ABSTRACT
The chapter focuses on the post-socialist toponymic policies, practices, and repertoires in Vinnytsia, a second-order Ukrainian city, representing the central part of a geopolitically divided country in-between its western and eastern extremes. The notable trends of the local toponymic process include express nation-building narrative accentuating the present and past episodes of the struggle for Ukrainian independence. Remarkably, the new national heroic ethos is unfolded primarily via the lens of local events and personalities. The appeal to the local context is realized via referring to the local “Golden Ages” and creating topographic street names related to contemporary or pre-existing landmarks. Beyond the mainstream of decommunization, the case study deals with the underlying changes of urban toponymy in the city, illustrating the transition in the attitudes to the street names – from the free creativity of the locals to the instrument of national and local memory policy and identity building. The efforts of the professional community and specific local political regime resulted in ideologically balanced, smooth, and cooperative decommunization of street names in Vinnytsia compared to other Ukrainian cities. In contrast to the West and East of Ukraine, Vinnytsia represents a rather inclusive than an exclusive approach to writing its new city-text realized through simultaneous linking of different historical contexts.
