Culture as Politics: A Note on Language Legislation in Putin’s Russia
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15845/bells.v7i0.1061Keywords:
sociolinguistics, language culture, Russia, language legislationAbstract
This article discusses the ways in which culture in general, and language in particular, has become an important field of attention to the authorities in today’s Russia for a particular purpose. Over the last decade, Russian authorities have significantly increased their involvement in the cultural field, creating programmes for the patriotic education of citizens, adopting new laws and regulations affecting film, literature and art, drawing on the capital of culture for all its worth. It is important to get a firm grasp of the state’s renewed interest in culture, in order to assess its impact in the broader context of Russian politics and society. In the following, I discuss a few concrete examples of state involvement in the cultural sphere, focusing in particular on the question of language legislation.References
Baranov, Anatolii. 2007. Lingvisticheskaia ekspertiza teksta: teoriia i praktika, Moscow: Flinta.
Borenstein, Eliot. 2008. Overkill: Sex and Violence in Contemporary Russian Popular Culture. Ithaca/London: Cornell University Press.
Brinev, Konstantin. 2009. Teoreticheskaia lingvistika i sudebnaia lingvisticheskaia ekspertiza. Barnaul: AltGPA.
Enstad, Johannes Due. 2011. “Putinistisk historiepolitikk: Oppussing av fortiden i Putins Russland.” Nordisk Østforum 15 (4):327–31.
Florida, Richard L. 2002. The Rise of the Creative Class: And How It’s Transforming Work, Leisure, Community and Everyday Life. New York: Basic Books.
Gabowitsch, Mischa. 2013. Putin kaputt!? Russlands neue Protestkultur. Berlin: Suhrkamp.
Gorham, Michael S. and Daniel Weiss, eds. 2016/17. The Culture and Politics of Verbal Prohibition in Putin’s Russia, special issue of Zeitschrift für slavische Philologie 72 (2)–73 (1).
Gorham, Michael S. 2014. After Newspeak: Language Culture and Politics in Russia from Gorbachev to Putin. Ithaca/London: Cornell University Press.
Gorham, Michael S., Ingunn Lunde and Martin Paulsen, eds 2014. Digital Russia: The Language, Culture and Politics of New Media Communication. London/New York: Routledge.
Kalinin, Il’ia. 2015. “Culture Matters: Why the Kremlin Wants to be the Keeper of Russia’s Cultural Heritage.” The Calvert Journal, 28 January, http://calvertjournal.com/comment/show/3608/Culture-matters- Russia-cultural-policy-Ilya-Kalinin (accessed 16 December 2016).
Karev, Igor’, Nataliia Mitiusheva, Iaroslav Zabaluev and Polina Ryzhova. 2014. “Pole bez brani.” Gazeta.ru, 1 July, http://www.gazeta.ru/ culture/2014/07/01/a_6093465.shtml (accessed 30 June 2016).
Krongauz, Maksim. 2005. “Zametki rasserzhennogo obyvatelia.” Otechestvennye zapiski 2, http://magazines.russ.ru/oz/ 2005/2/2005_2_4. html (accessed 16 December, 2016).
Krysin, Leonid, ed. 2000–12. Russkii iazyk segodnia, vols 1–5. Moscow: Azbukovnik.
Levin, Iurii. 1996. “Ob obstsennykh vyrazheniiakh russkogo iazyka.” In Anti-mir russkoi kul’tury: iazyk, fol’klor, literatura, edited by Nikolai Bogomolov, 108–20. Moscow: Ladomir.
Levontina, Irina. 2005. “Bukva i zakon: sudebnaia lingvisticheskaia ekspertiza.” Otechestvennye zapiski 2, http://www.strana-oz.ru/2005/2/ bukva-i-zakon-sudebnaya-lingvisticheskaya-ekspertiza (accessed 16 December, 2016).
Lunde, Ingunn. 2017. “‘Abanamat’”: Reactions From the Cultural Field to the 2014 Russian Anti-Obscenity Law,” Zeitschrift für slavische Philologie 73 (1): 1–29.
Medinskii, Vladimir. 2016. “Est li u pravdy versii?” Rossijskaia gazeta, 18 February, http://rg.ru/2016/02/18/medinskij-edinyj-uchebnik-istorii-prekratit-intellektualnuiu-mezhdousobicu.html (accessed 16 December, 2016).
Milroy, James and Lesley Milroy. 1985. Authority in Language. London/ New York: Routledge.
Naralenkova, Ol’ga. 2014. “Mikhalkov vystupil protiv total’nogo zapreta mata v kino.” Rossiiskaia gazeta, 28 June, http://www.rg.ru /2014/06/28/mmkf-site.html (accessed 16 December 2016).
