Book review: Martynova, M. (ed.). 2021. Language and Identity: An Anthropological Study of the Situation in Russia. Moscow: Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology RAS.

DOI: 10.33876/2311-0546/2022-2/340-348

Abstract

The review of the collective monograph "Language and Identity: An Anthropological Study of the Situation in Russia" gives a very high assessment of this work. It is noted that the research is based on the results obtained in the course of a single project to study the current linguistic situation in the Russian regions. The general research methodology and tools allowed to carry out a qualitative comparative analysis of the language situation in many regions. The review agrees with the thesis of the authors of the theoretical part of the work that the absolutization of the role of language is most often connected with the entrenched ideas about the inseparable connection between language and ethnicity, or more precisely, with the character of ethnic identification, since language is seen as the main ethno-differential attribute, primarily by linguists themselves, but also by a wide range of ethnic activists and other persons involved in the practice of preserving cultural diversity in the country. It is noted that the monograph describes different situations and shows that in some cases the language of minority groups has a high degree of "vitality" (such as Abazinian) and functions successfully, while in others there is a real threat of displacement of languages from the sphere of public use. But for all the diversity of the linguistic situations analyzed by the authors of the collective monograph, there are many similarities in the trends of linguistic development in Russian regions. It is especially noted that the monograph draws attention to the quality of language lessons, their content, the qualifications and specifics of the training of teachers who teach language subjects, i.e. to those problems which occur everywhere, but which rarely come to the attention of researchers. Here attention is also drawn to one of the most important problems connected with measures to preserve and develop minority languages, namely the image of the language.