Kubijovyč, Volodymyr

Kubijovyč, Volodymyr [Кубійович, Володимир],b 23 September 1900 in Nowy Sącz, Poland, d 2 November 1985 in Paris. Geographer, demographer, and encyclopedist. From 1928 to 1939 he lectured at Cracow University; in 1940 he was appointed professor at the Ukrainian Free University in Prague. In 1931 he was elected full member (in 1981 he became an honorary member) of the Shevchenko Scientific Society and headed its geographic commission. He was the society's general secretary from 1947 to 1963, and from 1952 president of its European branch. During the Second World War he headed the Ukrainian Central Committee (UCC) in Cracow and in 1943 took part in organizing the Division Galizien. In his role as head of the UCC, Kubijovyč revealed his exceptional ability as an organizer and statesman. After the war he emigrated to Germany and then France. He published over 80 works on the anthropogeography and demography of Ukraine, particularly of the Carpathian Mountains region. They include Życie pasterskie w Beskidach Wschodnich (Pastoral Life in the Eastern Beskyds, 1926), Rozšiření kultur a obyvatelstva v Severních Karpatech (The Spread of Cultures and Society in the Northern Carpathians, 1932), Pastoritul in Maramureş (Pastoral Life in the Maramureş Region, 1935), Pastushstvo Bukovyny (Pastoral Life in Bukovyna, 1935), Pastýřský život v Podkarpatské Rusi (Pastoral Life in Subcarpathian Ruthenia, 2 vols, 1935–7), Terytoriia i liudnist’ ukraïns’kykh zemel’ (The Territory and Population of the Ukrainian Lands, 1935), and Etnichni hrupy Pivdenno-zakhidn’oï Ukraïny (Halychyny) na 1.01.1939: Natsional’na statystyka i etnohrafichna karta (Ethnic Groups of Southwestern Ukraine [Galicia] on 1 January 1939: Nationality Statistics and an Ethnographic Map, 1983).

Together with other specialists Kubijovyč prepared and edited Atlas Ukraïny i sumezhnykh kraïv (An Atlas of Ukraine and Adjacent Countries, 1937) and Heohrafiia Ukraïny i sumezhnykh zemel’ (A Geography of Ukraine and Adjacent Lands, 1938 and 1943), securing his reputation as one of the founders of Ukrainian geography. He contributed numerous demographic and statistical surveys to Ukrainian, Polish, and Czech serials, and with the help of Mykola Kulytsky, and later Arkadii Zhukovsky, produced several maps of Ukraine and its regions (see Cartography). From their inception he was the chief editor of Entsyklopediia ukraïnoznavstva (Encyclopedia of Ukraine, 1949–95), Ukraine: A Concise Encyclopaedia (2 vols, 1963, 1971), and Encyclopedia of Ukraine (Vols One and Two, 1984–87), to which he contributed numerous entries. His contribution in this regard cannot be overestimated. His conceptualization of the Entsyklopediia ukraïnoznavstva provided a sorely needed structure to Ukrainian scholarship in the West. Overcoming great obstacles, Kubijovyč organized the scattered intellectual resources in time to ensure that the rich knowledge of Ukraine carried out by the various scholars forced to emigrate during the Second World War be passed on to future generations.

His memoirs include Ukraïntsi v Heneral’nii Hubernii 1939–1941 (Ukrainians in the Generalgouvernement 1939–41, 1975), Meni 70 (I Am 70, 1970), and Meni 85 (I Am 85, 1985, with a selected bibliography). Kubijovyč’s papers were placed in the Library and Archives of Canada following his death.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Shablii, O. Volodymyr Kubiiovych: Entsyklopediia zhyttia i tvorennia (Paris and Lviv, 1996)
Markus’, V. Budivnychi NTSh i EUD Volodymyr Kubiiovych (1900–1985), Atanas Figol’ (1908–1993): Naukovyi zbirnyk (Kyiv 1998)

Danylo Husar Struk, Arkadii Zhukovsky

[This article was updated in 2014.]