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Uyghur neighborhoods and nationalisms in the former Sino-Soviet borderland: an historical ethnography of a stateless nation on the margins of modernity
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Uyghur neighborhoods and nationalisms in the former Sino-Soviet borderland: an historical ethnography of a stateless nation on the margins of modernity
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UYGHUR NEIGHBORHOODS AND NATIONALISMS
IN THE FORMER SINO-SOVIET BORDERLAND:
AN HISTORICAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF A STATELESS NATION ON THE
MARGINS OF MODERNITY
VOLUME I
by
Sean Raymond Roberts
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(ANTHROPOLOGY)
August 2003
Copyright 2003 Sean Raymond Roberts
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U N IV E R SIT Y O F SO U T H E R N C A LIFO R N IA
THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY PARK
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA 90089-1695
This dissertation, written by
Sean R. Roberts
under the direction o f h l s dissertation committee, and
approved by all its members, has been presented to and
accepted by the Director o f Graduate and Professional
Programs, in partial fulfillment o f the requirements for the
degree of
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
Director
Date A u g u st 1 2 , 2003
Dissertation Committee
Chair
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D E D IC A TIO N
This work is dedicated to the Uyghur people, whose lives and history have inspired m y work.
I wish you all the happiness in the world and the attainment o f your hopes and dreams.
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Ill
A C K N O W L E D G E M E N T S
I have been at work on this project in some capacity or another for about ten years.
During that time, more people have assisted me in this endeavor than I can ever name. I can
only hope that those o f you whom I do not mention by name will know that I thank you as
well for your support, without which the completion o f this work w ould not have been
possible.
First and foremost, I must thank m y sources o f financial support for keeping me alive
during my years o f graduate study and research. The International Research and Exchanges
Board (IREX) supported m e during almost two years o f intensive fieldwork in Kazakhstan
through a language training grant in 1994 and a dissertation research fellowship in 1997. In
addition, at various stages o f m y research, the Social Sciences Research Council (SSRC)
helped to finance my participation in a summer language study program at the University o f
W ashington (1993), a pre-research seminar at the University o f M ichigan (1994), and a
dissertation write-up seminar in Seattle, W ashington (2001). Finally, the U niversity o f
Southern California also supported my graduate study, particularly during m y first tw o years
when I was the recipient o f the Haynes Fellowship for the Social Sciences. In addition to
expressing m y thanks to these organizations for their support, I would also like to express my
gratitude to Mr. Paul Eckel, without whose support for m y undergraduate studies I would
never even have gotten to graduate school.
I would also like to express m y thanks to m y many colleagues and mentors who have
supported me intellectually in this task. First and foremost, I would like to thank m y
dissertation committee who saw me through to the finish line. M y dissertation advisor, Prof.
Eugene Cooper, always expressed his unfailing support for my work and kept me optimistic
yet sufficiently cynical, especially through his consultations in Altadena over coffee and Car
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Talk. Prof. Azade-Ayse Rorlich, my other advisor, kept me intellectually challenged
throughout my graduate study and research, encouraged me to follow a less traveled path that
was both ethnographic and historical, and ensured that m y grounding in the com plexities o f
Central Asian history was as thorough as possible. Finally, Nancy Lutkehaus was also always
there to help me with consultations and letters o f support, especially during the last year o f my
writing. In addition, I wish to thank several other colleagues who never failed to encourage
me in m y w ork and cheer me on from the sidelines, including Bruce Grant, M arjorie Balzer,
Steven Sabol, Ruth Mandel, Justin Rudelson, Bill Clark, and James Millward. In addition, I
wish to thank m y Uyghur colleagues from the Institute (Center) o f Uyghur Studies in Almaty,
Kazakhstan, and especially its Director Kom m unar Talipov, who accepted me as one o f their
own and put up with my quirky American style o f scholarship.
In addition, I cannot express enough gratitude to the Uyghurs o f the Hi valley
borderland who continually took me into their homes, fed me, provided me with information,
and let me docum ent their lives. While the numbers o f Uyghurs who helped me in this regard
are far too m any to mention by name, certain individuals warrant special thanks. These
include my two most valued informants who became like fathers to me while in the field:
Savut-aka M ollaudov (my yerlik father) and Abbas-aka Aliev (my kitailik father). Similarly, I
must express my gratitude to m y Uyghur sisters in Alm aty who continually supported my
work and encouraged me as friends, Dilianur Qasymova (my kitailik sister) and Sahinur
Dautova (my yerlik sister). In addition, I feel the need to mention several others who
particularly went out o f their way to help me including Ablehat Kamalov, Savut
Abdurakhmanov, Diliapruz Hajiajieva, Imarbek M akhsimov, Tilvaldi Kurbanov, the late
M alik Kabirov, the late Abdumejit Rozibaqiev, Zia Samadi, Rozakhun from Kuldja, Ashim-
jon Kurbanov, Kurash Kusan, Sanat-aka, Selimakhun-aka, and Sheripakhun-aka. There are
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endless more Uyghur friends I could mention, but I will ju st say to them that I offer the
sincerest thanks for all o f your help and support. I hope m y work will prove as useful to you
and your children as you have been to its completion.
In addition, I want to thank many personal friends who helped me make it through this
difficult rite o f passage, especially M arcos Frommer, Vito Buscemi, and Edward J. Murphy.
During this ordeal and in the midst o f my nomadic lifestyle, these people have gone beyond
the duty o f friendship to house me, console me, and share their lives with me no m atter how
much tim e m ay pass between meetings. Finally, I want to thank my family for putting up with
m y long absences from their lives during the course o f this project while continuing to support
me in m y endeavors. I want to thank my m other for her constant support, my sister M adeleine
for her positive energy, and especially my brothers Ben and Bart for their m ale bonding in the
last stages o f my writing. Last but not least, I want to thank my wife Asel for her constant
help and support as well as for agreeing to wait an entire two years while I finished this
dissertation before we began planning for the future.
