Aspects of Identity of the Russian-Ukrainian Population in the Border Areas of Russia

Abstract

In this article, I take the case of the Belgorod region to discuss the phenomenon of multiple RussianUkrainian identities observed among the population of Russian areas bordering Ukraine. The formation of a mixed Russian-Ukrainian identity was the result of assimilation of Ukrainians — ​or “Khokhly”, as a low colloquial term had it — ​and subsequent split of their identity into civil (i.e. referring to the country of residence) and ethnic during the period after the 1930s. In the recent decades, the Russian-Ukrainian population of these areas was mainly sustained by interethnic marriages and the influx of migrants. Drawing on the outcome of ethnographic and sociological research that I conducted in 2018, I argue that 23% of residents of Belgorod region’s borderland areas still have a mixed Russian-Ukrainian identity, while the Russian and the Ukrainian constituents of their identity manifest themselves differently in various local groups and among various respondents.