"The Russian language is losing its position in terms of prevalence in the world and by 2025 it may become even less popular than Bengali or Portuguese, according to the center's data. sociological research Ministry of Education and Science of Russia, received by RIA Novosti.

"Russian language in the countries Western Europe today about 225 thousand schoolchildren are studying (before the beginning of the 90s - over 550 thousand). IN high school countries of Western Europe, 28.5 thousand students are learning the Russian language," the materials of the Ministry of Education and Science say.

The Russian language is still the fourth most widely spoken language in the world. The leader is Chinese - 1.35 billion people, English - over 650 million, Spanish - more than 330 million.

"It is assumed that in 10 years the number of those who know the Russian language may be reduced to 212 million people, and it will be overtaken by French, Hindi, Arabic," the document says.

By 2025, when, according to sociologists, the number of those who know the Russian language will be reduced to approximately 152 million people, Portuguese and Bengali will overtake it.

The Ministry of Education and Science notes that the policy of most of the CIS and Baltic countries in relation to the Russian language leads to the fact that in the first years of independence it could be considered native, then second native, then the language of interethnic communication, then the language of national minorities and, finally, one of the studied by choice or even an optional subject.

"The Russian language made a similar evolution in the Baltic States, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkmenistan," the materials say.

Compared with Soviet period the number of secondary schools with instruction in Russian has decreased in the CIS and Baltic countries by an average of two to three times. Russian as foreign language also begins to lose ground in school programs yielding to English.

A similar situation is observed in Europe. According to Russian Ambassador to France Alexander Orlov, the number of French people who study Russian is declining from year to year. Russian classes are being closed in some lyceums and colleges."
Yeees, Chinese most of my friends have already gone to study courses ... They say that this is the inevitable future of Russia - cooperation with China and, as a result, the integration of the economy into Russia, from which you can "make good money." I wonder who teaches Russian to their children? Is it difficult for a child to live in Italy and learn the language of mom and/or dad? There are lovers of Chinese in Italy (not cuisine))) language and culture...)?

Our "support and support", our "truthful and free Russian language", as I.S. called it. Turgenev, in the mouths of our compatriots, is less and less like that.
We heavily clog it with foreign words. And not because there are few words in our language. We still have more than 130 thousand of them. But for some reason, we really like to use foreign vocabulary. And especially actively we use English words in speech.

We are on English language became directly obsessed in the bad sense of the word. We do not just study it and apply it where it is appropriate. And inappropriately mix it with Russian speech.

Of course, everyone is used to such a word as, for example, “manager”. Forgetting about the Russian equivalent "manager". No, managers are required everywhere. Especially "pleasing" to the eye "clean-manager". Why not a cleaner? Probably because to say: "I work as a cleaning manager" is more prestigious than to say: "I am a cleaner." In general, it seems that the main reason for the clogging of the language with anglicisms is the desire to look cool. It seems that you know a foreign language, you can screw a word or another into speech. But why can't you be proud of knowing your native language? wide vocabulary? Instead of "cool" and "super" use "fine", "wonderful", "great"?

Well, we are used to managers and even put up with them. But why continue to pollute? At the same time, it is continued in most cases (not in all, of course) by those who carry out the language to the masses - journalists in newspapers, on TV, radio and especially on the Internet.

On TV, when talking about the fashion industry, they began to use the word "bow", which means "image" (from the English look - look, appearance). A synonym in Russian can completely replace this word. Moreover, in our head, “onion” is more associated with a vegetable from which tears flow. Although it’s true, you hear a lot of these “bows” and you want to cry.

But recently in our large mall"MEGA" held a certain event "Street Couture", where ordinary buyers took part. And the presenter, who, in theory, should have excellent spoken Russian, said: “So, all the participants are ready.” Which means that they are, in fact, ready (from the English ready - ready). It sounded funny. And most buyers just didn't understand the words. And the participants, judging by their faces, were themselves surprised that they were somehow “ready”.

There is an example from radio journalism. On Mayak Radio on Saturday morning, the presenter said: “So, let’s discuss all these trends ... yes, trends ... oh, I feel that today we will use this word!” She wanted to say that they would use this word a lot times (from the English use - to use, to use) I heard the same verb, new to our language, in the speech of the inhabitants of the city, when the girl asked her friend to “use her mirror”.

