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Soviet Karelian: The Language That Failed

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Paul M. Austin
Paul M. Austin*
Affiliation:
The Department of Russian and Slavic Studies, McGill University
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Extract

On January 1, 1938 virtually every trace of anything Finnish, including the language, disappeared in the Karelian ASSR, where until the day before Finnish had been one of the two official languages (with Russian) and the language of instruction in schools and of a wide variety of published materials—newspapers, literary journals and almanacs, J educational texts, translated belles lettres (both Russian and foreign) and official documents.

The history of Finnish in the Karelian ASSR dates from the Peace of Tartu (1920) which established the Finnish-Soviet border. It also stipulated that the "language of administration, legislation and public education" in the newly formed Karelian Workers Commune should be the "local popular language and designated Finnish that language. This might seem strange, since in 1923 there were in Soviet Karelia only 1,051 Finns, half of whom lived in the capital, Petrozavodsk.

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Articles
Information
Slavic Review , Volume 51 , Issue 1 , Spring 1992 , pp. 16 - 35
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1992

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References

1. M. Jääskeläinen, Itä-Karjalan kysymys: kansallisen laajennusohjelman synty ja sen toteuttamisyritykset Suomen ulkopolitiikassa vuosina 1918-1920 frtie East Karelian Question: the Origin of the Program of National Expansion and its Realization in Finnish Foreign Policy 1918-20] (PorvooHelsinki: WSOY, 1961), 313. This international treaty has now become the legal basis for the Karelians’ present claim to political autonomy and special status within the Russian Federation.

2. Hodgson, John H., Communism in Finland: a History and Interpretation (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1967), 153 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3. The number of Finns rose from 990 (0.5 percent) in 1920 to 2, 500 (0.9 percent) in 1926; Pokrovskaia, I. P., Naselenie Karelii (Petrozavodsk: Izdatel'stvo Kareliia, 1978), 65–68.Google Scholar

4. In Karjalan Kuva [The Image of Karelia] (Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura, 1973), Hannes Sihvo gives an exhaustive account of how perceptions of Russian Karelia after 1809 influenced Finnish nationalism. For the rôle played by “Karelianism” in Finnish foreign policy after independence, see Jouko Vahtola, “Suomi Suureksi—Viena Vapaaksi “: Valkoisen Suomen pyrkimykset Itä-Karjalan valtaamiseksi vuonna 1918 [ “A Greater Finland—A Free Karelia “: White Finland's Attempts to Conquer East Karelia in 1918] (Rovaniemi: Societas Historica Finlandiae Septentrionalis, 1988), with English summary, and Jääskeläinen, Itä-Karjalan kysymys, 20ff. For a summary of Jääskeläinen, see Paul M. Austin, “Soviet Finnish: End of a Dream,” East European Quarterly XXI (June 1987): 183-86.

5. Sihvo, 287.

6. As Sihvo shows (292), historians, ethnographers and linguists were eventually followed by politicians (and artists) who transformed this cultural Karelianism into political action.

7. Reino Kero, Neuvosto-Karjalaa rakentamassa: Pohjois-Amerikan suomalaiset tekniikan tuojina 1930-luvun Neuvosto-Karjalassa [Building Soviet Karelia: North American Finns as Importers of Technology in Soviet Karelia of the 1930s] (Helsinki: Kirjayhtyma, 1983), with English summary. For the Canadian experience see Kero, , “The Canadian Finns in Soviet Karelia in the 1930s,” in Finnish Diaspora I: Canada, South America, Africa, Australia and Sweden, ed. Kami, M. (Toronto: The Multicultural History Society of Ontario, 1981), 203–13Google Scholar. For an account of the American Finns’ experiences see Ahola, D, “The Karelian Fever Episode of the 1930s,” Finnish Americana 5 (1982-1983): 4–7 Google Scholar. For an eyewitness account see Tuomi, K, “The Karelian ‘Fever’ of the Early 1930's,” Finnish Americana 3 (1980): 61–75 Google Scholar. Kero puts the number of foreign Finns between 5, 000 and 6, 000 (58), while Aino Kuusinen, the wife of Otto Kuusinen, estimates 10, 000; Kuusinen, A., The Rings of Destiny: Inside Soviet Russia from Lenin to Brezhnev (New York: William Morrow, 1974), 94 Google Scholar. Between the censuses of 1926 and 1933 there was an increase of 9, 500 Finns bringing their numbers to 11, 700 or 3.4 percent of the population of Karelia; Pokrovskaia, 70-73.

