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Insofar as the policies implemented by
the State in order to ensure the equality between nations were based on the
Marxist-Leninist interpretation of the dialectical relations established between the
different nationalities, the underlying motivations of linguistic and national policies
were that the modernization of the different ethnic groups of the USSR could not be
achieved if the autochthonous populations didn't manage to reach a high level of literacy,
culture and social and political consciousness. At the same time, the new needs of the
Soviet society (industrialization, technologic challenges, building of socialism) required
the creation of a new society with an adequate critical mass of individuals able to deal
with new technical and intellectual tools in order to implement and make real the projects
designed by the State. On the other hand, the Socialist Revolution happened in a country
which didn't possess the objective conditions for its consolidation -the structure of the
population was overwhelmingly formed by peasant, the urban proletariat was scarce, the
level of industrialization still low according to Western standards as well as the
political and cultural development of the population- although the new regime managed to
set up new structures of power after a long civil war.
Nevertheless, the
strengthening of the new State and the building of socialism required a radical change in
the social, political, cultural and economic composition of the country. As far as the
industrialization of the USSR was a sine qua non condition for its own survival,
the most effective and fast way to gain the support (or neutrality) of the non-Russian
nationalities, as well as to inculcate into them the new political culture was to use the
autochthonous languages as one of the main tools of this process of learning and change.
It was therefore necessary to set up a new educational system and new cultural,
ideological and communicative domains in different languages. This is the reason why
language policy was from the very beginning one of the main cruxes of the Soviet policy
towards nationalities. Language policy was carried on by the Narkomnats (9) by means of four main activities,
namely: the selection of a standard code for every autochthonous language and its
dissemination as a common language of communication for the populations of the autonomous
territorial units; the modernization of the lexicon according to the needs of a modern
industrial society; the reform or creation of new alphabets for the autochthonous
languages; and the large-scale literacy campaign in the peripheral regions by means of the
teaching of the autochthonous languages in new national school systems. As a long term
result of this kind of policies, at the end of the Soviet Union the overall picture of the
sociolinguistic situation of both the autochthonous languages and Russian as the common
language of communication between all the parts of the State was as follows:
Table 1.
Ethnic groups, knowledge of Russian and of the language of the titular ethnic group (1989)
Republic |
Majority groups (%) |
% Knowledge of Russian |
% Knowledge of language of titular
ethnic group by other groups |
Armenia |
Armenis (93)
Azeris (3) |
45
19 |
--
7 |
Azerbaidjan |
Azeris (83)
Russians (6)
Armenians (6) |
32
--
69 |
--
15
7 |
Belarus |
Belorussians (78)
Russians (13) |
80
-- |
--
27
|
Estonia |
Estonians (62)
Russians (30) |
35
-- |
--
15 |
Georgia |
Georgians (70)
Armenians (8)
Russians (6)
Azeris (6) |
32
52
--
35 |
--
26
24
10 |
Kazakhstan |
Kazakhs (40)
Russians (38) |
64
-- |
--
9 |
Kyrgyztan |
Kyrgyz (52)
Russians (22)
Uzbeks (13) |
37
--
39 |
--
12
4 |
Latvia |
Latvians (52)
Russians (34) |
68
--
|
--
22
|
Lithuania |
Lithuanians (80)
Russians (9)
Poles (7) |
38
--
67 |
--
38
21 |
Moldova |
Moldovans (65)
Ukrainians (14)
Russians (13) |
58
80
-- |
--
14
12 |
Tadjikistan |
Tadjiks (62)
Uzbeks (24)
Russians (8) |
31
22
-- |
--
17
4 |
Turkmenistan |
Turkmens (72)
Russians (10)
Uzbeks (9) |
28
--
29 |
--
2
16 |
Ukraine |
Ukrainians (73)
Russians (22) |
72
-- |
--
34 |
Uzbekistan |
Uzbeks (71)
Russians (8) |
27
-- |
--
5 |
Own elaboration from the data provided by Natsionalnii Sostav Naseleniia SSSR
(1991).
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