Unofficially Speaking

“Article 6: When using the Russian language as the State Language of the Russian Federation, it is forbidden to use common, insulting, or borrowed words and expressions, or foreign words for which the Russian language has analogs in wide usage.”

Law on the State Language. Passed by a vote of 248-37 (with 1 abstention), by the Russian State Duma on February 5, 2003. On February 12, sent back for revisions by the Federation Council, because it lacked certain normative elements, and could not be executed in its present form. Current status, at press time: pending.

Porfiry Porfirovich Parfyonov was in a very dark mood.

He snuffed out his cigarette, turned the page of his newspaper, and took a bite out of a greasy butterbrod that had been languishing on his plate alongside a half-eaten pickle.

It had been a grueling day for Porfiry Porfirovich, Senior Inspector for the Voronezh City Linguistic Enforcement Directorate. First thing in the morning, he had to arrest two dissidents who had filled in “zhurnalist” instead of the newly-coined “smisatel” in the space on a government form requesting “profession.” It was clearly a provocation, as both admitted to knowing about the April 26 Decree of the Central Linguistic Directorate, which had explicitly forbade this term, along with other foreign job description implants, like “advokat,” “prezident,” “deputat,” and “oligarkh.”

Then he had drawn the dreaded sidewalk duty. Every inspector in the Directorate pulled sidewalk duty once a month, so it was no surprise. It just could have come on a better day.

Porfirovich spent the next two hours patrolling walkways around government buildings, drawing up citations for citizens who used impure speech on government property. It was a busier day than usual—12 tickets—since it was the end of the month and many pensioners were upset about late pension payments. One particularly ornery pensioner tried to convince Porfirovich that a rather colorful, yet impure, term he had used to describe an intransigent bureaucrat was actually not a form of mat’, but a somewhat obscure term of endearment used by jockeys when talking about their horses. Porfirovich found another pensioner’s defense more creative: that his obscenities directed at the government were a work of performance art and thus not covered by the law.

After lunch, Porfirovich had to testify in the widely-publicized case of Andrei Andreevich Andronnikov, a midlevel meat inspector for the local Office of Public Health. In May, Andronnikov had been investigating the 4th Voronezh Meat & Dairy Factory Named for Yermak. Andronnikov was so appalled at conditions in the plant that he launched into a rather “spicy” invective that questioned the provenance of the factory director and the suitability of his education. The director, one Innokenty Ivanovich Izmailov, felt rightly threatened and turned on Andronnikov by invoking Article 63 of the Fifth Revision to the Law on the State Language (“employees of the State shall not use profanity while in the service of the State”).

Needless to say, Andronnikov’s court defense rested on the shaky balance between public health and etiquette. Porfiry Porfirovich was trotted in by the prosecution, to put his shoulder under the side of purity versus Andronnikov’s anti-microbial stand. In what he thought was a particularly witty turn of phrase, Porfirovich declared that “I would not want any meat, not matter how sanitary, to pass over my lips, if my mouth did not voice the mother tongue, pure and truly Russian.”

He realized his misstep only too late, when he saw the face of his Moscow Section Chief—in attendance to heighten the significance of the trial—turn from ruddy to ashen. The defense attorney questioning Porfirovich pounced: “I’m sorry, but by s-- … er, that word … Citizen Porfirovich, do you mean “clean,” “germ-free,” or “lacking infectious qualities”? Because I am sure you are aware that this word you used meaning “clean” was banned from use in State trials by the April 26 Decree.”

The normally expansive Porfirovich was speechless. He stared back at the “paid disputant of diminished spine” (the April 26 revision from “advokat”) in disbelief. Somewhere in his peripheral vision he glimpsed the Moscow Section Chief slipping out the back door.

Porfirovich slogged through the rest of the day, his brain feeling like a cold lump of kasha, attempting to steer clear of the icy stares of his fellow inspectors.

The Revolution always devours its own children, they say.

Sitting in the flickering yellow light of his kitchen, Porfirovich found little comfort in that aphorism. He stuffed down the last bit of his pickle, picked up the newspaper and resumed memorizing this week’s list of pre-bans (foreign words waiting to be banned once replacements are coined by the Academy of Sciences’ Linguistic Enforcement Department): greypfrut, radio, internet, demokratia …