Abstract
Kazakhstan’s decision to transition its Kazakh language from the Cyrillic to the Latin alphabet has serious implications for language policy, communication, education, inclusion, and social cohesion. This critical qualitative study, underpinned by a discourse-historical approach, employs critical discourse analysis to analyze statements of ex-President Nursultan Nazarbayev and semi-structured interviews with Kazakh language educators and social media articles to determine the nature and effects of the Latinization of Kazakh on social cohesion, inclusion, and inclusive education. The findings indicate that Latinization of Kazakh is gradually becoming more ethnically oriented, implying that the inevitable formation of included and excluded language groups. These patterns in society might undermine social cohesion and inclusion, hinder their maintenance and hamper efforts to achieve inclusive education, which prioritizes equality for all social groups through proper access to knowledge.
Introduction
After independence in 1991, Kazakhstan’s first president, Nusultan Nazarbayev, attempted to focus his policy on the ethnic identity of Kazakhs and their dominance over other nationalities (Svanberg, 1994) by nationalizing the country (Beachain & Kevlihan, 2013; Brubaker, 1996; Peyrouse, 2008). However, both later political and economic dependence on Russia and the considerable share of Russian and other Slavic populations in the country ensured the maintenance of Russian as an official language, which started to be used together with Kazakh. The new era moreover advocated English as the lingua franca.
In his annual address to the nation, Nazarbayev (2007) clarified the status of the languages: Kazakh as a state language, Russian as a language of interethnic communication and English as the language of integration into the world economy. Thus, he ordered officials to start implementing the cultural project, “Trinity of the languages,” in education at all levels, supposedly to support Kazakhstani youth to speak these three languages equally. This excluded minority languages such as Ukrainian, German, Uyghur, Uzbek, and others, which are also spoken by representatives of minority groups.
Therefore, Kazakhstan developed trilingualism, implying the use of Kazakh, Russian, and English, raising questions of how all these non-state languages affect the development of the Kazakh language and position of Kazakhs. The express aim of the government was building a nation-state (Spehr & Kassenova, 2012) with Kazakhs as the main ethnicity of the country, inspiring questions: “How could a nation-state be built with a proper national identity and consciousness, when so many languages and cultures co-exist and interfere?”/“How does this diversity affect the titular nation and its self-identity?”
Zharkynbekova et al. (2014), supported by Bekturganova’s (2014), claim that most Kazakh youths and ethnic repatriates strongly agree with the government on trilingualism, and believe it will help maintain the unity of the people. In 2005, only 7.5% of urban Kazakhs were nationalists, and 19,9% called themselves national-patriots (Bekturganova, 2014). While Kazakhs support equality, Smagulova (2014) avers that in a bilingual family, children are more inclined to Russian, putting their national consciousness in doubt.
Zharkynbekova et al. (2015) emphasize that language policy (LP) makers significantly influence the attitudes of people and national identity and a multilingual policy could thus obviously slow down the building of a nation-state. Therefore, national patriots blame the government for soft and slow measures to support Kazakh as a state language (Kudaibergenova, 2016). According to Bekturganova (2014), this double policy seems unfeasible, as multilingualism can be accomplished only if the nation-state is already constructed and sufficient, unlike Kazakhstan. Strengthening the Kazakh language and Kazakh nationalism is thus a priority. This was the main reason for launching the complex project of modernizing the Kazakh language, that is, transferring to the Latin script, which was announced in 2006, and is supposed to be finalized by 2025.
Background
Before becoming a Soviet country, the Kazakh territory had a mixture of Turkic and Mongol inhabitants. Its official history as a state began in the 15th century, when three
Cyrillic remained the script used for Kazakh until 1991 when Kazakhstan gained independence from the Soviet Union (USSR). It helped Kazakhs to master Russian, but decreased the status of the Kazakh language in the country: monolingual Kazakh speakers had fewer opportunities regarding careers and general well-being (Roy, 2005; Smagulova, 2008). In fact, more Kazakhs spoke Russian than anyone else in Central Asia (Roy, 2005), and over 90% of Kazakhs were fluent in Russian (Fierman, 2006). Many more schools offered Russian-medium instruction than Kazakh, and parents preferred to send their children to the former owing to higher prestige (Smagulova, 2008).
After the dissolution of the USSR, in “reimagining” the nation, Kazakhstan started to promote the titular Kazakh as a state language. During this period of the 1990s, the genuine “post-Soviet stage,” Kazakhstan was not quite separate from Russia and still relied on it economically and politically, as well as for military support (Pavlenko, 2008). The first President, Nazarbayev, consequently proclaimed Russian the “language of interethnic communication,” and in 1995 as an official language (Constitution of the Republic of Kazakhstan, 1995, article 2).
Thus, previous close relationships with Russia did not allow Kazakhstan to refuse to use Russian, like countries such as Azerbaijan, Esthonia, and Latvia, which had a strong identity even before joining the USSR.
