Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T05:57:22.440Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The imagined nation-state in Soviet literature: The case of Koshpendiler

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Gulnara Dadabayeva  and
Dina Sharipova
Gulnara Dadabayeva
Affiliation:
Department of International Relations and Regional Studies, KIMEP University, Almaty, Kazakhstan
Dina Sharipova*
Affiliation:
Department of International Relations and Regional Studies, KIMEP University, Almaty, Kazakhstan
*
∗Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article focuses on the famous novel Koshpendiler (1976) by Ilyas Esenberlin. This literary work occupies a special place in Soviet Kazakh literature because it raises important problems such as the foundation of the state and nation, the sense of territoriality, and the struggle against Russian colonizers. The authors argue that this historical novel can be considered as an example of post-colonial discourse. The novel itself is an extrapolation of the 1970s’ Soviet reality when national Union republics, including Kazakhstan, were seeking greater independence. Kazakh cultural elites and the intelligentsia turned to the past history of nation-building to address the problems of the present day. Not having an opportunity to openly express their views, the Kazakh establishment preferred to express their national sentiments through the historical genre. In this work, the authors suggest their own vision of Soviet national literature from political science and historical perspectives.

Keywords

post-colonialnomadsKoshpendilerKazakhstanhistorical novelstatehoodKazakh ethnicity
Type
Articles
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 44 , Issue 1 , January 2016 , pp. 165 - 180
Copyright
Copyright © 2016 Association for the Study of Nationalities 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

The nation comes into being with understanding and respect for its past. (Ilyas Esenberlin)

