East Slavic Languages in the Reflection of a Naive Native Speaker (Content-Analytical Study of the Social Networks Communication)

The article presents a content-analytical study of the reflexion of the Eastern Slavic languages (and related entities) by naive native speakers, users of social networks Vkontakte, Odnoklassniki, and Facebook. The quantitative analysis made it possible to determine that the users of the Vkontakte network are the most active in this regard. Russian is used as a working language much more often than other East Slavic languages. Academically recognised languages (Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian) are comprehended more consistently. The qualitative analysis has shown that the image of a language depends on the network language environment. In the Russian-speaking environment, Russian is closely related to the image of a communicative tool, which can also be said about Ukrainian. The Ukrainian- and Belarusian-speaking environments focus on understanding the language as a cultural phenomenon. The opposition of "ours" and "theirs" becomes actual, with the Russian language usually interpreted as alien. The Ukrainian and Belarusian languages remain beyond the field of mutual reflection. Special language phenomena (Surzhik, Trasianka) are interpreted by users as independent languages. In some cases they are understood as primary for all East Slavic peoples. Besides the languages mentioned above, the users focus on the non-existing phenomenon of the Slavic language understood as the proto-language of Slavic culture, the loss of which caused the negative situation for the Slavic peoples.

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