The French Language in Russia: A Social, Political, Cultural, and Literary History by Derek Offord Vladislav Rjéoutski Gesine Argent

Abstract

 Reviews theorizers of the avant-garde (Bürger, Bourdieu, Luhmann, Mann, and Reckwitz). e editors want us to understand Schlingensief’s self-positioning above all historically and also at the cross-overs of art and non-art, within and without institutions and with respect to the institution of art itself. But Schlingensief himself probed and poked fun at such categorizations and does not appear to have shown extensive awareness of avant-garde theory. What he did know, however, was the ‘classical avant-garde’ of the s and s, and this volume shows that his productions and performances have to be interpreted against this history; he engaged with it in vital ways, which could be every bit as provocative in the s as the original interventions seventy or eighty years earlier, as the essays by Jasmin Degeling and, in particular, Sarah Pogoda demonstrate. e volume ends with a scholarly apparatus, including lists of works by Schlingensief and works about him. e written accounts and interpretations of his achievements would already fill several shelves, which is testimony to his posthumous reputation in the academic world and beyond. As is the case with all live performers, however, most of Schlingesief’s own works le fewer traces. As a consequence, both witnesses and researchers such as those gathered in this volume have a greater role to play in assessing and recording his influence and significance. S U J P e French Language in Russia: A Social, Political, Cultural, and Literary History. By D O, V R, and G A. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. .  pp. € ISBN ––––. is book marks the culmination of a large research project and it really demonstrates what such collaborative enterprises can achieve. e expansive nature of the topic and the research means that the book enriches our knowledge not only of the use of the French language in Russia, but of many other topics, with chapters on history, education, the court, high society, diplomacy and state activity, writing, cultural propaganda and political polemics, language attitudes, and literature. As each chapter, moreover, consists of over fiy pages of detailed discussion of many other subthemes, it is truly impossible to do any kind of justice to this impressive book and its scope in such a short review. e authors see two threads running through their work: language practice and the functioning of the French language in Russia (primarily in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries); and language attitudes and the ways that using French became entangled with conceptions of identity at various levels. e nature of these threads results in a truly interdisciplinary work, with much to interest linguists, literary specialists, and translators, as well as historians, sociologists, and even anthropologists . e subject and the sources mean that the court and the nobility are the main focus, since they had the resources and desire to speak and learn French, and le copious evidence of its use. And this book makes full use of such evidence: official documents, treaties, and laws; grammars, dictionaries, and MLR, .,   educational material; memoirs, diaries, and letters; plays, poems, and literature; and more. Alongside their main threads, the authors are keen to undermine several traditional assumptions. e first is that the Russian nobility spoke primarily French and, second, that consequently they spoke Russian infrequently, poorly, and to lower social groups. e reality was far more complex. ere were variations over time, across the nobility, within different scenarios, and when discussing different topics. Code-switching is explored repeatedly, as is the impact of plurilingualism. Indeed, this book may be about the French language, but the authors also provide a detailed account of the use of Russian and other languages (usually German and later English) among the court and the nobility. Many Russian monarchs and nobles were confident linguists who switched repeatedly between languages when speaking and writing among themselves, not just to other social groups, and some of the most interesting analysis explores when this ‘cultural capital’ was utilized and the factors involved. e final traditional assumption interrogated is that this plurilingualism—and the westernization it implied—had a detrimental impact on the formation of a Russian identity and culture. e reality, again, was far more...