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Nobility of the Grodno Region at the Beginning of the 21st Century: Language and Identity. An Outline of the Problem The subject of the paper is the nobility of the Grodno region at the beginning of the 21st century. Basing on archival queries and field explorations, the author identifies three clusters of gentry areas near Grodno, Belarus, that survived till our time. She draws attention to the fact that their inhabitants still speak Polish, and are acutely aware of their belonging to the nobility, which awareness is passed from one generation to the next. Further, she emphasizes that the language of the inhabitants of the various clusters is not identical, and also differs significantly from the language of Polish residents of rural areas. The author postulates the value of research into the language and identity of Grodno nobility as an important element of the unique culture of Polish-Belarusian borderland. The paper has been prepared within the Thesaurus Poloniae scholarship program of the Minister of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland.

The subject of the paper is the nobility of the Grodno region at the beginning of the 21st century. Basing on archival queries and field explorations, the author identifies three clusters of gentry areas near Grodno, Belarus, that survived till our time. She draws attention to the fact that their inhabitants still speak Polish, and are acutely aware of their belonging to the nobility, which awareness is passed from one generation to the next. Further, she emphasizes that the language of the inhabitants of the various clusters is not identical, and also differs significantly from the language of Polish residents of rural areas. The author postulates the value of research into the language and identity of Grodno nobility as an important element of the unique culture of Polish-Belarusian borderland. The paper has been prepared within the Thesaurus Poloniae scholarship program of the Minister of Culture and National Heritage of the Republic of Poland. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]