8. See Karely Karel'skoi ASSR (Petrozavodsk: Kareliia, 1983), 64-66 and map, 258 and Pertti Virtaranta, Kulttuurikuvia Karjalasta [Cultural Images from Karelia] (Jyvaskyla: Weilin + Goos, 1990), 294-99 and map, 291.

9. Karely Karel'skoi ASSR, 65-66; A. I. Afanas'eva, “Sozdanie sovetskoi natsional'noi j avtonomii i nekotorye voprosy iazykovogo stroitel'stva v Karelii (1920-1944 gg.),” in I Voprosy istorii evropeiskogo severa (Petrozavodsk: Ministerstvo vysshego i srednego spe-1 tsial'nogo obrazovaniia RSFSR, 1987), 51 and Virtaranta, Kulttuurikuvia Karjalasta, 299. 1

10. See the Russian translation of the recent Hungarian study by Péter Hajdu: P. I. Khaidu, Ural'skie iazyki i narody (Moscow: Progress, 1985), 94. Page 96 notes the main 1 differences between Karelian and Finnish. I

11. Hajdú, 96; Afanas'eva, 51. 1

12. For a discussion of the creation in Finnic-speaking areas of the new culture 1 based on national languages, that is, so-called korenizatsiia, see Seppo Lallukka, The I East Finnic Minorities in the Soviet Union (Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia, 1990), I ] 75-84. I

13. Niskanen, R. A., “Karel'skii iazyk: ukazatel’ otechestvennoi i zarubezhnoi lit-1 eratury,” in Pribaltiisko-finskoe iazykoznanie: voprosy leksikologii i leksikografii (Leningrad: Nauka, 1981 Google Scholar), particularly “Istoriia sozdaniia karel'skoi pis'mennosti” (1 lOff). A good 1 study, although incomplete, of the history of Karelian orthographic systems is A. P. I Barantsev “Karel'skaia pis'mennost',” in the section “Iz istorii sozdaniia pis'mennosti 1 dlia karel, vepsov i saamov,” in Pribaltiisko-finskoe iazykoznanie: voprosy fonetiki, grammatiki 1 ileksikologii, ed. M. Mullonen (Leningrad: Nauka, 1967), 89-125. All political questionsare passed over in silence. See also K. Heikkinen's chapter on prerevolutionary Karelia, , “Venäläisten vaikutus karjalaisessa kulttuurissa 1800-luvulla,” [The Influence of Russians in Karelian Culture in the Nineteenth Century] in Venäläiset Suomessa 1809-1917 [The Russians in Finland 1809-1917], ed. P. Kurkinen (Helsinki: Societas Historica Finlandiae, 1985), 73ff.Google Scholar

14. See, for example, A. Tomachevskaia, Karel'sko-russkii bukvar’ dlia legchaishego obucheniia gramote harel'skikh detei (Moscow: Tipografiia Kartseva, 1887) which has Karelian-Russian and Russian-Karelian glossaries, simple sentences and daily expressions, translations of portions of the Gospels and basic prayers in Cyrillic script.

15. Pokrovskaia, 65ff. Between 1920 and 1923, adjacent areas, particularly east of Lake Onega, were added to the Karelian Workers Commune, so that when it became the Karelian ASSR in 1923 the Karelian population was 101, 000. The increase in Russians from 112, 000 to 154, 000, however, reduced the Karelians from 42.7 percent to 37.4 percent of the population.

16. Pokrovskaia, 22-26, 88. According to the 1896 census only 6, 200 Karelians (10.4 percent) were literate. The female literacy rate was 3 percent. Literacy was in Russian.