However, according to Smagulova (2008)“Kazakhization” was not initiated through LP till recently; for instance, Nazarbayev’s successor, the second President, Kasym-Zhomart Tokayev, stated: “… First of all, there must be the Kazakh language …” (my translation) (“Tokayev viskazalsya o trehyazichii,” 2019)
Regarding language practices, the government made Kazakh obligatory in education, paperwork, and the public service. Smagulova (2008) posits that 53,3% of Kazakhs agree that Kazakh should be the sole state language, implying that the LP successfully shapes national ideology. Specific efforts include rewards for non-Kazakhs who speak Kazakh fluently and free language courses at work.
Initially, intense planning of Kazakhization troubled Russian speakers in the country, especially in 1990, when the “State program development of the Kazakh language” was issued, though Russian was still supported and retained a certain status.
Despite various measures, knowledge of Kazakh remains insufficient even among urban ethnic Kazakhs. Monolingual Kazakh speakers constitute only 5.7%, while others are bilingual, mostly using Russian for communication (Smagulova, 2008). However, Russian remains the language of the media (Ufellman, 2011) and of commodity, as in the entire Russian-speaking world (Muth, 2017), and remains an official language.
Problem Statement
Before launching the Latinization process in October 2017, Nazarbayev had raised this idea several times since 1991. He substantiated his idea using the model of neighboring post-Soviet Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan, although in these countries the process experienced difficulties because of the co-existence of both scripts (Alpatov, 2017). However, the Russian influence in those countries was not as strong as in Kazakhstan in Soviet times, as Kazakhs spoke more Russian than people in any other Central Asian Soviet Republic (Roy, 2005). Therefore, the process of nationalizing and restoring the titular language is challenging. It could be riddled with problems; for instance, Fierman (2009), in comparing the Azerbaijani and Kazakhstani, mentions that Azerbaijan’s success at Latinization cannot be applied to Kazakhstan, as Kazakhs had always had a “hybrid,” “Kazakh-Soviet” identity (Bhavna, cited in Pianciola, 2009). Similarly, Winner (1952) illustrates that even in the 1920s Latinization was not advocated by Kazakhs and was accomplished much more slowly than in Azerbaijan. Conversely, Tanayeva (2007) and Dotton (2016) raise concern regarding Uyghur, Uzbek, and Kyrgyz in Kazakhstan, when Latinizing of the Kazakh script goes ahead.
According to Dotton (2016), Latinization of Kazakh by policy-makers might neglect multi-ethnicity in the country while conducting nationalistic reforms. It seems that Latinization is being realized at the point when LP itself is contradictory: both nationalizing policies, and supporting multi-ethnicity (Dotton, 2016; Tanayeva, 2007; Yergalieva, 2018). Since Kazakhstan has adopted policies of inclusion in both society and education, for example the provision of education to all regardless of their background, including language (Makoelle, 2020a), it becomes imperative to analyze the impact of Latinization on issues of social cohesion, education, inclusion, and exclusion.
To this end, this study posed the following guiding questions:
What are the discursive strategies and arguments used to legitimize the Latinization?
What might be the consequences of Latinization? Who are winners and losers?
What are the implications of Latinization to education, inclusion, and social cohesion?
Therefore, Latinization itself was not a new object of research, as it has long been discussed by scholars (Batyrbekkyzy et al., 2018; Dotton 2016; Kudaibergenova, 2016; Kulzhanova, 2012; Yergalieva, 2018, and others). This study focused on analyzing the implications of Latinization for inclusion, exclusion, and inequality in society and possible discrimination against particular social groups in Kazakhstan caused by the transition to Latin script.
Literature Review
Nationality, Ethnicity, and Languages
Language manipulation at state level does not happen in a vacuum; it is usually part of wider political practices and social processes. As Anderson (1983) avers, nations, national identities, and consciousness have been formed along with language changes and revolutions. Therefore, language manoeuvres are mainly aimed at constructing a nation-state, that is, they are signs of nationalism.
Nationalism is defined as attempts to be autonomous in territory, united, and independent (Rogowsky, 1985, cited in Billig, 1995). Kazakhstan officially gained independence and territorial delineation in 1991. Constructing a competitive nation-state normally causes the exclusion of some groups, since, as Anderson (1991) claims, there is no nation that imagines itself “coterminous with the mankind” (p. 23). In this sense discrimination within Kazakhstan seems theoretically inevitable and natural.
According to Billig (1995), nationalism is an ideology stating that the world of nations is natural, something that can never be forgotten, where people will make sacrifices for its sake; nationalism might even provoke conflicts, wars, and revolutions.
It is important to clarify what kind of nationalism is being illustrated and practiced by Kazakhstani authorities, since the concepts of “nationalism” and “nation” have a wide range of meanings. Thus, in the post-Soviet territory “nationality” does not mean “citizenship,” but rather “ethnicity.” Meanwhile, “nation” and “state” cannot be used as synonyms (Pavlenko, 2009b). Considering this, one can hypothesize that Kazakhstan nationalistic movements do not support the interests of those sharing a common citizenship, but rather the interests of “native dominant ethnicity” or a “titular nation,” that is, Kazakhs. Thus, Latinization is more likely to fortify the interests of this particular group of Kazakhs who have been considered only part of the big nation called the Kazakhstani.
