| Publication |
2009.
|
| Summary/Abstract |
This article is devoted to the symbolic aspects of language and power in the four Turkic-speaking republics of Central Asia-Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. Much of the discussion will analyse what I will refer to as 'reference points' of identity represented in language. These include 'Islam', 'Turkic-ness', 'Persian culture', 'nationality', and two 'international' reference points-'world international' and 'Soviet international'. In the very first years after the Bolshevik Revolution, 'international' referred to parts of the world beyond the former Russian Empire, especially the industrial states of Western Europe. In the 1930s, however, 'international' came to mean the USSR, and in particular, Russia. In the post-Soviet world, 'international' is once again acquiring a much broader and more global meaning.
|