Этапы языковой политики в Монгольской Народной Республике

Abstract

Introduction. The 20th century reform of Mongolian writing shaped the basis for wide transformations in the country’s culture, science, and education. It is noteworthy that the language policy in the Mongolian People’s Republic was not only reduced to the Cyrillic reform of 1941. Goals. The article attempts a variety of insights into multiple directions of language policy in the Mongolian Peo\ple’s Republic. The work distinguishes four main stages of the latter’s implementation, and also compares those to similar processes in the USSR. Materials and methods. The paper analyzes Russian and Mongolian language sources, primarily laws and regulations of the USSR and the Mongolian People’s Republic, special attention be paid to works titled ‘The Revolution and Writing’ and ‘Public Education, Culture, Arts, and Science [in the MPR]: Systematically Collected Decrees and Laws’. Results. It reveals the MPR’s language policy was being implemented in strict compliance with similar processes in the Soviets. And it was largely the language policy that served a key to the successful abolition of illiteracy nationwide, modernization of Mongolian society, and spread of Soviet and European cultures. However, certain aspects and consequences of the language policy — primarily the intensified ‘Russification’ — would give rise to rejection and criticism among the Mongolian intelligentsia. Conclusions. Subsequently, this very reaction led to a dramatic rethink of the language policy in the 1990s, which attests to the significance of analyzing the MPR’s policy in this realm for better understanding of the situation in contemporary Mongolia.