The Ukrainian language: origin, developmentand present-day situation

Abstract

The article highlights the milestones in the development of the Ukrainian language and discusses the current trends observed mainly in the lexical sub-system as one of the first to reflect social, economic, and political changes in the life of any society. We also present main distinctives features of Ukrainian as one of the Slavic languages and discuss selected aspects of the sociolinguistic situation in Ukraine, as well as the language problems of the Ukrainian diaspora that tries to find a balance between adaptation, blending in the environment and preserving one’s identity. The study of changes in the lexical sub-system of Ukrainian from the break of the Soviet Union to the present day gives an excellent opportunity to reveal the influence of extralinguistic factors, such as the emergence of new realities and certain looseness of speech caused by a sense of freedom in the new society on the enrichment of the general vocabulary with revived words, borrowings, and derivatives, significant changes in onomastics in connection with decommunization.