Alikhan Bokeikhanov

Alikhan Bokeikhanov born on March 5^th, 1866, and was the grandson of the last khan of the Bokey horde who lived mostly in the western part of modern-day Kazakhstan. In the 19^th century it was common for Kazakh fathers to send their sons to Russian schools, especially if they were from wealthy families. Alikhan attended the Omsk Technical School and then studied economics at the Forestry Institute in St. Petersburg. Before entering politics, he was part of the Tobolsk Expedition which studied the farms of peasant migrants and seems to have left a lasting impression on him.

He entered politics by joining the Constitutional Democratic Party in 1905 and became an editor for several different newspapers including Irtysh and Qazaq (which we discussed in our episode: Russian Revolution and the Alash Orda). He would try to create a Kazakh Democratic party but failed. Instead, he was arrested and fled to Samara. He and other members of the Alash Orda created an uneasy alliance with the Russian party, the Kadets, and Alikhan was elected to the Duma in 1906, before the Tsar dissolved it.

When he wasn’t involved in politics, Alikhan was dedicated to his newspapers, arguing for Kazakh land rights and greater acceptance of indigenous peoples within politics. A sticking point between Russian officials and the Kazakh people was land ownership and the Kazakh’s nomadic nature. The Russians needed the land for their own people who were migrating to the Steppe for better wages and quality of life, but also believed that nomadism was the root of most of the Kazakh’s problems. If only they would just settle on the land granted to them by the Russians then all their issues would be solved.

Alikhan, along with Akhmet, argued against the Russian’s push for Kazakh sedentarism and argued for a gradual transition instead. They blamed the Russians for their lack of understanding of how the Kazakh lifestyle was a response to the climate of the Steppe. Alikhan would argue in an article in the Qazap:

“If we ask what kind of economy is more suitable for Kazakhs-the nomadic or the sedentary-the question is incorrectly posed. A more correct question would be: what kind of economy can be practiced under the climatic conditions of the Kazakh steppe? The latter vary from area to area and mostly are not suitable for agricultural work. Only in some northern provinces do the climatic conditions make it possible to sow and reap. The Kazakhs continue wandering not because they do not want to settle down and farm or prefer nomadism as an easy form of economy. If the climatic conditions had allowed them to do so, they would have settled a long time ago.”

Gulnar Kendirbai, ‘”We are Children of Alash…”, pg. 9

He did not equate Kazakh identity with nomadism but recognized that a people could not change their culture or lifestyle overnight. Instead, he argued that the Kazakhs embraced nomadism for scientific reasons and if the Russians were truly interested in helping Kazakhs succeed, then they needed to provide the tools necessary to adapt to a changing world. He would write:

“One may compare it with the dressing some Kazakh in European fashion and sending him to London, where he would either die or, in the absence of any knowledge and relevant experience, work like a slave. If the government is ashamed of our nomadic way of life, it should give us good lands instead of bad as well as teach us science. Only after that can the government ask Kazakhs to live in cities. If the government is not ashamed of not carrying out all the above-mentioned measures, then the Kazakhs also need not be ashamed of their nomadic way of life. The Kazakhs are wandering not for fun, but in order to graze their animals.”

Gulnar Kendirbai, ‘”We are Children of Alash…”, pg. 10

Alikhan was also a talented historian who crafted a unified Kazakh history by collecting and publishing Kazakh folklore, the history of their cultures and traditions, and shared world history with other Kazakhs through their newspapers. He engaged in literary criticism and analysis while encouraging Kazakh writers to write down their poems and stories, fearful that they would be lost if Kazakhs stuck purely to an oral tradition. Alikhan even hosted a competition for the first Kazakh novel, believing that the Europeans and the rest of the world would not respect the Kazakhs until they had proof of their own literary and cultural tradition. He also believed that Kazakhs should know about the outside world and so he focused on translating Russian and European scientific and fiction into the Kazakh language.

In 1915, Alikhan and Akhmet would travel to Petrograd to petition for the right for Kazakhs to fight alongside Russian forces in WWI and they would spend most of the 1916 rebellion trying to convince other Kazakhs to fight for Russia, believing it would grant them the respect needed for further rights down the road.

