A Word: War

by Kateryna Iakovlenko

Manifestos and statements often fall short. Words can hold both great meaning and nothing simultaneously. Oftentimes, silence speaks louder than words. Rumors are silent. Expressions help people to cope with new experiences, including the anxiety of an unknown future that may be captured and annexed by an aggressor country; the state of war, loss, and injury; and life itself, which suddenly turns out to be the highest form of protest against war.

Words lay scattered like a house decimated by rocket fire in Dnipro city, and now it's time to gather the letters up like bricks.

February 2022 began with the word "imminent." Before Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, international media quoted politicians and experts asking whether a Russian-Ukrainian war was inevitable. The Ukrainian press proceeded to translate the word "imminent" incorrectly. Shortly thereafter, they attempted to justify themselves by claiming that the likelihood of an irreversible military escalation in the near future was merely "very likely." It's unclear which was more frightening for Ukrainians: the unfamiliar and foreboding term "imminent" or the looming possibility of being attacked. This sense of uncertainty persisted throughout the waning days of February 2022, permeating the air and making it difficult to breathe or speak.

The truth is that Russia started the war in February 2014 by annexing Crimea and occupying parts of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts. After failing to make significant gains in eastern Ukraine, Moscow invaded the entire territory and attempted to conquer it by force. However, the power of the Ukrainian people was more potent than the aggressor’s might, and this is why Russia decided to commit genocide by killing civilians throughout the territory of Ukraine.

Language played a decisive role in February 2014, February 2022, and now in February 2023. When did the war start? Did it begin with “aggression” or “conflict,” or does it start with “defense”? Did it begin with statements, continue with terms, and does it end with words?

In 2015, Ukrainian artist Lada Nakonechna created one of the key works for understanding this war, a series of three drawings (“Hybrid War,” “Civil War,” and “Russian-Ukrainian War”) that are collectively titled “War in Ukraine.” Nakonechna highlights the disparities across different structural components, including the speaker's identity, the means of communication, and the formation of war-related discourse.

But let me focus on words.

You may attempt to diminish the significance of a conflict by regarding it as a localized issue, but the fact remains that nobody should turn away from the reality of war. Peaceful negotiations may alleviate some of war’s most serious consequences, but victory can only be determined on the frontline. A conflict may be minor and arise from a misunderstanding between two parties. There is no room for impartiality in war – at its core, war is about an aggressor country striking out at another. In conflict, the losses may be small, but the losses caused by war are inevitable, tragic, and define future generations. The consequences of war are far-reaching, impacting society, the economy, and the environment. In its wake, desolation, poverty, and hunger are prevalent, with entire cities left in ruins and people forced to flee and seek refuge elsewhere. The mere mention of war can instill fear and trepidation, with the experience defying easy description, particularly for those enduring it firsthand. Nevertheless, it is their voices that hold the most weight and significance.

If, in 2014, the word “war” was starting to become uncomfortable and perhaps even too provocative for the Western media, nowadays, it’s nearly impossible to avoid it. The “Ukrainian conflict” finally became the “Russian war.” But today, the terms “crimes against humanity” and “genocide” have become synonymous with the word as well, being one of the most terrible manifestations of violence against a nation and its culture. Yet the term “genocide” requires legal confirmation and consensus from the international community. Meanwhile, genocide has already become a part of our reality – Ukrainians are dying every day from the blatant cruelty of the occupiers. Those who lived through it – who survived it – will not have the final say in calling this genocide by its proper name, but rather people in distant international courts. Hence the question arises: Does the meaning of words depend on their inherent nature or the power structures that control the vocabulary apparatus? Does this mean that words can be owned like lands?

Ukrainian art has turned to words for a multitude of reasons. However, since February 2022, every word has become not just a mere prompt but also a form of expression, a cry for help, a message, a search for identity, and a means to fix reality and cope with trauma, among others. The language is precise and emotive, imbued with pathos and at times even resembling asemic writing. This has led to the emergence of new connotations for seemingly familiar words.

There is no place for poetry in war, yet the war has given rise to new forms of poetry. Ruined and abandoned houses, gutted forests, shelled land, and roads scarred by tank tracks began to resemble letters and unwritten sentences. Will someone add to them, cross them out, rewrite them, or throw them away like a crumpled piece of paper? The transgressive and existential aesthetics of this language profoundly impact how we communicate with one another. What language will we continue to use to talk about life, death, art, temporality, fear, faith, hatred, gratitude, rage, humanity, peace, tranquility, love, and freedom?