Social Criteria Describing Literacy and Education Levels in Ukrainian Governorates within the Russian Empire at the end of the 19th century

Abstract

This paper draws upon data from the Russian Imperial Census of 1897 to explore the literacy and education levels of residents of Ukrainian governorates within the Russian Empire at the end of the 19th century. An analysis of statistical data from a number of relevant sources revealed discrepancies both in the percentage of literate people overall and among males and females in the Russian Empire. It is impossible at this time to obtain conclusive data about the number of literate people both in the Russian Empire as a whole and in Ukrainian governorates within it in particular, as this information was gathered by different agencies and was not of a centralized nature. The data from the Russian Imperial Census of 1897 appear to be the most reliable in terms of objectivity, which may be associated with the fact that, in systematizing these data, use was made of a variety of data collection techniques, including census schedule, pilot census, linguistic survey, and survey by questionnaire. The work proposes a conceptualization of the literate as citizens with at least elementary reading and writing skills, the literacy level as the share of literate citizens in a region, and the literacy index as the ratio of literate citizens to a region’s total population. An analysis was conducted of the characteristics of the education policies pursued by the Russian government at the time, and its results were summarized. An insight was gained into the overall influence of those policies on the literacy and education levels of residents of Ukrainian governorates within the Empire. Literacy and education levels in Ukrainian governorates within the Russian Empire were analyzed through the lens of a number of factors (criteria), including regional characteristics, gender, age, estate, ethnicity, and religious affiliation.