ABSTRACT
This chapter assesses criteria and characteristics which may affect the reidentification and realignment of the population—religion, territory, historical experiences, and social environment. The four rival descriptions of Latvian and Kazakstani societies delineated here—bipolar, homogeneous, continual, and fragmented—are all ideal types in the Weberian sense. Actually existing societies may only approximate them more or less imperfectly. The cleavages and the cultural links and ties in Latvian and Kazakstani societies may be of various kinds—religious, linguistic, tribal, historical, territorial, and socioeconomic. Within both the Latvian and Kazak ethnic communities, the most significant socioeconomic dividing lines run between the rural population and the urbanites. Among the Latvian-speakers, the South-Eastern Latgalians have their own dialect which is occasionally used as a literary and liturgical language. The predominant religion among the Latvian-speakers in Latgale is Catholicism, and Latgalians tend to take their religion somewhat more seriously than their Lutheran compatriots.
