Samoidentyfikacja narodowa młodzieży polskiego pochodzenia ze Wschodu na studiach w Polsce

Abstrakt

At the turn of the 1980's the first group of young people of Polish origin from the former Soviet Union started their studies in Poland. Their number increased very quickly and in the academic year 1996/97 2622 people, mainly from such countries as the Ukraine, Lithuania, Belorussia, Russia and Latvia, studied at Polish universities. In the year 1997/98 sociological research was conducted concerning national consciousness of the mentioned students. The sample comprised 802 subjects. The present article, that is based on the results of the research, shows the kinds of national self-identification of the respondents before they started their studies in Poland and in the course of those studies; it also points to how the changes in this field were conditioned by their stay in Poland. Before coming to Poland just over 72% claimed they were of Polish nationality, but when some time passed after they had started their studies, only 63% did so. As many as 60% of the surveyed students stated that they were treated as “Ruskie” (derogatory form of “Russians”), 23% − as strangers, and 10% as people whose nationality was that of the country they came from. Over 53% defined this as an annoying experience and 21% felt humiliated and degraded by that. Over 68% felt forced to prove their being Polish. The way the young people are perceived and their emotional reactions resulting from that are probably the main cause of the national conversion of 9% of them. The phenomenon of changing one's national self-identification, that is known from other situations, especially in the borderland, in this case has a completely untypical and special character, as it is the result of contact between young people of Polish origin from the East who describe themselves as Polish, with the Polish society. This contact also made them realise the fact that being Polish in the countries they came from has a little different character from that in Poland, and the Polish character they represent met with misunderstanding, lack of acceptance and was questioned. This is why having a possibility of a closer national self-definition only over 9% of the subjects chose to identify themselves with the Polish nationality without a more precise qualification, over 18% pointed to their Polish origin, and over 64% labelled themselves as “Poles from the East”.