References

Abenov, E., Arynov, E., and Tasmagambetov, Y. 1996. Kazakstan: evolutzia gosudarstva I obsctestva [Kazakhstan: Evolution of State and Society]. Almaty: Institut razvitiya Kazakhstana.Google Scholar
Abuseitova, Meruert. 1985. Kazakhskoe khanstvo vo vtoroi polovine XVI veka [Kazakh Khanate in the Second Half of the 16 Century]. Alma-Ata: Nauka.Google Scholar
Adams, Laura. 2005. “Modernity, Postcolonialism, and Theatrical Form in Uzbekistan.” Slavic Review 64 (2): 333–354.Google Scholar
Adams, Laura. 2008. “Can We Apply a Post-Colonial Theory to Central Asia?” Central Eurasia Studies Review 7 (1): 2–8.Google Scholar
Akishev, Kemal. 1974. Issyk Barrow. Into the Depths of Centuries (Archaeological Collection), 61–78. Alma-Ata: Nauka.Google Scholar
Alimzhanov, Anuar. 1969. Strela Makhambeta. Almaty: Audarma.Google Scholar
Anderson, Benedict. 1983. Imagined Communities. London: Verso.Google Scholar
Appolova, N. 1960. Prisoedinenie Kazakhstana k Rossii v 30-h godakh 18 veka [Joining of Kazakhstan to Russia in the 30s of the 18th Century]. Alma-Ata: AN KazSSR.Google Scholar
Bhabha, Homi. 1983. “Of Mimicry and Man: The Ambivalence of Colonial Discourse.” Discipleship: A Special Issue on Psychoanalysis 28: 125–133.Google Scholar
Bhabha, Homi. 1994. The Location of Culture. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Botaiuly, Ruslan, and Mamashuly, Asylkhan. 2015. Romany Esenberlina vse esche prepodnosyat v dar [Novels by Esenberlin are Still Popular as a Gift]. Accessed October 13. http://rus.azattyq.org/content/esenberlin-romany-kochevniki/26813091.html.Google Scholar
Brandenberg, David. 2002. National Bolshevism: Stalinist Mass Culture and the Formation of Modern Russian National Identity, 1931-1956. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Chatterjee, Partha. 1993. The Nation and its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Hhistories. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Childs, Peter, and Williams, Patrick. 1997. An Introduction to Post-Colonial Theory. London: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Dave, Bhavna. 2007. Kazakhstan: Ethnicity, Language and Power. Central Asian Studies Series. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Esenberlin, Ilyas. 2007. Kochevniki [The Nomads]. Almaty: Kochevniki.Google Scholar
Fanon, Frantz. 1963. The Wretched of the Earth. New York: Grove Press.Google Scholar
Frank, Andre Gunder. 1966. The Development of Underdevelopment. Boston, MA: New England Free Press.Google Scholar
Guha, Ranajit. 1982. “Preface.” In Subaltern Studies I: Writing on South Asian History and Society, edited by Guha, Ranajit. Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Heathershaw, John. 2010. “Central Asian Statehood in Postcolonial Perspective.” In Stable Outside, Fragile Inside?: Post-Soviet Statehood in Central Asia, edited by Kavalski, Emilian, 87–106. Surrey: Ashgate.Google Scholar
Kan, Grigori. 2009. History of Kazakhstan. Textbook for High Schools, 224. Almaty: Almaty Kitap Baspasy.Google Scholar
Kandiyoti, Deniz. 2002. “Post-Colonialism Compared: Potentials and Limitations in the Middle East and Central Asia.” International Journal of Middle East Studies 34 (2): 279–297.Google Scholar
Kassymbayev, Zh., ed. 1997. History of Kazakhstan XVIII — Early XX Centuries. Almaty: Rauan.Google Scholar
Khazanov, Anatoly. 1995. After the USSR: Ethnicity, Nationalism, and the Politics in the Commonwealth of Independent States. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press.Google Scholar
Klyashtorny, Sergey and Sultanov, Tursun. 1992. Letopisi trekh tysyacheletii [Scripts of Three Thousands Years]. Almaty: Rauan.Google Scholar
Kozybaev, Manash. 1991. Istoriia i sovremennost' [History and Modernity]. Almaty: Fylym.Google Scholar
Kudaibergenova, Dina. 2013. “Imagining Community” in Soviet Kazakhstan. An Historical analysis of Narrative on Nationalism in Kazakh-Soviet Literature.” Nationalities Papers 41 (5): 839–854.Google Scholar
Kunaev, Dinmukhamed. 2011. O moem vremeni: Vospominania [About My Times: Memoirs]. Almaty: Almaty Kitap Baspasy.Google Scholar
Nechkina, M. V. 1951. “K voprosu o formule ‘naimenshee zlo” [On the Formula of Lesser Evil]. Voprosy istorii 9: 97–118.Google Scholar
Pokrovskii, Mikhail. 1920. Russkaya Istoroia v samom szhatom ocherke [Russian History in a Succinct Essay]. Par. 1, p. 276. Moscow: GIZ.Google Scholar
Said, Edward. 1978. Orientalism. New York: Random House.Google Scholar
Schatz, Edward. 2004. Modern Clan Politics: The Power of “Blood” in Kazakhstan and Beyond. Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press.Google Scholar
Sembinov, Murat. 1999. “Stanovlenie natsionalnoi istorii Kazakhstana” [Establishing National History of Kazakhstan]. In Natsionalnye istorii v sovetskom i post-sovietskih gosudarstvah [National Histories in Soviet and Post-Soviet States], edited by Karl Aiermaher and Gennadii Bordugov, 179-194. Moscow: AIRO-XX.Google Scholar
Shoinbayev, T., Zh, . 1982. Dobrovolnoe vhozhdenie kazahskih zemel v sostav Rossii. Alma-Ata: Kazakhstan.Google Scholar
Spivak, Gaytri. 1988. “Can the Subaltern Speak?” In Marxism and Interpretation of the Culture, edited by Nelson, Cary and Crossberg, Lawrence, 271–313. Chicago: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Suleimenov, Olzhas. 1975. Az I Ya. Almaty: Zhazushy.Google Scholar
Suleimenov, Olzhas. 2002. Peresekaushchiyesya Paralleli [Intersecting Parallels]. Almaty: Dauir.Google Scholar
Sultanov, Tursun. 1982. The nomadic tribes of the Aral Sea in XV-XVII centuries. Moscow: Nauka.Google Scholar
Tolybekov, Sergaly E. 1971. Kochevoe obshchestvo kazakhov v XVII — nachale XX veka. Politikoekonomicheskii analiz [Kazakh Nomadic Societies in XVII — Beginning of XX Century. Political and Economic Analysis]. Almaty: Nauka.Google Scholar
Yilmaz, Harun. 2012. “History Writing as Agitation and Propaganda: The Kazakh History Book of 1943.” Central Asian Review 31 (4): 409–423.Google Scholar