Unlike Their Parents, Young Kazakhs View Kazakh as Being More Attractive and Providing More Opportunities than Russian Can, Kazakhstan Scholar Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 12 – In Soviet times and even more recently, most Kazakhs viewed Russian rather than Kazakh the language of opportunity, an attitude the Soviets encouraged and that continued in the first decades of independence; but now that has changed especially among the young according to Aiman Zhusupova.

            The Narkhoz University scholar says that has happened not because of pressure by Astana but rather because of “the growth of the attractiveness” of Kazakh among the young because of translations, dubbing of foreign films, and the spread of Kazakh online (spik.kz/2379-zumery-kazahstana-kakovo-ih-otnoshenie-k-jazyku-trudu-i-aktivizmu.html).

            “To be sure,” Zhusupova continues, “the Russian language still occupies an important place in our lives, but among young people, the perception of Kazakh as a symbol of modernity and a resource for promotion, trust and attractiveness is strengthening” in part because proficiency in it is “becoming a prerequisite for a career” in government and other fields.

            This constitutes a sea change from the attitudes of their elders and sets the stage of a Kazakhstan in which the Kazakh language will be not just a means to career advancement but an important and highly valued part of national identity, something that will set the country apart not only from Russia but from its own past. 

            Yusupova, however, does not mention one of the major reasons for this tectonic shift: as recently as the mid-1980s, ethnic Russians formed a plurality of the population in Kazakhstan. Today, they make up less than 15 percent. One would have expected a decline in the use of Russian because of that alone, but the shift she describes is far deeper and more consequential.

            And that is important because it means there is every reason to think that Kazakhs in the future will function ever more a part of a larger Central Asia than as a halfway house between the other countries of the region and the Russian Federation, a development that will limit ever more sharply Moscow’s influence there.