Our generation has been given a difficult but honest role — to lead the country into the Ukrainian language.

29.10.2025

Ruslan Shostak, President of TERWIN

I’ll try to be brief, because I don’t have much moral right to philosophize on this topic.

I grew up in a Russian-speaking family.
And I personally experienced what was once considered normal — you could simply not learn Ukrainian.
You could live in Ukraine without speaking its language.
Instead of Ukrainian, I studied physics, chemistry, mathematics — everything except the culture and history of my own country.

Ukrainian wasn’t needed.
Not in school, not at university, not in business.
Until 2014, I — like most people — lived in a world where Ukrainian was considered optional, something unnecessary.

After 2014, things began to change.
Slowly, awkwardly, but they changed.
We began introducing Ukrainian into business: we held “Ukrainian Language Days,” spoke it in meetings, wrote internal texts.
Colleagues from Donbas, Dnipro, and Odesa tried to switch to Ukrainian.
It was a process.
Slow, but honest.

And then came 2022.
And many things became clear.
I realized that the war didn’t start just because of weapons.
It began because we had lived too long within someone else’s cultural code.
Because I myself spoke Russian — and by doing so, even unconsciously, I was feeding someone else’s system of meanings.

There are no “Odesa,” “Dnipro,” or “Kharkiv” languages.
There are only two — Ukrainian and Russian.
And if you don’t choose your own, someone else will choose for you.

Our generation has been given a difficult but honest role — to lead the country into the Ukrainian language.
This is not the government’s task.
It is the task of each of us — a parent, a leader, a citizen.

Yes, it’s hard. Yes, it takes effort.
But without this, there will be no united Ukraine.

And do you know why I consider the Ukrainian language so important?
Because it shapes our identity.
We don’t need to invent a history — we already have one.
Our history began a thousand years ago.
But all this time, even in independence, we continued to live in linguistic dependence.

I don’t want to blame anyone — not myself, not the government that never created a real model for transition and adaptation.
The war did it for everyone.
Quickly. Harshly. But honestly.
It forced us to recognize and accept what is ours — our spirituality, our identity, our country.

Where to start today?
Simply speak Ukrainian with your children.
And let them respond to you in Ukrainian — however they can, however it comes out.
That’s how icebergs begin to move — millimeter by millimeter, but in the right direction.
That’s how we’ll move this huge iceberg of Russian influence.