17. Afanas'eva, 55.

18. See the early Soviet work, N. N. Poppe and G. A. Startsev, Finno-ugorskie narody (Leningrad: Izdanie Leningradskogo obshchestva issledovatelei kul'tury finno-ugorskikh narodnostei, 1927), 40.

19. See the memoirs of Arvo Tuominen, General Secretary of the Finnish Communist Party in exile, L. Leino, trans., The Bells of the Kremlin (Hanover, NH: University ; Press of New England, 1983), 284-85.

20. For a discussion of prerevolutionary Finnish influence and material support i in Russian Karelia, see Toivo Nygard, Suur-Suomi vai lahiheimolaisten auttaminen [Greater ‘ Finland or Helping Kindred People?](Helsinki: Otava, 1978), with English summary. As Nygard shows, Finland also continued to be active across the border after 1917.

21. See A. I. Afanas'eva et al., eds., Kareliia v period vosstanovleniia narodnogo khoziaistva 1921-1925 (Petrozavodsk: Izdatel'stvo Kareliia, 1979), 256; Afanas'eva, “Soz-! danie … ,” 57; Hodgson, 158. j

22. Afanas'eva, 57. \

23. For a recent study of Soviet Finnish-language literature, see Aulikki Jalava, Kansallisuus kadoksissa: Neuvosto-Karjalan suomenkielisen epiikan kehitys [Nationality Lost: The Development of the Finnish Epic Literature in Soviet Karelia] (Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura, 1990), with English summary.

24. A. I. Afanas'eva, “Zavershenie likvidatsii massovoi negramotnosti v Karelii (1928-1941 gg.), in Voprosy istorii evropeiskogo severa (Petrozavodsk: Ministerstvo vysshego i srednego spetsial'nogo obrazovaniia RSFSR, 1986), 152.

25. D. V. Bubrikh, Karely i karel'skii iazyk (Moscow: Izdatel'stvo Mosoblispolkoma, 1932), 3-7.

26. A. Miloradova and P. Smirnov, Karialan kielen ucebnikka: Algu skolalla varoin: gramatikka i oigie kirjutanda. Enzimane cuati [Textbook of Karelian for Elementary School: Grammar and Orthography.Part One.](Moscu: Ucpedgis, 1933).

27. See Barantsev, “Karel'skaia pis'mennost',” 98. These Karelians, who had moved to this area deep inside Russia proper after the Treaty of Stolbova in 1619, were in fact the largest single group of Karelians. There was no influence of Finnish Communist emigrants here. For a recent study see Helmi and Pertti Virtaranta, Kauas läksit karjalainen[You Have Gone far Away Karelian] (Porvoo-Helsinki-Juva: WSOY, 1986). For a recent account of the area and its people, see P. Virtaranta, “Tverinkarjalaiset perustaneet oman kulttuuriseuran” [Tver Karelians Have Formed their Own Cultural Society], Karjalan Heimo, 1991, No. 1-2: 4-11.

28. See Nygård, Suur-Suomi, 187-233, for the activities of Finnish nationalists in Soviet Karelia. The coat of arms of one Finnish nationalist society included a map of all areas to be included in Greater Finland—Estonia, Soviet Karelia, the Leningrad area and parts of Sweden and Norway with Finnish-speaking populations.

29. Only in 1991 were details about the arrest and execution of the Karelian leadership published. Gylling was executed on 14 June 1938 in Moscow: Irja Takala, “Totuus Gyllingin-Rovion oikeusjutusta” [The Truth about the Gylling-Rovio Case], Neuvosto-Karjala, 13 July 1991.

30. Tuominen described the campaign against the Finns and Finnish in “The Tragedy of Karelia” in The Bells of the Kremlin, 291-307. Besides Aino Kuusinen's Rings of Destiny, there are other memoirs, such as C. Christer, Karjala kutsui [Karelia Called] (Helsinki: Kirjayhtyma, 1983) and K. Tuomi, Isanmaattoman tarina [The Tale of a Man without a Country] (Porvoo-Helsinki-Juva: WSOY, 1984). Tuomi, who later returned to the United States as a Soviet spy, estimates that of the 6, 000 Finns who he estimates came to Soviet Karelia, perhaps half managed to return home (31). Tuomi has aninteresting account of life in a northern Karelian village where, starting in November 1937, most of the foreign Finns (Canadian, American and Finnish) including his Communist stepfather, were arrested. He was expelled from the Komsomol since Finnishspeaking members were no longer trusted.