Billig (1995) argues that established nations normally perceive nationalistic movements as an over-heated reaction, directed against the interests of other nations. Ignatieff (1993) clarifies this as opposition between “ethnic” and “civic” forms of nationalism. Indeed, making a state a possession of one nationality alienates others and evokes conflicts (Kymlicka, 1995); in ethnic nationalism the abuse of others seems inevitable. As Brown (1999) postulates, there are no good or bad forms of nationalism; it all depends on the people articulating it—whether they focus on threatening others or rather developing their self-identity, excluding other groups, and striving to shape their nation-state.
The current research seeks to identify the threats and evidence of the possibly disadvantaged parties as a result of the changes in the state language. We base our study on Anderson’s definition of “nation” as “an imagined community,” which has been constructed by artificial forces and manipulations through its history, especially languages. Manipulation concerning languages always depends on how authorities imagine communities at a definite stage of development. It means that to understand the evolution of a language, as Blommaert (1999) says, it is important to recontextualize the history.
Language Policy and Language Planning in the Soviet Union and Post-Soviet Space
Existing from 1922 to 1991, the USSR consisted of 14 states, diverse in their nationalities and ethnicities. The colonial empire, Russia, aimed at uniting the colonies, building one nation, and establishing strong industrial areas. Hirsch (2000) describes the policy as double-purposed colonization: they intended to enhance the identities of the non-Russian nationalities by dividing territories, while simultaneously intending to assimilate them into Soviet society through Russification. The Central Asian policy, though, was peculiar with a single purpose—Russification only.
Russification means the policy that allies a nation with the Russian culture and language; manipulation with languages always pursues broader political intentions (Heller, 2008). A nation itself is indicated by its language, as well as territory (Spolsky, 2012). Thus, setting an LP was crucial for the Soviet administration in nation-building.
LP per se is understood as a set of rules, methods, and regulations for language use within a nation-state (Spolsky, 2012), a broad concept directed at organized language changes (Cooper, 1989; Grin, 2003; Kaplan & Baldauf, 1997). The policy is realized by more precise measures, called language planning, such as designing an orthography with standardized grammar and terms. It points language development in the direction most beneficial for “planners” (Haugen, 1959, cited in Spolsky 2012).
The LP of the Soviet administration was based on the support of national languages. The languages of Central Asia were not standardized and strong enough, being restricted to colloquial language (Pavlenko, 2008). Therefore, the authorities had to establish language construction (
In the Tsarist epoch, before the revolution (October 1917), the Russian Empire had no intention to make Russians out of non-Russians (Pavlenko, 2009b). The only goal of Russification at that time was consolidation of the colonial countries with a common language. Active Russification as a policy began only after the Poles’ rebellion against this Russian policy. In most cases Russification did not touch the peasants, only the “titular elites” (Pavlenko, 2009b, p. 349). Incidentally, Russia did not aim at forcibly Russifying non-Russians even later.
In Soviet times, the territories of the countries were delineated, and the national languages underwent a revival within the nativization (
However, in the 1930s, the linguistic nativization policy was retracted, as the titular nationalities showed low mastery of Russian. The corpus planning therefore included unification of the alphabet for all Soviet states, shifting entirely to Cyrillic (typical of Russian) (Pavlenko, 2008). All terms and neologisms had to be inserted into languages in their Russian variants. Sebba (2003) explains this sudden decision by the threat from Turkey, whose language had already adopted the Latin script, and could ally with these Soviet states with common cultural and religious roots. The goal of Russification remained bilingual people, and acquisition planning involved the rights for parents to choose the language of instruction in schools (Pavlenko, 2008).
The situation changed in 1991 with the break-up of the USSR. The reverse policy, or de-Russification, began in several post-Soviet republics, that is, the elimination of Russian from official documents, restricted use in schools, and neologisms being translated into the titular languages (Pavlenko, 2008). Cyrillic script reverted to Latin. These changes occurred differently in each country.
Inclusive Education in Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan has adopted the policy of inclusive education. It is a signatory to several international declaration and treaties regarding the provision of educational access to all people, regardless of their background such as disability, language, socio-economic status, and ethnicity (Makoelle 2020a). In terms of the Constitution of the Republic of Kazakhstan (1995), education is a fundamental human right. To achieve the provision of education for all, Kazakhstan (2007) Law on Education clearly makes provision for an inclusive and non-discriminatory education. According to the State Program (2011–2020, 2016–2019), Kazakhstan had the ambition of having all schools inclusive by 2020. The implementation of inclusive education has come into effect amidst the adoption of a trilingual education, whereby education provision has to be done in three languages, that is, Kazakh, Russian, and English (Makoelle, 2020b). While the purpose of implementing inclusive education is to foster unity and cohesion whiles making education equitably provided for all people (Makoelle & Somerton, 2021), the trilingual education policy could complicate the process. For instance, Khaldarova and Abdisadyk (2021) lament the lack of language proficiency in non-mother tongue languages as a challenge for teachers. The process of Latinization therefore comes amidst the process of educational reforms, including that of enhancing inclusion, respect, and tolerance of diversity of all students, regardless of their background. However, while transition from Cyrillic to Latin is seen as a geopolitical move to break from the Russian dominance, most teachers express support, but there is also resistance to the process (Seikadyrov, 2020). The challenges brough by Latinization include, among others, issues of teacher preparedness to transition smoothly into the process. For instance, Oralbayeva (2020) avers that learning could be disrupted if teachers are not ready with the Latin alphabet themselves. While the Latinization is viewed as a step to ensure unity and cohesion, the contrast is how the Russians could be part of a process that would technically devalue their language status, thus resulting into an inherent tension and contradiction. Furthermore, there is a view that Russian is still the language of science and learning and as such doing away with it could pose unintended ramifications (Terlikbayeva & Menlibekova, 2021).