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vi
T A BL E O F C O N TEN TS
VOLUME I
Dedication ii
Acknowledgements iii
List of Tables viii
List of Figures ix
Note on Transliteration xi
Abstract xiii
Introduction: The Global, Local, and Borderland Histories of a Stateless Nation:
The Production of Community and Nationhood on the Margins of Modernity 1
Chapter One: The Production of Location and Community in Central Asia:
Neighborhood and Village in Uyghur Social Organization 33
PARTI: THE ETHNOGRAPHIC PAST 59
Chapter Two: The Origins of the Uyghur Community in the Ili Valley
Borderland: Imperial Rivalries and Taranchi Migrations (1760-1900) 60
Chapter Three: Locality Production and Competing Colonialisms in the
Borderland: Uyghur Neighborhoods Under Qing and Russian Rule 95
Chapter Four: Modernism and its Discontents in the Borderland: The Rise
and Fall of the First Uyghur National Communists (1900-1937) 129
Chapter Five: Revolution Reprise and Socialist Entrenchment in the
Borderland: The Eastern Turkestan Republic, the Maoist Revolution,
and the Sino-Soviet Split (1937-1978) 181
VOLUME II
PART II: THE ETHNOGRAPHIC PRESENT 243
Chapter Six: Open Borders, Open Markets, and Closed States: The Uyghurs
Encounter a New World Order 244
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Chapter Seven: The Transnationalization of Almaty’s Uyghur Community:
A Window into and a Doorway out of Homeland
Chapter Eight: Producing Uyghur Localities in Almaty: Creating Social Space
and Organizational Structure for a Stateless Nation
Chapter Nine: Mediated Culture and the Uyghur National Narrative in Almaty:
The Production of a Stateless Nation’s Ideologies
Chapter Ten: Practicing the Uyghur Stateless Nation in Almaty:
Symbolic Capital and the Negotiation of Nationalist Ideologies
Conclusion: Border Crossings, Uyghur Localities, and the Future of
Political Power on the Margins of Modernity
Bibliography
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viii
L IST O F TA BLES
Table 1: Distribution o f First Oins Resettlem ent o f Taranchi Households 65
in Ili Valiev
Table 2: Taranchi Settlements in the Russian portion o f the Ili valley, 1884 92
Table 3: The B as System in the Ili Valley (Early 19th Century) 99
Table 4: The Bae System After the 1880s 124
Table 5: Schedule from the Husavniva maktav-1888 125
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ix
LIST OF FIG U R ES
Map 1: Central Asia and Surrounding Areas 6
May 2: The Ili Valiev Borderland, Circa 1970s 8
Illustrations 1: Kuldia under the Oins Empire until 1864 69
Illustrations 2: The Ili Sultanate 79
Illustrations 3: Kuldia Under Russian Occupation, 1871-1881 86
Illustrations 4: Taranchi Life in Semirech ’ e After the Migration (1880-1910s) 116
Illustrations 5: Vali-Akhun Yuldash Cross-Border Trade, and Capitalism 122
Illustrations 6: Uyghur “ Jadid” Reformers at the Turn o f the Century 136
Illustrations 7: Uvshur “ Mulsim National Communism ” 155
Illustrations 8: The Dismantling o f Uyghur “ Mulsim National Communism ” 174
Illustrations 9: Shens Shicai and Resistance to his Rule 185
Illustrations 10: The Eastern Turkestan Republic and its Aftermath 205
Illustrations 11: The Fall o f the Eastern Turkestan Republic 208
Illustrations 12: Sino-Soviet Socialist Brotherhood, 1949-1962 222
Illustrations 13: Soviet Uvshur Modernism Durins the Sino-Soviet Split 233
Illustrations 14: The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in Xiniians 240
Illustrations 15: China-Kazakhstan Trade in the 1990s 253
Illustrations 16: Kazakhstan-China Diplomatic Relations in the 1990s 259
Illustrations 17: The Kuldia “ Riots ’’ in February o f 1994 269
Illustrations 18: Chinese Communist Party’ s Propaganda Campaign asainst
Uvshur “ Separatists ” and for the Unity o f the Peoples in the Late 1990s 270
Illustrations 19: Prominent Outspoken Uvshurs Silenced in Xiniians in the 1990s 271
M ap 3: Most Prominent Uvshur Neishborhoods in Almaty, 1990s 304
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X
Illustrations 20: The Development o f Local Uvshur Mosques in Almaty (Early 1990s) 307
Illustrations 21: The Re-Birth o f Uvshur Zhuts and Zhutdarchilik in Almaty.
Kazakhstan in the 1990s 318
Illustrations 22: Xiniians Uvshur LiteraturePopular in Almaty 340
Illustrations 23: The “ Beauty ofLoulan” 344
Illustrations 24: Films from Xiniians that are Popular in Almaty 354
Illustrations 25: Political Statements in Transnational Uvshur Mediated Culture 361
Illustrations 26: Uvshur “Toys ” and Toastins the Nation 376
Illustrations 27: Performins the Nation 385
Illustrations 28: Uvshur Celebrations o f the Past 390
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N O TE O N TR A N SL IT E R A T IO N
W hen I first became interested in the study o f Central Asia as a University student,
my friend and I would continually joke about the “note on transliteration” section found in
every book on the region. It seemed to me at that time that this section was something o f a
rite o f passage for the scholar o f Central Asia where he/she needed to prove his/her linguistic
prowess. N ow that I am trying to write a thorough study on the region, I understand that
studying Central Asia inevitably gets one stuck in a linguistic quagmire o f Russian, Chinese,
Turkish, Persian, and Arabic words. Furthermore, the way in which a scholar who is not
fluent in all the languages involved handles this quagmire is inevitably imperfect. In this
study, I have done m y best to adhere to standardized transliteration systems for Russian,
Chinese, Uyghur, and Arabic. That being said, I am w ell aware that there m ay be lapses in
this standardization, and for that I apologize to my readers.
I have used the United States Library o f Congress system o f transliteration for the
Russian language. The only exception to this convention is well known proper names and
place names where the popular version does not conform to this transliteration system (e.g. I
use Moscow instead o f Moskva). For the Chinese language, I have done m y very best to
adhere to the Pinyin transliteration system, but this is admittedly where there m ay be the most
lapses in standardization. N ot all o f my English language sources use Pinyin, and a good deal
o f the M andarin Chinese words found in the text have come from either Russian or Uyghur
sources. W ithout a speaking or reading knowledge o f M andarin Chinese, it was often difficult
for me to find the Pinyin version o f a word. For this reason, there m ay be instances where one
finds a W ades-Giles version o f a M andarin word or, even more confusing, a Latin
transliteration o f either a Russian or Uyghur transliteration o f a M andarin Chinese word.
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xii
Transliteration o f Uyghur words presented a different problem. The sources I have
used in the Uyghur language are printed in no less than seven different alphabets, and
there exist discrepancies in the spelling o f various words in each o f these alphabets.
Furthermore, given that the study o f Uyghur language, history, and culture is less developed
than the corresponding fields relating to the Russians and the Chinese, there does not exist a
single accepted transliteration system for Uyghur. I have used a Latin transliteration o f the
Uyghur Cyrillic alphabet instituted in the Soviet Union in 1947 (see Allworth 1971:374). I
chose this system because, in my non-linguist opinion, it represents the best phonetic
transliteration o f Uyghur sounds. Exceptions to this rule are found in my writing o f place-
names in Xinjiang that are already well known in the English language, such as Kashgar,
Kuldja, and Urumchi. I have, however, transliterated all Uyghur names properly.
I have also generally used the Uyghur version o f Arabic and Persian loan words
except when the word refers to a widely known M uslim religious institution or practice, in
which case I have used the spelling for the term (without diacritics) as seen in the glossary o f
Dale Eickelm an’s The Middle East and Central Asia (An Anthropological Approach)
(Eickelman 1998:374-379). Finally, I should mention that bibliographic references represent
the spelling o f the original source rather than a standardized version o f transliteration for the
language in which it is written.
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A B STR A C T
This is an historical ethnography o f the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley, a stateless M uslim
nation lodged between Russian and Chinese spheres o f influence in Central Asia. The
central questions that the study addresses are how and why peoples such as the Uyghurs
persist in asserting their sense o f nationhood without sovereign statehood in our present
world system. In tackling these questions, however, the study does not only increase our
understanding o f the phenomenon o f the stateless nation. It also asserts that through an
understanding o f the motivations and activities o f disempowered and de-territorialized
people, we can better understand the roles o f power, identity, and territory in our modern
world system.
Drawing from the work o f Marc Auge, the study combines ethnographic and
historical m ethodology in an attempt to transcend the perspectives o f both disciplines.