O programme. 2015. “O gosudarstvennoi programme ‘Patrioticheskoe vospitanie grazhdan Rossiiskoi Federatsii na 2016–2020 gody’.” Pravitelstvo RF, Postanovlenie No. 1493, 2015, http://government. ru/media/files/8qqYUwwzHUxzVkH1jsKAErrx2dE4q0ws.pdf (accessed 16 December, 2016).
Osnovy. 2014. “Osnovy gosudarstvennoi kul’turnoi politiki.” http:// news.kremlin.ru/media/events/files/41d526a87 7638a8730eb.pdf (accessed 16 December, 2016).
Østbø, Jardar. 2016. “Securitizing ‘Spiritual-Moral Values’ in Russia.” Post- Soviet Affairs 32. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1060586X.2016.1251023 (accessed 16 December 2016).
Panikhida. 2014. “Panikhida po matu: v Barnaule zavtra prostiatsia s krepkimi vyrazheniiami.” Politsib.ru, 29 June, http://www.politsib. ru/news/72233 (accessed 30 June 2016).
Pervoe chtenie. 2013. “O proekte federal’nogo zakona ‘O vnesenii izmenenii v stat’iu 3 Federal’nogo zakona “O gosudarstvennom iazyke Rossiiskoi Federatsii”’ i otdel’nye zakonodatel’nye akty Rossiiskoi Federatsii v sviazi s sovershenstvovaniem pravovogo regulirovaniia v sfere ispol’zovaniia russkogo iazyka.” Transcript from the Duma hearings, 12 April, http://api.duma.gov.ru/api/transcript/190238-6 (accessed 16 December 2016).
Plutser-Sarno, Aleksei. 2001. Bol’shoi slovar’ mata: opyt postroeniia spravochno-bibliograficheskoi bazy dannykh leksicheskikh i frazeologicheskikh znachenii slova ‘khui’. St Petersburg: Limbus.
Plutser-Sarno, Aleksei. 2005. Bol’shoi slovar’ mata: opyt postroeniia spravochno-bibliograficheskoi bazy dannykh leksicheskikh i frazeologicheskikh znachenij slova ‘pizda’. St Petersburg: Limbus.
Ryazanova-Clarke, Lara. 2006. “‘The State Turning to Language’: Power and Identity in Russian Language Policy Today.” Russian Language Journal 56:37–55.
Saprykin, Iurii, Igor’ Mal’tsev, Arsenii Zhiliaev and Denis Boiarinov. 2012. “Kreativnyi klass v Rossii: kto vse eti liudi?” Colta.ru, 28 August, http://archives.colta.ru/docs/4829 (last accessed 30 June 2016).
Schmid, Ulrich. 2015: Technologien der Seele: vom Verfertigen der Wahrheit in der russischen Gegenwartskultur. Berlin: Suhrkamp.
Stiazhkin, Denis. 2014. “Chtetsy v zashchitu mata v iskusstve — ‘Abanamat’ (foto).” LiveJournal blog Vestnik svobody, 1 July, http://styazshkin. livejournal.com/988578.html (accessed 6 June 2016).
Ukaz Prezidenta 2015. “Ukaz Prezidenta Rossiiskoi Federatsii ot 31 dekabria 2015 goda N 683 ‘O Strategii natsional’noi bezopasnosti Rossiiskoi Federatsii’.” Rossiiskaia gazeta, 31 December, https:// rg.ru/2015/12/31/nac-bezopasnost-site-dok.html (accessed 16 December 2016).
Weiss, Daniel. 2008. “Umestno li nakazyvat’ za publichnoe upotreblenie mata? Obshchestvennoe mnenie i zdravyi razum lingvistov.” Scando- Slavica 54:198–222.
Weiss, Daniel. 2009. “Sudebnaia ekspertiza i vklad lingvista v interpretatsiiu zakona.” In From Poets to Padonki: Linguistic Authority and Norm Negotiation in Modern Russian Culture (Slavica Bergensia 9), edited by Ingunn Lunde and Martin Paulsen, 252–74. Bergen: Department of Foreign Languages.
Zaiavlenie 2013. “Zaiavlenie Rossiiskogo voenno-istoricheskogo obshchestva.” http://histrf.ru/rvio/activities/news/item-1378 (accessed 16 December, 2016).
Zakon 2005. “Zakon o gosudarstvennom iazyke Rossiiskoi Federatsii.” http://www.gramota.ru/spravka/docs/16_3 (accessed 16 December, 2016).
Zvereva, Galina. 2009. “Die Konstruktion einer Staatsnation: Geschichtslehrbücher für das neue Russland.” In Geschichtspolitik und Erinnerungskultur im neuen Russland, edited by Lars Karl and Igor J. Polianski, 87–118. Göttingen: V&R unipress.
Zykov, Vladimir and Aleksandr Kondrat’ev. 2013. “Roskomnadzor nakazhet smi tol’ko za chetyre maternykh slova.” Izvestiia, 25 December, http://izvestia.ru/news/563178 (accessed 16 December, 2016).
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2017 Ingunn Lunde
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
