ABSTRACT
On December 15, 1986, twenty-eight Belorussian cultural figures addressed a letter to Gorbachev expressing their concern for the fate of the Belorussian language, and urging that steps be taken to preclude "the spiritual extinction" of the Belorussian nation. The Belorussian language should be protected by state legislation, and its utilization in all spheres of public life guaranteed and promoted by a series of measures for patriotic upbringing. The entire system of education, according to the proposals, should provide for language continuity. The proposals envisaged both scholarly works on the development of the Belorussian language and research devoted to the history of Belorussian literature and culture. Ukrainian writers continued pushing for an improvement in the overall status of the native language in the Ukraine. Several developments in Ukrainian literature and the arts indicated that the liberalization of Russian cultural life may have had a "fallout effect" in the Ukraine. Russians and other national minorities residing in the Ukraine should learn Ukrainian.