W hile it is divided into ethnographic past and ethnographic present sections, the text seeks
to problematize the divisions between the past and present as well as between the disciplines
o f history and anthropology, recognizing that once ethnography is documented it has become
essentially history. In its examination o f both the past and present, the study concentrates on
this com m unity’s local engagement with global processes, charting both the Ili valley
U yghurs’ m arginalization in the world system and their resistance to this marginalization.
A central theme in the dissertation is the importance o f the production o f locality to
this borderland com m unity’s survival as a unique people whose social life transcends the
border dividing them and resists the homogenizing forces o f modernity. In particular, the
study concentrates on the importance o f community rituals as a means o f inscribing social
space and creating local subjects, both o f which defy the prescriptions o f the states in which
they live. In its examination o f the twentieth century, the study also accents the im portance
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o f the production o f a Uyghur national identity that is negotiated through the practices o f
local Uyghur communities and is unified by a mediated culture o f books, newspapers, audio
visual recordings, and shared material products that convey a specific narrative o f the
nation.
The study’s conclusions emphasize the importance o f examining marginal
populations in international borderlands as a means for better understanding concepts o f
power, identity, and place in the world system. They also suggest that the experiences o f
people in such borderlands, particularly as they concern the production o f locality as a form
o f resistance to the homogenizing processes o f globalization, are becoming more pertinent to
the lives o f all people in today’s increasingly de-territorialized and fragm ented world.
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1
IN T R O D U C T IO N — The Global, Local, and Borderland H istories o f a Stateless
Nation: The Production o f Community and Nationhood on the M argins o f
M odernity
On the morning o f Febuary 7, 1997, several hundred m ale Uyghur worshippers
gathered at the Zaria Vostoka mosque located near the large Barakholka wholesale bazaar in
Almaty, Kazakhstan to join in prayer for Id, the celebration o f the end o f the month o f
Ramadan. The crowd was as diverse as the city’s Uyghur population itself, including not
only the neighborhood’s inhabitants but also numerous Uyghur traders from the bazaar,
many o f whom were Chinese citizens. After the prayer, a young alim (muslim scholar) who
was born in China, studied in Pakistan, and now lives in Kazakhstan spoke into the
microphone. In an impassioned speech, he broke the news o f what had happened two days
earlier in Kuldja, the largely Uyghur city located some 220 miles from Alm aty in the
Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) o f China. He told the crowd that m any
young Uyghurs had been killed while taking to the streets to conduct a peaceful protest for
the right to worship Islam freely.
After all had observed a moment o f silence for the dead at the request o f the alim,
the attendees began murmuring amongst themselves about what had happened as they
dispersed and headed back to their homes, neighborhoods, and places o f employment. Back
in the Uyghur neighborhoods o f the city, this murmuring quickly turned into political
discussions which, in turn, led to a concerted response by the community to the events in
Kuldja. W hile the often competing Uyghur nationalist leaders o f Alm aty became the
spokespeople for the com m unity’s response, their actions and statements were carefully
negotiated with neighborhood leaders who formed their ideas through discussions with
groups o f Uyghur men in their respective localities.
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2
W orking together, the Uyghurs o f Alm aty launched an international information
campaign about the events in Kuldja. They gathered information and eyewitness accounts
about the events and relayed them by e-mail and fax to Uyghur groups in the United States,
Europe, Turkey, and Australia. In addition, they held a large news conference for the m any
journalists from around the world who, being denied entrance to Xinjiang by the Chinese
government, had come to Almaty to cover this story. A t the same time, groups o f men
gathered separately at private homes and local mosques in each o f the Uyghur
neighborhoods o f the city to discuss what long-term measures their particular neighborhoods
and the Uyghur com m unity as a whole should take to respond to these troubling events.
While A lam ty’s Uyghurs had come together and mobilized to address the events in
Kuldja, it was not an official political organization or a single leader that directed this
m obilization; rather it was the local neighborhoods o f the city that served as the
organizational focal point. This was because, as I stressed to several international journalists
who interviewed me at this time, in absence o f both a state structure and a recognized
leadership to represent it, the Uyghur nation draws its organizational pow er and cohesion
from its local communities.
I begin this study with the preceding vignette from my fieldwork because it
highlights the ways in which the Uyghur community o f Almaty, Kazakhstan operates as a
stateless nation. As the passage demonstrates, the activities o f such a stateless nation differ
significantly from those o f a nation-state. Nation-states have distinct leaders and institutions
and can implement official policies, all o f which creates a uniformity that suggests both
legitimacy and hegemony. Stateless nations, however, do not enjoy such uniformity and,
thus, are always plagued by outside perceptions o f illegitimacy and organizational disorder.
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3
W hile nation-states have policies and laws, stateless nations are perceived as having
ideological allegiances and cultural traditions. W hile nation-states have borders and
territory, stateless nations only possess an historical homeland and local communities.
Finally, while nation-states declare and fight wars, stateless nations are seen as taking part
in rebellions or, even worse, as committing acts o f terrorism.
In referring to the Uyghurs as stateless, I do not use this term as it is defined by the
United Nations, which asserts that a "stateless person (is) a person who is not considered as
a national by any State under the operation o f its law” (see United Nations 1954). W hile the
U.N. definition o f stateless refers to a person’s lack o f citizenship, this study is more
concerned with the inability o f a group o f people to determine for them selves to which state
they belong and to define what that state stands for, where its boundaries are drawn, and who
governs it. The operative definition o f a stateless nation used in the study, therefore, is: a
group ofpeople who identify collectively and politically as a nation with an historical
homeland defined by distinct borders, but who do not have sovereign rule over that
homeland. The Uyghurs are such a stateless nation as are the Tibetans, the Palestinians, the
Kurds, various Native American nations, and numerous other peoples around the world who
consider them selves deserving o f official political representation in the world but who are
not recognized as having claim to such by the international com m unity.1 In an increasingly
out-dated vernacular still often used to describe the geographical distribution o f power in the
world, all o f these stateless nations are also referred to as members o f the Fourth World.
This study is an ethnographic examination o f the Uyghur stateless nation as it has
been articulated historically in the Ili valley borderland between the former Soviet Union and
the People’s Republic o f China. The central questions that the study addresses are how and
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why people such as the Uyghurs persist in asserting their sense o f nationhood without
sovereign statehood in our present world system. In tackling these questions, however, the
study does not only seek to increase our understanding o f the phenomenon o f the stateless
nation. It also asserts that through an understanding o f the motivations and activities o f
disem powered and de-territorialized people, we can better understand the roles o f pow er and
territory in our modern world system.
Below, I outline the study’s approach to this subject matter and its theoretical
foundations. In particular, I discuss the study’s combined ethnographic and historical
approach, its theoretical perspective on the formation o f local communities as the territorial
bases o f the Uyghur stateless nation, and its understanding o f the production o f the nation as
a concept without a state structure to define it. Before examining these theoretical and
methodological questions in more depth, however, I wish to introduce the reader briefly to
the Uyghur stateless nation, the borderland where this study was conducted, and the context
in which I came to study both o f them.
1. The U vshurs o f the Ili Valley Borderland: A n Introduction
Some nine to ten million people in the world identify themselves as Uyghurs.2 The
majority o f these people, over eight million, today live in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonom ous
Region (XUAR) in the northwest corner o f the PRC. In addition, a significant num ber o f
1 The Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO), an international organization championing the
rights o f stateless nations, for example, has 53 member stateless nations representing over 100 m illion people.
