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Food preparation and consumption is an essential part of culture. Leaving their homeland and finding themselves in a society with eating habits different from theirs, migrants face a dilemma of adapting their diets to those customary in their new place of residence or trying to maintain their food habits. Relying on the ethnographic method and applying thematic and critical discourse analyses, this article explores how Russian-speaking migrants discuss changes in their foodways and what role Russian food stores play in the life of immigrant communities. Material for analyses was drawn from fieldwork conducted in Finland, Germany, Israel, and Switzerland. It includes in-depth interviews, immigrants’ essays, and group discussions. We also studied culinary discussion groups on Facebook and documented linguistic landscape related to food consumption in the diaspora. Among the salient themes in the discourse dealing with eating habits abroad are food nostalgia, trying out familiar recipes with new products, evaluating traditional dishes of the host society, and re-evaluating Russian cuisine, searching for the right food in the new country and trying to showcase the best of one’s own cooking to other people. Immigrants’ discourse about food and the labels on the food products available in “Russian” stores outside Russia reveal frequent use of paroemias and quotations and allusions to Soviet and post-Soviet popular culture. Russian-speaking immigrants’ reflections about their old and new foodways reveal that they are an integral part of search for a new hybrid self-identity.

The Russian-speaking space plays an important role for diasporans: starting a business, founding a company, seeking legal advice, or high-quality medical treatment is always more convenient when participants understand the nuances of communication in a common language. It facilitates the understanding of highly specialized fields such as legislation and medicine. In business, it makes presumptions and expectations transparent, and common values allow the quality scale to be defined and shared. The sphere of activities conducted in the diaspora in Russian depends on the contingent of immigrants: their education, career aspirations, and interests. Integration in a new society is closely linked to the level of language proficiency in the local language/s and also in English as the lingua franca of science, commerce, and entertainment. Yet, Russian often competes with the other languages and serves as a unifying factor for communities with a background in the former Soviet Union. In the present special issue, the authors combine sociolinguistics and linguistic anthropology while analyzing the everyday verbal and cultural practices of Russian speakers abroad. Observations of communication in immigrant groups reveal the cultural potential of the speakers as reflected in their discourse. They demonstrate a variety of lifestyles and practices, but have a strong sense of cultural identity.

