Spreading of Russian language

Russian language tracks its origin to the ancient Russian, one of the first Slavic languages, which was the ancestor for contemporary Russian, Ukrainian and Belorussian languages. Though all these languages belong to one Slavic group of languages and that causes their similarity, Russian language differs from the above mentioned by its phonetical, morphological and lexical peculiarities.

Written Russian language is based on Cyrillic script. It originates from Ancient Rus. The Ostromirovo Gospel (1056) and Izborniki (1073) were the earliest books written in Russian Cyrillic alphabet.

Great impulse to the development of modern Russian language was given by industrial revolution and technical progress of the 18th century. It is also the period of foundation of Russian literature. Russian folklore became the basic material for creativity of Russian writers and poets. One of the most famous figures of that time — Alexander Pushkin — had united in his works different language tendencies. Those works have become the masterpieces of standard literary Russian language. We can find their further development in the works of outstanding writers such as Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Turgenev and others.

Foundation and great influence of Russian State on the world history assisted in spreading Russian language all over the world, especially in European countries.

Foundation of the USSR, where Russian language was used as means of international communication made it possible to be spoken on the whole territory of former socialist countries with population over 250 million people.

Long period of "cold war" attracted world's attention to this country and arose interest in the "mysterious Russian Soul". The unique possibility to communicate with "threatening Russian bear" was — and still is — Russian language.

21 century and modern economical and political reforms lead Russia and former socialist countries to the new level of development. Russian language helps in scientific, economical, cultural communication, rises new interest and necessity of studying. Russian language is taught in more than 100 countries of the world.

Nowadays Russian language is one of the most wide-spread languages of the world. It is used as one of the six official working languages in the UN and many other international organizations.

The Government of Russia takes great care of the popularization of Russian language all over the world. According to the decree of the President of Russia the year 2007 was proclaimed the Year of Russian language in the world. Within the framework of this project the campaign under slogan "We recommend Russian" took place in many countries. It was a good advertising for and a measure of importance of the Russian language for modern life and progress.