All these words are practically rooted in our language. But journalists do not stop there. They, especially on the Internet, offer more and more Anglicisms. For example, the Macintosh laptop website published an article about a contest with prizes, where various companies chose the most commonly used word "IT". IT people are just programmers (from the English IT - information Technology). So soon the journalists themselves will become “journalists”. Did the article itself suggest such words? how to “google” (i.e. search for information through the Google search engine), “exploit” - as a replacement for the word “use” (from the English exploit - use, use) and, attention, “unlock” - that is, “unblock” (from English lock - lock, lock). Why these unnecessary replacements?

And Internet users are already preoccupied even with the spelling of these anglicisms. For example, on the [email protected] portal, a certain Ilya Demyanovich asked the question “How would it be correct to say: “google” or “google”. And then he even explained: “I still thought it was right to“ google ”, and today, to the question:“ Where can I download Chinese rap ”, my classmate answered“ google. Of course, there were also humorous answers that it’s right to “google” or “google” in general, but still the most popular was: “It would be right to“ enter a query into the Google search engine. Here, people who stand for the purity of the Russian language have not died out, apparently.

Although there are fewer of them. A survey was conducted on the website headhunter.ru “How often do you use English terms in speech? 57% answered all the time, 40% - sometimes / from time to time, 7% - very rarely. The column "never" did not even appear.

Maybe someone will say that there is nothing wrong with that, and in our integrating world it is normal to use foreign words. I doubt. Especially so intense. Still, the identity, individuality of cultures is needed, and it is not least preserved through language. And so, little by little, English, maybe even replace Russian?

