It wouldn't make much sense - they were in the Austrian (since the first partition) territory before the Lemko Republic, so it would be rather odd if they spoke Russian there given the utter lack of continuity with Russian speakers.
Yea, you're right, it doesn't make much sense. I suppose he's just confusing Russian and Rusyn language. However, then that would suggest this confusion goes back before him, at least beginning with my paternal grandfather...this whole thing is a mess. I'm never really sure how to identify to people, whether as Polish, Ukrainian, or Russian. I want to learn a second language and I can't choose which.
Lemko or Rusyn would make the most sense, but it's the least used. Picking one of the others will either add to the confusion or just fully assimilate as Polish (well, except the whole Orthodox baptism thing). Tough decisions.
My personal theory about language confusion is that Russian sounds so similar to Lemko/Rusyn and most of these expats have forgotten these languages, however they know recent history/family traditions and that they don't like people like Pilsudski and Bandera, as well as that they're from the area of the pro-Russian Lemko Republic. Considering after Operation Vistula there wasn't much point to being Lemko or at least speaking it, but assimilating as Polish or Ukrainian didn't make sense, perhaps they retrospectively adopted a more Russian orientation and this has led to the confusion of what forgotten language was spoken.
For me, this meant while I was growing up I thought I was some weird Russified Pole or something, and then I found out I was Lemko but, there was still stuff about Russian this or that that leaves me confused. The language thing is the big one.
Unfortunately I don't know the truth, and probably never will unless I learn Polish and go there lol
That's possibly a result of religion - the Russian Orthodox lot are rather different to the others.
Religion, yea, and politics/history too I think. I mean, besides religion the other divide is stuff like the USSR and Russia. I noticed much of the Ukrainian identity is defined by anti-communism and such, whereas even while Lemkos, too, were abused by the USSR some maintain pro-Russian attitudes. This would explain a lot about the surprised looks I got when, while trying to figure out what I was (I had found out plenty of Lemkos assimilated as Ukrainians), I asked if we were Ukrainian.
The only thing I can think of - maybe they understood Church Slavonic? That is often mistaken for being Russian because Russian took so much from it, but it is a separate language. That would explain the claim of speaking Russian, although as far as I know, the two aren't mutually intelligible. If they were Russian Orthodox believers, then they could well have been under the impression that Church Slavonic = Russian.
Interesting idea. But why speak the language of the church, rather than the village? Seems odd for a peasant. Seems far more likely he (and his father) are confusing Rusyn language with Russian, I'd have to connect with other family members to figure out what's what, but that's nearly impossible. I don't really know most of them except for the American expats, and they've long forgotten this sort of stuff. I also only speak English.
You're not mixing it up. Your father, however, probably did. There was a romantic-era ethnic myth among some Rusyns that they were actually a group of ethnic Great Russians that somehow got cut off from the rest of the herd. I remember waiting for a friend in the narthex of a Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Church and reading some of the literature they had put out.
Yea, I was taught about this, as part of stuff about Great Russian chauvinism. However like I said, confusion over spoken language did not start with my father, but his father. Nonetheless, they didn't consider themselves Great Russians. I was also taught that Russia, Ukraine, etc. are nations that grew out of the Rusyn people, and we are sort of the last ones carrying the torch (with a distinct Carpathian/Lemko touch) but still divided between Ukraine and Russia.
