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Part of
The Politics of Multilingualism: Europeanisation, globalisation and linguistic governance
Edited by Peter A. Kraus and François Grin
[Studies in World Language Problems 6] 2018
► pp. 39–64

Chapter 3
A Russian-speaking nation?

The promotion of the Russian language and its significance for ongoing efforts at Russian nation-building

| Durham University

The study explores Russia’s language policy in its connection to the nation-building project. The data demonstrate that, in the recent years, the policy-makers have increased their efforts at strengthening the position of Russian both in Russia and abroad. The policy analysis reveals that the intention is to use the language as a tool to foster national identity. However, this might be not as easy a task as one might assume because language itself influences the choice of strategy in the nation-building process.

Keywords: Russian language, language policy, nation-building, identity politics, Russian Federation
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • 1.Language, nation, and the state
    • 1.1Nation-building and language policy in Russia
    • 1.2Legal institutional framework
    • 1.3Language ideologies and state languages
  • 2.An analysis of the language policy in three contexts
    • 2.1Policy towards the “peoples of Russia”
      • 2.1.1Sociolinguistic situation
      • 2.1.2Language planning
    • 2.2Policy towards migrants
      • 2.2.1Sociolinguistic situation
      • 2.2.2Language planning
    • 2.3Policy towards “compatriots abroad” and beyond
      • 2.3.1Sociolinguistic situation
      • 2.3.2Language planning
  • 3.Policy mechanisms of identity-building
    • 3.1From problems to goals
    • 3.2From resources to tools
    • 3.3From actions to results
  • Conclusion
  • References
Published online: 10 September 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/wlp.6.03zam
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