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Between Modernity and Tradition: Conflict Between the Belarusian Intelligentsia and the Broader Population in Interwar Western Belarus
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 25 March 2025
Abstract
This article examines the complex dynamics between the intelligentsia and the broader population in the formation of national identity by looking at a case of intra-societal conflict. The article focuses on Western Belarus – the northern portion of the Polish-Soviet frontier in the interwar period – which was historically influenced by Polish, Belarusian, Lithuanian and Ukrainian cultures. In this region, the Belarusian intelligentsia's efforts to promote national enlightenment were initially met with scepticism and even hostility from the broader population. The discrepancy between the intelligentsia's self-perceived role as the nation's vanguard and society's apathy towards issues related to national identity led to internal conflict. Drawing upon Belarusian and Polish archival collections, the Belarusian interwar press and oral history interviews, the article offers an alternative understanding of the challenges associated with the process of nation-building in Eastern Europe in highlighting the often overlooked perspectives of the ordinary people who were at the centre of these intellectual endeavours.
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References
1 Polish Underground Movement (1939–45) Study Trust in London, B II 518 (5842a), 106.
2 This research was inspired by the approach of Pieter M. Judson, who has explored similar questions in relation to other regions; see Pieter M. Judson, Guardians of the Nation: Activists on the Language Frontiers of Imperial Austria (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2006); Pieter M. Judson, ‘Nationalism in the Era of the Nation State, 1870–1945’, Oxford Handbook of Modern German History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011), 499–526. For the dominant presentation of the intelligentsia as guardians of the broader population's interests, see Alexander G. Kohanovskij, ‘Belorusskaya intelligenciya: samoopredelenie i etapy stanovleniya v XIX – nachale XX v’, in Pracy gistarychnaga fakulteta BDU: navukovy zbornik V. 2 (Minsk: BDU, 2007), 3–20; Olga Korenevskaya, ‘Osobennosti Zapadnobelorusskogo vozrozhdeniya (na primere periodicheskoj pechati)’, Bialoruskie Zeszyty Historyczne 20 (2003): 69–89.
3 Vladimir Ignatov, ‘Belorusskie narodniki ob istoricheskoj missii nacionalnoj intelligencii’, Doctrina. Studia Spoleczno-Polityczne 19 (2022): 96–111.
4 For works dealing with the development of nationalism from the perspective of the broader population, see Maarten Van Ginderachter and Marnix Beyen, eds., Nationhood from Below: Europe in the Long Nineteenth Century (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011) and Catherine Gibson, Geographies of Nationhood: Cartography, Science, and Society in the Russian Imperial Baltic (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022), esp. 176–216.
5 Namely Grodno, Brest and (partly) Minsk and Vitebsk regions. Jan Szumski, Sowietyzacja Zachodniej Białorusi 1944–1953. Propaganda i edukacja w służbie ideologii (Kraków: ARCANA, 2010), 21–28; Uładzimir Michniuk, ‘Zachodniaja Biełaruś: hranicy, terytoryja, nasielnictwa (histaryjahraficznyja natatki)’, Biełaruski Histaryczny Czasopis 11 (2004): 19.
6 Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Oxford: Wiley, 2006); Eric Hobsbawm, Nations and Nationalism since 1780 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012); Miroslav Hroch, European Nations: Explaining Their Formation (London: Verso, 2016); Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities (London: Verso, 2016); Paul James, Nation Formation: Towards a Theory of Abstract Community (New Delhi: SAGE, 1996); Eugen Weber, Peasants into Frenchmen: The Modernization of Rural France, 1870–1914 (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1976).
7 James E. Bjork, Neither German nor Pole: Catholicism and National Indifference in a Central European Borderland (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 2008); Kate Brown, A Biography of No Place: From Ethnic Borderland to Soviet Heartland (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004); Yuki Murata, ‘Because of the Sun? The Centennial of Taras Shevchenko's Birth in Kyiv in 1914 and Anationalism in Late Imperial Russia’, Slavonic and East European Review 101, no. 2 (2023): 284–312; Jeremy King, Budweisers into Czechs and Germans: A Local History of Bohemian Politics, 1848–1948 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2002); Tara Zahra, Kidnapped Souls: National Indifference and the Battle for Children in the Bohemian Lands, 1900–1948 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2011); Kathryn Ciancia, On Civilization's Edge: A Polish Borderland in the Interwar World (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2021).
