Society and Language: Debates Surrounding the National Language in Belarusian Society at the Beginning of the 1990s

Abstract

The dissolution of the Soviet Union at the end of the 1980s and beginning of the 1990s sparked a wave of political and national emancipation in its republics that led to the creation of new successor states. This also applied to the former Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic (BSSR), which declared its independence on 27 July 1990. Even before this, however, a project concerning a wholly new and groundbreaking law was introduced in the country for public debate. According to the law, the Belarusian language – as the national language of the majority population – would become the one and only state and official language in the republic.