395-411 p.

Download the article

doi.org: https://doi.org/10.22378/he.2026-11-2.395-411
EDN: URAGMS

Abstract. The article focuses on the assessment of changes in teaching of the languages of the national republics in schools by parents as participants in educational relations, using the example of the Republic of Tatarstan. In 2025, the topic was once again brought to the fore by the discussion of plans to rename the subject “Native Language” in the Federal State Educational Standard to “Language of the Russian Federation People.” The study is based on the data from a representative sociological survey conducted in 2018 by sociologists from Kazan Federal University, with a quota sample of 2,000 people from the Republic of Tatarstan, representing the region’s population by gender, age, as well as by education, ethnicity, and location (Kazan, other cities, and rural areas). The article identifies the attitudes of students’ parents regarding the use of Russian and Tatar languages and the mandatory study of these languages in schools, the discourse of the “language conflict” in the republic, the place and role of Russian, Tatar, foreign and native languages in the school curriculum, and the introduction of the mandatory subject “Native Language” in 2017. The views of students’ parents are compared to the attitudes of non-childbearing residents of the region and Tatarstan as a whole. The study revealed that the mass-scale opinion of parents was not as categorical as the rhetoric of the leaders of the “parent communities” in social networks and in the mass media. While there was a slightly greater recognition of language tensions, including tha one that appeared in 2017, grеater preference for Russian in everyday life and expectations of its increased influence in the future, parents’ opinions did not differ significantly from those of the republic’s residents, who supported the study of their native languages regardless of their political status and denied the existence of a language conflict.

Keywords: native language; Russian language; languages of the peoples of the Russian Federation; Tatar language; parental community; Tatarstan

For citation: Nizamova L.R. (2026) Parents’ opinions on learning and using languages in the Republic of Tatarstan in the context of introducing the subject “Native Language”. Istoricheskaya etnologiya [Historical Ethnology]. Vol. 11. No. 2: 395–411. https://doi.org/10.22378/he.2026-11-2.395-411 (In Russ.)

REFERENCES

Vlasova T.A., Makarova M.I. (2016) How are parents involved in intra-school forms of interaction? Zhurnal sotsiologii i sotsial’noy antropologii [The Journal of Sociology and Social Anthropology]. Vol. 19. No. 2 (85): 74–87. (In Russ.)
Gabdrakhmanova G.F., Alos-i-Font E. (2024) On the issue of recording nationality and language proficiency in the 2020–2021 All-Russian Population Census. Sotsiologicheskie issledovaniya [Sociological Studies]. No. 1: 28–39. https://doi.org/10.31857/S0132162524010032 (In Russ.)
Goshin M.E., Mertsalova T.A. (2018) Types of parental involvement in education, family socioeconomic status, and learning outcomes. Voprosy obrazovaniya [Educational Studies]. No. 3: 68–90. https://doi.org/10.17323/1814-9545-2018-3-68-90 (In Russ.)
Ilakavichus M.R., Yakushkina M.S. (2022) Psychological and pedagogical education as a means of developing parenting communities: The experience of CIS member states. Chelovek i obrazovanie [Man and Education]. No. 3: 45–56. http://dx.doi.org/10.54884/S181570410023070-2 (In Russ.)
Lotfullin M.V. (2020) Teaching the subjects “Mother Tongue” and “State Language of the Republic” in the general education system of the Russian Federation. Al’manakh “Etnodialogi” [“Ethnodialogues” Almanac]. No. 2 (60): 75–86. https://doi.org/10.37492/ETNO.2020.60.2.004 (In Russ.)
Martynova M.Yu. (2019) Mother tongue and school: an anthropologist’s perspective. Vestnik antropologii [Herald of Anthropology]. No. 2 (46): 164–177. https://doi.org/10.33876/2311-0546/2019-46-2/164-177 (In Russ.)
Musina R.N. (2014) The role of the family in ethno-linguistic socialization and the formation of ethno-linguistic consciousness. In: Gabdrakhmanova G.F., Makarova G.I. (eds). The State Languages of the Republic of Tatarstan: Multiple Dimensions. A Collection of Essays. Kazan: Marjani Institute of History of the Tatarstan Academy of Sciences Publ.; Artifact Press, 2014: 182–198. (In Russ.)
Petrukhina O.A. (2018) Parental community as a form of modern social partnership between families and educational organizations. Nauka o cheloveke: gumanitarnye issledovaniya [Human Science: Humanitarian Studies]. No. 2 (32): 99–104. https://doi.org/10.17238/issn1998-5320.2018.32.99 (In Russ.)
Sorokin P.S., Red’ko T.D. (2024) Modern research on agency in education: Systematization of key concepts and developments. Voprosy obrazovaniya [Educational Studies]. No. 1: 236–264. DOI: 10.17323/vo-2024-18131 (In Russ.)
Titova M.A. (2016) Children speak. Sotsiologicheskie issledovaniya [Sociological Studies]. No. 2: 148–153. (In Russ.)
Tishkov V.A. (2020) Where did Russian ethnology come from and where did it go: A personal perspective in the global context. Etnograficheskoe obozrenie [Ethnographic Review]. No. 2: 72–137. https://doi.org/10.31857/S086954150009606-6 (In Russ.)
Khalidov A.I. (2019) Prospects for preserving the languages of the peoples of the Russian Federation in the context of implementing the Law on the Voluntary Study of Native Languages. Vestnik Akademii nauk Chechenskoy Respubliki [Bulletin of the Academy of Sciences of the Chechen Republic]. No. 3 (46): 114–119. (In Russ.)
Shabrova N.V. (a) (2022) Protecting children’s rights and interests in school education: Practices of Russian parents. Vestnik PNIPU. Sotsial’no-ekonomicheskie nauki [PNRPU Sociology and Economics Bulletin]. No. 2: 112–124. https://doi.org/10.15593/2224-9354/2022.2.8 (In Russ.)
Shabrova N.V. (b) (2022) Parents in the European school system. Integratsiya obrazovaniya [Integration of Education]. Vol. 26, No. 3: 539–558. https://doi.org/10.15507/1991-9468.108.026.202203.539-558 (In Russ.)
Gimadieva A., Warditz V. Back to Russian monolingualism? Discursive reflections on the 2017 educational reform in Russian and Tatar-language media. Frontiers in Language Science. 2025. 4:1652436: 1–17. https://doi.org/10.3389/flang.2025.1652436
 

About the author: Liliya R. Nizamova, Cand. Sc. (Sociology), Associate Professor at the Department of General and Ethnic Sociology, Kazan Federal University (18 Kremlevskaya St., Kazan 420008, Russian Federation); https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5439-0636, e-mail: lnizamov@kpfu.ru

Received 11.02.2026 Revised 12 03.2026   Accepted for publication 27.03.2026

Published Online 08.06.2026