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By Sharon Crecelius DON’T SAY THE UKRAINE! When did you notice that the media was referring to what we have always called THE Ukraine as, simply, Ukraine? Have you found it awkward to do the same? Do you wonder: Why the fuss over one three letter word? To Ukrainians the significance of dropping the THE is great indeed! To us it is a key to understanding Ukraine’s turbulent history and its pride in its emerging nationhood. On August 4,1991 the Ukrainian Parliament declared Ukraine’s independence from Moscow and the Soviet Union. This declaration of independence was over whelmingly approved in a special referendum in which 90.5 percent of Ukraine’s citizens cast ballots. After cen turies of foreign rule and injustice Ukraine was a sover eign nation instead of merely THE Ukraine, a vague and undefined region of a dominating power. A Long and Brutal History of Domination Ukraine first came under the harsh rule of the Polish-Lithuanian kingdom in the fourteen century. In 1648 the Ukrainian people rebelled and established a free Ukrainian Cossack Republic which lasted more than a hundred years. But the Republic was under con stant Russian pressure and, in 1775, fell to the armies of Catherine of Russia. For the next century and a half Ukrainians lived under the tyranny of Czarist Russia, the vast majority of them landless serfs without education and political rights. During this time the Russian govern ment pursued an active campaign to destroy Ukrainians as a separate nationality. This included prohibiting the use of the Ukrainian language. Ukraine’s dream of nationhood was not crushed and in 1918, taking advantage of the chaos of the Rus sian Revolution, Ukraine declared itself an independent republic. Without the help of the Western powers, how ever, the infant republic was soon crushed by the super ior forces of the Bolsheviks and, in 1922, was forcibly incorporated into the Soviet Union. Starvation, Extermination, and Deportation Ukrainians once again experienced the heavy hand of Russian tyranny. Millions of Ukrainian farmers and their families died of starvation as a direct result of the Soviets’ forced collectivization of farms in the early 1930s. At the same time thousands of Ukrainian writers, teachers, artists, political leaders and clergymen were branded “bourgeois nationalists” by Moscow and phys ically exterminated. Thousands of families were deported to Siberia and the Soviet Far East. It is not surprising that, at the outbreak of World War II, the Ukrainian peo ple put up little resistance to the German armies, hoping that the Germans would permit the establishment of a Ukrainian state. They were tragically disappointed. In 1942 Ukrainians formed the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA) which waged guerilla war against both the Nazis and the Soviets. After Germany’s defeat UPA continued to fight Soviet and communist Polish troops until 1950. Beginning in the late 1960’s and continuing until recently, the Soviet government imprisoned thousands of Ukrainian intellectuals and workers for criticizing the Russian domination of all facets of Ukrainian life. But the people of Ukraine persisted in a peaceful and con stitutional campaign to secure their own statehood, re sulting in the 1992 realization of the dream of independ ence and giving truth to the words of Ukrainian poet Vasyl Simonenko: "...My people’s veins throb with Cossack blood...My people live! My people will always live! No one will destroy my people!” Sharon Crecelius, a former teacher and newspaper reporter, has been writing for MIDDFEST for five years. Her favorite part of MIDDFEST is hosting out of country guests. Reprinted with permission from MIDDFEST Видання C оюзу Українок A мерики - перевидано в електронному форматі в 2012 році . A рхів C У A - Ню Йорк , Н . Й . C Ш A.
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