How Do Languages Affect Holidays

Nathaniel Worthman
Professor. Dadak
Writing 101
8.3.19
This week for my language log I want to talk about holidays. Now, I know what you're thinking, “what does this have to do with languages?” “I come to this blog for content on language!” Okay hold your horses it all connects! So what holiday sparked this? Маслиница (Maslinitsa). Маслиница is the Russian version of Mardi Gras. So why is this important? Well, the way we use language demonstrates what a culture values and not just the literal meaning.
During Маслиница people all over the Russian speaking world people make блины (bleenee) or Russian pancakes to celebrate this holiday rooted in pagan tradition wherein the pagans believed this was how the should say goodbye to the new year and winter and help the sun return to bring spring.  This is so interesting to because if you speak one language the likelihood of you practicing a language/culture specific holiday increases significantly.
Another great example is International Women's Day. Many Americans think that the holiday is a newer holiday created by the west. This however is not the case. In Russian speaking countries this holiday has been practiced for quite sometime but it has only recently come to america. According to all my experience and travels I think that a lot of this has to do with a lack of cultural communication from the english speaking world to others. I mean if you think about it, holidays like Valentines Day, Christmas while originally religiously specific have become so commercialized in English speaking countries that they have even spread and become major holidays in countries that are not predominantly catholic.  This in my opinion is all due to language and cultural exchange. What do you think?

Comments

  1. AM. DadakMarch 8, 2019 at 8:35 AM

    In Poland, I was surprised one day in March when at every turn, jelly donuts appeared. Students had them for their second breakfast break, they appeared with celebration in the teachers' room, the janitor interrupted my after-school elementary English club to bring me some, and at my private lesson later in the afternoon, my student's mother brought me some. It was my second month in county, my Polish was only fledgling, so I had no idea what was going on. Clearly, though, it was something special, and people were happy to present these baked goods to the foreigner in town, so I smiled, said thank you, and though "well, jelly donut day is a thing here in Poland."

    It took me a little while to put it all together. The Poles called the day "Tłusty Czwartek," which means "Fat Tuesday" - which at some point dawned on me is the same phrase in the French/creole "Mardi Gras." Thus, these jelly donuts - actually paczki - fit in with the tradition of using up the fat and sugar in the house before Lent.

    So, does this connect in with Маслиница? It looks like it does, according to 5 minutes of checking around the internet, reading about Fat Tuesday, Shrove Tuesday, Lent in Orthodox Christianity, etc.

    Wait! What about the pagan rituals? For mаслиница, as with lots of Christian holidays, I wonder if it is a case where the religion absorbed an existing practice so that pagan celebrations became Christian ones - folk could still have their traditions and the church could claim the party was in celebration of their beliefs.

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