As we’ve discussed in our other episodes, Alikhan would help create the Alash Autonomy and serve as its president. He was one of the lead negotiators with both the Bolsheviks and the White Movement, relying on his old relationship with the Kadets to earn White recognition of Kazakh autonomy. When Kolchak coup established General Kolchak as military commander of the Siberian White Movement, he dismantled all autonomous states (including the Alash Autonomy). The Alash Orda would turn to the Bolsheviks, but they were similarly rebuffed. We’ll discuss the Red conquest of the Steppe in other episodes, but by the time the Bolsheviks defeated the Whites, the members of Alash Orda were forced to accept Bolshevik rule. If they wanted to remain in politics, they had to accept jobs within the Soviet administration. Alikhan returned to scientific life instead, although he was now a member of the Bolshevik party. As the Soviets strengthened their grip on Central Asia, they grew suspicious of indigenous activists. Because of his past, Alikhan was arrested first in 1926 on the charge of counter-revolutionary activity and sent to the Butyrka Prison in Moscow. He was released only to be arrested again in 1928, banished to Moscow in 1930, and arrested for a final time in 1937. He was executed on September 27^th, 1937, a victim of one of Stalin’s many purges. According to historian Sultan Khan Akkuly, his last words were, “I did not like the Soviet government, but acknowledged it.”

Akhmet Baitursynov

Akhmet Baitursynov is the father of Kazakh language and literature. Born on September 5^th, 1872, in the Kostanay Region of Kazakhstan. When he was 13, his father and brothers were sent to Siberia for attacking a Russian colonel who attacked their village. He attended Russian-native schools before graduating from the Orenburg Teacher’s college in 1895. He became a teacher and taught in country schools for Kazakhs for about a decade and a half before getting involved in politics. Along with Alikhan (who he met in 1904 in Omsk), he joined the Constitutional Democrat Party in 1905 and founded several newspapers including the Qazap. Also, like Alikhan, he was arrested in 1909 and exiled to Orenberg.

He helped Alikhan write about land rights and highlighting how ill-equipped the Kazakhs were to settle down, but his main focus was on language. He wrote in 1914:

“…the nationality of people who spoke their own language and wrote in their own language will never disappear without creating a person. The most powerful thing that causes the preservation and loss of the nation is language”

Dina A. Amanzholova, Kazakh Autonomy and Russia: the History of the Alash Movement, pg. 36

Kazakh intellectuals were considered about poor education opportunities available to Kazakh children and utilized the new teachings methods championed by Tatar reforms and the Jadids. Akhmet was particularly concerned about primary education and focused on resolving the lack of teaching materials available to primary schools, especially the lack of materials on the Kazakh language. When detractors picked on his paper, the Qazaq, for writing primarily in Kazakh, he replied:

“Finally, we would like to tell our brothers preferring the literary language: we are very sorry if you do not like the simple Kazakh language of our newspaper. Newspapers are published for the people and must be close to their readers.”

Gulnar Kendirbai, ‘”We are Children of Alash…”, pg. 19

            The Kazakh intellectuals resisted the Tatar clergy’s attempts to subsume Kazakh language to the Tatar language, eventually arriving at a compromise. This pressure around language inspired Akhmet Baitursynov to reform the Kazakh language, creating spelling primers, and improving the Kazakh alphabet multiple times. He created the modern Kazakh language. His books were soon used in primary schools. He also published a textbook on the Kazakh language which studied the phonetics, morphology, and syntax of the Kazak language as well as a practical guide to the Kazakh language and a manual of Kazakh literature and literary criticism.

            Akhmet, like Alikhan, was involved in the creation of the Alash Orda party, believed Kazakhs should fight along Russians during WWI, and helped create the Alash Autonomy in 1917. After the Bolsheviks took over the Steppe, he joined the Bolshevik government and served as the Commissioner of Population of Kazakh Autonomous Socialist Soviet Republic from 1920-1921. He left the government and returned to teaching in 1922, serving in several positions such as Chairman of the Research Society for the Kazakh Region, member of the Academic Center at the Regional People’s Commissariat, and the Scientific and Literary Commission of the People’s Commissariat of Commerce. He lectured in Orenburg from 1921-1925 before transferring to the Kazakh State Pedagogical Institute in Almaty as a professor. He was arrested for the first time on June 2^nd, 1929, and sent to Butyrskiy prison. He was released to be arrested again only for Maxim Gorky’s wife, E. Peshkova, to intervene and petition for his release. He would be arrested once more in 1937 and was executed on December 8^th, 1937, another victim of Stalin’s purge.

References

Central Asia: a New History from the Imperial Conquests to the Present by Adeeb Khalid

Kazakh Autonomy and Russia: the History of the Alash Movement by Dina A. Amanzholova

‘”We are Children of Alash…” The Kazakh Intelligentsia at the beginning of the 20th century in search of national identity and prospects of the cultural survival of the Kazakh people’ by Gulnar Kendirbai, Central Asian Survey, 1999, Vol 18 No 1

The Geography of Civilization: a Spatial Analysis of the Kazakh Intelligentsia’s Activities, from the mid-nineteenth to the early twentieth century by Tomohiko Uyama

150th Anniversary of the Birth of the Leader of the Nation Akhmet Baitursynov by Zhumakhan Arynov and Smagulova Aigeri