See http://www.unp0.0rg/member/#current for a list o f the UN PO ’s members.
2 These figures are approximations given the questionable and dated official data on Uyghur population in
Central Asia. W hile Uyghurs claim that the census figures on their population have been doctored to reflect a
smaller and more marginal people, unfortunately we only have this official data to rely on. According to the last
official available data on the population o f both the XU AR (1993 Chinese census) and Kazakhstan (1989 Soviet
census), the Uyghurs numbered 7,589,468 in the XU AR and 185,301 in Kazakhstan. Given increases in birth,
the number o f unregistered Uyghurs in the XU AR due to penalties for exceeding state mandated birth limits, and
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5
Uyghurs live in former Soviet Central Asia, the largest population being in Kazakhstan, and
the Uyghur diaspora has small but notable populations in Saudi Arabia, Australia, Turkey,
Afghanistan, Germany, the United States, Canada, and elsewhere (see Besson 1998).
The language that all o f these people share is from the Turkic family and is m ostly
m utually intelligible with Uzbek, the national language o f the newly independent state o f
Uzbekistan. Religiously, they are prim arily Sunni M uslims of the Hanafi school o f Islamic
law, but historically many also have belonged to various M uslim Sufi sects, the N aqshabandi
order in particular.3 W hile ultimately a product o f the general Central Asian cultural
symbiosis between the nomads o f the steppe and the settled people o f the oases, the
Uyghurs, like the Uzbeks and Tajiks, are culturally more closely linked to the settled
agricultural and urban traditions o f the region’s oases. To accent these links, Uyghurs today
claim a long historical heritage o f settled civilization that dates back to the prosperous
Uyghur empire that ruled much o f today’s XUAR during the eighth and ninth centuries (see
M ackerass 1973; M alivkin 1983; Radlov 1893; Pozdneev 1899).4
The area that most Uyghurs identify as their homeland and the site o f a potential
future nation-state corresponds to the present borders o f the XUAR in China (see M ap 1).
Referring to this area as either Eastern Turkestan or Uyghurstan, Uyghurs em ploy historical
arguments about the ancient Uyghur Empire and its precedents to justify their claims to this
land (see, fpr example, Almas 1989). W hether these ancient historical claims are legitimate
the number o f Uyghurs living elsewhere, both inside and outside Central Asia, it can be estimated that the total
population o f Uyghurs today is between 9 and 10 million, if not more.
3 In addition, there exist today a minority o f Uyghur atheists who have been influenced by M arxism-Leninism
and a handful o f recent Uyghur converts to Christianity and other religions.
4 As is the case in any contemporary peoples’ claims to an ancient heritage, however, it is debatable whether or
not a direct bloodline can be traced between the ancient and modem Uyghurs [See Gladney (1990) for an
argument concerning the tenuous links between the ancient and modern Uyghurs]. Regardless, there is little
doubt that the ancient Uyghurs contributed to the cultural and biological mix that characterizes today’s Uyghur
population.
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or not, Uyghurs and their ancestors have been the primary population in Eastern Turkestan
for several centuries. W hile today Uyghurs still represent the largest ethnic population in the
XUAR, these dynamics are gradually changing as the in-migration o f Han Chinese
increases yearly. As a result, many Uyghurs fear inevitable assimilation if they are not able
to attain sovereignty over their homeland, a sense o f urgency that fuels their nationalist
m ovem ent and its resistance to Chinese rule.
Map 1: Central Asia and Surrounding Areas
Xinjiang Uyghur
Autonomous Region
) i Central Asia
V t 1970s
Adapted from Cyrus Black, et. al., The Modernization of Inner Asia (ME Sharpe 1991).
Note the Ili valley borderland that is blocked off in a rectangle in the center of the map.
Political borders and designations correspond to those of the 1970s.
The community o f Uyghurs in the Ili valley borderland between China and
Kazakhstan originates from the m id-eighteenth century when the Qing dynasty colonized
Eastern Turkestan and forcibly transferred to the Ili valley many o f those Uyghurs who had
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resisted the colonization. W hen a distinct border was drawn in the Ili valley between
Russian and Qing territories in the late nineteenth century, this com m unity transform ed from
a frontier population at the edge o f Qing rule to a borderland people lodged between the
Russian and Qing Empires.5 By the beginning o f the twentieth century, Uyghurs had
already established distinct local communities on both sides o f the border, and their
population in Chinese and Russian parts o f the Ili valley was approximately equal (see
Aristov 1896:442).6
If this com m unity o f Uyghurs found itself divided between Russian/Soviet and
Chinese domains throughout the twentieth century, it was also engaged in constant cross-
border movem ent whether in mass migrations or as temporary visitors to one side or the
other, making their lives inevitably transnational in character.7 This cross-border m obility
has been facilitated by the obvious discrepancy between the Ili valley’s physical and political
geography. As a corridor o f land that originates in the Tenghri Tagh or Tian-shan mountains
in what is today the western edges o f China, the valley follows the Ili river unobstructed into
Eastern Kazakhstan until steering northerly into the steppe on its way to Lake Balkash (see
map 2). By contrast, the mountains that encircle the valley to the east, north, and south make
the area relatively difficult to access from other parts o f Xinjiang or China more generally.
As a result, the Ili valley forms a natural corridor for the transfer o f population and the
transmission o f goods and ideas that defies the man-made border between polities that has
divided it since the 1850s.
5 The division o f the Uyghurs between the Qing and Russian Empires at this time was facilitated by a mass
migration o f Uyghurs to Russian territory. See chapter two for more about these events.
6 Aristov estimates that the Uyghur population in 1896 on both sides o f the border was equal, with approximately
50,000 living on each side (Aristov 1896:442).
7 This cross-border mobility was mostly suspended during the 25 years o f the Sino-Soviet split. This was the
only period during the twentieth century, however, when there was not substantial cross-border movement.
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8
Map 2: Ili Valley Borderland, circa 1970s
Lake Balkash
/, .nimfev
f */
> ' • - t * >
Note the discrepancy between the natural boundaries of physical geography and the political
borders.
Today, the Uyghur cross-border community represents about 15% o f the
approxim ately five million people living in the Ili valley on both sides o f the border with the
remaining population consisting o f Kazakhs, Han Chinese, Russians, Tatars, M ongols, and
numerous other peoples.8 Among the greater Uyghur nation, this cross-border com m unity
possesses a reputation as a home to sophisticated intellectuals and restless rebels.9 This
reputation garnishes great respect in the larger Uyghur nation, and many Uyghurs from
elsewhere have gravitated to the Ili valley historically with aspirations o f intellectual
development and revolutionary activism. Furthermore, the fact that the Three-Viliyat
8 According the 1993 data for China and the 1989 data for Kazakhstan, about 15% o f the 4,713,886 people
living in the Ili valley were Uyghurs (689,042). O f these Uyghurs, 175,053 lived on the territory o f what is today
the Almaty oblast’ o f Kazakhstan (total population o f the oblast’ 2,814,847), and 513,989 lived in the Ili Viliyat
o f the X U A R (total population o f the viliyat 1,899,039) (cf. Shingjiang 1995a:98; Itogi 1992:34, 114, 144).
