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« 2026. № 5 (191)

The Ethnology Notebooks. 2026. № 5 (191), 1375—1385

UDK 94(477:=161.2)(470)”1927″:321.01:323.1:070

DOI https://doi.org/10.15407/

  • Received: 22.09.2026
  • Accepted: 02.10.2026
  • Published: ??.??.2026

UKRAINIZATION IN THE RUSSIAN SFSR: THE SEARCH FOR MANIFESTATIONS OF UKRAINIAN «BOURGEOIS NATIONALISM» (Based on the Journal «Novym Shliakhom» (By the New Path) (1927))

STEFANIV Vasyl

  • ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0667-7069
  • PhD in History, Associate Professor,
  • Department of History,
  • Ukrainian Catholic University,
  • 17, I. Svientsitskoho Str., 79011, Lviv, Ukraine,
  • Contacts: e-mail: stefaniv@ucu.edu.ua

Abstract. Introduction. The article provides a textual analysis of materials from the 1st and 2nd issues of the Ukrainian-language pedagogical journal Novym Shliakhom (By the New Path). The periodical was published in Krasnodar (RSFSR, Kuban) from 1927 to 1930 and was subsequently shut down by the Soviet authorities on charges of «Ukrainian bourgeois nationalism» — a Soviet ideologeme used to describe alleged Ukrainian intolerance toward other nations.

Purpose. The study aims to identify statements within the journal’s materials that the communist regime could have interpreted as bourgeois-nationalist. The relevance of the research lies in introducing new empirical data into scientific discourse, which would demonstrate the existence or absence of a threat posed to the Soviet regime by the Novym Shliakhom journal and the Ukrainization process as a whole.

Methods. The methodological foundation of the research comprises textual analysis, comparative-historical analysis, problem-chronological and interdisciplinary approaches, analytical-synthetic methods, partial statistical analysis, and the method of historical reconstruction.

Results. The journal’s materials are thematically divided into four groups covering: the historical connection between Kuban and Ukraine, the cooperation of Kuban educators with the Ukrainian SSR, the language issue in Kuban, and the significance of Ukrainization for the Sovietization of the region. Particular attention is paid to statements reflecting the confrontation at the level of national identities in Kuban during the Ukrainization period. It is concluded that the materials of the first and second issues of the journal from 1927 contain only a minor number of statements that could be interpreted as a manifestation of Ukrainian bourgeois nationalism.

Conclusion. It is revealed that the materials from the 1st and 2nd issues of the Novym Shliakhom journal for 1927, published during the period of Ukrainization/Korenizatsiya (indigenization) in Kuban, are thoroughly imbued with Soviet-communist ideology. The minor number of statements that contradicted Bolshevik ideology are historical or folkloric in nature and, objectively, could not have been the reason for the journal’s closure on charges of Ukrainian bourgeois nationalism.

Keywords: Ukrainization in Kuban, Sovietization in Kuban, language of Kuban, Novym Shliakhom journal, Ukrainian bourgeois nationalism.

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