8 Eugeniusz Mironowicz, Białoruś (Warsaw: Wydawnictwo TRIO, 1999); Per Anders Rudling, The Rise and Fall of Belarusian Nationalism, 1906–1931 (Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2015); Marek Wierzbicki, Polacy i Białorusini w zaborze sowieckim. Stosunki polsko-białoruskie na ziemiach północno-wschodnich II RP pod okupacją sowiecką 1939–1941 (Warszawa: Stowarzyszenie Kulturalne Fronda, 2007); Ryszard Radzik, Między zbiorowością etniczną a wspólnotą narodową. Białorusini na tle przemian narodowych w Europie Środkowo-Wschodniej XIX stulecia (Lublin: Wydawnictwo UMCS, 2000); Nelly Bekus, Struggle over Identity: The Official and the Alternative ‘Belarusianness’ (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2010).
9 For example, Anna Engelking, Kołchoźnicy. Antropologiczne studium tożsamości wsi białoruskiej przełomu XX i XXI wieku (Toruń: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu Mikołaja Kopernika, 2012); James C. Scott, Weapons of the Weak: Everyday Forms of Peasant Resistance (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1985); James C. Scott, The Art of not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2009).
10 Konstanty Srokowski, Sprawa narodowościowa na kresach wschodnich (Kraków: Gubethner i Wolff, 1924), 10.
11 This material is primarily held in the regional archives of Grodno (Dziarzhaўny arkhіў Grodzenskaĭ voblastsі, hereafter DAGV) and Brest (Dziarzhaўny arkhіў Brėstskaĭ voblastsi, hereafter DABV) in the Republic of Belarus.
12 In the interviews I conducted in 2016–19 in the western regions of the Republic of Belarus, participants were selected on the basis of their belonging to the oldest generation of the region, in particular those born before the Soviet occupation in 1939, and their local origin, being native to Western Belarus. As such, the interviewees could be described as the keepers of local oral traditions. Given the demographic situation in the region, which is characterised by relatively short life expectancy, the choice of respondents was limited to a small number of individuals. For interviews collected by other researchers, the quotations are supplemented with details about the authorship and publication of the interview, which are enclosed in square brackets. Separately, it is worth noting the publication of interview recordings, which were especially important during the study: Evgenij Semenovič Rozenblat, ‘Za pol´skіm časam…’: Zapadnaja Belarus´ v vospominanijah sovremennikov [‘Under the Polish Rule…,’ Western Belarus in the Memoirs of Contemporaries] (Brest: BGU, 2019); Z kresów wschodnich R.P. Wspomnienia z osad wojskowych (London: Ognisko Rodzin Osadników Kresowych, 1992).
13 In this context, it is important to mention the Polish Underground Movement (1939–45) Study Trust in London (hereafter SPP), the collections of the Polish Institute and Sikorski Museum (PISM) and the Francis Skaryna Belarusian Library and Museum in London (FSBLaM). As part of this study, a comprehensive analysis was conducted on a source base comprised of thirty-five Belarusian newspapers and journals published between 1921 and 1939 in the territory of the Second Polish Republic. This sample was deliberately selected to include publications with a wide range of political leanings, from communist to liberal democratic and fascist perspectives. Among the analysed newspapers and magazines, it is worth noting the following: Žic´ce belarusa, Sjaljanskaja niva, Belaruskaja nіva, Biełaruskaja Krynica, Belarusi zvon, Časopіs dlja ўsіh, Novy šljah, Belaruskaja dumka, Belaruskaja dolja, Zmaganne, Narod, Selyanin, Rodny kraj, Padnyaty scyag.
14 On the limits of oral history see E. Jessee, ‘The Limits of Oral History: Ethics and Methodology Amid Highly Politicized Research Settings’, Oral History Review 38 (2011): 287–307.
15 On the importance of print media to the invention of the Belarusian nation, see Korenevskaya, ‘Osobennosti Zapadnobelorusskogo vozrozhdeniya’, 69–89.
16 ‘Ad Redakcyi’ [From the Editorial Board], Sjaljanskaja niva, 9 (14 Mar. 1926), 4.
