The roles of language and ethnocultural identity in integrating immigrant youth in southern Russia

Social integration of immigrants into host communities is complicated by their cultural and language differences. The success of the process is determined by government policies and educational effectiveness that focus on socialisation and developing tolerance and intercultural interactions/communications. Using student data collected in educational organisations of southern Russia, this study examined the role of cultural characteristics in everyday interactions and analysed students' attitudes towards immigrants as cultural foreigners. About one-fifth of the respondents tended to distance themselves from immigrants/foreigners showing high levels of mistrust of immigrants and people with other religious backgrounds. The questionnaire results prove that the youth of Astrakhan Region tend to be the most tolerant to cultural foreigners, for the region was historically formed as ethnically mixed one. Young people of the Republic of Kalmykia are the least willing to accept representatives of other cultures and migrants, which might be a consequence of repressions against Kalmyks on an ethnocultural basis by the USSR government during the Second World War. The findings suggest that the educational system insufficiently addresses cultural diversity. This study clarifies that schools should have an active role in developing tolerance among students in southern Russia.