So or thus? Linguist explained the typical mistake of Ukrainians.

Thus means "after" / "then", not "therefore" or "so". It is not used as an insert and is never separated. This was stated by philologist Olga Vasilyeva in the "Language Issue" section of Glavkom.

Philologist Olga Vasilyeva explained that the word "thus" is often used in the wrong meaning. For example, in the sentence "These steps and decisions are not so much difficult as they require an understanding of what university autonomy really is, and thus – political will". She pointed out that in this case "thus" is incorrectly used as "and therefore".

Olga Vasilyeva also noted that this sentence has other mistakes. Instead of the phrase "require understanding", it should use the phrase "need understanding". And instead of the phrase "not so much... but rather" the phrase "not as... as" should be used.

The philologist provided an example of the correct use of the word "thus". According to her, Mikhail Kotsyubinsky used it in the sentence "For a year, [Ivan] wandered like this, and thus got married".

Furthermore, Olga Vasilyeva reminded that Ukrainians should not transliterate Belarusian and Russian names, but only convey them using Ukrainian equivalents. For example, instead of the names Artem, Mykola, Oleksandr, Semyon, Vera, Kateryna, Svitlana, their Ukrainian equivalents should be used.

She also explained that even though foreign names are not translated, Russian names should be expressed in a Ukrainian manner. For instance, the name Andrzej Duda remains unchanged, while the name Dmitry Medvedev is expressed in Ukrainian.

The philologist also noted that Ukrainians make the most mistakes in phrases and words like "suggest", "according to the law", "thus", "currently". She pointed out that often Ukrainians mistakenly add the letter "s" to the word "suggest". She also noted that the problem arises in the use of phrases "according to" or "in accordance with", when people say "according to the law".