17 Terry Martin, The Affirmative Action Empire: Nations and Nationalism in the Soviet Union, 1923–1939 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2001); Francine Hirsch, Empire of Nations: Ethnographic Knowledge and the Making of the Soviet Union (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2014).
18 Andrea Komlosy, ‘Imperial Cohesion, Nation-Building, and Regional Integration in the Habsburg Monarchy’, in Nationalizing Empires, eds. Stefan Berger and Alexei Miller (Budapest: CEU, 2015), 369–427.
19 See Przemysław Adamczewski, Polski mit etnopolityczny i Kaukaz (Warsaw: Instytut Studiów Politycznych Polskiej Akademii Nauk, 2019).
20 Felix Ackermann, Palimpsest Grodno. Nationalisierung, Nivellierung und Sowjetisierung einer mitteleuropäischen Stadt. 1919–1991 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2010), 32–93.
21 On Belarusian nation-building in the Soviet Union see Hirsch, Empire of Nations.
22 Arkadz’ Smolich, Geagrafia Belarusi, wydannie 2-e (Wilno: Wilenskaje Wydawnictwa, 1922), 9.
23 ‘Pamiž Zahodam i Ushodam’ [Between the West and the East], Belaruskaja niva (23 Feb. 1925), 2.
24 Cf. with the Balkanian case: Slobodan G. Marković, ‘Patterns of National Identity Development among the Balkan Orthodox Christians during the Nineteenth Century’, Balcanica 44 (2013): 209–54.
25 Statsenya Andrey Pavlovich, born in 1911, village of Spruts of Drogichinsky district [Rozenblat, ‘Za pol´skіm časam…’, 150].
26 Marian Leczyk, Oblicze społeczno-polityczne Drugiej Rzeczypospolitej (Warszawa: Książka i Wiedza, 1988), 91–2.
27 Zaretskaya Anna Alekseevna, born in 1931, village of Yakovichi, Pruzhansky district [Rozenblat, ‘Za pol´skіm časam…’, 55].
28 The transformation of the demographic situation in the region during the interwar period can be evidenced by comparing the census results from 1921 and 1931. These censuses reveal significant changes in the population structure, highlighting the gradual rise of urban centres and the growth of educated populations. See Mały Rocznik Statystyczny (Warszawa: Główny Urząd Statystyczny Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej, 1938). Also see Dorota Michaluk, ed., Przemiany życia społecznego i gospodarczego ludności wiejskiej w Polsce i krajach sąsiednich w okresie międzywojennym (Ciechanowiec: Muzeum Rolnictwa im. ks. Krzysztofa Kluka w Ciechanowcu, 2022), 159–85.
29 On the development of Belarusian nationalism in this period see Rudling, The Rise and Fall of Belarusian Nationalism, 1906–1931. Also cf. Mironowicz, Białoruś, 83.
30 Compare with the Silesian case: Bjork, Neither German nor Pole.
31 Ryszard Radzik, ‘Between Russia and Poland: National and Cultural Evolution of the Belarusian Society in the Last Two Centuries’, Annus Albaruthenicus 3 (2002): 13–32.
32 Mironowicz, Białoruś, 80–111; Wierzbicki, Polacy i Białorusini w zaborze sowieckim. Stosunki polsko-białoruskie na ziemiach północno-wschodnich II RP pod okupacją sowiecką 1939–1941, 25–43.
33 For a deeper understanding of how the Belarusian intelligentsia conceptualised the nation during the interwar period and earlier see Bekus, Struggle over Identity, 53–68; Oleg Łatyszonek, Od Rusinów Białych do Białorusinów: U źródeł białoruskiej idei narodowej (Białystok: UB, 2006); and Dorota Michaluk, Białoruska Republika Ludowa 1918–1920. U podstaw białoruskiej państwowości (Toruń: Wydawnictwo Naukowe Uniwersytetu Mikołaja Kopernika, 2010).
34 My calculation is based on the data of monthly reports of local voivodes and chiefs of local counties for 1922–39 on the state of affairs in the subordinate territory. I used the following collections, which are split between different archival fonds: collection of reports of the Polesie Voivodeship, DABV 1/9/27–29; collection of reports of the territorial units from the current Grodno Region, DAGV 551/136, and collection of reports of the Nowogródek Voivodeship, Archiwum Akt Nowych w Warszawie, PL/2/1184/0.
