Вытворчасць ведаў аб этнічнасці беларусаў як інструмент кантроля беларускай этнаграфіі: прыклад вызначэння заходняй мяжы пражывання беларусаў у 1943–1944 гг. па загаду Генштаба Чырвонай Арміі

Abstract

In the 1930s and 1940s, the production of ethnographic knowledge in Belarus came under complete political and ideological control in the USSR. This is most clearly illustrated by the problem of the ethnicity of Belarusians. In the 1920s, Belarusian ethnographers quite freely explored the ethnic aspects of Belarusian culture. In the 1930s, this topic became the cause of repression. A public onesided discussion was organized within the scientific community, which condemned views alternative to Marxism. During the war, in 1942–1945, in order to achieve the foreign policy goals of the USSR regarding the post‑war redivision of Europe, the topic of ethnicity again became temporarily relevant. In secret research topics, the ethnicity of the peoples of Eastern Europe became a central issue. The article analyzes the text about the western ethnic border of Belarusians, prepared within the framework of such a secret topic by Moisei Grinblat in 1943–1944. This work was carried out under the control of the intelligence of the General Staff of the Red Army. In parallel, the opponents included specialists in Lithuania, Moldova, Poland, Ukraine and other countries of Eastern and Central Europe. The analysis of M. Grinblat’s work shows the absence of real field ethnographic material on the problem, the use of outdated literature, which was chosen by the author arbitrarily (taking into account the set political goal). The text is filled with a significant number of examples of manipulation of style, literature, facts to achieve a goal that had political and ideological reasons. The study of the text also allows us to understand the degree of theoretical development of ethnic issues in the Soviet ethnography in the 1940s. The historical conditions of the emergence of the analyzed text by Moisei Grinblatt make it possible to understand the degree of control of the political and military elites of the USSR over the production of scientific knowledge both in the USSR as a whole and in the specific Belarusian case.