appeal. , epidemic nature.
It is in vain that fighters for the purity of the language still feel like loners, without the slightest support in the environment that surrounds them, and too often fall into despondency.
“Hands give up,” rural teacher F.A. writes to me. Sharabanova. - No matter how much I explain to the guys that they can’t say what time is it?, my last name, ten chickens, he came home from school, I took off my boots, they stubbornly refuse to part with these terrible words. Are there really no ways to make the speech of the younger generation cultural?”
There are ways, and they are not bad at all. There is a serious magazine “Russian Language at School”, where many different methods are offered. The magazine very well reflected the ardent attempts of advanced teachers to improve the speech culture of children.
But can a school - alone - eradicate the remnants of lack of culture?
No, what is needed here is the united efforts of all the scattered fighters for the purity of the language - and can there be any doubt that if we, as a whole “hulk”, get down to business in unison and passionately, we will be able in the near future, if not completely, but to a significant extent, to cleanse our language of this filth.
Last year I published a short article in Izvestia, which outlined several practical measures for the public fight against perversions and deformities of speech. In this article, I proposed, among other things, to hold annually on an all-Union scale a “Week (or month) of struggle for the purity of language” under the auspices of the USSR Academy of Sciences and the Writers’ Union.
This project evoked lively responses that amazed me with its extraordinary passion. Letters from readers poured to me in an avalanche from Leningrad, from Moscow, from Kiev, from Ufa, from Perm, from Pereslavl-Zalessky, from Novosibirsk, from Dzhambul, from Gus Khrustalny - and only then did I truly understand how tenderly and Soviet people devotedly love their great language and what aching pain is caused to them by the distortions that disfigure and spoil it>
Almost every one of these letters (and there are eight hundred and twelve of them!) indicates some specific means of eradicating this evil.
A resident of Riga, K. Barantsev, suggests, for example, printing lists of incorrect and correct words on the covers of cheap school notebooks that are distributed to millions of children.
Lvov University student Valery Uzhvenko suggests, for his part, “indicating words that cripple your language on postcards, on envelopes... While watching films,” he writes, “one should show the film magazine “Why do we say that?” or “Learn to speak correctly.” “How not to talk” should be printed on stickers on matchboxes, candy and biscuit boxes.”
(1) Our language is still felt by many as a kind of blind element that cannot be controlled.
(2) One of the first to approve this idea was the brilliant scientist W. Humboldt.
(3) “Language,” he wrote, “is completely independent of the individual subject...
Composition
We don't often think about what role we can play in the fate of future generations. Our entire culture, our speech, behavior, even tastes and preferences - all of this, one way or another, can affect our future and the future of our children. Does it make sense to control your speech? And who should do it? Who is responsible for the fate of their native language? K.I. asks these questions in his text. Chukovsky.
The author's reasoning consists of two completely opposite truths, each of which complements each other. The essence of the first is that a person, as an individual subject, no matter how cultured and educated he may be, can in no way influence the fate of the entire language, since the opinion of the majority usually wins. However, the writer draws our attention to the fact that “in the past, such pessimism was completely justified,” but now everything has turned in a completely different direction. The writer presents the second truth from the point of view of abandoning the philosophy of “inaction and refusal of non-resistance to evil.” And here he draws the reader’s attention to the fact that in the era of the conquest of space, in that age when such levers of influence as radio, cinema and television are of utmost importance, a person is obliged to feel a completely different power behind him and use the powers given to him to the correct extent .
The thought of K.I. Chukovsky is this: responsibility for the fate of the native language lies not only with society as a whole, but also with each person individually. And therefore the writer believes that “in order to improve the quality of your language, you need to improve the quality of your heart, your intellect.”
It is impossible not to agree with the author. I also believe that people underestimate their own contribution to the present and future of their country. The general cultural level of the entire society is made up of the efforts of each individual person. Responsibility for the fate of our native language lies with us, with each individual person, and therefore it is very important to constantly monitor our own level of culture and education, develop ourselves and encourage others to do the same.
In the poetry of I.S. Turgenev there is a well-known poem “Russian Language”. In it, the author’s words are addressed directly to the language itself as a free element, but it becomes clear to the reader that the author is aware of both his personal contribution and the contribution of his people to the greatness of the Russian language. “But one cannot believe that such a language was not given to a great people!” exclaims I.S. Turgenev, emphasizing that the language and the people who speak it are closely interconnected and complement each other. And just as language can be a support and support for a person, the latter can constantly develop and improve his speech, thereby raising the general cultural level of his country.
A.S. wrote about how very quickly negative trends in language change are being established in society. Griboyedov in the comedy "Woe from Wit". Famus society, in contrast to the educated Chatsky, was replete with vulgarity and illiteracy. These people had wealth as a priority, they, as was fashionable, neglected Russian culture and language, and very often used French words, which one of the main characters of the work, Alexander Chatsky, reproached them with, but his efforts could not be crowned with success. Famus society could not be corrected and put “on the path to truth,” but A.S. Griboyedov leads the reader to the idea that the fate of the Russian language is not lost as long as there are such responsible people as Alexander Chatsky, capable of maintaining self-control in any situation, in any society.
Thus, we can conclude that the Russian language is, of course, a free and great element, but it is such only thanks to the efforts of the Russian people. Through the efforts of each of us, we can preserve our language, we just have to not bend to fashion trends and trends of the uneducated crowd.
