Speaking Soviet with an Accent: Culture and Power in Kyrgyzstan

247 Pages·2012·149.78 MB·English

by  Ali Iğmen

Central Asian HISTORY
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“Drawing on the rich history of comparative colonialism, Dr. İğmen’s fascinating
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account of the cultural revolution in Kyrgyzstan analyzes the many ways in which
E SPEAKING SOVIET
the Kyrgyz intelligentsia appropriated and refashioned the Soviet project in Central
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Asia.”—Choi Chatterjee, California State University, Los Angeles
“İğmen’s research in Kyrgyzstan links rural to urban and local to national in an S
exploration of the cultural construction of ‘Kyrgyzness.’ In this admirable example P
of cultural history, the Soviet state shaped the structures through which Kyrgyz E with an ACCENT
were to become modern, but İğmen elucidates the content of culture, drawing on A
many voices of Kyrgyz who articulate the ways that their own concepts of Kyrgyz- K
ness infused new cultural forms, rendering them meaningful.”—Marianne Kamp, I
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University of Wyoming
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Speaking Soviet with an Accent presents the first English-language study of Soviet
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culture clubs in Kyrgyzstan. These clubs profoundly impacted the future of Kyrgyz
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cultural identity and fostered the work of many artists, such as famed novelist
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Chingiz Aitmatov.
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Based on extensive oral history and archival research, Ali İğmen follows the rise of
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culture clubs beginning in the 1920s, when they were established to inculcate Soviet
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Culture and Power in Kyrgyzstan
ideology and create a sedentary lifestyle among the historically nomadic Kyrgyz
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people. These “Red clubs” are fondly remembered by locals as one of the few places
where lively activities and socialization with other members of their ail (village or I
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tribal unit) could be found.
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Through lectures, readings, books, plays, concerts, operas, visual arts, and cultural
Olympiads, locals were exposed to Soviet notions of modernization. But these pro-
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grams also encouraged the creation of a newfound “Kyrgyzness” that preserved aspects
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of local traditions and celebrated the achievements of Kyrgyz citizens in the building