Methods
The study adopted a three-dimensional approach by applying three qualitative research strategies, that is, critical discourse analysis (CDA), a discourse-historical approach (DHA), and semi-structured interviews. In the analysis process, qualitative data from the three are also analyzed in relation to the emerging literature on the adoption of inclusive education as a vehicle for educational and social inclusion.
Critical Discourse Analysis
CDA is a set of various methods, in an interdisciplinary field, studying language in relation to society, power distribution, ideology, changes in cultural, economic, and social lives, and how these are illustrated through language (Wodak, 2001). It helps to reveal social inequality and injustice (Van Dijk, 1993; Van Leeuwen, 2006), foresees the consequences of political or social practice (Van Dijk, 1993), and is problem-oriented (Fairclough, 2010; Wodak, 2013). CDA is often aimed at exposing ideologies (shared beliefs) from the analyzed texts and legitimizing power (Reisigl & Wodak, 2009). The “critical” part of the method implies that the analyst defines discrimination in the rhetoric, pointing to moments where injustice is obvious in political speeches, and suggesting more relevant ways to render the ideas (Fowler, 1996). The research methodology illustrates that it is applicable to studying political and social contexts, and efficient for deciphering political motives for Latinization of the Kazakh language, ways of legitimation, and general change in LP in Kazakhstan. LP can obviously be efficiently highlighted and investigated through CDA, as it concerns social issues, and is very dynamic and changeable.
Discourse-Historical Approach
The DHA studies a discursive event referring to history (Wodak, 2001), revealing cases of discrimination, inequality, and manipulation in the discourse of political authorities (Reisigl & Wodak, 2009) and identifying legitimation and argumentation of a political practice (Reisigl, 2017). Identifying ways of legitimation and argumentation, facts of discrimination in political speeches can aid understanding of LP in Kazakhstan and the reasons for Latinizing the alphabet. Therefore, the DHA was important for this study to uncover the discursive strategies in legitimation of Latinization and reveal its consequences. Analysis comprised the following steps:
1. Defining micro-topics and the ways Latinization is legitimized.
2. Identifying discursive strategies through linguistic means and interpreting the results.
3. Uncovering winners and losers through exclusion/inclusion strategies.
Discursive strategies are important for discovering legitimation in the discourse. “Strategy” is defined as “the idea of the best way of reaching the goal” and “representation of the means of reaching it” (Van Dijk & Kinsch, 1983, pp. 64, 65). Common discursive strategies are presented in Figure 1:
Discursive strategies (Wodak, 2001, p. 73).
Argumentation strategies include an important concept for analysis, topoi. A topos (plural topoi) is a connector between a premise and a claim, which “represents common-sense reasoning” (Van Dijk, 2000, cited in Hart, 2013, p. 200) and makes logical ties: “If X, then Y” or “It is Y, because X” (Reisigl & Wodak, 2009, p. 110). The commonest topoi are usefulness and advantage, uselessness and disadvantage, definition and name-interpretation, danger, and threat (Wodak, 2001).
Revealing topoi in argumentation in Latinization discourses will help clarify Nazarbayev’s political point in launching Latinization, as well as the standpoints of Kazakh linguists. Topoi may be grounded or fallacious, the latter being used to manipulate listeners, for example, in media discourses (Hart, 2013). A fallacy is also an argument, but an “invalid” one (Hamblin 1970, cited in Van Eemeren & Grootendorst, 1992, p. 102). For example, there may be a fallacy “argumentum ad baculum,” which means “appealing to force or fear,” while providing an argument (Reisigl & Wodak, 2009). It means the speaker does not provide a solid reason, but rather frightens the listener. It is thus not an argument, but a fallacy. Identification of these fallacies can shed light on some socio-political issues concerning the discourses. Political speeches and experts’ opinions may be subjective and intentionally exaggerated or misleading. Considering topoi critically will enable one to determine fallacies and evaluate the actions of political authorities in the area of LP in Kazakhstan.
Semi-Structured Interviews
Numerous recent studies (Wodak & Savski, 2018) prove the successful synergy of CDA and ethnography. Interviewing is an ethnographic research method and recorded interviews are data of no less value than political speeches of elites in CDA. If speeches are the roots of the topic, interviews serve to co-construct the concepts of the study with particular informal or semi-formal opinions (Van Leeuwen & Wodak, 1999). The notion of “political discourse” entails not only official speeches of authorities, but surrounding voices as well.
Traditionally, interviews are divided into three types: structured, semi-structured, and unstructured (Zacharias, 2012). Ho (2012) mentions that the unstructured type seeks as much information as possible, ignoring consistency of data arrangement and further analysis. The balanced and most relevant type for political studies is a semi-structured interview, which falls between the two extremes. Like a structured interview, it requires prepared questions, not only topics. It flows according to a plan and is regulated by an interviewer. On the other hand, like an unstructured interview, it allows respondents to share extended thoughts and add examples from their personal experience.