35 Cf. with a typical propaganda text describing the history of the interwar period from the perspective of the Communist Party: Vladzimir A. Poluian, Revoliutsionnoe i natsional'no-osvoboditel'noe dvizhenie v Zapadnoi Belorussii v 1920–1939 gg. [The Revolutionary and National Liberation Movement in Western Belarus in 1920–1939] (Minsk: Gosizdat BSSR, 1962); Uladzimir Ladyseu, Shlah da svabody: z historyi revalucyjna-vyzvalienchaha ruhu u Zahodniaj Bielarusi u 1919–1939 hh. [The Way to Freedom: From the History of the Revolutionary-Liberation Movement in West Belarus in 1919–1939] (Minsk: BDU, 1978).
36 Haryton Kutarga, ‘Vyradok’ [A Degenerate], Seljanskaja niva, 16 (30 Apr. 1926), 4.
37 Cf. Wierzbicki, Polacy i Białorusini w zaborze sowieckim. Stosunki polsko-białoruskie na ziemiach północno-wschodnich II RP pod okupacją sowiecką 1939–1941, 25–43.
38 Leczyk, Oblicze…, 91–2.
39 Omelianuk (Kornelyuk) Olga Vasilyevna, born in 1925, village of Buyaki, Brest region [Rozenblat, ‘Za pol´skіm časam…’, 119].
40 Maria Ivanovna Lyashuk (Zaretskaya), born in 1926, village of Chernaki, Kamenetsky district [Rozenblat, ‘Za pol´skіm časam…,’ 105].
41 In this case, I build upon what has already been described, but in the context of Asia: Scott, Weapons of the Weak. Also see Andrei Cusco, ‘Russians, Romanians, or Neither? Mobilization of Ethnicity and “National Indifference” in Early Twentieth-Century Bessarabia’, Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 20, no. 1 (2019): 7–38.
42 For further insight into the role of the aristocracy in the Belarusian national project see Siargei Dubavets, ‘Praekt Belarus’, ARCHE 1 (2005): 165–6.
43 The most vivid declaration of this is contained in the documentation of representatives of the Polish Home Army in the form of numerous reports from 1941–4 and memoirs from the postwar era, e.g. SPP BI/1010, BI/1603, BI/1603, BI/0981, BII/518.
44 This refers to the Western Belarusian intelligentsia who remained in their homeland. In contrast, those who fled to the Soviet Union during the interwar period fell victim to Stalin's purges, along with their Eastern Belarusian counterparts. Tatyana S. Protko, Stanovlenie sovetskoj totalitarnoj sistemy v Belarusi (1917–1941 gg.) (Minsk: Tesej, 2002).
45 Cf. David Marples, Belarus: A Denationalized Nation (London: Taylor & Francis, 2013).
46 The phenomenon of tutejszość in the past and present remains a subject of interest for many Belarusian researchers: Alexander Pershái, ‘Localness and Mobility in Belarusian Nationalism: The Tactic of Tuteishaść’, Nationalities Papers 36 (2008): 85–103; Аlexander Pershái, ‘Minor Nation: The Alternative Modes of Belarusian Nationalism’, East European Politics and Society 24 (2010): 376–98; Ihar Babkoŭ, Królestwo Białoruś. Interpretacja ru(i)n (Wrocław: KEW, 2008); Ihar Babkoŭ, ‘Henealëhiia belaruskaĭ idėi’, ARCHE 3 (2005): 136–65.
47 Yanka Kupala, Zbor tvoraў: u 7 tomach, T. 3 (Minsk: Navuka i tehnika, 1972), 215.
48 Statsenya Andrey Pavlovich, born in 1911, village of Sprouts of Drogichinsky district [Rozenblat, ‘Za pol´skіm časam…’, 150].
49 In this context, even interwar anthropologists began to take note of this fact, Józef Obrębski, Dzisiejsi ludzie Polesia i inne eseje (Warszawa: Wydawnictwo IFiS PAN, 2005).