of a new state. These ideals proved appealing to many Kyrgyz, who, for centuries, had A
seen riches and power in the hands of a few tribal chieftains and Russian imperialists.
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This book offers new insights into the formation of modern cultural identity in
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Central Asia. Here, like their imperial predecessors, the Soviets sought to extend their
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physical borders and political influence. But İğmen also reveals the remarkable agency
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of the Kyrgyz people, who employed available resources to meld their own heritage
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with Soviet and Russian ideologies and form artistic expressions that continue to
influence Kyrgyzstan today.
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Ali İğmen is assistant professor of history at California State University, Long Beach.
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CENTRAL EURASIA IN CONTEXT
U ALI IGMEN
University of Pittsburgh Press ISBN 13: 978-0-8229-6206-9 R
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ISBN 10: 0-8229-6206-3
www.upress.pitt.edu H
9 780822 962069
Cover design: Ann Walston
SPEAKING SOVIET WITH AN ACCENT
CENTRAL EURASIA IN CONTEXT
Douglas Northrop, Editor
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9 Culture and Power in Kyrgyzstan
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9 ALI IGMEN
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UNIVERSITY OF PITTSBURGH PRESS
Published by the University of Pittsburgh Press, Pittsburgh, Pa., 15260
Copyright © 2012, University of Pittsburgh Press
All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States of America
Printed on acid-free paper
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Igmen, Ali
Speaking Soviet with an accent : culture and power in Kyrgyzstan / Ali Igmen.
p cm. — (Central Eurasia in context)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISB8N9-20672 --2 89(90p-6bk. : alk. paper)
1. Minorities—Government policy—Soviet Union—History. 2. Kyrgyz—Cultural
assimilation—Soviet Union—History. 3. Soviet Union—Cultural policy—History. 4. Soviet
Union—Ethnic relations—History. 5. Popular culture—Kyrgyzstan—History. 6. Politics and
culture—Kyrgyzstan—History. 7. Kyrgyzstan—Intellectual life—20th century. I. Title.
J6N2540 2.I51M052
3009.650894'034—1d2 c3 2012006941
To Franz Goebel
CONTENTS
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction: Craft ing Kyrgyzness 1
Map of Kyrgyzstan 8
Chapter 1: Being “Asiatic” Subjects of the Empire 9
Chapter 2: Th e Making of Soviet Culture in Kyrgyzstan during
the 1920s and 1930s 22
Chapter 3: Th e Emergence of the Soviet Houses of Culture
in Kyrgyzstan 37
Illustrations 70–82
Chapter 4: Celebrations in Soviet Kyrgyzstan during the 1930s 83
Chapter 5: Soviet Th eater in Kyrgyzstan in the1 930s 98
Chapter 6: Self-Fashioning Kyrgyzness among Women 120
Conclusion: Speaking Soviet the Kyrgyz Way 140
Notes 147
Glossary 181
Bibliography 187
Index 227
vii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
To all of the colleagues, friends, and family members in the United States,
Kyrgyzstan, and Turkey who have helped make this book possible, I express
my sincere appreciation.
My research for this book fl ourished in Kyrgyzstan and Turkey with the
support of Fulbright-Hays, Social Science Research Council, United States
Information Agency, and Foreign Language and Area Studies fellows hips
and grants, and I also received fi nancial support through various mini-
grants from the University of Washington and California State University,
Long Beach. Research for this book began in 1995 in Osh, Kyrgyzstan, with
generous support from a joint mission of the United States Information
Agency and Portland State University. I would like to thank Jere Bacharach,
Grant Farr, and Marta Colburn for including me in their educational devel-
opment project in Osh. I am grateful to the Honorable Roza Otunbayeva,
then foreign minister and the former president of Kyrgyzstan, for helping me
obtain the necessary work and research permits. Bakyt Beshimov, rector of
Osh State University, provided graduate student research assistants and li-
brarians and allowed me to teach a course on Western views of Central Asia.
I would also like to thank Mukhtar Irısov and his parents for welcoming me
into their home in Osh and helping me interview the aksakals (elders) of
their clan in Papan.
During subsequent research for this book, Irıs Beybutova, dean of Kyrgyz
State National University in Bishkek, introduced me to many helpful individ-
uals. In the fi nal stages of my research, Almaz Akishev, Ruslan Narynov, and
Layli Ukubayeva generously provided assistance. I am also indebted to Renee
Giovarelli and Zinaida Aliyeva for inviting me to travel with them to Osh
and around Ysyk Köl. Th e oral history interviews in this book would not have
been possible without the assistance of Baktibek Isakov of Manas University.
ix
x 9 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I owe an enormous debt to Gülnara Jamasheva, my Kyrgyz-language
teacher, and her sister, Anara Jamasheva, the former director of IREX in
Bishkek, who introduced me to Kubanychbek Kendirbaev, a Houses of Cul-
ture expert. Kubanychbek in turn introduced me to the archives and archi-
vists in Bishkek, Tokmok, and Kochkor and to actress Sabira Kumushalieva,
whose life story provides examples of the concepts I address. I thank Jipar
Duishembieva for helping me translate the interviews and Elmira Kuchum-
kulova for proofreading most of the manuscript.
Th e research for and writing of this book could have not been accom-
plished without the academic intensity of Glennys Young, Sarah Abrevaya
Stein, and Bruce Grant. I benefi ted from Young’s expertise in the social and
cultural history of imperial Russia and the Soviet Union, from Stein’s exper-
tise in the histories of the Ottoman and Russian empires, and from Grant’s
help with the Soviet Houses of Culture and getting me into an excellent
workshop at the Max Planck Institute.
Th e core of this book emerged during a workshop organized by the So-
cial Science Research Council and the Center for Russian and East European
Studies at the University of Michigan. I would like to thank the workshop
organizers, Seteney Shami, Anthony Koliha, and Donna Parmalee, and par-
ticipants Bruce Grant, Stephen Hanson, Adeeb Khalid, and Beth Mitchnek.
For helping me pursue the career I now have, I thank Ilse Cirtautas, Dan-
iel Waugh, Janet Ekholm, Reşat Kasaba, Jere Bacharach, Jonathan Lipman,
and Mary Neuburger. Many colleagues also provided both academic and
moral support. Th ey include Robert Stacey, John Findlay, Ruby Blondell, Uta
Poiger, Marianne Kamp, Virginia Martin, Choi Chatterjee, and especially
Susanne Young and Lori Anthony, who deserve special acknowledgment for
“rescuing” me when I was stranded at 9,000 feet in Naryn, Kyrgyzstan.
I am also grateful to those who, despite being outside my own fi eld, ei-
ther graciously critiqued my writing or provided exceptional friendships:
Adam Warren, Sandra Joshel, Kate Brown, Holly Haynes, Jade Hidle, Ruby
Blondell, Selim Kuru, Sara Maxwell, Robin Brownstein, Th omas Menduni,
and Frederick Zimmerman. My colleagues and friends at California State
University, Long Beach, including Gerry Riposa, Mark Wiley, Nancy Quam-
Wickham, Sebouh Aslanian, Emily Berquist, Jane Dabel, Andy Jenks, Ma-
rie Kelleher, Claire Martin, Caitlin Murdock, Lise Sedrez, Kim Trimble, and
Hugh Wilford, continue to provide valued support, and Sharon Sievers will
be sorely missed at CSULB. Houri Berberian and Patricia (Patty) Cleary de-
serve a special note of thanks. Houri has been an irreplaceable comrade and
friend, and Patty taught me the intricacies of the “system” at CSULB.
A writer could not have asked for a more accommodating and profes-
sional publisher than the University of Pittsburgh Press. I thank editorial
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 9 xi
director Peter W. Kracht and the Central Asia in Context series editor Doug-
las Northrop, as well as Amberle Sherman, editorial assistant, Alex Wolfe,
production editor, and the two anonymous readers. I also thank the outside
copy editor, Maureen Creamer Bemko. Only I am responsible for any errors
of fact or interpretation that may remain in this book.
Finally, I would like to express my love and gratitude to my family: my
intellectually curious grandmother Nafi ze Gürsoy, my parents Muhsin and
Yücel İğmen, my brother Akil İğmen and my sister-in-law Elisabetta Campi,
and my niece Asya İğmen. In 1996, my life changed when I met Franz Goe-
bel. I am forever indebted to him for making a home with me and always re-
minding me of my place, as Mary Oliver eloquently wrote, “in the family of
things,” such as “the wild geese, high in the clean blue air.”