Unit VI. Donetsk

Pre-reading tasks

3. Brainstorm all facts you know about Donetsk.

4. Study the definitions of the following words:

Ironwork – fences, gates, etc, made of iron bent into attractive shapes.

Vicinity – the area around a particular place.

Scattered – spread over a wide area or over a long period of time.

Outskirts – the parts of a town or city that are furthest from the centre.

A concentration camp – a prison where political prisoners and other people who are not soldiers are kept and treated cruelly, especially during a war.

Census – an official process of counting a country’s population and finding out about the people.

Coal-pit – a place from which coal is dug out of the ground.

Coke – a solid black substance produced from coal and burned to provide heat.

Amenity – something that makes a place comfortable or easy to live in.

Servitude – the condition of being a slave or being forced to obey someone else.

Hardship – something that makes your life difficult or unpleasant, especially a lack of money, or the condition of having a difficult life.

Malnutrition – when someone becomes ill or weak because they have not eaten enough good food.

Donetsk (former names: Yuzovka, Stalino), is a large city in eastern Ukraine on the Kalmius river. Administratively, it is a center of Donetsk Oblast, while historically, it is the unofficial capital and largest city of the economic and cultural Donets Basin (Donbass) region. Donetsk currently has a population of over 982.000 inhabitants (2010) and has a metropolitan area of over 1,566,000 inhabitants (2004). According to the 2001 Ukrainian Census, Donetsk is the fifth-largest city in Ukraine. While the majority of people in central and western Ukraine speak Ukrainian, most residents of Donetsk are Russian-speaking Ukrainians and ethnic Russians. According to 2001 population census, Ukrainians are 56,9% of Donetsk oblast and Russians are 38,2%. The Russian language is dominant in Donbas: even many ethnic Ukrainians speak it as their first language.

Donetsk lies in the steppe landscape of Ukraine, surrounded by scattered woodland, hills (slag heaps), rivers, and lakes. The northern outskirts of the city are mainly used for agriculture. The Azov Sea, 95 km south of Donetsk, is a popular recreational area for those living in Donetsk. A wide belt of farmlands surrounds the city.

The city was founded in 1869 by a Welsh businessman, John Hughes, who constructed a steel plant and several coal mines in the region to produce iron rails for the growing Russian rail network; the town was thus named Yuzovka in recognition of his role in its founding ("Yuz" being a Russian or Ukrainian approximation of Hughes. During Soviet times, the city's steel industry was expanded. The plants used coal from the immediate vicinity, and both coal mining and steel making developed rapidly in Donetsk. By 1914 there were 4 metallurgical plants, 10 coal-pits, and a population of about 50 000. After the October Revolution (1917), Yuzovka was renamed Stalino and, in 1961, during the De-Stalinisation to its modern name after the Seversky Donets river.

For the time being there are more than 40 coal-pits within Donetsk city limits. A major integrated coking, iron-smelting, and steel-making plant makes modern Donetsk one of the largest metallurgical centers in Ukraine. Coke by-products are the basis of a chemical industry producing plastics. Donetsk's economy consists of about 200 industrial organizations that have a total production output of more than 5 billion hryvnias per year and more than 20,000 medium-small sized organizations. The city's coal mining industry comprises 17 coal mines and two concentrating mills; the metallurgy industry comprises 5 large metallurgical plants located throughout the city; the engineering market comprises 67 organizations, and the food industry — 32 organizations.

In the beginning of World War II, the population of Stalino consisted of 507,000, and after the war - only 175,000. The Nazi invasion during World War II almost completely destroyed the city, which was mostly rebuilt on a large scale at the war's end. It was occupied by Nazi Germany between 16 October 1941 and 5 September 1943. The territory of Donetsk at the time of the Nazi German occupation consisted mainly of a Jewish ghetto, in which 3,000 Jews died, and a concentration camp in which 92,000 people were killed.

In 1945 many forced laborers, young men and women aged 17 to 35, were interned into reparation servitude from the Danube Schwabian communities Schwowe of Yugoslavia, Hungary, and Roumania and worked under extreme hardship to rebuild Stalino and to labor in its mines. Many died from disease and malnutrition.

The principal street, from the railway station to the steelworks, is main Donetsk city attraction. It is 5.5 miles (9km) long, with the main shops, hotels, and administrative buildings. Donetsk is a well-known educational location of the surrounding area, accompanied with several universities, which include 5 state universities, 11 institutes, 3 academies, 14 technicums, 5 private universities, and 6 colleges. The most important and prominent educational institutions include the National Technical University, as well as the Donetsk National University which was founded in 1965. The National Technical University held close contacts with the University in Magdeburg. There are also several scientific research institutes, and an Islamic University within Donetsk. Important attractions of the city include the Cathedral Transfiguration of Jesus, the Donetsk National University, and others. In Donetsk, there is the 360 metre tall TV tower, one of the tallest structures in the city, completed in 1992.

Three major professional football clubs play in the city, which include two in the Ukrainian Premier League and one in the Ukrainian Second League: Shakhtar Donetsk, which plays at the Donbass Arena, Metalurh Donetsk, which plays at the Metalurh Stadium, and FC Olimpik Donetsk.

The main forms of transport within Donetsk are: trams, electric trolley buses, buses and marshrutkas (private minibuses). The city public transportation system is controlled by the united Dongorpastrans municipal company. Another method of transport within the city is taxicab service, of which there are 32 in Donetsk.

Post-reading tasks