Russification

7 Key excerpts on "Russification"

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  The Romanov Empire and Nationalism

  Essays in the Methodology of Historical Research

  • Alexei Miller(Author)
  • 2008(Publication Date)
  • Central European University Press

    (Publisher)

  Russification OR RussificationS? 57 had remained a minority until the very collapse of the empire. The dominating idea was that of an all-Russian nation that united all East Slavs. But the East Slav ethnicity was not a rigid barrier either. As we have already noted, the attitude toward the assimilation of Finno-Ugric groups was invariably positive. The significant number of russified and christened Tatars among both Russian peasantry and Russian nobility was neither a secret nor a problem for anyone. The racial concept of nation received some currency in Russia in the early twentieth century, but was neither dominant nor even as strong as in neighboring Germany. The few supporters of the concept of a multiethnic Russian nation that ide-ally would have to cover the whole empire, for instance P. B. Struve, empha-sized expanding political participation and instilling civic loyalty in the em-pire. This position added urgency to the problem of civic and political inclu-sion of the peasant masses — a problem that was recognized, at least with re-gard to Russian peasantry, by a wide circle of Russian nationalists. 35 The notion of Russification is often used in historiography to describe not just the linguistic and cultural assimilation, but other forms of interaction between various imperial agents as well. The term “administrative russifica-tion” was used by Thaden to describe the process of imposing administrative institutions and government forms typical of central regions. It was precisely in this sense that Catherine II spoke about the task of “russifying” the Smolensk Province, Little Russia, and the lands annexed as a result of the divisions of the Polish Commonwealth. The term Russification is suitable for description of absolutist unification and administrative centralization in Rus-sia no more than the term germanization suits an analogous policy of Joseph II in the Habsburg Empire.

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  The Russian Empire

  A Multi-ethnic History

  • Andreas Kappeler(Author)
  • 2014(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  In the course of the nineteenth century a number of new factors appeared on the scene, and these changed the traditional policy patterns. The two most important ones have already been discussed in the previous chapter. The national movements of the non-Russians, first and foremost that of the Poles, and national consciousness in sections of Russian society began to jeopardize the basis of the dynastic legitimation of the multi-ethnic empire and its estate-based and pre-national policies. To this was added the increasingly urgent need to modernize the empire, something that was linked to an administrative, judicial and social process of systematization and regularization. Finally, Russia was affected by changes in the rest of Europe, where the model of the ethnically uniform nation state was gaining ground. That this could also be applied in multi-ethnic empires was demonstrated by the policy of germanization which followed the unification of Germany, and the policy of magyarization which occurred after the Austro-Hungarian ‘Compromise’ of 1867.

  Russian policy was influenced by these new forces, and the tendency towards swift administrative, social and cultural integration became stronger, and culminated towards the end of the nineteenth century in what was known as the policy of Russification. However, the widely held view among historians that there was such a thing as a simple and one-dimensional policy of Russification which began at the latest under Nicholas I needs to be differentiated in what follows in both regional and chronological terms.1 Furthermore, it needs to be asked to what extent, as the title of this chapter suggests, there was in fact a single

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  The Nationalities Factor In Soviet Politics And Society

  • Lubomyr Hajda, Mark Beissinger(Authors)
  • 2019(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  CHAPTER 5 Some Factors in the Linguistic and Ethnic Russification of Soviet Nationalities: Is Everyone Becoming Russian? Barbara A. Anderson and Brian D. Silver

  Language and ethnic affiliation are the most important determinants of the non-Russian peoples' identity in the USSR. Given the country's multiplicity of nationalities, and the political ramifications of this diversity, changes in language behavior and ethnic attachments have significant long-term implications for the Soviet state and society.

  Changes in language behavior and ethnic identity of a population seldom take place quickly. When they do occur, it is often an intergenerational process. The levels and rates of assimilation among the Soviet nationalities are influenced by a variety of factors. Regime policies are one, but even sudden shifts in policy often produce an effect only gradually. They are, in any case, not necessarily determinative, for the varying levels of development and the specific experiences of particular groups also play an important role. There is, as well, the impact of critical historical events that may precipitate a process of unforeseen change that becomes fully apparent only after the passage of considerable time.1

  Our study examines the linguistic and ethnic assimilation of the non-Russian nationalities in the Soviet Union in this light, focusing on a few elements of the process that are important but not well understood.2

  The Extent of Linguistic Russification

  The Soviet censuses of 1959, 1970, 1979, and 1989 each asked every respondent's native language (rodnoi iazyk), with parents answering for young children. This question was supposed to elicit the language that the respondent knew best, not necessarily that which he or she had learned first, and did not have to match his or her self-identified nationality.3

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  Enlightened Colonialism

  Civilization Narratives and Imperial Politics in the Age of Reason

  • Damien Tricoire(Author)
  • 2017(Publication Date)
  • Palgrave Macmillan

    (Publisher)

  This fundamental change was carried forward by Peter’s successors, removed of its religious trappings, and turned into an offensive to bring about the settlement of nomads, who were increasingly viewed as inferior. Over the course of the eighteenth century, Russian governments thereby developed a comprehensive civilizing mandate out of strategies used to civilize individual populations. Not all of these strategies could be discussed in the context of this paper. Apart from the ousting of Muslim and shamanistic beliefs in favor of the Russian Orthodox faith and apart from the policy envisaging the replacement of nomadic ways of life with settlement and agriculture, the Russian imperial elite’s policy encompassed: driving the nomads out of their ancestral lands; restricting the nomad’s movements by lines of fortresses; gradually displacing indi- genous customs through the introduction of Russian traditions; repla- cing traditional tribal political structures with governors who were often violently imposed by Russia; attempting to marginalize indigenous lan- guages in certain regions through the use of the Russian language; and integrating populations into the community of subjects dependent on the tsar’s grace (milost’), rewards (that is, bestowal of titles for digni- taries), and Russian justice (that is, involvement in specifically designed Russian courts of justice (raspravy)). 46 If one uses the characteristics proposed by Jürgen Osterhammel in his widely recognized definition of colonialism, then the Russian empire clearly meets the criteria that 124 R. VULPIUS would allow it to be described as a colonial empire in terms of its rule over non-Christian peoples. The driving force behind this shift towards colonial policy was the Russian reception of the Enlightenment.