However, the number o f Uyghurs from elsewhere who have gravitated to this borderlands since the fall o f the
U SSR and the liberalization o f China to take advantage o f a flourishing cross-border trade has likely increased
the number o f Uyghurs in the valley substantially, particularly in Kazakhstan since the last official figures were
collected. Thus, it can be estimated that the above cited official numbers from 1989/1993 have increased by at
least 100,000 to 200,000, likely also effecting the percentage o f the Ili valley’s population which is Uyghur.
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9
Revolution and its resultant short-lived Eastern Turkestan Republic was based in the Ili
valley during the 1940s has placed this community at the forefront o f the Uyghur nationalist
movem ent since W orld W ar II and made it made a symbol o f resistance for all U yghurs.1 0
2. The Research B ehind the Study
I was first drawn to the study o f this com m unity during a trip from Soviet Central
A sia to C hina’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR) in January 1990. This trip
required twice crossing the border between Kazakhstan and the People’s Republic o f China
(PRC) in the Ili valley, which only had recently opened after being closed for over twenty-
five years. In the course o f the trip, I encountered numerous Uyghurs from both sides o f the
border who were crossing over to visit relatives from whom they had long been separated.
In m eeting these Uyghurs from both sides o f the border as they reunited with kin, I was
particularly struck by the ways that the worldviews and habits o f those on different sides had
diverged during the years o f separation. W hen I entered graduate school two years later, I
decided to study the com m unity’s evolving reunification and its effects on Uyghur
nationalism in more depth.
In 1 994,1 returned to the Ili valley borderland to begin a year o f field research on
this topic. By this time, not only had the border between Kazakhstan and China opened up
entirely, but the Soviet Union itself had ceased to exist. W hile I was able to make a research
trip to the Chinese side o f the border for one month, I spent most o f the year in Almaty,
Kazakhstan where the Kazakhstan Academ y o f Sciences’ Institute o f Uyghur Studies served
9 See Rudelson (1997) for more about the differences that Uyghurs perceive in their different geographical
communities in their homeland.
1 0 The “Three Viliyat Revolution” was a revolt o f Uyghurs and other M uslims in the Kuldja area during the
twilight o f Republic Chinese rule. The revolution and its short-lived government were assisted by the Soviet
Union and had a strong Marxist orientation.
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10
as my host. In spending significant time in the Uyghur community o f A lm aty and working
with numerous local Uyghur scholars, I quickly learned that the study o f the Ili U yghurs’
recent reunification could not be undertaken without an understanding o f the long and
com plex history o f Uyghur cross-border interaction in the Ili valley. W hile I began to grasp
this history and its relationship to the social and political life o f Uyghurs in the borderland
today during this year o f fieldwork, I also knew that I was ju st at the tip o f an iceberg.
After about eighteen months in the United States editing a docum entary film and
defending m y masters thesis, both o f which were based on my previous year o f research
among Uyghurs in the Ili valley, I once again returned to Almaty, Kazakhstan in January
1997. M y approach to fieldwork during this year was more focused and more intensive.
Having learned the importance o f local urban neighborhoods, or mahallas, to the fabric of
Uyghur social life, I decided to make the Uyghur neighborhoods o f Alm aty the primary
fieldsite for my research. During the course o f the year, I spent six months living with a
family in the Uyghur mdhdlla o f Zar ’ ia Vostoka and six months living by m yself in an
apartment on the outskirts o f the Uyghur neighborhood o f Druzhba. In these two living
situations, I was able to participate in and observe the dynamics o f this cross-border
com m unity as they transpired in the local Uyghur neighborhoods of Almaty, which by this
time included many Uyghurs with Chinese citizenship as temporary residents. In these two
neighborhoods and several others in the city, I attended numerous com m unity meetings,
rituals, and holidays while also observing the more m undane aspects o f daily life both in the
neighborhoods and within specific households.
During this time, I also interviewed numerous people who represented different
segments o f the Uyghur cross-border community living in Almaty. The interviewees
included people whose parents and themselves had been born in Kazakhstan, people who
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11
were born in China but had migrated to Kazakhstan in the 1950s and 1960s, and people who
were still citizens o f China and were living in Kazakhstan only temporarily. In addition, the
interviewees spanned the spectrum o f generations, gender, and social classes including
young and old, men and women, intellectuals, petty traders, farmers, and wealthy
businessmen. W hile the interviews were conducted mostly as life histories, they also elicited
information about these individuals’ understanding o f the Uyghur nation and the Ili valley
borderland today.
During this year o f fieldwork, I also spent hours conducting historical research in
A lm aty’s public libraries and archives as well as in the personal libraries and archives o f
Uyghurs in the city. This research included piecing together the history o f m igrations and
Uyghur localities in the borderland as well as the history o f these com m unities’ political
battles to retain a sense o f autonomy while under the rule o f what they considered to be
outsiders (i.e. Chinese, Russian, and Kazakh). In addition, I was able to once again travel
across the border during this year to observe the Uyghur community in China for one month
and take note o f the changes that had transpired on the other side o f the border.1 1
W hile the extent o f my intensive fieldwork ended in January o f 1998,1 rem ained in
Alm aty for another two and one-half years working for the United States A gency for
International Development (USAID). During this time, I continued to participate in the
activities o f the Uyghur community, conduct historical research, and record interviews.
Furthermore, in the summer o f 2 0 0 0 ,1 made one last trip to the XUAR o f China to briefly
evaluate the changes that had transpired on the other side o f the border during the three years
since m y last visit.
1 1 Unfortunately, due to the tense political situation in Xinjiang in 1997, my research on the Chinese side o f the
border was particularly limited as I found m yself harassed by Chinese security officers on several occasions
merely for my knowledge o f the Uyghur language.
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12
The sum o f these years o f research in the Uyghur community o f Almaty,
Kazakhstan, bolstered by four brief excursions to the Chinese side o f the Ili valley, provide
the basis for this study’s ethno-historical examination o f this cross-border community. The
historical materials collected include secondary and primary literature in various languages,
the recording o f 38 separate life histories, and documents from official and personal
archives. The ethnographic materials are reflected primarily in personal fieldnotes based on
participant observation in the Uyghur community o f Almaty, but they also include the
ethnographic writings o f colonial travelers and contemporary Uyghur scholars as well as the
personal memories o f Uyghurs as recorded in interviews.
In collecting this data, three observations stood out as most remarkable about this
cross-border population. First, this community has endured a turbulent history o f
engagem ent with the forces o f globalization and state-building in the Ili valley borderland,
fostering multiple mass migrations and requiring constant cultural negotiations and
transnational political mobilization. Second, despite this unsettling history, or perhaps in
part due to it, the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley have persistently and with flexibility established
and preserved cohesive local communities on both sides o f the border, thus helping to
maintain a nation that is stateless, de-territorialized, and cross-border in nature. Third,
despite living in states promoting their own national and multi-national ideologies
throughout the twentieth century, the Uyghurs have continually engaged in the production o f
a distinct narrative for their own stateless nation. These three observations led me to
approach this study as an examination o f the interaction between the history o f the Ili
valley’s engagem ent with modernism, the construction and maintenance o f local Uyghur
communities, and the production o f the Uyghur stateless nation. The m ethodological and
theoretical bases o f this approach are described below as I outline its combination o f
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historical and anthropological perspectives as well as its theoretical understanding o f the
construction o f neighborhoods and the production o f nations.
3. L ocal a n d G lobal H istories on the M argins o f M odernity
The space that anthropology studies is historical space, and the primary
material o f history is localized—and therefore anthropological-time.