In studying Latinization, the topics arising may seem sensitive and complex, requiring clarifications and comments (Barriball & While, 1994). Besides, the questions might trigger some interesting information from the respondents’ memory (Smith, 1992), which can be useful from a historical perspective. In combination with critical analysis of official political discourses and social media texts in this study, interviews can serve as fair supplementary data.
Data Collection and Analysis
Ex-President Nazarbayev’s Rhetoric
Nazarbayev mentioned the importance of Latinization long before launching it. The following speeches were analyzed:
1. Speech on 29 December 2012 at a meeting with representatives of the media;
2. 14 December 2012. Annual address to the Nation of the Republic of Kazakhstan;
3. 9 October 2017. Meeting with the working group on designing the Latin alphabet;
4. 12 April 2017. Annual address to the Nation: “Course toward the future: modernization of Kazakhstan’s identity.”
We intentionally selected speeches from different periods to consider all the arguments, even if these changed diachronically. The speeches were retrieved from the official website of the President of Kazakhstan www.akorda.kz, which contains all the transcriptions of the former and current presidents of Kazakhstan and their press secretaries in three languages—Kazakh, Russian, and English.
Speeches 1 and 3 do not contain much information on Latinization, which is only mentioned. Nevertheless, mentioning and analyzing them strengthen the findings.
Any official political speech sets trends in ideology formation (Wodak, 2001), along with social media, especially in Kazakhstani power relations, when the President’s power is considered supreme, and the government system is erratic and authoritarian (Fauve, 2015; Lillis, 2017).
Extracts on Latinization and related topics were highlighted and annotated for interpretation. The same was done with the next form of data—interviews.
Interviews With Experts
Semi-structured interviews lasting 20 to 30 minutes were conducted in Kazakh with experts in the Kazakh language who participated directly in designing the Latin alphabet. They were selected for their activity, authority in their field and my personal familiarity (first author) with them. Familiarity is crucial, as it enhances open communication; the interviewee will be more sincere, perceiving the talk as more informal and relaxed.
The first expert holds a Doctor of Philological Sciences degree, is an author of functional grammar of the Kazakh and German languages. The expert contributed much to comparative studies of Kazakh and German, working in international collaborative projects with German turkologists. The expert contributed to Latinizing Kazakh through participation in the cultural group discussion and a critical letter on the designed versions of the Latin script. The expert’s group was successful, proposing their own apostrophe variant of the script.
The second, an expert in philological sciences, a member of a working group in the design of the Latin alphabet. When interviewed, the expert worked on language studies with a leading linguistic institution in the country.
Because of the distance between us, we conducted telephonic interviews and recorded the conversations using an online speech recorder. Basic questions were prepared in advance. Some questions were paraphrased, and additional questions were asked to clarify viewpoints and to elicit more information and openness, especially about sensitive political aspects.
The full interviews were recorded (attached CD) and transcribed before annotating the content for further qualitative analysis and interpretation, to ascertain how the experts legitimated the Latinization process and what strategies they used. Though they are not politicians, both experts belong to the Kazakh elite and are patriots and supporters of the Kazakh language who potentially encourage the building of a nation-state. Their discourses revealed interesting points on Latinization.
Analysis of the Emerging Literature on Inclusive Education
The analysis of the current literature on inclusive education was aimed at making a comparison between the goals of Latinization and that of inclusive education. While the analysis of president’s speeches and the experts interview focused on the perceived advantage of Latinization the emerging literature on inclusive education presents a deeper understanding about the process Latinization might have on issues of curriculum reform, availability of teaching and learning resources, teacher preparedness, language policy in schools, and the implications for trilingual education policy.
Findings
Legitimation on Latinization Policy in Nazarbayev’s Discourse
Critical examination of Nazarbayev’s (2012) rhetoric revealed a diachronically changing character of legitimation of both Latinization and the entire LP of Kazakhstan. His earlier speeches reflect a variety of arguments on changing the script, probably because the idea was fresh and needed to be explained to the nation. The dominant discursive strategy in his discourse is
Nazarbayev sees Latin script as the way to scientific innovations, technology, the internet, and world economy, and the way to modernize Kazakh (2). At the same time, he does not compare the Roman script with Cyrillic, discrediting the latter. He rather describes it as useful, influential, and still powerful (3):
He emphasizes the importance of Cyrillic and Russian for Kazakhstan, and refers to history to prove it (4):
Instead of opposing Cyrillic to Latin, he employs the
Other than the advantages of modernization and historical argumentation, the linguistic viewpoint is included in Nazarbayev’s discourse. Again, this confirms polyphony in his discourse, and the voice of language experts is obvious. It is reasonable, as a professional view should be considered first when launching language planning:
This linguistic argument is based on the
Natural processes of inclusion and exclusion in nationalism are inevitable, and logically non-Kazakhs speakers might be outside the interested community. Although verbally Nazarbayev tries to maintain peace in society, he still distinguishes between different categories of citizens concerning new language planning. He follows the
Nazarbayev distinguishes Kazakhs within the Kazakhstani while proving the importance of Cyrillic (6). These two are imagined as in-group in his discourse, though they are still separated verbally (dissimilar in his view). He distinguishes “intelligentsia,” referring to the group of educated elites, who are supposed advocate language modernization (7).