50 Interview with woman born in 1938, Woronowa. The interview was collected in Aug. 2016 in Lida.
51 ‘Ad Redakcyi’ [From the Editorial Temat], Sjaljanskaja niva, 9 (14 Mar. 1926), 4.
52 DABV 1/9/47/22.
53 Felix Ackermann, Palimpsest Grodno. Nationalisierung, Nivellierung und Sowjetisierung einer mitteleuropäischen Stadt. 1919–1991 (Munich: Harrassowitz, 2010), 68–72.
54 The Belarus National Committee and the Belarusian School Society are notable for being among the most influential and widely represented organisations in the region.
55 The monthly reports of local voivodes, as a rule, interpreted these activities in this way. DABV 1/9/27–29; DABV 93.
56 Compare with the German-French borderland: Alison Carrol, ‘Path to Frenchness: National Indifference and the Return of Alsace to France, 1919–1939’, in National Indifference and the History of Nationalism in Modern Europe, eds. Van Ginderachter and Jon Fox (London: Routledge, 2019), 132–3.
57 ‘Piśma do redakcji’ [Letters to the Editor], Sjaljanskaja niva, 9 (14 Apr. 1926), 2.
58 On the evolution of Belarusian national identity among the broader population, see Radzik, Między zbiorowością etniczną a wspólnotą narodową. Białorusini na tle przemian narodowych w Europie Środkowo-Wschodniej XIX stulecia.
59 And, even earlier, see Börries Kuzmany, ‘Objectivising National Identity: The Introduction of National Registers in the Late Habsburg Empire’, Nations and Nationalism 29, no. 3 (2023): 975–91.
60 The purposeful use of examples from other countries has been repeatedly described in the Belarusian press. In this regard, the most characteristic is 25 sakavіka, a journal published in Wilno by Belarusian students in 1936–9.
61 ‘Piśma do redakcji’ [Letters to the Editor], Biełaruskaja Krynica, 21 (14 July 1929), 3.
62 Hi-Hi, ‘Krèsovyja patrioty’, Belaruskaja dolja (23 May 1923), 1.
63 Interview with woman born in 1933, Pińsk. The interview was collected in July 2017 in Pińsk.
64 Morgane Labbé, ‘National Indifference, Statistics and the Constructivist Paradigm: The Case of the Tutejsi (“The People from Here”) in Interwar Polish Censuses’, in National Indifference and the History of Nationalism in Modern Europe, eds. Van Ginderachter and Fox, pp. xx.
65 Tarasevich Evgeniya Ilyinichna, born in 1924, village of Sprouts in Drogichinsky district [Rozenblat, ‘Za pol´skіm časam…’, 153].
66 Pinczuk, ‘Maskouskaja zakvaska na Pales´si’ [Moscow sourdough in Polesie], Belaruskaja niva, 3.16 (13 Jan. 1926), 4.
67 Cf. Serhiy Bilenky, Romantic Nationalism in Eastern Europe: Russian, Polish, and Ukrainian Political Imaginations (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2012).
68 On the relationship between Belarusian nationalists and the state of the Second Polish Republic see Rudling, The Rise and Fall of Belarusian Nationalism, esp. Chs 5 and 7.
69 A prominent example is Branislaw Tarashkevich, who standardised the modern Belarusian language. He initially cooperated with the Polish authorities but later was engaged in open opposition to the Polish state. See Anatolii I. Valahanovich and Uladzimir M. Mihnyuk, Spovedz u nadzei zastacca zhyvym: Aўtabiyagrafia B. Tarashkevicha (Minsk: BelNDIDAS, 1999).
70 See Bronisław Taraszkiweicz, Zahodnyaya Belarus – plyacdarm imperyyalistychnaj intervencyi (Minsk: Belaruskaya akademiya navuk, Kamisiya pa vyvuchenni Zahodnyaj Belarusi, 1931).
71 ‘Pragrama Belaruskaj Nacyjanal-Sacyjaljutyčnaj Partyj’ [The programme of the Belarusian National-Socialistic Party] Novy šljah, 1 (1936), 1–5.
72 ‘Nash pan’ [Our Master], Belaruskaja dumka, 51 (12 May 1936), 6.
73 Numerical material on denunciations of this kind is available in the fonds of local archives that contain records of the state police and courts of the Second Polish Republic, e.g. DABV, 1/10, 1/2042; DAGV, 1/367, 1/209 etc.
