Table Of ContentLANGUAGE POLICY IN THE SOVIET UNION
Language Policy
VOLUME 3
Series Editors:
Bernard Spolsky, Bar-Ilan University, Israel
Elana Shohamy, Tel Aviv University, Israel
Editorial Board:
Claire Kramsch, University of California at Berkeley, USA
Georges Lüdi, University of Basel, Switzerland
Normand Labrie‚ University of Toronto, Canada
Anne Pakir, Singapore University, Singapore
John Trim, Former Fellow, Selwyn College‚ Cambridge, UK
Guadalupe Valdes, Stanford University, USA
The last half century has witnessed an explosive shift in language diversity not unlike the
Biblical story of the Tower of Babel, but involving now a rapid spread of global languages
and an associated threat to small languages. The diffusion of global languages, the
stampede towards English, the counter-pressures in the form of ethnic efforts to reverse or
slow the process, the continued determination of nation-states to assert national identity
through language, and, in an opposite direction, the greater tolerance shown to
multilingualism and the increasing concern for language rights, all these are working to
make the study of the nature and possibilities of language policy and planning a field of
swift growth.
The series will publish empirical studies of general language policy or of language
education policy, or monographs dealing with the theory and general nature of the field.
We welcome detailed accounts of language policy-making - who is involved, what is done,
how it develops, why it is attempted. We will publish research dealing with the
development of policy under different conditions and the effect of implementation. We will
be interested in accounts of policy development by governments and governmental
agencies, by large international companies, foundations, and organizations, as well as the
efforts of groups attempting to resist or modify governmental policies. We will also
consider empirical studies that are relevant to policy of a general nature, e.g. the local
effects of the developing European policy of starting language teaching earlier, the
numbers of hours of instruction needed to achieve competence, selection and training of
language teachers, the language effects of the Internet. Other possible topics include the
legal basis for language policy, the role of social identity in policy development, the
influence of political ideology on language policy, the role of economic factors, policy as
a reflection of social change.
The series is intended for scholars in the field of language policy and others interested in
the topic, including sociolinguists, educational and applied linguists, language planners,
language educators, sociologists, political scientists, and comparative educationalists.
Language Policy
in the Soviet Union
by
LENORE A. GRENOBLE
Dartmouth College,
Hanover, New Hampshire, U.S.A.
KLUWER ACADEMIC PUBLISHERS
NEW YORK,BOSTON, DORDRECHT, LONDON, MOSCOW
eBookISBN: 0-306-48083-2
Print ISBN: 1-4020-1298-5
©2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers
NewYork, Boston, Dordrecht, London, Moscow
Print ©2003 Kluwer Academic Publishers
Dordrecht
All rights reserved
No part of this eBook maybe reproducedor transmitted inanyform or byanymeans,electronic,
mechanical, recording, or otherwise, without written consent from the Publisher
Created in the United States of America
Visit Kluwer Online at: http://kluweronline.com
and Kluwer's eBookstore at: http://ebooks.kluweronline.com
CONTENTS
Preface vii
1. Introduction 1
1. Organization of the Soviet State 4
2.The Linguistic Map of the Soviet Union 8
3.Ethnic Composition of the USSR 20
4.Analyzing the Soviet Union 26
2. An Overview of Soviet Language Policy 35
1. The Early Soviet Years 35
2.Constructing Nationalities 38
3.The Nationalities Question 40
4.The Literacy Campaign 45
5.Language Policy under Stalin, 1930–1950 54
6.Language Policy after World War II 57
7.Brezhnev and the 1970’s 58
8.Language and Education 59
9.Perestroika 62
3. The Slavic Republics and Moldova 65
1. The Russian Soviet Federate Socialist Republic 66
2. The Ukrainian SSR 82
3. The Belorussian SSR 86
4. The Moldavian SSR 89
5. The Backlash of Reform 93
4. The Baltic States 95
1. Introduction to the Baltics 95
2. The Estonian SSR 97
3. The Latvian SSR 99
4. The Lithuanian SSR 104
5. Reform and Revolt 108
5. The Caucasus 111
1. Overview of the Caucasus 111
2. The Georgian SSR 115
3. The Armenian SSR 122
4. The Azerbaijan SSR 123
5. The North Caucasus 125
6. Summary View of the Caucasus 134
V
VI CONTENTS
6. Central Asia 137
1. Overview of Central Asia 137
2. Turkestan 141
3. The Uzbek SSR 143
4. Central Asia Prior to World War II 149
5. Central Asia after Stalin 157
6. Language Reform 159
7. The North 161
1. Languages of the North 161
2. The Literacy Campaign in the North 162
3. “Small” Languages of the North 167
4. Language Development 173
5. The “Large” Minorities 179
6. Language Endangerment 187
8. The Impact of Soviet Language Policy 193
1. Language Shift 193
2. Shifting Demographics 197
3. The New “Nativization” Movements 204
4. Conclusion 209
Appendix 211
Works Consulted 219
Language Index 227
Subject Index 231
Map of the Soviet Union, 1980 237
PREFACE
Soviet language policy provides rich material for the study of the impact of policy
on language use. Moreover, it offers a unique vantage point on the tie between
language and culture. While linguists and ethnographers grapple with defining the
relationship of language to culture, or of language and culture to identity, the
Soviets knew that language is an integral and inalienable part of culture. The former
Soviet Union provides an ideal case study for examining these relationships, in that
it had one of the most deliberate language policies of any nation state. This is not to
say that it was constant or well-conceived; in fact it was marked by contradictions,
illogical decisions, and inconsistencies. Yet it represented a conscious effort on the
part of the Communist leadership to shape both ethnic identity and national
consciousness through language. As a totalitarian state, the USSR represents a
country where language policy, however radical, could be implemented at the will
of the government. Furthermore, measures (such as forced migrations) were
undertaken that resulted in changing population demographics, having a direct
impact on what is a central issue here: the very nature of the Soviet population. That
said, it is important to keep in mind that in the Soviet Union there was a difference
between stated policy and actual practice. There was no guarantee that any given
policy would be implemented, even when it had been officially legislated. One of
the vagaries of Soviet language policy was that it could be invoked—or not—at the
bidding of whoever happened to be in charge at the moment. This makes evaluation
of the policy all the more challenging. One cannot assume that any policy was
actually implemented, any more than one could assume that the purported
motivation behind a given piece of legislation was genuine.