Later speeches of Nazarbayev address other social groups related to LP:
Russian speakers are presented as social group later, in further speeches, as if they are responding to public reaction. This might also be a display of polyphony. Negation in political discourse usually expresses two voices (points of view): one refuted by the speaker, and the one originally expressed (Ducrot, 1984, cited in Fløttum, 2010). Thus, if the speaker refutes an idea, it means that the idea already exists and has been expressed. Indeed, the speech was pronounced after many debates on Latinization; one of the central arguments was that it would discriminate against Russians and Russian speakers. This statement coincides with the description of racism and discrimination by van Dijk: “One of the crucial properties of contemporary racism is its denial” (Van Dijk, 1992, p. 87). Thus, denial of negation of the rights of Russian speakers may mean possible exclusion in future.
Nazarbayev differentiates between inner subgroups in Kazakh society:
Nazarbayev seems to respond to society, which suggests ways of discriminating against Russified Kazakhs. The elements of polyphony are obvious: it is not his viewpoint, but a social opinion with which he does not agree (9). However, he himself admits this distinction. He uses the colloquial, offensive name for Russified Kazakhs—“Shala Kazakhs” (шала қазақ), literally translated as “a bit of Kazakh” or “half Kazakh.”
Thus, Nazarbayev categorizes social actors of the Latinization discourse as Russian speakers (out-group, implicitly), Kazakhs (in-group), intelligentsia (agitators of Latinization, in-group), and so-called “Shala Kazakhs” (referring to the society itself that identifies this sub-group).
In his later speeches Nazarbayev does not discuss Latinization in depth, although he mentions it briefly in the 2018 meeting, referring to the modernization of Kazakh and using it in Parliament. The
However, the statement relates to Parliament only, which is ordered to speak Kazakh, but offer translation. He mentions no specific vulnerable groups affected by this shift (Russians or Russian speakers), nor does he mention trilingualism and other languages in Kazakhstan. Diachronically, in his later speeches the
The current president, Tokayev, also tends to prioritize Kazakh over Russian and English, which may mean that the attention of LP is shifting from multilingualism toward Kazakh only. This confirms the increasing Kazakhization policy (Smagulova, 2008; Pavlenko, 2009a).
Thus, the imagined community in Nazarbayev’s discourse is the state, based on a titular ethnicity—Kazakhs with a state language, Kazakh, which “does not infringe the rights” of other ethnicities.
In summary, the ex-president’s dominant discursive strategies in the Latinization discourse are the
In Nazarbayev’s discourse the country is imagined as the state, with Kazakhs as the main power and the Kazakh language as the first language. Though Nazarbayev’s speech is central to legitimizing Latinization, there are discourses concerning it. The next paragraph analyses the opinions of language experts on Latinization.
Experts’ Reasoning on Latinization
In comparison with Nazarbayev’s discourse, the interviewers’ discourses, which are not addressed at a wide audience, do not necessarily contain polyphony. They are consequently likely to be braver and more open in expressing their opinions.
The analysis shows that the dominant discursive strategy in legitimizing Latinization is
Expert 1 (K.T.) starts by discrediting Cyrillic to prepare further positive presentations for Latin. He refers to contrast and the disadvantages Kazakh has experienced with “the wrong” alphabet (2), (3).
Expert 2 (A.F.) provides examples of “odd” sounds that changed the Kazakh language negatively (4). One can observe the
The following sample illustrates this topos:
Similar criticism of Cyrillic is found in a study by Shamiloglu (2017), who notices that Cyrillic is making Kazakh consonants palatalized under the influence of subsequent vowels, imitating Russian pronunciation, thus changing the nature of the language.
By contrast, the respondents describe the advantages of the Latin alphabet for the language. They both use the
(9)
(2) Civilized countries, if you have noticed, shifted to Latin script … Thus, if the country is eager to become advanced, then its language should be advanced as well (A.F.)
Expert 2 directly employs the
The interesting point in (9) is that even the advantages of Latin are accompanied by disadvantages of Cyrillic (…
The
This must be logical reasoning, especially in light of Russia’s hostile attitude to the West (Ryazanova-Clarke, 2017a), a policy not supported by Kazakhstan. The expert therefore emphasizes the need to avoid it, using
Returning to the theory of “imagined communities” and the idea that societies and nations are all as they are imagined by the political elites, one can assume that in this discourse Russia is represented as the community that must be distanced from Kazakhstan, and language reforms are imagined as a practical measure for doing it.
Generally, the interviewees’ arguments are based on Nazarbayev’s speech, though with braver reasoning. This is unsurprising, as the Kazakh-speaking intelligentsia group in Kazakh society is genuinely interested in promoting national ideas and usually supports the government (Tanayeva, 2007). Its opinions generally represent the voices of the political elite. Evidence of this is the reference of both respondents to the speeches of Tokayev and Nazarbayev.
(2) This purpose is also pursued by our current president Kasym-Zhomart Tokayev, who is continuing this course (A.F.)
The references sound like authorization, a basic type of legitimation for political practices (Van Leeuwen, 2006).
