The Concept of Homeland in the Works of Belarusian Emigrants and Repressed Citizens

Abstract

The article analyzes contexts with nouns that express the concept of homeland in Belarusian: radzìma, ajčyna, bac'kaǔščyna. The main meanings of these words are 'place of birth, small homeland’ and 'native/home country’. The works of emigrants and repressed citizens in different periods of the 20th and 21st centuries are considered, including the changes that the concept of homeland in these works has undergone over the past hundred years. In the first half of the 20th century, bac'kaǔščyna 'fatherland’ predominated, at the end of the 20th and beginning of the 21st centuries, the word radzìma and especially the proper name Belarus prevailed. The noun ajčyna, which belongs to the highest style, was and is used most rarely. In emigration literature, ajčyna and bac'kaǔščyna meant 'homeland’, only the lexeme radzìma sometimes meant 'small homeland, place of birth’. The importance of the country’s history and historical studies for the formation of the concept of homeland is noted.