31. In an article in the Soviet Finnish journal Punalippu [Red Flag] (renamed Carelia in 1990) a survivor, Jaakko Rugojev, recounts that all but two members of the Finnish-language section of the Karelian Union of Writers were arrested in 1937-38 and all their works were banned. See J. Rugojev, “Puna-Kantele, soi surut synkkahan korpeen … ,” [Red Kantele, Your Sorrows Ring out into the Dark Wasteland] Punalippu, 1988, No. 3: 11-12. In 1991 Carelia publishes in each issue the names, date and place of birth and date of death of those repressed in the 1930s. Most of the victims were Finns who died in 1937-38.

32. The 1939 census did not note nationality. Archival sources indicate that the number of Finns fell from 11, 700 in 1933 to 8, 300 in 1939, a loss of 3, 400, which reduced them from 3.4 percent to 1.8 percent of the population of Karelia; Pokrovskaia, Naselenie Karelii, 73.

33. M. I. Kalinin, This brochure was sent to press on 26 September 1937.

34. Only the era of glasnost’ has revealed the extent of the destruction of books, journals and even all the pedagogical materials produced over the previous ten years. For moving eye-witness accounts of these events, see the article in the Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat: Jukka Rislakki, “Kirjaroviot syttyivät 50 vuotta sitten” [The Bonfires of Books Blazed Fifty Years Ago], Helsingin Sanomat, 1 April 1988.

35. Tuominen, The Bells of the Kremlin, 305.

36. Ahtia, E. V., Karjalan kielioppi [Grammar, Karelian] (Suojarvi: Karjalan Kansa-Iaisseura, 1938).Google Scholar

37. Bubrikh, D. V., Grammatika karel'skogo iazyka (fonetika, morfologiia) (Petrozavodsk: Izdanie Karel'skogo Nauchno-Issledovatel'skogo Instituta Kul'tury, 1937).Google Scholar It was sent to press 23 December 1937.

38. Bubrikh, Karely i karel'skii iazyk, 38.

39. Ibid.

40. See Barantsev, 102.

41. Even the most unsophisticated Finns in Karelia understood the obvious political message; Tuomi notes that the new language was seen as a “blow to Greater Finland bourgeois nationalism which had violently finnicized the Karelian people,” Isanmaattoman tarina, 61.

42. See Hajdu, 82, 96.

43. Bubrikh, D. V., Kakoi iazyk—tverskim karelamt (Leningrad: Izdanie Loikfun 1931), 5.Google Scholar

44. Karely i karel'skii iazyk, 21-25.

45. Ibid., 37-38. In an interesting article on this concept of a single world language and how it related to the case of Finnish and Karelian, see T. Vihavainen, “Neuvostolehdisto ja ‘Suomen kriisi’ talvella 1939-40” [ “The Soviet Press and the ‘Finnish Crisis’ of the Winter of 1939-40 “], Historiallinen Aikakauskirja, 1984, No. 1: 34-46.

46. Boucht, Karjala kutsui, 218. Boucht was a Finn from Vancouver.

47. Tuominen, 305.

48. Afanas'eva, “Sozdanie … ,” 63.

49. Barantsev, 103. Only 36 percent of the 1938 Plan was completed (Afanas'eva, 63). The largest collection of this material is in the Finno-Ugric Library in Helsinki, most of which was brought to Helsinki in 1944 by Finns returning from the occupation of Karelia. Since some of the publications reflect the political situation in the USSR in 1938-40, this collection may be the most complete now available anywhere. The author of the only Soviet study of Karelian orthography noted that even he did not have access to all the relevant materials, although the total number in both Russian and Karelian could hardly number more than 300 items (Barantsev, 116).