The next discursive strategy of the interviewees in portraying Latinization is
Expert 1 distinguishes between three categories of ethnic Kazakhs, related to language use: 1. Genuine Kazakhs, who speak mainly Kazakh; 2. Russian-speaking Kazakhs, who mainly speak Russian; and 3. Russified Kazakhs, who speak Russian and think in a “Russian way.” Here the speaker emphasizes chauvinism as a vivid feature of Russian culture.
Incidentally, Expert 1 uses the concepts “Russian-speaking Kazakhs” and “Russified Kazakhs” as synonyms (10): We call them (Russian-speaking Kazakhs—Zh.B.) “Russified Kazakhs.” This triggers associations with Whorfian theory of “linguistic relativity” (Whorf, 2012), which argues that language determines thought, and vice versa. Expert 1 imagines that the Russian language influences the way Kazakhs think—people who mainly speak Russian think in a “Russian manner” by default—and insists on escaping from this influence.
The scholar sees the Kazakh intelligentsia (7) as “saviors” from this “Russified” mind. They are presented as mediators between LP-makers and the people. Implicitly this is a reason to justify Latinization: distancing from Russian influence.
Both interviewees mention two potentially vulnerable groups in the Latinization discourse: Russian-speaking Kazakhs and Russian speakers (10, 11). The latter group, according to the extract (11), involves all “others” except Kazakhs. The interviewers express in-group identity using the adjective + noun phrase “genuine Kazakhs,” while out-group description entails the phrase “Russian speakers” (no further clarification and categorization). The problematized social group imagined on the border of this line is “Russified Kazakhs,” who should be “saved” and can hypothetically join the group of “genuine Kazakhs” (10).
This opinion illustrates the rough imagination of the political elites about today’s language, cultural, and ideological situation in the country: society is divided into these three groups, concerning the Kazakh language. This implies a form of nationalism in Kazakhstan. The LP is thus based not on civic, but ethnic nationalism—prioritizing the interests of ethnical Kazakhs in building a nation-state. The discursive
Unlike leaders who have to adapt to the public, experts do not try to mitigate the discrimination. Conversely, discrimination is expressed directly by the topoi of threat and danger, and the discrediting of Cyrillic. Other discursive strategies the interviewees used are predication and, like Nazarbayev, nomination. Through nomination certain groups of social actors are distinguished. Further findings show what consequences are likely owing to the language reform, and which of these social groups might benefit or lose.
Consequences of Latinization
The experts interviewed are optimistic about the consequences of Latinization. The future is seen as a Kazakh-dominated society with Russian speakers who have to adjust. The goal of Latinization is seen as avoiding the cultural and ideological influence of Russian on “Russified” Kazakhs. However, as mentioned above, no nationalistic movement can proceed without social tension and further consequences.
The portrayal of consequences is controversial. Winners and losers can be defined through a
Sarym constructs in-group identity with his ethnicity by means of “we” and clarifies “Kazakh nation,” before adding another noun, “state,” thus making them equal in his mind and imagining the “state” as belonging to Kazakhs, by default presenting all Kazakhs as the interested party in this language planning.
Russian speakers are identified as “out-group,” referred to in the third person. Thus, he sees only two basic categories, which are important to differentiate:
Russian media look at the problem differently. Shustov makes the following predictions:
Shustov (2017) emphasizes the vulnerability of senior Kazakh speakers, who will not be able to read Kazakh easily after Latinization:
This argument confirms the prediction of weakening Kazakh in the future. The author refers to the experience of Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, where the elderly became illiterate. However, this might be a fallacious prediction for Kazakhstan; the Kazakh reading group of elderly can still read Russian, so they might probably shift to Russian rather than becoming illiterate.
Alternatively, Shustov (2017) does not exclude the possibility of rejection by Russia after refusing Cyrillic. Moreover, he predicts distancing from others:
…
Actually, there are two possible consequences. In the first case the imagined winners are “genuine” Kazakhs, who have nationalistic or patriotic interests and will get a modernized state language; and, the government, who will take a step forward in reinforcing national identity and constructing a competitive nation-state. In this scenario the imagined losers are Russian speakers who will have additional obstacles in learning Kazakh in a new script, and elderly Kazakh speakers, who will struggle with learning the new script. There will be a problematic social group, so-called “Shala-Kazakhs” or Russian-speaking Kazakhs, who will have to choose their self-identity.
The alternative does not imagine any winners in Latinization. Many more losers will suffer after this modernization: “genuine” Kazakhs, who will lose their language again and revert to the Russian language; the government, whose language planning will fail, causing disorder in the educational system and splitting the country into territories, lost contacts with Russia and other countries as partners, and Russia, which will lose Kazakhstan. The whole tendency in the Latinization discourse is that the term “Kazakhstani” is not used.
Consequently, the imagined community of today’s Kazakhstan is not the Kazakhstani people as a whole, but rather a mixture of groups such as Kazakh speakers, Russian speakers, and Russian-speaking Kazakhs.
