According to the Myslovo dictionary, in Ukraine, the word of the year 2022 was the phrase "Russian warship, go fuck yourself." It should have been just one word, but we have a whole phrase - the response of the Ukrainian defender of Snake Island to the invaders, which became the leitmotif of Ukraine's resistance to Russian military aggression. Some consider this phrase to be a remake of the Ukrainian national idea formulated by Les Podervianskyi back in 2014 — "get the fuck away from us"

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Previously, the words of the year in Ukraine were:

"vaccine" (2021 word of the year)

"coronavirus" (word-2020)

digitization (2019)

Tomos (2018)

bezviz (neologism meaning visa free travel) (2017)

corruption (2016)

blockade (2015)

cyborgs (2014)

Euromaidan (2013).

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Linguists claim that although swear words exist in most languages, speakers of almost every language pretend as if these words do not belong to their language. In reality, most of the obscene words that supposedly appeared with the arrival of foreigners are actually older than most of the decent words that this text is written with. Of course, the widespread association of curse words in Ukraine with Muscovites (soldiers of the Russian tsarist army) is not unfounded. But have you read the letter of the Zaporizhia Cossacks to the Turkish Sultan without censorship? It's full of linguistic creativity in terms of swearing, which could be used now, in the conditions of another war.

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As time passes, culture and language change. However, language was and remains a weapon. And we are completely fine with grabbing the weapon from the hands of the attacker in order to hit him back. So why should we be ashamed of our linguistic trophy?

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Artists’ statement:

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“In the first days of the Russian invasion, the entire emotional message was concentrated in a set of letters available to the enemy. All the resentment and pain shot out with a bullet of a slogan, that spread throughout the country in a matter of hours, flooded the official airwaves, spread across memes and Telegram channels, appeared on road signs, posters, and later penetrated the design and souvenir products.

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This phrase will be carved in the memory of generations. Never before has the transition from individual memory to collective memory been so impressively fast. This phrase is already a part of the history of Ukraine - it is a determinant of our position in relation to the territorial neighbor in particular and colonial policy in general.

This media message is already being synthesized into an ornamental symbolic form. It is embroidered, cross-stitched in the collective memory (that is - Ukrainian culture) in the same way as the elements of the pattern in the embroidery. Perhaps time, ethics and interaction with the European context will begin to wash out its colors. Perhaps the river of humanism will change the contours of the bank of hatred and the landscape will change... but the terrain will remain”.

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