Marxism and Problems of Linguistics - From Marx to Mao

Reference is further made to Lenin, and it is pointed outthat Lenin recognized the existence of two cultures undercapitalism — bourgeois and proletarian — and that the sloganof national culture under capitalism is a nationalist slogan.All this is true and Lenin is absolutely right here. But whathas this to do with the “class character” of language? Whenthese comrades refer to what Lenin said about two culturesunder capitalism, it is evidently with the idea of suggestingto the reader that the existence of two cultures, bourgeois andproletarian, in society means that there must also be twolanguages, inasmuch as language is linked with culture — and,consequently, that Lenin denies the necessity of a single nationallanguage, and, consequently, that Lenin believes in“class” languages. The mistake these comrades make here isthat they identify and confuse language with culture. Butculture and language are two different things. Culture maybe bourgeois or socialist, but language, as a means of intercourse,is always a language common to the whole people andcan serve both bourgeois and socialist culture. Is it not a factthat the Russian, the Ukrainian, the Uzbek languages arenow serving the socialist culture of these nations just as wellas they served their bourgeois cultures before the OctoberRevolution? Consequently, these comrades are profoundlymistaken when they assert that the existence of two differentcultures leads to the formation of two different languages andto the negation of the necessity of a single language.When Lenin spoke of two cultures, he proceeded preciselyfrom the thesis that the existence of two cultures cannot leadto the negation of a single language and to the formation oftwo languages, that there must be a single language. Whenthe Bundists 6 accused Lenin of denying the necessity of anational language and of regarding culture as “non-national,”18