technological advantages that people in the cities have. However, in spite of the differences that exist between the rural and urban varieties of the spoken language, many visitors find that they have trouble communicating with the local population of Ukraine when they follow guidebooks published abroad. This is because these books tend to focus on either pure Russian or pure Ukrainian and disregard the hybrid form. The speaking of Surzhyk instead of Russian or Ukrainian is viewed negatively by nationalist language activists. Because it is neither the one nor the other, they regard Surzhyk as a threat to the uniqueness of Ukrainian culture. Literature Nikolai Gogol used the language extensively in his short story collection Evenings on a Farm Near Dikanka. Surzhyk has been an object of parody in Ukrainian literature since the very emergence of the Ukrainian language. For example, in the 1798 poem Eneyida, written by Ivan Kotlyarevsky and based on the Latin poem Aeneid, for satirical purposes the character "Filozop" speaks Surzhyk while standing over the dead Pallas. In popular culture Surzhyk is often also used for comic effect in the arts. Examples include the short plays of Les Poderviansky, and the repertoire of the pop star Verka Serdyuchka. The punk-rock group Braty Hadyukiny (literally “viper's brothers”) sings many of its songs in Surzhyk, often to underscore the rural simplicity of its songs' protagonists. See also Balachka — dialects of Kuban Cossacks Linguistic Russification — the process of introducing the Russian language into non-Russian communities Russification of Ukraine Trasianka — an interlanguage derived from Belarusian and Russian, spoken in Belarus West Polesian — an intermediate dialect that blends Ukrainian and Belarusian. References Del Gaudio S. On the Nature of Suržyk: a Double Perspective. Wiener Slawistischer Almanach, Sonderband 75. München – Berlin – Wien 2010. External links How Do Ukrainians communicate? Surzhyk and national identity in Ukrainian nationalist language ideology (Niklas Bernsand in Berliner Osteuropa-Info, Vol. 17 - page 41 -, Freie Universität, Berlin) Language Contact: Morphosyntactic Analysis of Surzhyk Spoken in Central Ukraine (Kateryna Kent, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities) Ukrainian language varieties and styles Russian language varieties and styles Mixed languages Russification