“There are several models for the formation of internal (self) identity in the Kyrgyz ethnic environment. However, no one will be able to say which of the models of identity is dominant for us: Islam, Turkism, Sovietness, nomadism,” writes the well-known Kyrgyzstani Sinologist, diplomat, ex-SCO Secretary General, Muratbek Imanaliev in an article, written specifically for CABAR.asia.
We live in Eurasia, the most variegated from all points of view of human life and being, the civilizations created by them, religions, socio-economic and political systems, schools of thought, space. And the question is who we are? It is far from idle. This is a question of the complex identity of our nation and, at the same time, of its self-identification in the large family of Eurasian nations.
Many nations, especially in Asia, Africa, Latin America, have lost the core of their own model of identity: for example, over 70% of the world’s nations do not speak their own language, and secondly, they do not have the framework of their own culture, being only the bearer of a foreign cultural shell, thirdly, they do not have their own writing, etc. Nonetheless, they strive to be nationalists of that newly created nation, to which they belong not by blood and not by ancestry, but by cohabitation with people like them who have found a new homeland. Strictly speaking, a foreign language, foreign culture, foreign urbanism, etc. become their own, developing and changing, re-forming, become a model of self-identification of that group of people who consider themselves a nation. For example, Americans are a nation of different racial elements. This is a new model of nation-building, moreover, a nation constructed with great difficulties and still remains with open gaps and potentially disintegrating, although this can only happen under special circumstances. Virtually all of the nations that make up America retain their ethnic identity and, to some extent, culture, and yet they are all Americans.
What role does national ideology play in the American case? From this point of view, the Americans (it is not important the newly acquired US passport or the descendants of people who fought in the Civil War of the mid-19th century) believe in the ideology of the divine mission of the American nation, *Pax Americana*, the inviolability of the American dollar and the flag. Everything constitutes the national ideology of the Americans.
The Role of Ideology in Strengthening Identity
Can national ideology contribute to the formation and strengthening of the ethnic identity of the Kyrgyz? Many functionaries from among the officials have repeatedly tried to build the ideology of the nation, but things are still there. It seems to me that it is necessary to base the national ideology on simple ideas that are understandable to all ordinary people. For example, why don’t we find an answer to such a simple question “Why do the people of Kyrgyzstan live so short?”, Answering this question we will come across other problems that need to be answered. It would seem a medical and social question, but it has a lot of different dimensions, up to foreign policy, if, of course, you look at this problem conceptually and broadly.
And all questions must construct a model that is accepted by all, the nation state (1), the multinational and multi-confessional national society (2) and ethnic identity (3).
An important, in my opinion, element or foundation of the national ideology, but related to the activities of philosophers and political experts, is the problem of restoring the historical responsibility of the Kyrgyz, which most directly goes back to the problem of the culture of statehood. So far, unfortunately, our historical responsibility is on the shoulders of others. This heavy burden must be placed on our shoulders by elite groups. The question “can the Kyrgyz govern the Kyrgyz?”, remains unanswered.
In these refereed limits and spaces, the historical identification of the Chinese is very curious. This is a people or initially a group of Chinese civilization, which was constantly engaged in the introduction of different ethnos and ethnic groups under the “Chinese banners”. In China, seven large dialects of the Chinese language are known, the conversation in which requires an interpreter, and secondly, anthropologically, the Chinese are divided into two large groups, the northerners are bigger, similar to Koreans, and the southerners, the smaller ones, are more similar to the Vietnamese. However, they are all considered Chinese. What differences and contradictions do we have with them? This is not an easy question, but the answers must be found.
Nonetheless, in the Chinese ethnic group there is also the problem of separation, for example, Singaporeans, who are ethnically Chinese, but do not consider themselves as such, but see themselves as Singaporeans, just like the Hindus, Malays living in Singapore.
Formulating identity
With regard to the Soviet Union, one serious question remains – how deeply “Sovietness” and the image of “Soviet person” have entered our consciousness. In this sense, there is also a theme of gratitude of a part of the Kyrgyz, but the desire of some Kyrgyz to return to the USSR still has a background of “obedience”?
For us, the formulation and formation of a system of identities is a very fundamental issue. Existing global forms of identities, which include continental and racial identities, which predetermine meaningful representation both for an outside observer and for the Kyrgyz themselves.
Nevertheless, there are certain problems here:
- If one asks a Kyrgyz, who are they according to the continental identification – Asian or European? Most likely, they will not immediately answer, unlike a Chinese or an Englishman. For them, this question is not worth it. Eurasia is geography for Europeans, Asians, Americans, but for Russians it is a philosophical and geographical designation of Russian civilization, but for the Kyrgyz it is not clear at all.
In general, is continental identification understandable for us or not? If one asks a Kyrgyz, where do you live, in Asia or Europe? I wonder how they will answer? The question is not about whether they took a course in school geography, but in their self-perception, their understanding of who they are.
- Racial identification, which may not be difficult to confuse with continental, seems to me to be a less complicated issue, although there are problems of historical identification here as well. Now we are Mongoloids, but this was not always the case, and as some history buffs who read about the Dinglins and other tribes that lived in Eurasia imagine, they were still more of a Caucasian (representatives of European ethnicity) type. But who are the Dinglins? – is a difficult question which remains to be answered.
- There are several models for the formation of internal (self) identity in the Kyrgyz ethnic environment. Probably no one will be able to say which of the identity models is dominant for us: Islam, Turkism, Sovietness, or nomad. For example, no one remembers, and no one really knows about nomadism, but residual fragmentary memories give rise to pictures of nomadic romance.
