Migrants and Language Learning in Russia (Late Seventeenth--First Part of Eighteenth Century)

In the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries Russia experienced a considerable lack of teachers. In this situation, foreign migrants became Russia's preferred teachers for more than a century. Foreigners were particularly welcome to teach languages and a whole range of other subjects such as history, geography, and mathematics. All teaching was done in a foreign language. Foreigners became important actors in cultural transfers from Western Europe to Russia. Social elites (the nobility, particularly its upper strata) became the main clients of these foreign teachers. This process ended up producing several generations of aristocracy possessing a sort of hybrid culture, both Russian and Western-European with a particular predominance of French culture starting from the generation of the middle of the eighteenth century. In my paper I will first analyse the national composition of the teaching staff in some major Russian educational institutions, first and foremost the institutions for the nobility or in which noble students were present, and in private education; then I will give a brief overview of the geographical origin of the students in these institutions. I will finally analyse the positive aspects as well as the problems caused by this situation and will show what reactions the predominance of foreign teaching staff in Russia provoked in Russian society.