Language and Nationality Quotes

“Ideas begin to guide life only afterwards, after long periods that are required for their transformation, so to speak, into the black soil of thought, that is, into something that is no longer a subject for discussion.”
― Oleksander Potebnja, Language and Nationality

“It seems obvious that not only the feeling but also the consciousness of national unity, in the sense of intercourse of thought, which is achieved through unity of language, is a very ancient phenomenon; moreover, the time of its origin cannot be determined with accuracy. In contrast, we hear that the idea of nationality was born for the first time at the beginning of our century. Further, it stimulated “the gradual singling out of the personalities of civilized peoples” “from the original indifference of savage peoples.” And “the great service of the communication of this stimulus” may be credited to certain individuals — “in Germany, among others, to [Johann Gottlieb] Fichte the elder; among us, to the Slavophiles” (Gradovskii 246). Such opinions are voiced by others as well, but only partially with justification. Of course, unlike Ecclesiastes, we believe that everything under the sun is new and that events do not repeat themselves.
Our age’s idea of nationality bears an imprint of originality, but similar ideas appeared earlier as well. Their generic similarity seems to me to turn on the following. Such an idea is not a necessary feature of a people but a design of individuals and circles that arises from time to time. It is their intention to make certain qualities that are ascribed to the people the guiding principle of the purposeful activity of individuals, societies, and governments of that people — to impart greater energy of activity by exalting its principles. Accordingly, this idea is partly a certain content of thought, partly a general emotional temper of an individual, a circle, a society, and sometimes, in rare critical moments of national life, of a significant portion of the people. In this sense, we see this idea wherever there arises in the people, in response to conflict with other peoples, an apotheosis of certain national features and there is written on a banner something like “God is with us: understand, O nations, and submit,” or “civilization is with us,” and for this reason, again, “submit.”
― Oleksander Potebnja, Language and Nationality

“Examining languages as profoundly different systems of ways of thinking, we can expect from the presumed replacement in the future of the diversity of languages by one universal language simply a lowering of the level of thought.”
― Oleksander Potebnja, Language and Nationality

“all understanding, even the fullest, is at the same time misunderstanding”
― Oleksander Potebnja, Language and Nationality