Buryat Language and Ethnic Identity Among the Buryats in the Web Space

The Internet and social networks are changing the communication practices of people, including ethnic minorities. Our study contributes to the field of computer-mediated communication in minority languages ​​using the example of the Buryat language. The novelty of our work based on the fact that there are no studies about topics of messages in the Buryat language on the Internet. In the work we study online language practices in the social network Vkontakte, the analysis was based on data collected during the HSE School of Linguistics project “Russian Languages ​​on the Internet” in 2016/2017. Three hypotheses were proposed during the study: Buryat language is used for maintaining communication on everyday topics, there is an association between the language of communication and gender, and between the choice of language and place of residence. Hypothesis testing was made using a mix approach: topic modeling of posts in the Buryat and Russian languages ​​and a regression analysis of user’s data. However, not all hypotheses were confirmed. During the study it was confirmed that the user’s gender and user’s place of residence o were significant predictors. The hypothesis about the choice of language depending on the topic of the message was partially confirmed: according to topic modeling, the Buryat language is used to discuss culture, language, religion, etc.