ONOMÀSTICA 6 (2020): 125-137 | RECEPCIÓ 27.10.2019 | ACCEPTACIÓ 15.7.2020 Toponyms of selected communes with minority languages in north-eastern Poland (legal regulations and practice) Urszula Bijak & Barbara Czopek-Kopciuch (†) Institute of Polish Language, Polish Academy of Sciences, Kraków, Poland [email protected] Abstract: The aim of this article is to present the current legal regulations concerning the languages of national and ethnic minorities in Poland and geographical names in ethnically mixed areas. The research covered the area of the Podlasie Voivodship in the north-eastern part of Poland, especially two communes: Orla, inhabited by the Belarusian minority, and Puńsk with the Lithuanian minority. The authors briefly describe the multilingual toponymic landscape of Podlasie region and focus on problems with the introduction of auxiliary settlement names in minority languages and with the current standardization of names of physiographic objects in these two selected communes. Keywords: standardization, geographical names, supplementary names in minority languages, Podlaskie Voivodship, Orla and Puńsk communes. Topònims de municipalitats seleccionades amb llengües minoritàries al nord-est de Polònia (regulació legal i aspectes pràctics) Resum: L’objectiu d’aquest article és presentar la normativa legal vigent sobre les llengües de les minories nacionals i ètniques a Polònia i els noms geogràfics de les zones ètnicament mixtes. La investigació va abastar l’àrea del voivodat de Podlasie a la part nord-est de Polònia, i especialment dues municipalitats: Orla, habitada per la minoria bielorussa, i Puńsk, amb la minoria lituana. Les autores descriuen breument el paisatge toponímic multilingüe de la regió de Podlasie i se centren en problemes amb la introducció de noms d’assentaments auxiliars en llengües minoritàries i amb la normalització actual dels noms d’elements fisiogràfics en aquestes dues comunes seleccionades. Paraules clau: normalització, noms geogràfics, noms suplementaris en llengües minoritàries, voivodat de Podlaskie, municipalitats d’Orla i Puńsk. 131 Urszula Bijak & Barbara Czopek-Kopciuch (†) 1. Minorities in Poland. General information Poland is a country characterized by considerable ethnic, cultural, and linguistic homogeneity. Yet, in the Polish census of 2011 (GUS 2015, 29), 96.2% of the country’s inhabitants declared themselves to be of Polish nationality and ethnicity, while only 3.8% declared themselves as having another national or ethnic status. Before the Second World War, national minorities had constituted more than 30% of Poland’s population, but the country’s ethnic structure was to be greatly influenced by the conflict. The main factors were the mass extermination of Jews, mass relocations and the displacement of population, migration, and the great territorial shift experienced by Poland’s borders in 1945. Today, the most numerous national minorities in Poland are Germans, Belarusians, and Ukrainians, followed by the other smaller national minorities of Lithuanians, Russians, Slovaks, Jews, Armenians, and Czechs, and the ethnic minorities of the Karaims, Lemkos, Romani and Tatars, and the regional linguistic minority of the Kashubians. Some of these minorities (Jews, Armenians, Russians, Romani and Czechs) find themselves dispersed throughout the country, whereas others inhabit compact territories along the state borders. 2. Legal regulations concerning minorities Polish legislation guarantees national and ethnic minorities the right to preserve and develop their languages, preserve their customs and traditions, develop their culture, establish their own educational institutions, and to freely conduct religious observances. Moreover, the legislation grants election privileges to the electoral committees of minority organizations and it prohibits discrimination. The aforementioned national and ethnic minorities may be granted the right to use their languages locally as “supporting languages” for communication. Yet, in accordance with Article 27 of Poland’s Constitution, Polish is the country’s only official language. Nevertheless, mutual relations between Polish and other languages do not seem to generate any conflicts, although they do give rise to some issues of 132 Toponyms of selected communes with minority languages in north-eastern Poland identity. Such issues are regulated by laws and other legal acts, including the Constitution of the Republic of Poland, the Electoral Law, the Law on the Education System, the Law on Broadcasting, the Law on the Polish Language, the Criminal Code, the Law on Personal Data Protection, the Law on Ethnic and National Minorities and Regional Language. The Law on Ethnic and National Minorities and Regional Language permits a minority