It might be argued that the Bolsheviks had no choice but to take account of
language in the early years of the Soviet Union. To a certain extent this is true.
Faced with a multi-ethnic, multi-lingual and largely illiterate population, the newly
instated Bolshevik government had two pressing needs. One was to quiet unrest
among its citizens: opposition to the new government was felt in a number of
quarters, and support of the nationalities was critical. The other was to compensate
for years of backwardness under tsarist rule and push the country into the industrial
age. Rapid industrialization was a critical goal. The first need requires a sensitivity
to the demands of the multitude of ethnic groups in the USSR, and the second
requires an educated workforce. From this standpoint, language policy is crucial.
That said, the attention given language policy goes beyond what was necessary to
satisfy these demands. Literacy rates rose dramatically, and by World War II the
population was largely literate. But the manipulation of the Soviet citizenry only
intensified in the post-World War II period: under the guise of Communist
“internationalism,” the non-Russian population was being pushed toward Russian.
In creating the new Soviet state, the government tried to manipulate the cultures
and identities of the many different ethnic groups living in its borders, in part by
affecting language use. The extent to which language use can actually be legislated
remains an open question. The data from the Soviet Union provide at least a partial
answer: language use can be legislated, depending upon a number of other factors,
some of which may be beyond the control of even the most totalitarian states. Thus,
for example, the Soviets created a situation where the Russian language was
required for all administrative exchanges; this was an effective method of instigating
VII
VIII PREFACE
language shift in some parts of the population. But for sectors of the population
which were quite large, this was less effective. And the Soviet government never
managed to control the Population growth in Central Asia was beyond the
government’s control. Thus the large Uzbek-speaking population was less affected
by Soviet language policy than was the Itelmen-speaking population. Yet it would
be an oversimplification to think that speaker population size is the only factor
which determined the efficacy of Soviet language policy. Some quite small groups
have managed a relatively high level of language retention, while some larger
groups have shown a higher rate of language shift. An example is provided by the
Beluchi, with a population of less than 30,000, versus the Belorusans, with a
population of over 10 million. As of the 1989 census, 96.9 percent of Beluchi
considered their heritage, ethnic language to be their first language, while only 70.9
percent of Belorusans did. In a similar vein, Germans—with a population of over 2
million—reported a retention rate of only 48.7 percent. Clearly more than
population size is involved.
These issues lie at the heart of the present study. The text is designed to be
useful to a variety of readers, whether read in its entirety or selectively. The first
chapter provides an overview and introduction to the Soviet Union, its
ethnolinguistic makeup, and general political structure. The second chapter presents
a chronology of Soviet language policy which is aimed at painting the general
development of language policy at a national level, independent of local variables.
By its very nature, the highly centralized governmental system of the Soviet Union
repeatedly attempted to implement the same policy throughout its vast territory,
regardless of local particulars. Yet, as history has shown time and time again, local
particulars do matter, and blanket policies which fail to take them into account often
produce results as varied as the people affected by them. For this reason, the bulk of
this book is divided into regional chapters, each of which contains information
about several Union Republics or, in the case of Siberia, a single vast territory that is
home to a wide range of languages and cultures. These chapters are intended to
provide surveys of the all the geographic and ethnolinguistic regions of the Soviet
Union. This organization is itself debatable, and no doubt a finer level of
categorization could and would produce a more detailed analysis of each individual
region. Alternatively, some might argue that the geographic groupings themselves
are misleading. For example, the Moldavian SSR is presented together with the
“Slavic” republics, in large part because they shared borders and, together with the
Baltics, constituted the European part of the USSR.
