“The purpose of the document is to preserve national traditions” – Kommersant FM

The State Duma will deal with foreign signs. Presumably, in May the lower house will consider a bill according to which all street commercial information should be presented in Russian. In particular, such designations as “sale”, “shop” and “open” will be prohibited. The relevant committee recommended adopting the document in the first reading. Kommersant FM political commentator Dmitry Drize fears that the innovation will create difficulties for businesses and tourists from abroad.

At the end of May 2024, the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation plans to consider a bill according to which all signs and inscriptions in public places, including information about products and promotions, must be in Russian. The purpose of the document is to preserve national traditions and culture, as well as combat foreign influence. As noted in the accompanying documentation, as a result it should become impossible to use such inscriptions as “fresh”, “sale”, “shop”, “open” and so on on signs and shop windows.

At the same time, trademarks and patented company names do not need to be translated into Russian. That is, Mercedes, Adidas, BMW and other popular, one might say, popular brands will remain so. And it’s not clear how to translate them. Although you can try, why not? In the USSR, I remember, they tried to translate the names, in particular, of foreign musical groups from friendly socialist countries. It turned out, I must say, not very well. But let’s not get distracted and have an evening of memories, although it is important to understand that all this has already happened and there is nothing new here. “Milk”, “Bread”, “Beer and water”, “Diet” stores, bakery, glass shop. By the way, not all of these names are of Russian origin.

In general, it would be useful to conduct research on how many Russian words there are in the Russian language, so that in the future it would be easier to formulate bills. But we won’t do this either; it’s better to continue. The initiative comes from below; about a year ago, the mayor of Krasnodar toured the city under his jurisdiction and was unpleasantly surprised: almost all the signs were in English. He ordered measures to be taken, but gaps in the legislation immediately emerged. And now the issue is being resolved at the federal level. For the sake of objectivity, it is worth noting that these actions seem logical, after all, we live in Russia, and not in America.

Preservation of the national language should be among the main priorities of government authorities. But I would like to ask the question: why are foreign names so popular?

Business owners do not use them out of love for the West, which means there is a commercial benefit in this. And should they be banned? Maybe we can beat class-alien names by creating an interesting, profitable national alternative? However, they decided to follow the usual path of prohibitions. I see, it’s easier this way.

So they want to ban pizza and bring back pies and other national dishes en masse. That’s also correct, but let them compete with the Italian invention. Why should dear Russians be deprived of delicious food? This is the first thing. And secondly, what should foreigners do? They might want to buy a Russian souvenir, an accordion or a nesting doll, but they won’t be able to, because not everyone understands the Cyrillic alphabet. And English, as you know, is the language of international communication. By the way, what to do with Chinese names, should they also be banned? Too many questions arise on such and such a generally unimportant topic.

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