Linguistic Regimes and Territorial-Administrative Divisions on the Western Borderlands of the Russian Empire after 1905

• In Event: Modern Challenges of the Russian Empire: Nationalism, Imperial Governance, and Hybridity

Abstract

This paper will argue that the tsarist authorities in the late imperial period applied different linguistic regimes to different regions depending on the location of that region on the Russian mental map. I argue that when implementing linguistic policy, officials were thinking about the future territorial-administrative status of a particular region. Thus, this paper will show how non-Russian language rights in public life (in particular, in schools) were related to the projected territorial-administrative reforms in The Kingdom of Poland, Western Region, and Baltic provinces.

Author

• Darius Staliunas, Lithuanian Institute of History (Lithuania)