Language Policies in the Republic of Tatarstan

During the Soviet period Soviet nationality and language polices were extrinsically linked as part of the Soviet government’s plan to assimilate all nationalities into a ‘Soviet’ nationality which used Russian as the ‘Soviet’ language. This resulted in the Russian language having high prestige, because it was used in the sphere of the government spheres and all other spheres of language use. As a result, the non-national languages were regarded as having low prestige due to the increase in Russian language use and because Russian was regarded as the language for socio-economic advancement. During the Soviet period, Russians rarely assimilated into the indigenous societies of the independent states or republics. Therefore they never learned the titular language nor identified with the titular population or the state or republic in which they resided. After the collapse of communism many independent states and republics of the former Soviet Union implemented language policies as a way to establish the titular identity and to increase the prestige of the titular language and to increase the prestige of the titular language. <br><br>These policies have created many tensions within the post-Soviet space; recent events in Ukraine and Crimea for example, have revealed that language policy can be used by governments to try and establish political loyalties and identity in attempts at nation-building. Many studies about the post-Soviet space have explored the top-down aspect of identity technologies which is regulated by governments through the implementation of language and education policies in the post-Soviet period, but only a few studies actually explore the effects of these identity technologies from the bottom-up perspective. Some recent studies have challenged the top-down perspective by demonstrating that policies implemented from a top-down perspective are negotiated and contested at citizen level. <br><br>Nowadays being a national treasure of the country, the state languages of the Republic of Tatarstan are protected and supported by the state. Language policy as one of the components of the state policy aimed at ensuring the optimal functioning of languages in all spheres of public life, their interaction and further development.<br><br>The main objectives of the program established by the government in order to ensure language protection are to create conditions for achieving real equality of Tatar and Russian as a state language of the Republic of Tatarstan, the preservation and development of the Tatar language as the basis of national culture, means of communication and the full consolidation of the Tatar people, the preservation and development of the Russian language as the state language of the Republic of Tatarstan, assist in the preservation and development of the languages of other peoples living in the Republic of Tatarstan and raising the general level of culture and cross-language voice of tolerance.