Bilingual Education and the Problems of Ethnic and Linguistic Identity in the USSR and Modern Russia

• Main Author: Mikhail A. Marusenko
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia (RUDN University) 2019-12-01
• Series: Polylinguality and Transcultural Practices
• Subjects: bilingual education; ethnic identification; language identification; mother tongue; indigenous people; national minority
• Online Access: http://journals.rudn.ru/polylinguality/article/viewFile/21326/17046

The article discusses the relationship of bilingual education with the problems of ethnic and language identification in the USSR and modern Russia. The concept of protecting the rights of national minorities includes an extensive range of linguistic rights and the right to education in minority languages. This right is protected by many international agreements and documents of international organizations and is considered to be an unconditional conquest of fighters for human rights. However, this ignores cases of inconsistencies in ethnic and linguistic identity, which are increasingly frequent in the modern world, and the right of citizens to free ethnic and linguistic self-determination. Planning in the field of bilingual education and teacher training requires objective information on the real number of people willing to study in minority languages, which can be obtained as a result of language monitoring and censuses.