“Cossack Language”: Language as a Sign of Identity in Hetmanshchyna (Second Half of the Seventeenth – Eighteenth Century)

Abstract

The language image of the early modern Hetmanshchyna was quite diverse and included “prosta mova”, Latin, Polish, Russian, Old Slavonic, and spoken Ukrainian. Each of them was assigned its own functions. Along with ideas about own territory, ethnogenesis, an image of the past, a pantheon of heroes and antiheroes, language in Hetmanshchyna of the 17–18 centuries was also an important factor of identity.

The purpose of the article is to analyze the functioning of languages in Hetmanshchyna, highlighting their function. Defining language as a marker of the identity of the community / communities that lived in its territory.

The research methodology is based on the deconstruction of documents and narratives, which existed in Hetmanshchyna during this period.

The originality consists the comprehensive study of a significant amount of textual sources, which made it possible to reconstruct the language situation in Hetmanshchyna to identify the features of the language factor as a marker of identity. Conclusions. Distinguishing the spheres of use of different languages in Hetmanshchyna, we see their use as a direct or indirect construct of identity. Each of them occupied its own functional niche, the very existence of which is a manifestation of the identity of the society that lived in Hetmanshchyna.