2010

The focus of this report and the role of Karelian in Russia within Map 1 Map 2 Map showing the Republic of Karelia and the two Finnish regions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Map_of_Kar elian_dialects.png Schematic map of the dialects of the Karelian language http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Karelia_toda y.png Case-Specific Report: Karelian language in Russia 5 ELDIA-European language diversity for all the ELDIA project is on Olonets Karelian. However, the Russian language sociological and administrative systems often do not distinguish between various groups. Consequently, we have preferred to apply the broad concept of Karelian (language) in this report. Putting aside the issue of classification of Olonets Karelian and Lude as the dialects or separate languages, the term "Karelian language" is applied in this report to all three main branches, unless Olonets Karelian and Lude are mentioned separately. For almost thousand years, there has been intensive interaction between speakers of what later became Karelian and Northwest dialects of Russian. Ancestors of Karelians became a minority in the historical territory of the contemporary Republic of Karelia due to gradual influx of Slavic populations, which began already in 11th century and lasted for centuries. From the 19th century the Russian language started to dominate gradually even stronger over Karelian. In the 20 th century dramatic changes followed the processes of modernization of 1930-s, WWII, after-war building, when major transfers of population took place. Thus, Karelians have been minority with respect to Russians for a long period of time. The Karelians living in the Republic of Karelia are in the main focus of this report, because it is referred their "titular republic", whereas in the other regions of Russia they are few and do not have any collective status. Nowadays the main ethnic groups (or «peoples», both terms typically used in Russian context) inhabiting the territory of Karelia are the Karelians, Veps, and Russians. In Russian public discourse Karelians are the «titular people» of the Republic of Karelia. Being the titular people, they are not referred in legislation to as a national or ethnic minority, although they have been in minority already at the time of the creation of the Republic. Neither are Karelians officially counted as an indigenous people like, for example, Veps. Karelians are not in the list of «indigenous small-in-number people of the Russian Federation», because the latter category is applied according to legislation only to «peoples», which preserve traditional livelihoods, lead traditional way of life and number less than 50 thousand people (Federal Law on Indigenous Small-In-Number Peoples 1999, Unified List of Indigenous Small-In-Number Peoples 2006). Karelians are an ethnic category of Russian, Soviet and All-Russia's population censuses. The existence of Karelians as an ethnic entity nowadays is fixed in legal acts (laws, decrees and others), implementation programs. It is reflected in the data of population censuses, data on current statistics, and documentation of national NGOs. Case-Specific Report: Karelian language in Russia 6 ELDIA-European language diversity for all The regular complex research on history and culture of all groups of Karelians started in Russia at the beginning of 1920-s. Material culture, everyday life, family, matrimonial law and customs, rites and music of Karelians were studied. Since the second half of 1940-s, ethnogenesis, ethnic history, structure of the Karelian language, folklore, material culture, family structure, everyday life and culture of woodcutters were actively investigated. Since the end of 1960-s, study of arts and crafts of Karelians, of linguistic and ethno-cultural processes was initiated. During the last twenty years particular attention has been paid to the issues of preservation, usage and development of the Karelian language, study of calendar ceremonial rites, customs and beliefs of Karelians. The following institutions were historically in charge in Russia for exploration of these issues (Nikolskaya 1976): Commission for the Study of the Tribal Composition of the Population of the Borderlands of Russia (KIPS), Karelian State Museum of Petrozavodsk, Leningrad Department of the Russian Museum, Moscow Institute of Ethnography (later, Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology of the Russia's Academy of Sciences), Institute of the Language, Literature, and History of the Karelian Scientific Center of the USSR (later Russia's) Academy of Sciences. Documents and other materials are stored in the National Archives of the Republic of Karelia and Karelian State Archives of the Newest History. In Finland studies on the Karelian language are conducted in the Karelian Institute of the University of Joensuu, the Research Institute for the Languages of Finland and the Department of Finno-Ugrian Studies of the University of Helsinki. Karelians are the autochthonous population of the North coast of Ladoga Lake and the isthmus between Ladoga and Onega Lake. According to an old theory, at the end of 14th, during the 15th and 16th century the ancestors of present-day Karelians started to move to the North in the direction of the White Sea, where in the 16th-18th century the group of Proper Karelians was formed, and to the East to the areas of the Olonets Isthmus, as the groups of Olonets Karelians and Ludes were formed (Bubrikh 1947: 31-40). In the 17th century there was a wave of mass migration of Karelians to the inland areas of Russia. The issue of autochtonity of Karelians in Karelia is settled, although it does not have further legal and political implications. This explanation has later been modified but, in principle, the idea of a gradual diffusion and areal splitting of the Karelian varieties is still accepted. In all areas, Karelian must be considered as an autochtonous language. The only exception is the Tver Case-Specific Report: Karelian language in Russia 7 ELDIA-European language diversity for all

2012

2019

2010

The article considers the issues, related to the distribution and position of the Finnish language in Russia in the 19-20th c., first of all in the areas of compact settlement of the Finns – in Ingria and Soviet Karelia.

This article examines Finnish language literature in Russian Karelia on the Russian-Finnish national borderland from the 1940s until the 1970s. It focuses on the concepts of the non-Russian language space and border that are constructed and studied in the context of three novels: Iira (1947), Tiny White Bird (1961), and We Karelians (1971). The article claims that the non-Russian language space and the national border started to be understood differently from the official degrees dictated by Moscow, as found in literature already from the late 1950s and early 1960s. From the 1950s onwards, the historical, linguistic, and cultural roots across the national border and the Finnish population were allowed to be recognized in literature. Furthermore, this article claims that in the 1970s, literature was able to represent such regional history, and also the closeness and permeability of the national border that influenced the lives of the Soviet Karelian non-Russian speaking population and their identity formation. This led to different ideas of the national border, in which the border and its functions and meanings became gradually more multi-voiced, ambivalent and controversial, in comparison to the conceptualization of the border as presenting a strict, impermeable boundary.

1990

2020

Moscow has tied the national compatriot identity inseparably to its own Russian-speaking diaspora. With the recent notion of military crises in the Russian territorial neighbourhood, geopolitical fears have grown in both the Baltics and Central Asia. Still, the question of how Moscow-friendly and secessionist the Russophone minorities in both regions are, remains largely unanswered. This article is focusing on the comparison of two regional actors in the post-Soviet nationalisation process by comparing the language policies of Estonia and Kazakhstan since their independence from the USSR.