This article presents a multifaceted portrait of immigrants to Germany from the post-Soviet states. The article traces the paths of two families over the course almost of a third of a century after immigration, focusing on language use and integration into the new environment. In-depth interviews conducted at various stages of the integration process and age-appropriate tests served as research material. The content, text, and lexical analyses, as well as a linguistic biography method, were used. The research included four generations of Russian Germans and Jews in each family. Russophones in Germany have not had an easy time integrating but, ultimately, have a positive attitude toward their adoptive country. The results show that the German language became the primary means of communication outside the family and partly within the family where Russian dominates among the second and third generations. The oldest generation (great-grandfathers and great-grandmothers) were fluent in German to some extent; those who moved at the age of 20–40 learned it sufficiently for their jobs; their children studied in German preschools and schools and became completely bilingual; and the great-grandchildren were born in Germany. The younger generations have fully integrated into German society, although strong connections with locals exist among the older generations too. Proficiency in the Russian language is still maintained even among the great-grandchildren's generation, although not to the same extent as among the generation of young parents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: The Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine had a significant impact on the Russian-speaking identity, reformulating existing linguistic and cultural boundaries and shaping Russian speakers' self-perception and vision of the world. We focus on families with children who are trying to balance their inner and outer life in order to stabilize the positive environment of the upbringing process and analyze how adults explain to the children the need to learn the Russian, Ukrainian and other languages. This can shed light on the challenges and strategies employed in alleviating prejudiced attitudes against immigrants' languages and cultures which can cause alienation from the roots in the one-and-a-half and second generation. The research questions were: How has the war altered language policies in families with different ethnic backgrounds? What changes in home language use strategies do parents propose? Material and methods: Material drawn from numerous posts of Facebook discussions have been analyzed with the help of thematic analysis. Results and discussion: We observe that in many multilingual families with Ukrainian roots the war has led to a greater emphasis on the Ukrainian language use as an attempt to reinforce ties to their cultural heritage and express support for the country. Russian is increasingly viewed as the language of the aggressor; moreover, Russian culture is devalued and rejected. Some families have become more open to new language learning, especially the languages of their new environment, and try to identify themselves as multicultural and multiethnic personalities. On the other hand, in those families where parents work or study in the fields in which Russian is widely used, adults prioritize the development of Russian language skills in their children in order to improve their future educational and professional opportunities. We explore attitudes and challenges faced by parents in Russian-speaking families, as they demonstrate the complexities of identity formation and language transmission while making salient the interplay between parents' personal experiences, their aspirations for their children's cultural identity, and the pressures of integration into the local society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Immigrants often change their names to assimilate into a new culture, comply with local linguistic norms and simplify pronunciation for the hosts. Personal names serve as markers of ethnic affiliation, with name choices indicating levels of assimilation or preservation of identity. Gender disparities in name selection still exist, influenced by origin-specific factors and integration levels. Ethnically identifiable names can impact professional success, with assimilation playing a role in immigrants' achievements. While acculturative conservatism may favour mainstream names, ethnic names can foster social connections within immigrant communities. However, they may also lead to discrimination in broader society. This article aims to explore Russian-speaking immigrants' responses to name change opportunities and bilingual children's perceptions of name spelling in Finland and Israel. The findings highlight the challenges migrants face in assimilation due to societal perceptions, particularly evident in employment and educational contexts where unfamiliar names can lead to discrimination or integration difficulties. Despite international recognition of the right to pronounce names correctly, practical difficulties persist due to linguistic differences between native and host languages. Mechanisms of surname de-Russification involve simplification, translation, or adoption of culturally foreign names, representing a shift in original identities. While changing names may signal integration, the fairness and implications of this decision vary, with children often adapting better than adults to cultural hybridity and bilingual practices to which they are exposed from an early age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bilingual preschool education is under researched compared with bilingual school education. There is also a lack of research on bilingual preschool teachers' agency and how they negotiate between two languages in the classroom. We examined the language practices of five bilingual preschool teachers working within three different socio-linguistic settings, in Finland (Finnish-Swedish and Russian-Finnish contexts) and Israel (an Arabic-Hebrew context) and interviewed the teachers about their use of languages in the classroom. We found that in each context the teachers reported modifications to an initial bilingual education model over time: from a strict separation of languages, to flexible bilingual practices. A thematic analysis of the contents of the teacher reflections as they emerged through interviews revealed five shared categories: (a) the flexible use of two languages; (b) responsible code-switching; (c) contextual and linguistic supports; (d) adjustments for individual children; and (e) role-modelling. Despite the different settings and socio-linguistic conditions, the similarities in teachers' practices and the rationale they gave for applying flexible bilingual practices were significant. The shared practices across contexts may have important implications for bilingual education.

Originating from many different sources, Russian as a heritage language in Finland displays a spectrum of developmental tendencies: both attrition and maintenance can be observed in various degrees. The Finnish educational system allows for the organization of bilingual pre-schools and schools when there are sufficient numbers of potential pupils. At the very least, children who speak a minority language (anything other than Finnish or Swedish) at home are entitled to ninety minutes of lessons in that language per week. Accommodations are made in higher education as well, such as the special program for Russian heritage learners at the University of Helsinki. Research has shown that bilingual children who grow up without regular instruction in Russian lack higher-level skills in the language, and their Russian is influenced by Finnish or Swedish on every level. (Contains 25 notes.)

The study provides an overview of the sociolinguistic situation in Kyrgyzstan and the current role of Russian and Kyrgyz in the republic. We present initial results of a mass survey of language use that show that the efforts to introduce the Kyrgyz language on all levels of societal use had some effect. At the same time, Kyrgyzstan is a multinational multilingual state with a high degree of mixed marriages and ethnic tolerance. To know the national language is prestigious and important, yet many Kyrgyz and representatives of other ethnicities prefer to have their children instructed mainly in Russian because Russian provides access to better education, employment, information, and economic advancement. Among the Kyrgyz, mastery of their own language is widespread, whereas for other peoples of Kyrgyzstan, understanding of the specific characteristics of the national ethnolinguistic identity is in the process of development.