74 An example of this can be found in the case of Dymitry Garbuz, a village head from the village of Laskowicze. He was anonymously denounced in 1935 and accused of murdering a Polish lancer during the Polish-Soviet war, but the authorities considered this difficult to verify, given Dymitry Garbuz's current pro-Polish position and the amount of time that had passed since the alleged incident. DABV, 1/10/1884.
75 ‘Pales´e i PPS’ [Polesie and PPS], Sjaljanskaja niva, 9 (14 Mar. 1926), 3.
76 In this context, the existence of the Belarusian National Socialist newspaper (Novy šljah) in 1933–7 is extremely relevant.
77 Even in the pro-communist press, the anti-Polish orientation remained in the spotlight, albeit framed in the context of the class struggle. See Časopіs dlja ўsіh, 1 (13 Mar. 1932), 1–6.
78 Statystyka wyborów do sejmu i senatu odbytych w dniu 5 i 12 listopada 1922 roku (Warsaw: GUS, 1926).
79 See Mniejszosci narodowe w wyborach do Sejmu i Senatu w r. 1928 (Warsaw: WSRP, 1928); Statystyka wyborów do sejmu i senatu odbytych w dniu 4 i 11 marca 1928 roku, (Warsaw: GUS, 1930).
80 ‘Pales´e i PPS’ [Polesie and PPS], Sjaljanskaja niva, 9 (14 Mar. 1926), 3.
81 Eleonora Mietlicz, ‘Geografia polityczna Kresów Wschodnich w latach 1922–1930’, Annales Universitatis Mariae Curie-Skłodowska Lublin Polonia sectio К 6 (1999): 177–87. Also see Ales Pashkevich, ‘Naciyanalnyya pracesy u Paleskim vayavodstve u 1920-ya gg praz pryzmu vynikau vybarchyh kampanij u polski parlament’, Arche 4 (2013): 199–210; Zofia Tomczonek, Ruch ludowy na kresach północno-wschodnich Drugiej Rzeczypospolitej (Białystok: Oficyna Wydawnicza Politechniki Białostockiej, 1996), 79–80.
82 Interview with woman born in 1929, Brzoza. The interview was collected in July 2015 in Brzoza.
83 Interview with woman born in 1935, Lachowicze. The interview was collected in Aug. 2016 in Lachowicze.
84 Anna Yakovlevna Pashkevich, born in 1917, Divin village of Kobrin district [Rozenblat, ‘Za pol´skіm časam…’, 133].
85 See ‘Wybory gminne’ [Elections in the districts], Przegląd Wileński, 13 (1927), 3.
86 The phenomenon of national indifference is useful in this regard; see Alexei Miller, ‘“National Indifference” as a Political Strategy?’, Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 20, no. 1 (2019): 63–72.
87 Among the few exceptions are the representatives of the Belarusian centralist movement: ‘If you sincerely and honestly satisfy the legitimate needs of the Belarusians, the Belarusians will be loyal to the Polish state’, ‘Belaruskaja sprava i pol´skae gramadzjanstva’, Belarusi zvon 7 (1931): 1.
88 Cf. Bilenky, Romantic Nationalism in Eastern Europe.
89 See ‘Kwestia narodowościowa w programie drugiego powszechnego spisu ludności Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej. Wywiad z Generalnym Komisarzem Spisowym p. Rajmundem Buławskim’, Sprawy Narodowościowe 1 (1932): 3.
90 For studies highlighting the challenges of applying political or ethnic labels to the linguistic situation in the region, see Curt Woolhiser, ‘Constructing National Identities in the Polish-Belarusian Borderlands’, Ab Imperio 1 (2003): 293–346; Curt Woolhiser, ‘Linguistic Variation, Identity and Mental Maps: Exploring the Perceptual Dialectology of Poland's Podlasie Region’, in Linguistic Regionalism in Eastern Europe and Beyond, eds Christian Voß et al. (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2018), 217–54.
91 The topic of classification is considered in Rok Stergar and Tamara Scheer, ‘Ethnic Boxes: The Unintended Consequences of Habsburg Bureaucratic Classification’, Nationalities Papers xlvi (2018): 575–91; Kuzmany, ‘Objectivising National Identity’, 975–91.