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  The Geography of Nationalism in Russia and the USSR

  • Robert J. Kaiser(Author)
  • 2017(Publication Date)
  • Princeton University Press

    (Publisher)

  Nevertheless, a more subjective affiliation with the indigenous language was not erased. This is clear from the continued high percentages claiming the indigenous language as the native or primary lan- guage even while fluency was shifting in favor of Russian. This tendency appears to occur with ethnocultural traits generally; the objective loss of tradi- tional ethnocultural characteristics over time with the social and geographic mobilization of the masses has frequently coincided with a rising subjective sense of national self-consciousness among indigenes. Geographically, this was particularly apparent in the homeland urban setting. In rural areas of the homeland, the Russian language and culture has not had as great an impact, and in these areas Russians have had to accommodate them- selves to the indigenous language and culture. Outside the homeland, and particularly in urban areas, nonindigenes faced pressures to acculturate to the Russian or indigenous nations. Overall, since the vast majority of members of most nations have remained in the homeland even while they have urbanized, Russification and sovietization have had a limited impact on the population. The cities of each national homeland have become the stages for rising interna- tional tensions and conflicts as indigenes migrate to them, and not the scenes of international integration. This becomes even more apparent when the next stage in the process of assimilation—international marriage—is examined. INTERNATIONAL MARRIAGE International marriage has been treated by Soviet ethnographers as a more significant indicator of the potential for international integration than linguistic assimilation (e.g., Bromley 1969). This placement of international marriage in an intermediate position along the acculturation-psychological assimilation pathway is also seen in the work of Western analysts (Clem 1980,52): "One way of substantiating the contention that true assimilation remains a distant goal is to

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  Shamanism and Northern Ecology

  • Juha Pentikäinen(Author)
  • 2011(Publication Date)
  • De Gruyter

    (Publisher)

  384 Elena Glavatskaya language only. Thus, for the first time since Peter the Great's reign the fight against ethnic religions got state support. All this, alongside mea-sures in the field of economics, led to Russification and the destruction of ethnic identity. But the laws prescribing Khanty children to be sent to boarding schools (internaty) were the last straw. Thus the govern-ment inflicted the heaviest blow upon the weakest link in the system of religious and ethnic security. During their internat period children were separated from their family's everyday life, they were excluded from participation in vital rituals. They usually had no possibility to train in their native languages. At the same time they were under the great influence of Russian culture. For some of them it could mean the loss of ethnic identity. Thus, it was by mere chance that the task of destroying the Ob-Ugrian ethnic identity and of replacing it by a new system of views failed. Otherwise it would have led to a decreasing the Ob-Ugrian population and their total Russification. Luckily, in spite of all the dif-ficulties the Khanty and Mansi have managed to resist the Russification policy and to retain their ethnic and religious identity. It seems possible that the danger of Russification will always threaten the Ob-Ugrians, but we would still like to believe that the mighty machine of the gov-ernment will no longer loom behind it. Notes 1. Undoubtedly, there were some other means of attracting non-baptized peo-ple to Christianity, the most efficient being that those who were converted became excused from jasak 'fur tax'. At the turn of the 17th century the average jasak was 5-12 sable per person. Thus, being interested in jasak peo-ple as suppliers of valuable furs, the Russian government did not promote intensive Christianization of the Ob-Ugrians.

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  Ethnicity, Nationalism and Conflict in and after the Soviet Union

  The Mind Aflame

  • Valery Tishkov(Author)
  • 1996(Publication Date)
  • SAGE Publications Ltd

    (Publisher)

  The Central television and the press used only one language, except for regular 30-minute educa-tional programs in English, French, and Spanish. Today, after ten years of liberalization, there is still not one word in Tatar, Bashkir, Chuvash, Chechen or any other major non-Russian language spoken on Moscow-based TV broadcasts. When I proposed making C U LT U R E S AND LANGUAGES I N CON FLICT 87 national broadcasting more multi lingua l at the Russian government's meeting presided over by Boris Yeltsin in July 1 992, the Deputy Prime Minister (in charge of mass media) Mikhail Poltoranin reacted gloomily, 'It wil l blow up the whole country. Russians wil l not stand for it.'3 In this book I do not evaluate the extent to which the dissemination of the Russian lan-guage and of common Soviet cultura l values was introduced forceful ly, and to what extent it was a 'natural ' process in a country with ethnic Russians both as an ethnic majority and as a kind of 'state-bearing nationality'. The fact that this country went through industrialization and rapid urbanization in the 20th century could not but lead to a certain cultura l unification. Whatever the relative importance of these factors (polit-ical efforts and the modernization process), the results of their combined influences were perceived by the contemporary non-Russian intelligentsia and political activists as the result of deliberate efforts at Russifying minority languages and cultures through state policy. Ironical ly, this very process of disseminating 'socialist Soviet culture' also pro-duced dissatisfaction amongst ethnic Russians themselves, on the part of the intel ligentsia -primarily writers. To many of them, it signified a 'loss of one's roots' and abandoning the traditions of Russian folk (primarily peasant) culture. What was consid-ered Russif icat ion by the non-Russian intellectuals meant 'Sovietization ' for Russian nationalists.

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