Dnieper Ukraine
During the first half of the 19th century, Ukrainianism/Little Russianism had been favored in Russian intellectual circles. "Old Ruthenian" and Russophile ideologists agreed that "the three" had recognizable cultural and linguistic differences, whereas Russophiles went a step further and argued in favor of a common self-identification of "Russian" and the use of one literary language. The era can be described as one of competing loyalties towards multiple identities, as opposed to mutually exclusive identities, "for many residents of Dnieper Ukraine it was perfectly normal to be both a Little Russian and Russian, or a Russian from Little Russia speaking (Ukrainian);" Russophiles from Galicia saw themselves as "Little Russian Russians from Galicia," many others would fall into this pluralist category, including Nikolai Gogol and nobles of Cossack origin. Conversely, those who favored a mutually exclusive "Ukrainian" identity over that of "Little Russian" did so in order to 'heighten perceptual differences.' "In a real sense, the evolution of the 19th century Ukrainian national reivival can be seen as the story of the conflict between a framework of multiple loyalties on the one hand and one of mutually exclusive identities on the other."