Orc (

Cyrillic , bg, кирилица , mk, кирилица , russian: кириллица , sr, ћирилица, uk, кирилиця , fam1 = Egyptian hieroglyphs , fam2 = Proto-Sinaitic , fam3 = Phoenician , fam4 = G ...

: орк,

romanised Romanization or romanisation, in linguistics, is the conversion of text from a different writing system to the Roman (Latin) script, or a system for doing so. Methods of romanization include transliteration, for representing written text, and ...

: ''ork''), plural orcs ( Russian and uk, орки), is a pejorative commonly used by many Ukrainians to refer to a

Russian soldier The Russian Ground Forces (russian: Сухопутные войска �ВSukhoputnyye voyska V}), also known as the Russian Army (, ), are the land forces of the Russian Armed Forces. The primary responsibilities of the Russian Ground Forces ...

participating in the Russian-Ukrainian War and Russian citizens who support the aggression of Russia against Ukraine. The pejorative serves to symbolize inhuman wickedness and brutality of the invaders. It comes from the name of orc, the fictional humanoid monsters from J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy novel '' The Lord of the Rings''.

Usage

Comparisons of Vladimir Putin's Russian regime and its security services to the evil necromancer Sauron, his domain of Mordor, and orcs were made at least as early as 2009 by a Russian-American blogger and 2012 by Russian journalist Leonid Bershidsky. Since the beginning of the Russo-Ukrainian War in 2014, Ukrainians have used the term to as a pejorative for Russian forces. During the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Ukrainians began to massively use the term "orcs" in relation to Russian military personnel and their war crimes. ''

Al Jazeera English Al Jazeera English (AJE; ar, الجزيرة‎, translit=al-jazīrah, , literally "The Peninsula", referring to the Qatar Peninsula) is an international 24-hour English-language news channel owned by the Al Jazeera Media Network, which is own ...

'' and '' Politico'' included the term as an example of the "new language of war in Ukraine". The term is used by Ukrainian senior officials, the military and the media. For example, in early March 2022, in the Russian-occupied city of

Melitopol Melitopol ( uk, Меліто́поль, translit=Melitópol’, ; russian: Мелитополь; based on el, Μελιτόπολις - "honey city") is a List of cities in Ukraine, city and List of hromadas of Ukraine, municipality in Zaporizhz ...

, demonstrators protested against "orc looting". On April 8, the chairman of the Sumy Regional State Administration, Dmytro Zhyvytskyi, announced that his region was now "free of orcs". The Mayor of

Makariv Makariv (, ) is an urban-type settlement in Bucha Raion, in Kyiv Oblast (province) of Ukraine. It hosts the administration of Makariv settlement hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine. The population of the settlement is , down from 12,042 in 20 ...

followed him the next day, he stated that the bodies of 132 civilians were found and that they were "killed by Russian orcs".

Analysis

Calling Russian soldiers "orcs" has been described as an example of dehumanization. '' The Spectator'' compared the "brutality and chaos" of the Russian troops to Tolkien's orcs and noted that the use of this term may not be just an accidental insult, but the result of drawing an analogy between the Middle-earth conflict and the real world.

References

External links

Anthem of Doomed ("Let's Go Orcs!")
��An anti-war song and video about Russian invasion of Ukraine by

Nogu Svelo! Nogu Svelo! (russian: Ногу свело!, lit=Cramp in the Leg!) is a popular Russian rock band from Moscow, usually associated with humor and parody and accessible and sometimes childishly simple melodies. They have experimented with many styl ...

and

Oleg Kuvaev Oleg Igorevich Kuvaev (russian: Олег Игоревич Куваев; born 6 February 1967) is a Russian-Israeli artist, designer and animator, known for his ''Masyanya'' flash-animated series. Since first appearing in the Internet in Russia, R ...

{{Russian invasion of Ukraine, Impact 2010s neologisms Anti-Russian sentiment Pejorative terms for European people Propaganda in Ukraine related to the Russian invasion of Ukraine Ukrainian responses to the Russo-Ukrainian War

Usage

Analysis

See also

References

Further reading

External links