- M arc Auge (1999:5).
In the words o f M ichael Herzfeld, “anthropology and history have danced a
flirtatious pas de deux throughout the past century” (Herzfeld 2001:55). Despite these
flirtations, however, there remains a significant gap between the two disciplines that limits
the ability o f either to analyze social, political, and cultural processes. Recognizing M arc
A uge’s assertion that the space in which anthropology is conducted must be historicized and
that the time studied by history can only be understood locally with the help o f ethnographic
knowledge, this study attempts to bridge the gap between history and anthropology by
engaging both disciplines simultaneously. M ore specifically, it joins the diachronic
examination o f global processes, which is central to the concerns o f the historian, with the
study o f people’s lives in local communities, which usually commands the attention o f the
anthropologist.
It does not merely attempt to illuminate the affects o f global processes on local
communities. Rather, it explores the dialectical relationship between the social behavior o f
local people and the movements o f global history, accenting the struggle between global
hierarchies o f power and local collective human agency, or in the words o f Partha
Chatterjee— the contradiction between capital and community (see Chatterjee 1993:237). In
addition to its physical location in an international borderland, therefore, this study inhabits a
borderland o f disciplinary knowledge between history and anthropology and highlights the
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14
border crossings between the past and the present, structure and agency, and the local and
the global contexts o f our lives. It situates itself in this disciplinary borderland because one
can only understand the reasons behind the construction and persistence o f a stateless
Uyghur nation in the Ili valley by examining the diachronic global and local socio-political
processes that have fostered this consciousness.
The study’s examination o f the history o f global processes in this borderland can
otherwise be cast as a history o f modernism and the related phenomenon o f globalization in
the Ili valley. W hile many recent social commentaries have declared that globalization
represents a new era in the human experience facilitated by new technologies o f rapid
transportation and communication (cf. Hannerz 1989; Appadurai 1997; Glick-Shiller 1994,
Ong 1999), I argue, along the lines o f David Harvey’s critique o f post-modernism (see
Harvey 1990), that the affects o f recent technologies on social life do not m ark a m ajor shift
in the social order or historical trajectory o f the world. Rather, this most recent
technological compression o f time and space merely reflects a new phase in a m uch longer
process o f globalization that began with the initiation o f colonialism and the the
simultaneous birth o f the ideology o f modernism that facilitated its conquest. In other
words, the present phenomenon o f globalization is just another chapter in the longue duree
history o f our modern world system and, as such, provides little opportunity for an alteration
in the hierarchical order o f peoples in the world that emerged out o f the colonial encounter.
These assertions, o f course, are not entirely new to social sciences. Drawing from
the pioneering historical research o f Fernand Braudel, scholars such as Immanuel
W allerstein, Andre Gunder Frank, and Eric W olf firmly established a structural approach to
the historical study o f our interconnected world system in the discourse o f social science
over the course o f the last several decades (cf. Gunder-Frank 1993; W allerstein 1974, 1980;
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15
W olf 1982). The work presented here, however, provides a different perspective on this
history. It does not engage existing works by seeking to more precisely explain the origins
o f the world system or by providing a clear taxonom y o f its hierarchy. In fact, this study is
hardly concerned with the actual structural workings o f the world system, least o f all its
economic bases. Instead, it concentrates on the interaction between power and culture in the
developm ent and maintenance o f our present world system as experienced in a particular
locality among a specific population.
Such an approach is less based on W allerstein’s analysis o f the capitalist world
system than it is on W alter M ignolo’s recent subaltern re-examination o f world systems
theory that he calls the study o f the moderen/colonial world system (M ignolo 2000). Along
the lines o f M ignolo’s argument, this study presents modernity and colonialism as
inextricably linked ideologies o f European hegemony that are founded in the colonial
encounter and have fostered the establishment and persistence o f cultural, political, and
economic hierarchies on a global scale. W hile this perspective does not refute the
importance o f capitalist economic relations in the construction o f our present global political
and economic order, it does suggest that economic factors alone cannot fully explain either
the development o f our present world system or its modes o f domination.
In recounting the history o f globalization in the Ili valley from this perspective, this
study examines four distinct historical periods reflecting different processes in this
borderland’s engagement with the project o f modernism: colonization and colonial rule
(chapters two and three), de-colonization and the expansion of modernism (chapter four),
high m odernity and socialist entrenchment (chapter five), and the rise o f post-cold w ar neo
liberalism (chapters six through ten).1 2 For the Uyghurs, all four o f these periods can be
1 2 The term socialist entrenchment is used here to refer to the post-war period when the global spread o f
socialism as a state ideology was perhaps at its apex in the twentieth century. In this context, Soviet state
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16
characterized as offering unfulfilled promises. W hile colonial rule carried with it various
promises o f a better life through exposure to superior civilizations, the Uyghurs, like most
colonized peoples, were never allowed to partake in this better life on the same terms as did
their colonizers. Even more disappointing, while the subsequent post-colonial periods all
promised various forms o f liberation and equality to the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley, these
promises were likewise never fulfilled, and this borderland community rem ained on the
margins o f the world system as a disenfranchised minority in the states they inhabited. The
Ili valley U yghurs’ continued marginalization in the world system, therefore, reflects a
hidden caveat to modernism’ s promises: the progress o f the modern world is destined to
take place unequally in line with the global cultural, economic, and political division created
long ago between colonizers and colonized.
If the study’s approach to global history examines the intersection o f culture and
power in the articulation o f global modernity, its approach to local history describes the Ili
Uyghurs’ engagement o f modernism and its world system through the production,
maintenance, and practice o f local communities. Due to the construction and maintenance of
these local communities, the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley have survived as a distinct group
despite their marginal position in the world system and have provided them selves with social
spaces that evade control by dominant external forces. In the study, this local history is
presented together with the study’s account o f global history, localizing the later and
socialism likely was at its most stable period in history. In the PRC, however, the situation was quite different as
the Cultural Revolution deeply divided the country and virtually halted state econom ic and social institutions. It
is interesting to note that this period roughly coincides with an era in global capitalism that David Harvey calls
Fordism , during which time the traditional manufacturing industry reigned supreme in the realm o f capital
accumulation (see Harvey 1990:125-140). At this same time in the Soviet bloc, industrial production also
dominated econom ic forms o f accumulation. Furthermore, the transition from Fordism to flexible accumulation
that Harvey describes as accounting for cultural phenomena known as post-m odern roughly coincides with the
fall o f the Soviet Union and the adaptation o f Chinese socialism to more liberal-oriented econom ic policies.
While the study o f such links between the history o f these socialist states and trends in global capitalism could
lead us to some potentially important conclusions about the fall o f the U.S.S.R. and the growing power o f China
today, this line o f inquiry is beyond the scope o f this study.
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17
imbuing it with a narrative o f human agency and resistance. As a result, the study provides a
less determ inistic narrative o f the history o f the world system than most W allerstein-inspired
texts by accenting the ability o f even the most peripheral of populations in the world system
to resist global hierarchies in the local context, albeit often only with partial effectiveness.
