The political symbolism of the city toponymic practices ; Політичний символізм топонімних практик міста
Background. From the French Revolution and till now the street and square names are used as an instrument of the symbolic power, determined by ideological needs, and in the one hand manifested the political identity and another hand constructed this identity. The history of the Kyiv central square names confirms this thesis. Later on, in 1919 the same practices were exploited by the bolshevik authorities and in 1991 by the Ukrainian authority. If the bolshevik toponym policy and practices were aggressive, the Ukrainian state is trying to rename the central Kyiv's squares very and very gingerly. From the end of the 1990 till the 1996 less than 10 central squares were renamed.Methods. The methodologic approach is an attempt to combine the linguistic, urban studies and historical methods and to use this combination to the analysis of die place names, in particular square names. Such methodology offers not so much the study of language or specific lingual units, but an examination of the language practices in the broad multifaceted context of the city history.Purpose. The main goal of this article is to investigate the history of the main central square names in Kyiv from 1869 till 1996 and the socio-political semantic of the renaming process. The target square names are Alexandrovskaia, Bohdana Khmelnytskoho, Dvortsovaia, Drevlianskaia, Galichskaia, Kirilovskaia, Kozhemiackaia, Kreshchatinskaia, Libiedskaia, Lukianovskaia, Lvovskaia, Mikhailovskaia, Novostroienskaia, Sophievskaia, Teatralnaia, Tsarskaia (Tsaria osvoboditelia), Universitetskaia, Vladimirskaia, Zhitnietorzhskaia, Zolotovorotskaia. The most important in this list are Alexandrovskaia, Bohdana Khmelnytskoho, Dvortsovaia, Sophievskaia, and Tsarskaia (Tsaria osvoboditelia), which play an active role in the political struggle for die city and country during the 124 years. From 1919 till 1930th Alexandrovskaia was renamed into Krasnaia, Tsarskaia (Tsaria osvoboditelia) into Internationala, Sophievskaia became The Red Herns ofPerekop (1921) and The Herns ofPerekop (1926), Dvortsovaia - Centralnogo Ispolnitelnogo Komiteta USSR. After 1990, the topographical chronology was: Chermna received the name Kontraktova (1990); Zhovtnevoji Revoliutsii (former Sovietskaja and Kalinina) got the name Mai dan Nezalezhnosti and Kalinina - Mykhajlivska (1991); Bohdana Khmelnytskoho became Sophijska (1993); last but not least Leninskoho Komsomolu (former Stalina) changed into Evropejska (1996).Results. This article has identified die importance of the streets and squares naming policy. The results indicate that die permanent changing of the central square names in Kyiv refiects the political transformation of the society. During the all periods the central square names demonstrate the symbolic power of the city 'owners': imperial strong power, soviet state aggressive power, and weak power of Ukraine.Article received 22.08.2019 ; У статті проаналізовано практики найменування і перейменування центральних площ Києва від 1869 і до 1991 року як частину складної політичної історії української столиці після втрати Магдебурзького права і до відновлення незалежності. Підтверджено тезу, гцо такі практики за відповідних умов є політичною процедурою, детермінованою ідеологічними потребами; самі назви - політичними символами, гцо маніфестують певну політичну ідентичність і водночас є конструктором і частиною цієї ідентичності; а політично мотивоване переназивання вулиць - спільна риса усіх періодів революційних змін.Матеріал надійшов 22.08.2019