Which culture is prevalent for us in terms of development – Russian, Soviet, nomadic, Islamic? What is called the Kyrgyz culture? It would seem that the epic “Manas” is a kind of basis of the national culture. The Manas epic is neither Islamic nor Soviet: the epic is purely Kyrgyz inheritance and only Kyrgyz. The formation of the “Manas” culture determines the construction of not just the image of Manas – the builder, Manas – the unifier, Manas – the creator, etc., but an integral, stitched, complex cultural niche according to the images mentioned above.
According to external cues, society in Kyrgyzstan is divided into three or four segments nowadays:
- the largest – Islamic orientation, which is on the way of finding a model of identity.
- pro-Russian, conservative in political views, post-Soviet inertial identity. Within the framework of this sector, it should be borne in mind that a huge part of young people under 30 are ready to leave for Russia, and also a huge part of people over 60 are stalking the USSR.
- pro-Western liberal-minded people who would like to identify themselves with the West, but the West is not particularly willing to accept them. These groups of people have a drawback – there are no national interests of Kyrgyzstan under the raised flags.
Nationalists are on the rise, however, in the bulk, they are “ordinary”, without ideology, without a political route.
The issue of modern Kyrgyz urbanism is complicated. In the second half of the nineteenth and, especially in the first half, when the Kyrgyz were “unseated” from a horse and forced to be a pedestrian and a sedentary person, part of the Kyrgyz, trying to master new forms of life, moved to Russian cities on the territory of Kyrgyzstan, and the other part began to master Uzbek and Tajik cities in the same Kyrgyzstan. Incidentally, this is one of the most important reasons for the events of 1990 and 2010.
We need to build Kyrgyz cities, with Kyrgyz urban culture and Kyrgyz urban traditions. So far, the life of the Kyrgyz is not taking place in the national urban space.
About religion and Islam
Peculiarly, for some reason Islam is considered an Eastern religion, although there is as much Eastern in it as in Christianity. Interestingly, this also applies to the Holy scriptures. Another issue is the advancement vector. In one case, north and west, in the second case, south and east. In reality, Eastern religions, perhaps, should be considered Hinduism, Buddhism (although these religions were created by Caucasians (representatives of European ethnicity), i.e., Hindus), Taoism, Confucianism, although the latter two can hardly be considered religions: these are more ethical and social teachings. In the Abrahamic religions and the religions of the East, there are completely different concepts of God.
The Kyrgyz ethnos adopted Islam through the Tatar-Bashkir Muslim diaspora, when the Russian government decided to Islamize the Kazakhs and Kyrgyz in order to introduce them to a stationary religion and thus bring them to a settled life. But still, the fact is that the Kyrgyz adopted the most curious image – ritual Islam. Among the Kyrgyz, there has never been a single theologian or any other honorable preacher. The same is with Marxism – not a single theorist of Marxism has emerged from among the Kyrgyz.
The original religion of the Kyrgyz is Tengriism. Tengriism was the religion of nomads, people who were constantly moving from one place to another. Therefore, they did not need books, notes and other biblical wisdom. Therefore, the absence of sacred books and other written commandments complicates the wider spread of Tengriism in the Kyrgyz ethnic environment.
Turkism is an abstract brotherhood of peoples, which are tied to each other by several circles of unity. Well, what is the same for the Turkic-speaking people: the blood of all these nations is different, the culture is also different, the language, and the morphology and syntax are similar and even close, but the vocabulary is mostly different. I agree, the religion is the same, but this is the situation with a billion people on Earth.
It seems to me that the problem of sustainability due to the formation of a multilayer support outside the region of residence is the main problem of the creation of the TURKSOY.
Post-Soviet (please do not confuse with post-communist) civilizational identity, the main shareholder of which is Russia, on the one hand, keeps us from wars and conflicts, on the other hand, it hinders the development of sovereignty.
Conclusion
An innovation of recent decades is the transformation of the Kyrgyz into a networkwide nation. The Kyrgyz are scattered all over the world today in large demographic spots. Do they, and especially their children, retain their ethnic identity? The fastest transition in Kazakhstan: adaptation mechanisms are practically absent, and they are almost unnecessary. In 2006, the Government of Kazakhstan implemented a migration amnesty: 11,600 Kyrgyz passed into Kazakhstani citizenship, some of them simultaneously changed the column on ethnicity in the passport. If ethnic identity is not preserved, then in Russia the transition to Russian identity will probably take place in 3-4 generations. The picture is about the same in other countries, especially in states in which there is an assembly of the nation from different races, nations, and ethnic groups. Take a closer look at the Turks-immigrants who appeared in Germany in the 60s: few of them returned to Turkey, with the exception of those who did not take root and pensioners. A generation of Turks has grown up in Germany, some of whom are written as Turks, but in reality, they are Germans. They are very active in German public life, they participate on an equal basis with the Germans in the party life of Germany, they are businessmen, etc. And they look at modern Turkey through the eyes of the Germans.
The Kyrgyz are the smallest nation in Central Asia. There are only about 6 million of us around the world, while according to some data there are more than 8 million Turkmens, Tajiks – around 20, Uzbeks – around 35, and Kazakhs – around 18.
At the same time, we are the poorest at home: we are a state-forming nation, but we live poorly at home. At the same time, it is important to remember that every Kyrgyzstani is a bearer of sovereignty.