En
Ru
Russian Language Day
Every year on 6 June in Russia and around the world, on the birthday of the great Russian poet and prose writer Alexander Pushkin, the Day of the Russian Language is celebrated as a national treasure of the peoples of the Russian Federation, a means of international communication and an integral part of the cultural and spiritual heritage of world civilisation.
According to the data for 2025, the Russian language ranks ninth among the most widespread languages of the world and is one of the most translated languages. It is spoken by about 253.4 million people.
The founder of the modern literary Russian language is considered to be A. S. Pushkin, who enriched the book language with live Russian speech, thanks to which the literary language acquired a more structured, unified and systematic character. As the poet N. A. Nekrasov noted, "in Pushkin's works, the Russian language for the first time found a worthy expression and appeared in all its greatness. Pushkin's poetic genius was, one could say, a friend to the genius of the Russian language".
For the first time at the official level Russian Language Day was celebrated at the UN on 6 June 2010. At the meeting of the Department of Public Information of the UN Secretariat on 20 February 2010 it was decided to celebrate Russian Language Day as one of the official languages of the United Nations within the framework of the programme for the development of multilingualism and the preservation of cultural diversity. The following year, on 6 June 2011, the Russian Language Day was officially established in Russia by the decree of the President of the Russian Federation D. A. Medvedev. Since 1997, this day has been celebrated as a public holiday "Pushkin Day of Russia", established by the decree of the President of the Russian Federation B. N. Yeltsin.
Lit.: День русского языка в ООН // Организация Объединённых Наций [Электронный ресурс]. URL: https://www.un.org/ru/observances/russian-language-day; Указ Президента Российской Федерации от 06.06.2011 г. № 705 «О Дне русского языка» // Президент России [Электронный ресурс]. URL: http://www.kremlin.ru/acts/bank/33264.
Based on the materials of Presidetial Library:
Alexander Pushkin (1799–1837): [digital collection]