Implications for Education, Inclusion, and Social Cohesion
The emerging discourse from the analysis of president’s speeches as well as the experts’ interviews suggests conflicting aspirations between the process of Latinization and ideals of inclusive education. While inclusive education advocates respect for diversity and equal recognition of various languages through trilingual policy, the process of Latinization is purported to put Kazakh at the center stage and, therefore, assimilation of minorities into the project. The focus is on the language itself rather than on the implications of Latinization and its impact on educational access for all language groups. The process of Latinization could militate against the project of educational reforms, undermine the provision of much needed teaching and learning resources as students and teacher grapple with the new alphabet. This could impact on teacher preparedness for pedagogical practice and an attempt to transition from Cyrillic to Latin. Language is a representation of cultural capital that mediates student learning, as such the transition from Cyrillic to Latin might lead to a loss of such mediation as students culturally mediated knowledge conceptions might have not been conceived through Latin before. This can present issues of cognitive injustice as find it hard to relate new knowledges with old ones.
Discussion
The research aimed to identify arguments for Latinization in Kazakhstan and define its consequences. CDA of the data has shown that the Latinization process in Kazakhstan has a distinct nationalistic goal—constructing a nation-state, based on Kazakhs as a titular and basic ethnicity.
Research question 1 was supposed to define discursive strategies exploited to legitimize Latinization in the discourses. The
All the linguistic evidence mentioned can be related to Anderson’s theory on “imagined communities.” They signal that Kazakhstan today is imagined as the country of the Kazakh ethnicity, and the language manoeuvres are directed at realizing this idea, avoiding verbal discrimination (former President), to depict the “ideal Kazakh state” due to Latinization (former President, interviewees).
Research question 2 focused on the consequences of Latinization and identifying winners and losers. Analysis of the nomination strategy reveals that the society consists of roughly three groups: the Kazakh-speaking group (“genuine” Kazakhs), Russian-speaking Kazakhs, and Russian speakers (non-Kazakhs). In the Latinization discourse the government, Kazakh language experts, and patriots articulate their in-group identity as “genuine” Kazakhs or simply Kazakhs, whereas Russian speakers are imagined as an outer group. In society, references to Russian-speaking Kazakhs have negative connotations, for example, “Russified Kazakhs” or “Shala Kazakhs.” This group is labeled as problematized and at risk.
Two consequences of Latinization are imagined. The first views Russian speakers and Russian-speaking Kazakhs as losers, while “genuine” Kazakhs and the government are imagined as winners, proving their identity and maintaining Kazakh as the main ethnos of the country.
The second portrays society after Latinization negatively. There are no winners, only losers: the “genuine” Kazakhs, shifting to Russian; the government, destroying education and culture; the senior generation who will not be able to read in Latin (fallacious topos provided by the Russian expert); and finally, Kazakhstan and Russia losing their close historical and political ties. In this sense, according to Brown, “forgetting” historical connections such as a common Soviet past, “irrelevant” to the new political goals, seems disadvantageous for both sides.
However, a common Soviet past does not mean a common future. Thus, the situation in other post-Soviet countries that have already accepted Latin is not comparable with Kazakhstan. Kazakhstan’s cultural and media dependence on Russia is stronger than that of any other country that has refused Cyrillic, though Russia never intended to Russify non-Russians to that extent (Pavlenko, 2009b). The new corpus planning might therefore be more painful for Kazakhstan than for others.
However, while the Baltic countries overcame the issue of disregard of the rights of minority language speakers (Pavlenko, 2011), Ukraine’s nationalism caused a serious language war and Moldova, which adopted Latin in 1989, cannot be a model, as it is still highly bilingual with a preference for Russian (Muth, 2017). Latinization seems undesirable for multi-ethnic Kazakhstan.
Research question 3 focuses on the implication of Latinization to education, inclusion, and social cohesion. While Latinization is seen as a political project to break away from the Russian Cyrillic influence, the conflicting aspiration of this process and educational project of inclusion seem to be at odds. There is clear evidence that Latinization will have serious implications for education reform aimed at trilingual education provision, as the current Latinization project might alienate the other minorities of Russian language background. The consequences of Latinization will be dire for teacher preparedness, teaching, and learning and the provision of the educational resources to make inclusion a success.
Conclusion
The study has found that Latinization is a political project to do away with the Russian influence of the past Soviet legacy, but the project does not take into account the implications of this process to the alienation between different language groups, which may lead to polarization. The study also demonstrates the contrast between what the project seeks to achieve against the ideals of creating an inclusive and cohesive society. The indication is that the adoption of inclusive education might be at odds with this process as it advocates coexistence rather than dominance by the other group. There are far-reaching implications of Latinization on the education process and delivery.
Despite answering the research questions, there may be some inaccuracies in the findings. For example, in any discourse studies the analyst cannot claim without doubt, but only infer what the speaker/writer intends to say. This reduces the acceptability rate of the research findings, even when based on solid linguistic evidence.
There are further perspectives on the investigation of LP in Kazakhstan. We believe it would be useful to analyze the comments of ordinary internet users in social nets, forums, and news websites. Opinions of the mass audience can be thought provoking, as they enable a researcher to look at the problem from the perspective of a future user of this script, an ordinary person whose life will also change owing to the corpus planning.
Overall, Latin script for Kazakh is a fresh topic in the LP field and sociolinguistics. As the process will last for several years and undergo several stages of development and social changes, it will present numerous perspectives for future studies.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