50. A. P. Barantsev and R. Niskanen, “Ukazatel’ sovetskoi literatury po voprosam karel'skoi pis'mennosti za 1925-1939 gg.,” in Pribaltiisko-finskoe iazykoznanie: voprosy fonetiki, grammatiki i leksikologii (Leningrad: Nauka, 1967), 116-24.

51. Barantsev, “Karel'skaia pis'mennost',” 103.

52. Afanas'eva, “Sozdanie … ,” 63-64.

53. Austin, “Soviet Finnish: End of a Dream,” 195-96.

54. N. A. Anisimov, Karel'skoi gosudarstvennoi izdatel'stva, 1938).

55. G. I. Gur'ev, [Textbook of Karelian for Elementary Schools: Grammar and Orthography] (Petrozavodsk [sic]: Karel'skoi gosudarstvennoi izdatel'stva, 1939).

56. V. I. Nikitin et al., [Textbook of Karelian and Collection of Exercises for Elementary School: Grammar and Orthography], (Petrozavodsk: Kargosizdat, 1939).

57. N. A. Anisimov, [Karelian Grammar: Part One. Phonetics and Morphology] (Petrozavodska: Karel'skoi gosudarstvennoi izdatel'stva, 1939); A. E. Rigoev and M. E. Sergeev, [Karelian Grammar: Part Two. Syntax] (Petrozavodsk: Karel'skoi gosudarstvennoi izdatel'stva, 1939). There was confusion even about the spelling of the capital of Karelia: “Petroskoi” was replaced by either “Petrozavodska” or “Petrozavodsk.” Also in the 1938 Bukvari the word “grammar” is in an adapted form with two “k's,” to fit into a Finnic pattern, but , in 1939 the word was in its normal Russian form.

58. Karelian teachers themselves were afraid to discuss the language imposed on them; Tuominen, 305.

59. E. la. Fortunatova, [Reader: Part One for Primary Classes of Elementary School] (Petrozavodsk: Kargosizdat, 1939).

60. V. I. Nikitin et al., [Reader: For Grade VII of Incomplete and Secondary School] (Petrozavodska: Karel'skoi gosudarstvennoi izdatel'stva, 1939).

61. A. Golubeva, Brikhachchuine Urzhumas pai [The Lad from Urzhum] (Petrozavodska: Karel'skoi gosudarstvennoi izdatel'stva, 1940).

62. There was no consistency in the spelling of Moscow, let alone the hundreds of topographical and historical names which appear in these translations. Most of the publications were in fact literary translations.

63. M. Lermontov, Ashik-Kerib (Petrozavodsk: Gosizdat K-FSSR, 1940). It is interesting to note that while the title-page indicates in Cyrillic Karelian script that it is published in the Karelo-Finnish SSR, the publication data at the end shows that it was published in September 1940, that is, six months after the establishment of the Karelo-Finnish Republic and restoration of Finnish as an official language. It is one of few such books and suggests that there may have been continuing discussions in 1940 about which language should be given official status.

64. See Rislakki's article in Helsingin Sanomat.

65. For an examination of Finnish policy and practice during the occupation of Karelia, see Antti Laine, Suur-Suomen kahdet kasvot, Itä-Katjalan siviiliväestön asema suomalaisessa miehityshallinnossa 1941-1944 [The Two Faces of Greater Finland: The Place of East Karelian Civilians in the Finnish Administration of Occupation 1941-1944] (Helsinki: Otava, 1982), with German summary; Helge Seppälä, Suomi miehittäjänä [Finland as Occupier] (Helsinki: SN-Kirjat, 1989); Jukka Kulomaa, Äänislinna: Petroskoin suomalaismiehityksen xmodet 1941-1944 [Äänislinna, the Finnish Occupation of Petrozavodsk 1941-1944] (Helsinki: Societas Historica Finlandiae, 1989), with English summary. Surnames and topographical names were changed, including Petroskoi to Aanislinna, i.e. Fort Onega (a term used by some Finns since the 1850s), and more than 70 street names in Petrozavodsk. According to Finnish military records, most of the pre-war population of about 700, 000 either was evacuated or otherwise disappeared, leaving about 36, 000 “Finnish-related” and 50, 000 “non-Finnish-related” (Seppälä, 30-32). Only about 700 Finns of the 8, 000 pre-war Finnish population remained in Soviet Karelia after the Red Army retreat (Laine, 106). In the occupied areas the population was divided into “non-Finnish-related” and “Finnish-related,” i.e. Finns, Karelians, Veps, Ingermanland Finns and Estonians, qualified for permanent residence in Karelia.