92 Yurij B. Koryakov, ‘Yazykovaya situaciya v Belorussii i tipologiya yazykovyh situacij’ (PhD diss., Moscow State University, 2002), 77.
93 Ibid., 26.
94 Dariusz Chajewski, ‘Polesie, czyli kraina, gdzie żyli tutejsi ludzie, którzy mówili po swojemu’ [Polesie, the land where the tutejsi lived and spoke their own language], Gazeta Lubuska (19 Jan. 2019) https://plus.gazetalubuska.pl/polesie-czyli-kraina-gdzie-zyli-tutejsi-ludzie-ktorzy-mowili-po-swojemu/ar/13819759.
95 In the Belarusian case, the situation was different. For the role of writers’ different conventions in relation to the Belarusian language and their collective creation of a single literary convention, see Nina Barszczewska, ‘Rola pisarzy w rozwoju języka białoruskiego w XIX – początku XX w’, Studia Białorutenistyczne 13 (2019): 281–96.
96 Piśma da Redakcji [Letters to the Editor], Biełaruskaja Krynica, 4 (13 Dec. 1928), 4.
97 Iz žizni Grodnenŝiny: derevnja Čamjary Slonimskogo poveta [From the life of the Grodno region: The village of Chemery in the Slonim district], Belaruskaja nіva (25 Dec. 1925), 4.
98 The collections of local archives show the complete opposite, with peasants wanting to send their children to Polish-speaking schools to provide them with the best prospects for social advancement in future. For example, in Grodno region, petitions of the parents of schoolchildren and transcripts of their conversations with school inspectors are available in DAGV 87/61–70. For local police reports with similar remarks in relation to the rural areas of Wołkowysk County, see DAGV 84.
99 ‘Naš Bacjuška’ [Our Priest], Sjaljanskaja niva, 8 (28 Feb. 1926), 4.
100 Cf. Judson, Guardians of the Nation.
101 Evgeny Stepanovich Parfenyuk, born in 1921, Brest [Rozenblat, ‘Za pol´skіm časam…’, 126].
102 Stepan Fedorovich Pipko, born in 1927, Brest [Rozenblat, ‘Za pol´skіm časam…’, 136].
103 Interview with woman born in 1935, Lachowicze. The interview was collected in Aug. 2016 in Lachowicze.
104 Chajewski, ‘Polesie…’.
105 The categories of indifference are thoroughly examined in Zahra, Kidnapped Souls, 4; Tara Zahra, ‘Imagined Noncommunities: National Indifference as a Category of Analysis', Slavic Review 69(1) (2010): 98.
106 This builds upon the approach of Tara Zahra, ‘Imagined Noncommunities’, 93–119.
107 A great example of this can be found in the case of Mandatory Palestine, as examined in Caroline Kahlenberg, ‘Peddlers and the Policing of National Indifference in Palestine, 1920–1948’, History Workshop Journal 90 (2020): 115–41.
108 Compare with the Balkan case Marković, ‘Patterns of National Identity’, 209–54.
109 Nikolay Prokofievich Savilo, born in 1929, village of Pinsky district [Rozenblat, ‘Za pol´skіm časam…’, 142].
110 See Jeremy Seekings and Nicoli Nattrass, Class, Race, and Inequality in South Africa (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2005); Thomas Sowell, Ethnic America: A History (New York: Basic Books, 1981); Susan J. Ferguson, ed., Mapping the Social Landscape: Readings in Sociology (New York: Mayfield Pub., 1996); Miroslav Hroch, Social Preconditions of National Revival in Europe: A Comparative Analysis of the Social Composition of Patriotic Groups among the Smaller European Nations (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985).
111 For specific examples of post-war Soviet nation-building projects see Tarik C. Amar, The Paradox of Ukrainian Lviv: A Borderland City Between Stalinists, Nazis, and Nationalists (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2015); Zbigniew Wojnowski, The Near Abroad: Socialist Eastern Europe and Soviet Patriotism in Ukraine, 1956–1985 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2017); Violeta Davoliūtė, The Making and Breaking of Soviet Lithuania: Memory and Modernity in the Wake of War (London: Routledge, 2016).