Several films were presented at the Sundance Independent Film Festival new look Russian - without matryoshka and balalaika
The Sundance American Independent Film Festival, held in Park City, is very similar to its creator, Robert Redford. On the one hand, Redford is handsome and very popular with the audience. On the other hand, he is up to his neck in politics and believes that if you do not talk about important things: about war, violence, civil liability, then the world will not move. And, of course, it must be moved. The festival does the same. On the one hand, it is for the audience. Full halls, people stand for two hours from seven in the morning in line for tickets. On the other hand, Sundance is very interested in politics and is known for a very strong documentary competition program.
Russia has participated in this festival more than once, and in 2008, director Anna Melikyan even received at Sundance a prize for directing in the Foreign Feature Films competition - her Mermaid was then one of the unconditional hits. This year Russian feature films not in the main competition. There is one documentary co-production - "Russian Lessons" by Andrey Nekrasov and Olga Konskaya. And there are a couple more films that tell Americans about what today's independent Russians are like. Everything fits perfectly into the framework declared on the very high level"reboot".
The stereotype about bears on the streets of Moscow remained in the same times where the evil Americans in top hats, the characters of Soviet cartoons, disappeared. The bears have been replaced by another cliché - the mafia bulls of the 1990s, walking around modern cinema, from David Cronenberg's Vice for Export to Terry Gilliam's The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. Last year's Sundance showed the film Frozen Souls by Sophie Barts, in which the hero's soul is stolen by the Russian mafia and he has to go to St. Petersburg for his soul. What else is Russian? Vodka, matryoshka, earflaps.
Robin Hessman, in the film "My Perestroika" from the competition documentary program, tried to break American stereotypes by showing everyday life several Russian families. Of course, there is vodka in the frame, but many Americans, after watching Perestroika, admitted that they completely changed their opinion about Russia. “They were also taught in childhood that there is some kind of threat hanging over the world and that this threat is us,” the middle-aged man was surprised after the film. – And we were taught in exactly the same words that they are the threat. We are very similar. I made friends with these people."
This is one of the few films in which the history of our country does not look like petrified tediousness from a history textbook, or hysterical sobbing, as in TV reports. This is a fairy tale about a wonderful pioneer childhood, very different youth (one of the characters wanted to join the party, another was a dissident, the third was a conformist), about tanks and hopes of 1991 and disbelief of 2008.
“My Perestroika” is a warm, even tender movie about several former classmates who entered the era of Gorbachev's perestroika at the age of 20, and now, when they are over forty, each of them lives as best they can. Ruslan plays in the passage and gives banjo lessons; Andrei opens the seventeenth store of expensive French men's shirts; Olga fixes billiard tables and tries to keep their former beauty; A married couple Boris and Lyuba - perhaps the main characters of the film - teach at the 57th school, one of the most famous Moscow schools.
Robin Hessman lived in Russia for many years, first came to the USSR in 1991, studied at VGIK, and now oversees the documentary program of the Amfest film festival. She knows Russian life from within and admits that, of course, he can no longer objectively evaluate what is in the frame. For her, there is nothing strange or surprising in Moscow life, and the Americans were amazed at it. “There is no such thing as Americans thinking bad or good about Russia,” says Robin. They don't think about her at all. We need to tell them more about Russia.”
Three heroes of "Perestroika" - teacher Boris Meyerson, his wife Lyuba and son Mark - arrived in Park City for the premiere of the film, walked around the city in red fan scarves with the inscription "My perestroika". Red is, after all, also a cliché, from the same row as bears-vodka-matryoshka-earflaps. After the film, the audience asked the characters if they were afraid to look into the future. A new stereotype is born: today's Russian is the one who should be scared.
This idea is supported by the film "Russian Lessons" by Andrei Nekrasov and Olga Konskaya - an investigation of the August events of 2008. The film tells about Russian-Georgian relations - not only about the 2008 war, but also about the Abkhazian conflict of the 1990s. The authors go to the Russian-Georgian border from different directions: Olga - from the Russian, Andrey - from the Georgian. On the way, they talk with witnesses of the events, send footage to each other, and look for the truth. Then, while editing the film, they understand that they need to deal with the lies of the state channels (one of the strongest moments of the film is the frame-by-frame analysis of Russian TV programs in which video material was processed on a computer for propaganda purposes) and with the origins of the problem. They quote Leo Tolstoy, interview witnesses of a long-standing Abkhazian conflict, and Russia in the film appears as a loose monster, devouring everything that moves in the wrong direction.
This is a very personal film, and it can only be reproached for some kind of manipulation of the viewer, a kind of emotional blackmail. The material of "Russian Lessons" already speaks for itself, but when tragic music is superimposed on eyewitness accounts, this reduces the credibility of the film. When the authors quote Putin's words and prove that they are not related to reality, this is an honest job. But when at the same time Putin freezes on the screen, contorting in an animal grin, this is a method of Soviet propaganda. Nekrasov himself said in an interview that he made a political film, but he hopes that it cannot be called propaganda. But the film, claiming to be an objective display of reality, turns out to be extremely subjective.
Russian vodka flows in the surreal black-and-white parable "The Temptation of Saint Tony" by Estonian Veiko Õunpuu, presented in competitive program Sundance. This film came to represent the actress Ravshana Kurkova, she played the role of the hero's Russian beloved. Kurkova is best known for her work in the films "Dead Daughters" and "Three Girls", in the series "Barvikha", "Officers" and "Capercaillie". "Temptation" is a movie of a completely different level, and Ravshana is absolutely organic in it. It's a scary, oppressive film about an eccentric Tony who tries his best to be good, but falls deeper and deeper into the dreary horror of the world around him. In this world, a cop is slowly undressing during interrogation, and women are being picked like lobsters. The heroine of Ravshana is accidentally rescued by Tony from the police. The heroine's father is always drunk, and she gradually grows into this muddy world. Ravshana explains why Yunpuu chose her: “We needed someone who would stand out from the film, my heroine is almost like an alien.”
Probably, the heroine could be of any nationality. The film is pure Babylon, in which quotes from Fellini side by side with Pazoliniev's detached morbidity and everyone speaks their own language: some in Estonian, some in Russian, some in German, some in French (the great French actor Denis appears in the film Laban), but everyone still understands each other. For his debut work Autumn Ball» Veiko Õunpuu received the Horizons prize at the Venice Film Festival; The Temptation of Saint Tony is his second feature film. By Ravshana's definition, this is a film about modern society it's impossible to be good. Even if you are a righteous person, you will have to eat someone, because that is how life works. Ravshana herself does not agree with this view of the world: “A rather pessimistic idea. The hero is an eccentric, strange comrade, but there is a lot of light in him. And the fact that he turns into a monster - I’m even outraged, I’ll tell you honestly ... But Veiko showed apathy in this picture modern world».
The film has such energy that at the Sundance premiere in the very middle of the picture, just on the border between slight absurdity and complete lawlessness, a fire alarm whistled, lights flashed throughout the hall, but some viewers decided that this was just a special effect, emphasizing the obvious unbearability of being.
Stereotypes may have nothing to do with reality, but they say a lot about the main emotions that the country broadcasts during external world. Pride, fear, recklessness, conciliation, threat. Today, it seems, a new, post-mafia image of the “standard Russian” is gradually taking shape - submissive, but formidable. Without earflaps.