Ulan-Ude’s Promise to Increase Use of Buryat in Republic Schools Welcomed But Sparking Questions on Why It Appears to Be Bucking Russia-Wide Trend

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Nov. 12 – At the end of last month, the Buryat education ministry announced that it would shift a quarter of the republic’s schools to Buryat as the language of instruction beginning in 2026. Many activists welcomed the promise, but others questioned whether Ulan-Ude would really do it or was only saying this to calm nationalist and separatist voices.
    Given the Putin regime’s Russianization of public education especially since 2017, many activists in Buryatia and in other non-Russian republics welcomed this exception and even said it showed that republic leaders had far greater freedom of action in this area if they had the will (idelreal.org/a/sto-nachalnyh-shkol-v-buryatii-hotyat-perevesti-na-buryatskiy-yazyk-obucheniya-chto-ob-etom-dumayut-eksperty-i-natsionalnye-aktivisty-/33192054.html).
    But far more expressed skepticism. Many said that Ulan-Ude would never in fact take this step but only promise it, something that in the short term would help the republic government fight nationalist and separatist attitudes and boost the standing of republic head Aleksey Tsydenov.
    Others said it would likely be only a bookkeeping measure given that approximately a quarter of all republic schools are in rural areas where Buryat remains strong but would not touch the major cities where Russian in schools and everyday life is increasingly dominant and Buryat marginalized.
    And some said that for Moscow it hardly mattered which language Buryat children were taught to become fighters for the empire given that they are now cannon fodder for the Kremlin in Putin’s war in Ukraine. If this feint toward the national language helps with recruitment, then it is all to the Kremlin’s good, not the good of the Buryat people.
    But one Russian specialist Vlada Baranova who resigned from the Higher School of Economics in 2022 hopes Buryatia will carry this promise out and that this will inspire others. The possibilities for that are real because under existing law, heads of republics have more room for maneuver in this area than many think. If they don’t act, it is only a question of will.
    “It is difficult to say what was behind the decision to increase the presence of Buryat in the educational system,” the author of Language Policy without Politicians (in Russian; Moscow: 2023) says. “Perhaps it is a PR campaign to improve the standing of an unpopular leader. But if it is implemented, that would be wonderful.”