The spelling of language names is complicated; most of the languages of the
former USSR do not use the Latin alphabet. For the sake of accessibility, wherever
possible I follow the spelling used by the fourteenth edition of the Ethnologue
(Grimes 2000). This provides a consistent standard; spelling alternates are listed in
Appendix II. See Chapter 1, section 4.2 for further discussion of the issues involved
in naming languages and peoples of the former USSR. Cyrillic names (other than
language names) are transliterated according to the Library of Congress system; this
is particularly relevant to the references section, with the hopes that it will make the
references there more readily accessible.
In translating the names of administrative territories, the following conventions
are followed: Sovetskaia Sotsialistecheskaia Respublika ‘Soviet Socialist Republic’
PREFACE IX
or simply SSR, and the Avtonomnaia Sovetskaia Sotsialistecheskaia Respublika
‘Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic’ or ASSR; and the smaller administrative
regions are: oblast’ ‘region’ (often also translated as ‘province’), krai ‘territory’,
okrug ‘district’ and raion ‘area’. These translations are among the most standard and
are commonly used.i
The year 1991 saw the end of the Soviet Union. Yet at the same time, the people
living in that country at that time continued living in the same territories,which had
new political boundaries, and new notions of statehood. In order to avoid
cumbersomewording, I have often abbreviated references to former boundaries and
political divisions, referring not to “the former Tajik SSR” but rather to “the Tajik
SSR” or “the Russian SFSR.” This is intended as a shorter way of referencing
political entities which no longer exist.
As one final caveat, I should point out that not all the languages of the former
USSR are discussed here, and those that are introduced are not all analyzed in equal
levels of detail. Such discussion is beyond the scope of the present work. For a more
complete overview of the linguistic structures of these languages, see Comrie
(1981).
I would like to express my gratitude to a number of people who have helped me see
this work to its completion, in particular to Bernard Spolsky and Lindsay Whaley
for their comments on parts of the manuscript, as well as the anonymous referees,
for their many helpful recommendations. Any errors are, of course, my own. It is
hard to imagine working on a project of this size without the help of Patsy Carter,
who tracked down every resource, no matter how obscure. I am especially grateful
to my research assistants Lora Bolton and Laura Vacca for their help with earlier
drafts, and to Sarah Finck for a meticulous reading of the text and to Sarah Kopper
for her work compiling the index. Marianna Pascale provided invaluable assistance
with technical difficulties in the preparation of the manuscripts.
Lenore A. Grenoble
Dartmouth College
iThere is variation in translation of these terms; oblast, for example, is often
translated as ‘province,’ with reference to the provinces of Australia and Canada.
CHAPTER 1
INTRODUCTION
The former Soviet Union provides one of the most interesting examples of the
deliberate use of language policy by a nation state to further its political goals.
Throughout its history, the Soviet government implemented far-reaching language
policies that fundamentally changed the nature of language use within its borders.
Soviet leaders knew that language counts, that it is a crucial part of both a nation’s
and anindividual’sidentity, and it could be manipulated toserve as a powerful tool
for the State. It is clear that the Soviet government did not always achieve its goals
with its language policies, which at times were contradictory and confusing. Yet at
the same time Soviet language policy was strikingly deliberate. This tension stems
from two opposing yet concurrent trends in Soviet thinking. On the one hand, the
national languages were manipulated to create a sense ofidentity among individual
groups of people, despite the potential that this created for emerging sense of
nationalism. On the other hand, there was a strong tendency to promote a single
language in the formation of a unified, industrialized nation state, with Russian
serving all the functions of a state language in its official use in government, law,
and education.
One of the unique aspects of studying languagepolicy in the former USSR is the
advantage of the relatively short-lived and self-contained history. The Soviet Union
existed as a nation state for just under 75 years, providing the opportunity to view
the development of Communist language policy from its very inception to its
termination over the course of a brief and closed time period. The February
Revolution of 1917 led to the overthrow of the tsarist regime and the establishment
of a provisional government. Vladimir Ilych Lenin, exiled for some ten years,
returned from abroad to lead the Bolshevik Revolution in October of that same year.
Yet even prior to the Revolution, Lenin and his followers had met and discussed
language policies for the region. This fact alone underscores the importance of
language to the Communist leaders, and portends the significant role language
policy would play in the shaping of the Soviet state. From a historical perspective,
the country’s life was relatively short, and in December 1991, the Commonwealth of
Independent States was formed, officially signaling the end of the Soviet Union. The
Union Republics became independent states and sought international recognition; in
fact some (such as the Baltic Republics) had sought independent recognition even
before the ultimate downfall of the USSR. Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev
formally resigned on December 25, 1991, marking the end of an era.
That language policy was so central to the Communist Party leaders stems from
the very nature of the territory over which they ruled. From its inception in 1917 to
its ultimate break-up in 1991, the Soviet Union was a multi-lingual and multi-ethnic
state. At its point of greatest expansion, it encompassed some 8,649,490 square
miles with a total population of just under 286,000,000. The 1989 Soviet census
cites approximately 130 ethnic groups, including indigenous and immigrant people,
with a varying percentage of each group speaking its heritage language, and an
1
