Ethnogenesis of Ukrainians. Cognitive Practices. 1. Historiography

Author

Balushok Vasyl

a Ph.D. in History, a senior research fellow at the Ukrainian Ethnological Centre Department of M. Rylskyi Institute of Art Studies, Folkloristics and Ethnology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (Kyiv, Ukraine).

ORCID ID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1362-8270

Ethnogenesis of Ukrainians. Cognitive Practices. 1. Historiography

Abstract

We are going to reveal our own cognitive practices, that is, our working tools before studying the ethnogenesis of Ukrainians. These are historiography, the theoretical basis of the study, sources and the methodology for working with them. And given the allowable length of the article, the author presents historiography and the rest of the cognitive practices separately – as two parts of one whole. Therefore, the task of the first part is to consider the historiography of the problem. The theoretical basis is a combination of moderate primordialism and constructivism, within the framework of the neo-evolutionary paradigm. The history of studying the ethnogenesis of Ukrainians as a component of cognitive practices within this topic has its own characteristics. This is, in particular, despite the large number of published works touching on the problem, there are few works specifically devoted to the origin of Ukrainians (books and articles by M. Braichevskyi, P. Tolochko, L. Zalizniak). But in most studies, the analysis of ethnogenesis is woven into the general presentation of material from history, linguistics, etc. A significant number of publications are characterized by politicization in the struggle for «seniority» between representatives of the Russian-imperial (P. Tolochko) and Ukrainian-patriotic (M. Chubatyi, Ye. Nakonechnyi, Ya. Dashkevych, L. Zalizniak) versions, as well as a journalistic and fiction component. As a result, most authors treat facts rather loosely and have lack of a modern methodological base. Many researchers, being historians, archaeologists, and linguists, often do not sufficiently use the theory and provisions of ethnology, which negatively affects the quality of publications. The most radical of these versions belong to the cladistic (from the ancient Greek κλάδος (kládos) – branch), those prove the branching of peoples from each other and underestimate the role of substrata and superstrata. Nowadays, cladistic theories, those are thought to be evolutionist ones, are considered obsolete in ethnology. However, the focus of the author’s attention includes the published works aimed at studying the ethnogenesis of Ukrainians, without reference to other Slavic peoples. They reject the idea of an «elder brother». The author considers himself their follower.  I will start with the works of M. Kostomarov, who has formulated the thesis about the existence of local ethnic communities in Ancient Rus, and also traced how separate Ukrainian and Russian peoples were formed under the influence of different geoenvironments and socio-historical circumstances. M. Vladymyrskyi-Budanov, O. Yefymenko, and, especially, M. Hrushevskyi have noted the different ethnographic basis of Old Rus local communities. M. Hrushevskyi has pointed to the consolidating role of large-scale all-Ukrainian migrations caused by nomadic invasions. V. Petrov, also within the framework of the primordial approach, found out how the foundation on which the Ruthenian-Ukrainian ethnicity grew was formed. F. Shevchenko, M. Braichevskyi, and Ya. Isaievych determined that the completion of the formation of Ukrainians occurred during the existence of the Galicia-Volyn state. And M. Braichevskyi has formulated a theory of ethnogenesis, which takes into account the role of the substrate, combining the primordial approach (the emergence of the ethnocultural component) with the constructivist approach (the role of the princely elite in the formation of Ukrainian ethnicity).

Keywords

ethnogenesis, formation, historiography, cladistic theory, primordialism, constructivism.

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Продовження дослідження в журналі «Народна творчість та етнологія», № 3, 2026.