Taken together, these two historical narratives, global and local, present an
analytical story o f the social experience o f the Uyghur borderland com m unity in the Ili
valley over the last two and one-half centuries. In combining historical and anthropological
analysis o f global and local processes, the study avoids being caught outside history in the
ethnographic present while also steering away from historical determinism and its lack o f
attention to the importance o f human agency and the forces o f cultural difference. M ore
specifically, this ethnographic history o f the Uyghurs and the Ili valley ultim ately helps us
understand why, how, and in opposition to what this borderland com m unity has persistently
constructed its own social spaces and, in the twentieth century, its own ideal o f a stateless
nation.
4. The P roduction o f Locality and the Struggle for Place and P ow er on the P eriphery
o f the M odern/C olonial W orld System
Ideological and political hegemony in any society depends on an ability to
control the material context o f personal and social experience.
- David Harvey (1990:226-227)
The work o f producing neighborhoods—life-worlds constituting relatively
stable associations, by relatively known and shared histories and by
collectively traversed and legible spaces and places is often at odds with the
projects o f the nation-state.
- Arjun Appadurai (1997:191)
As suggested above, the Ili valley Uyghurs engagement with modernism and the world
system is m ost evident in their production, maintenance, and practice o f local communities.
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Ever since the eighteenth century, the local Uyghur communities in the Ili valley have
provided an anchor for this borderland people in its attempts to assert its political voice and
power against all odds. In the absence o f a state structure to guide social and political
organization, these communities have been particularly important as an organizing principle
through which the Uyghurs o f this borderland have been able to mobilize politically and, in
the twentieth century, articulate their stateless nation. As such, they have provided an
alternative and isolated reality that defies the demands o f the state systems in which the
Uyghurs o f this borderland have lived. It might even be said that these localities are
something o f a state within states where the Uyghur community has been able to construct a
social life on its own terms. This phenomenon, however, has not been limited during the
modern period to the experiences o f the Uyghurs in the Ili valley borderland. Several
scholars have recently suggested, for example, that the construction o f local com m unities
has served as one o f the most powerful forms o f resistance to globalization and its existing
power structures among a variety o f peoples.
David Harvey, for example, has suggested that the growing power o f the state in the
twentieth century is directly related to its increasing ability to control space and place, thus
determ ining the parameters o f social life (see Harvey 1990:226-239). Harvey also asserts,
however, that states continue to face significant challenges to their complete control o f both
space and place. If the primary challenge to the state’s control over space em erges from the
increasing flow o f people and goods across borders, it is the power o f people to create
discrete local places, or communities, which presents the primary challenge to its control o f
place (see Harvey 1990:295-303).
Arjun Appadurai has taken this point a step further, noting that neighborhoods,
defined broadly as any self-organized local social spaces, limit the totality o f state power
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19
because “they usually contain large or residual spaces where the techniques o f nationhood
(birth control, linguistic uniformity, economic discipline, communications efficiency, and
political loyalty) are likely to be either weak or contested” (Appadurai 1997:190). Such
neighborhoods pose a particularly strong threat to the state control o f place when inhabited
by m inority and marginal populations who are already alienated from state institutions and
are more likely to produce alternatives to these institutions in their local places of
inhabitation. In this context, the production o f neighborhoods has become a critical and
contested arena for the local political engagement o f both homogenizing states and a
globalizing world system, especially for those people who are marginal in these systems o f
power.
This has indeed been the case for the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley not only in recent
years, but throughout the modern period. Through the production o f their own social spaces
and institutions in neighborhoods and villages, the Uyghurs of the Ili valley have continually
created an alternative to state constructions o f place on both sides o f the border and to the
global construction o f place in the world system. These alternative Uyghur social spaces,
however, have been constantly challenged by the states on opposing sides o f the border in
the Ili valley, which have sought to limit the Ili U yghurs’ self-reliance. The production o f
Uyghur localities in the Ili valley, therefore, must be viewed as a contested process that
highlights this population’s struggle with external domination and its desire to assert its
group consciousness as a stateless nation. In examining this contested process, the present
study draws from a number o f theoretical perspectives on the production o f locality and
community, illuminating not only why this borderland people has persistently sought to build
its own local communities, but also how they have done so.
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In general terms, the study bases its understanding o f the motivations for locality
and com m unity production on Fredrik B arth’s articulation o f the construction o f social
boundaries. W riting about ethnicity in 1969, Barth noted that group identity is asserted
through boundary construction, which demarcates one group from another. As he states
quite simply about the study o f ethnicity, the “critical focus (is) the ethnic boundary that
defines the group, not the cultural stuff it encloses” (Barth 1969:15). In other words, more
important than what a specific ethnic group represents is what it purposely does not
represent and against which it defines itself. I suggest that the same can be said for the study
o f local communities. Rather than studying neighborhoods or villages as isolated
communities with particular practices, the critical focus should be an investigation o f why
and how these localities are produced and in opposition to what other places and institutions.
Arjun Appadurai has offered such an approach to the study o f the production o f
locality in his recent writings on transnationalism (Appadurai 1997:178-199). In the same
vein as B arth’s assertions about ethnicity, Appadurai argues that the production o f local
communities vis a vis other hegemonic and homogenous places is articulated through the
construction o f social boundaries. According to this perspective, it is in the construction,
maintenance, and re-production o f community boundaries where one finds the focal point for
the local political engagement o f state power and the world system. As Appadurai notes,
“the production o f a neighborhood is inherently an exercise o f power over some sort o f
hostile or recalcitrant environment, which may take the form o f another neighborhood”
(Appardurai 1997:184). In the case o f the Ili Uyghurs, this hostile environm ent is that which
has served to marginalize them in global power structures— the states in which they live and
the modern/colonial world system more generally.
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In examining the construction o f community boundaries as the political engagem ent
o f external forces, this study pays special attention to the role of com m unity practices that
contribute to group socialization and the reproduction o f local knowledge as an alternative
to externally imposed knowledge and group allegiances. In doing so, the study once again
owes much o f its inspiration to A ppadurai’s work on the production o f locality (Appadurai
1997). According to Appadurai, the construction o f community boundaries involves the
dialectical creation o f social space and local subjects (Appadurai 1997:179-181). This
dialectical process in which local places and local subjects create each other transpires
through the reproduction o f joint community practice— rites o f passage, com m unity rituals,
holiday celebrations, etc.
W hile Appadurai clearly links such community practices with the production o f
locality, he unfortunately stops short o f describing the dynamics through which practice
translates into the creation o f social space. To understand these dynamics, therefore, one
must look elsewhere and, in particular, at the work o f Pierre Bourdieu and his theory o f
practice. According to Bourdieu, shared community practices, which he refers to as
practices o f coordination, are the central force in the construction o f both social space and
local subjects [Bourdieu (1977) 1987:22], Bourdieu notes that through the reproduction of
such practices o f coordination, individuals in a given community develop an unconscious set
o f assumptions about the proper performance o f social life. This set o f assumptions, which
Bourdieu refers to as habitus, is inscribed in individuals during childhood and reinforced in
them throughout their lives.1 3 The reinforcement o f this set o f assumptions is largely
facilitated by the competition for symbolic capital, or prestige, in the com m unity that is
waged by seeking to establish oneself as a m aster o f local knowledge who dem onstrates the
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22
correct practices expected o f all local inhabitants. As Bourdieu writes, “the agent who
‘regularizes’ his situation or puts him self in the right is simply beating the group at its own
game; in abiding by the rules, falling into line with good form, he wins the group over to his
side by ostentatiously honoring the values the group honors” [Bourdieu (1977) 1987:22],
In this sense, the drive to reproduce community values creates local subjects who, in turn,
recreate the community.