66. Lauri Hakulinen et al., Itä-Karjalan murreopas [East Karelian Dialect Guide] (Helsinki: Otava, 1942), 11-12. This glossary and brief grammar was specifically published for “Finnish soldiers, officials, teachers, etc. working in East Karelia.” For Finnish propaganda in both Finnish and Karelian, see Mannerheim's “Declaration to the Karelian People” of 8 July 1941, (Laine, 224-25).

67. S. Lallukka, Suomalais-ugrilaiset kansat Neuvostoliiton uusimpien väestönlaskentojen valossa[The Finno-Ugric Peoples in the Light of the Most Recent Soviet Censuses] (Helsinki: Neuvostoliittoinstituutti, 1982), 82. This demographical study of the Finno-Ugric peoples and languages is a useful survey with charts of the decline in the number of Finnish and Karelian speakers.

68. This process was already noted twenty years ago; E. I. Klement'ev, “Iazykovye protsessy v Karelii,” Sovetskaia etnografiia, 1971, No. 6: 38-44. For a historical and contemporary review see S. Lallukka, “Karjalaisasutuksen eroosio Neuvosto-Karjalassa,” [The Erosion of the Karelian Population in Soviet Karelia] Suomen Antropologi, 1990, No. 3: 3-14, and The East Finnic Minorities in the Soviet Union (Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia, 1990). This is now widely discussed in the Soviet Finnish press; see, for example, J. Klementjev's articles in Neuvosto-Karjala: “Karjalaiset tilastojen peilissa,” [Karelians in the Mirror of Statistics], 3, 5 and 8 January 1991. The censuses of 1896, 1926, 1933, 1939, 1959, 1970, 1979 and 1989 demonstrate that the percentage of Karelians has in fact been decreasing steadily for the last hundred years as a result of assimilation and massive immigration of non-Karelians. Karelians also live in various areas of the USSR. It is interesting that the tiny communities of Karelians in Dagestan, Uzbekistan and Tadzhikistan claim a higher language retention rate than in Karelia: J. Klementjev, “Vuoden 1989 väestönlaskenta” [The 1989 Census], Carelia, 1991, No. 6: 163.

69. Gosudarstvennyi komitet SSSR po statistike, Natsional'nyi sostav naseleniia: chast’ II (Moscow: Informatsionno-izdatel'skii tsentr, 1989), 19.

70. Pokrovskaia, 165. Other non-Russian nationalities also exhibit similar figures.

71. Lallukka, Suomalais-ugrilaiset kansat, 62ff.

72. This Declaration, published in Neuvosto-Karjala on 20 July, has received wide discussion in the Soviet Finnish-language press as well as in Finland.

73. Kirsikka Isola, “Suomen kieli kukkii jalleen Karjalassa,” [Finnish Flourishes Again in Karelia], Opettaja 1990, No. 33: 22-24. As of mid-1990, Finnish has been expanded to 43 schools as both a native and a second language.

74. The Finnish government, press and public have displayed enormous interest in these developments (a topic deserving separate investigation), especially where the Finns and Ingermanland Finns are concerned.

75. For an examination of this proposal, see Virtaranta, Kulttuurikuvia Karjalasta, 294-300. For an Olonets Karelian's view, see Ljudmila Markianova, “Karjalan kielen ja karjalaisen kulttuurin asema Neuvosto-Karjalassa” [The Situation of the Karelian Language and Culture in Soviet Karelia], Kieliposti, 1991, No. 2: 4-9. The questions of the 1920s and 1930s about Karelian dialects, the differences between them, which to use as a base and the relationship to Finnish have all resurfaced.

76. See, for example, the case of the Mordvins; Lallukka, The East Finnic Minorities, 86ff.