or regional language to be used in selected communes as a “supporting language” in dealings with commune authorities and in judicial proceedings in a court of first instance. It also states that alongside Polish geographical names, traditional names in the minority or regional language may be used as supplementary names for localities, physiographical objects and streets. A supplementary name can be established by a motion brought before a commune council, provided the minority constitutes not less than 20% of the commune’s total population or – in those cases where the minority does not reach 20% – on the condition that the establishment of a supplementary name has the support of more than half the commune’s inhabitants as expressed in a public consultation. The same regulations apply to the names of physiographical objects and streets. The motions brought before the commune councils need to count on the positive assessment of the Commission on Names of Localities and Physiographical Objects. The Law states that supplementary names should be placed after the corresponding name in Polish and that they cannot be used independently. Today, the Register of Communes where supplementary names in minority languages or in a regional language are used includes a total of 60 communes. Since 2006, supplementary names in German, Kashubian, Lithuanian, Lemko, and Belarusian have been accepted, in accordance with the procedure outlined above, for more than 1,200 localities (see Map 1). 133 Urszula Bijak & Barbara Czopek-Kopciuch (†) Map 1. Communes with supplementary names (as mapped by Paweł Swoboda) 3. Podlaskie Voivodship as a borderland region In this paper, we discuss the aforementioned issues drawing on two examples of communes in the region of Podlaskie Voivodship: the commune of Orla (inhabited by the Belarusian minority, which constitutes almost 69% of the commune’s population) and the commune of Puńsk (inhabited by Lithuanians, who constitute almost 76% of the total population). The north-eastern territories of Poland, i.e. present-day Podlaskie Voivodship (the historical area around the towns of Białystok and Suwałki), are a borderland region. In the 10th and 11th centuries, the area was first inhabited by a population of Baltic, Polish and Ruthenian origin, becoming a melting pot of languages (Baltic and West and East Slavic), 134 Toponyms of selected communes with minority languages in north-eastern Poland cultures, and religions (Roman Catholicism and the Orthodox Church). As the history of the region is very complex, and we do not have space here to do it justice, we focus instead on providing an outline of the area’s linguistic landscape. The dialects of four languages are used here: Polish, Belarusian, Lithuanian, and Russian. Polish dialects dominate in the area surrounding the town of Suwałki, Belarusian dialects are to be found in the area to the north-east of the town of Białystok, Lithuanian dialects are clustered in the north-eastern part of the Suwałki region (specifically, in the communes of Puńsk, Sejny, Szypliszki, and Berżniki), and Russian dialects spoken by Orthodox Old Believers (who settled here in the 17th century) are to be heard near the towns of Suwałki, Sejny, and Augustów. All these dialects are internally heterogeneous and display many transitional features, e.g. mixed Polish-Belarusian qualities. The communities typically use both a primary language (the one spoken at home), which is mainly a dialect, and the Polish language (as the language of prestige). Processes of language integration are also present (Barszczewska, Timoszuk, 2016, 19–28). 3.1. Belarusian and Lithuanian minorities According to the 2011 Polish census, the Belarusian minority traditionally inhabits the south-eastern part of the Podlaskie Voivodship. Belarusians constitute 87% of the population of eight communes (Bielsk Podlaski, Czyże, Dubicze Cerkiewne, Hajnówka, Kleszczele, Narew, Narewka and Orla). In four of these communes (Czyże, Hajnówka, Narewka and Orla), Belarusian has been introduced as a “supporting language” but supplementary names in Belarusian have only been adopted in one commune, that of Orla. Lithuanians are a national minority traditionally living in the northern part of the Podlaskie Voivodship (66% of inhabitants declaring themselves to be of Lithuanian nationality live there). The minority essentially live in the following three communes: Puńsk, Sejny and Szypliszki. In Puńsk, Lithuanian has been introduced as a “supporting language”. In 2008, the same commune applied for the establishment of 30 supplementary names in the minority language (the commune as a whole is made up of 33 localities/hamlets) (see GUS 2015 and Map 2). 135 Urszula Bijak & Barbara Czopek-Kopciuch (†) Map 2. Belarusian