Belarusian Humanities Lyceum
Curt F. Woolhiser
cwoolhis at FAS.HARVARD.EDU
Sat Sep 13 21:08:28 UTC 2003
This is very sad indeed. Certainly, Lukashenka and his administration have done
their utmost to reverse the language policies of the early 1990s, just as they
have effectively crushed most democratic institutions in the country. However,
I have heard that despite the closure of Belarusian-medium institutions such as
the Humanities Lyceum, a larger percentage of Belarusian schoolchildren (that
is, those attending "Russian" schools) are now taking at least some classes
with Belarusian as the language of instruction than was the case in the late
Soviet period. So, even though "official bilingualism" as practiced under
Lukashenka is weighted heavily in favor of Russophones, perhaps the situation
is not quite as bleak as it seems. In any event, I think it's safe to say that
young Belarusians are more likely to speak Belarusian or at least have
favorable attitudes toward it than people of Lukashenka's generation, which
bodes well for the future of the language.
Curt Woolhiser
===============================
Curt Woolhiser
Department of Slavic Languages
and Literatures
12 Quincy St., Barker Center
Harvard University
Cambridge, MA 02138-3879 USA
Tel. (617) 495-3528
Fax (617) 496-4466
email: cwoolhis at fas.harvard.edu
===============================
Quoting Uladzimir Katkouski <uladzik at MAILBOX.HU>:
> This is not really about language, but it's more of a political issue
> which in our case is entangled with the sociolinguistics (Belarusian vs
> Russian in Belarus). I've put 2 articles about National Humanties Lyceum
> struggle.
>
> Children on the streets: Belarusian Humanities Lyceum closed down
> http://www.pravapis.org/art_humanities_lyceum.asp
>
> Youth keeps alive spark of rebellion (reprint from yesterday's TIMES)
> http://www.pravapis.org/art_youth_rebellion.asp
>
> I feel so bad for these about children, I can't believe the government
> is doing all this.
>
> Regards,
> Uladzimir
>
>
>
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