TIL the difference between "Ukraine" and "The Ukraine" is roughly whether it's a post or pre-Soviet context
quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/count...
quickanddirtytips.comPosted Mar 10, 2014, 10:22 PM UTC
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quickanddirtytips.comThere's no "the" in either Russian or Ukranian.
The real difference is "na Ukraine" vs "v Ukraine" in Russian.
The first is what used to be said during the Soviet Union. I guess the closest translation would be "at the borderland" (which is what "Ukraine" means), understood as a reference to a local place. The second would be "in The Borderland", as in the name of a separate country. Like "at the beach" vs "in France".
Ukranians have a problem with the "na" version as it treats Ukraine as a part of Russia, which it isn't anymore. Some Russians though insist that "na" is what we always said, so we'll continue saying it, though it may be technically incorrect.
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I just say "the Ukraine" always.
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there is NO difference...
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"the Ukraine" is definitely wrong. The Ukrainian language does not contain the article,
"the".Nor does Russian.I don't understand why people say this every time this is discussed here, whether ukrainian uses articles is totally irrelevant; from what I gather, the point is that "in the Ukraine" and "na Ukraine" both imply a region/sub-region, not a sovereign state, that is all.
Somehow people began referring to Ukraine as if it were a valley between mountains or maybe a body of water.