W hile this study draws heavily from B ourdieu’s articulation o f the mechanics
through which shared practices create both local subjects and social spaces, in the case o f the
Uyghurs in the Ili valley the inscription o f group practices is not as unconscious as
Bourdieu’s discussion o f habitus would suggest. Among the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley, for
whom the production o f locality is an overtly political act o f social boundary demarcation,
the reproduction o f com m unity practices and values is a conscious process that requires
internal com m unity negotiation and engagement with externally imposed practices and
ideals. In this context, the competition for symbolic capital is not m erely a force in the
reproduction o f practice; it is also a vehicle for the com m unity’s negotiation o f externally
imposed knowledge and local knowledge that, in turn, produces the continually changing
shared ideology o f the community. W hile Bourdieu suggests that habitus reproduces an
unchanging set o f practices and assumptions about the world, therefore, this study also views
habitus and its reproduction as a vehicle that mediates change and incorporates it into
existing local knowledge.
Throughout this study, therefore, the theoretical perspectives o f Barth, Appadurai,
and Bourdieu are utilized to examine both the continuity and change in the Ili valley
U yghurs’ production o f locality as this community engages the global forces o f modern
1 3 According to Bourdieu, the habitus is an “immanent law, lex insita, laid down in each agent by his earliest
upbringing, which is the precondition not only for the co-ordination o f practices but also for the practices o f co-
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23
history. The picture that emerges is one in which the local Uyghur com m unities in this
borderland are able to both incorporate and resist change as their members see fit and as the
context demands. This process, however, is also characterized by a continual struggle
between the Uyghurs and those governing the states in which they live over the “ability to
control the material context o f personal and social experience” (Harvey 1990:227). In this
struggle, the Ili Uyghurs continually have been forced to contest with the often heavy-
handed proscriptions o f the states in this borderland, which have frequently contradicted,
forbidden, or broken down Uyghur conventions o f community and its practices. In this
context, the ability o f the Uyghurs in this borderland to preserve their own sense o f
com m unity based in shared practices o f coordination has been critical to both the survival o f
these people’s drive for self-determination and its articulation in the form o f a Uyghur nation
in search o f sovereignty.
5. Im agining P olitical Em powerm ent: A nti-C olonial Resistance and the N arrative
o f the N ation
Now, the task is to trace in their mutually conditioned historicities the specific
form s that have appeared, on the one hand, in the domain defined by the
hegemonic project o f nationalist modernity, and, on the other, in the numerous
fragm ented resistances to that normalizing project.
- Partha Chatterjee (1993:13)
The “ narrative o f the nation, ” as it is told and retold in national histories
literatures, the media, and popular culture ...provide (s) a set o f stories,
images, landscapes, scenarios, historical events, national symbols, and rituals
which standfor, or “ represent, ” the shared experiences, sorrows, and
triumphs and disasters which give meaning to the nation. As members o f such
an “imaginedcommunity, ” we see ourselves in our m ind’ s eye sharing in this
narrative. It lends significance and importance to our humdrum existence,
ordination” [Bourdieu (1977) 1987:81],
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24
connecting our everyday lives with a national destiny that pre-existed us and
will outlive us.
-S tu art Hall (1996:627).
Thus far, the roots o f the Ili valley U yghurs’ political m arginalization in the world
system and the importance o f local Uyghur communities to these people’s resistance o f this
marginalization have been discussed in the context o f the persistence o f the stateless Uyghur
nation. The question remains, however, as to why this borderland com m unity’s struggle
with political marginalization has become expressed through the ideology o f nationalism.
The simple answer, o f course, is that the distribution of political power and territorial
sovereignty in the world has become overwhelming based on the concept o f the nation in the
last one hundred years. But why has this happened?
In the last two decades, there has been a revived interest among social scientists in
this question, and it has produced a large body o f useful literature. W hile the majority o f this
literature is in agreem ent that the nation, as a socio-political concept, is a social construction
that is invented, imagined, and/or reproduced by its members (cf. Anderson 1991; Balibar
1990; Fox 1990; Handler 1988; Hobsbawm 1990; Verdery 1990, 1991; W illiams 1989),
there has been less consensus concerning the origins o f this concept and the reasons behind
its alm ost universal appeal today. One o f the most popular explanations is that the nation
concept initially developed in Europe or the Americas and was subsequently adopted in a
modular form by people around the world through the globalizing forces o f colonialism and
modernism (cf. Anderson 1991; Gellner 1983). In the post-colonial school o f social
sciences, however, the assumption that colonized peoples simply adopted a common nation
form from their oppressors has been vehemently attacked as an idea informed by the same
belief in European superiority that characterized the spirit o f colonialism itself.
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25
Partha Chatterjee has been one o f the most prom inent voices criticizing the concept
that the nation form was merely transported unchanged from colonial m etropoles to
colonized people around the world. Chatterjee recognizes the critical role o f colonialism in
the spread o f the nation form, but he suggests that nationalism among the colonized not
only differed from that o f the colonizers but was diametrically opposed to it. According to
Chatterjee, the origins o f these two different nation forms emerged from a style o f colonial
rule, which from its very beginning was based on the same concept o f the intersection o f
biology and culture that has characterized the ideology o f the nation (Chatterjee 1993:16-
22). Calling this style o f domination, a rule o f colonial difference, Chatterjee points out that
colonial regimes made clear distinctions between the realms o f the colonizers and the
colonized, suggesting that the differences between these parties were irreconcilable by virtue
o f their different biological origins or races (Chatterjee 1993:18-24). As empires around the
world were being gradually transform ed into modern nation-states during the nineteenth and
early twentieth centuries, therefore, the impulse among colonized peoples was not to become
citizens o f their oppressors’ nations, but to create their own national movements in
opposition to those o f the colonizers. For this reason, Chatterjee suggests that the nation
form as adopted by the colonized people o f the world differed markedly from that o f the
colonizers. It em bodied a different vision o f the nation steeped in a “narrative o f
com m unity” that, instead o f serving the interests o f state-building projects, was expressed as
local resistance to the existing hierarchy o f the world system (Chatterjee 1993:237).
The type o f nationalism discussed by Chatterjee is particularly germane to the
Uyghurs o f the Ili valley, who are not only a former colonized people but still perceive o f
them selves as living under the neo-colonial rule o f outsiders. From the time that the
Uyghurs o f the Ili valley first engaged with the ideology o f nationalism in the late nineteenth
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26
century, they have always conceived o f their nationalist movement as a form o f resistance to
the global political and cultural hierarchy o f power that emerged from the colonial
encounter. It is not surprising, therefore, that this stateless nation has continually expressed
itself through a narrative o f community that defies the hegemonic power o f large states and
international political conventions.
As is demonstrated in chapters two and three o f this study, both Russian and Qing
rules o f colonial difference played critical roles in gradually transforming Uyghur resistance
to colonialism from the local struggle over the production o f place to a global m ovem ent for
national sovereignty. While this transformation altered Uyghur strategies o f political
mobilization, it did not obliterate the role o f the production o f neighborhoods and villages as
the primary organizational principle for the nation. This is evident in the subsequent
chapters o f the study, which stress the continued salience o f the local com m unity as the
primary mode o f expression and vehicle for the production o f the Uyghur stateless cross-
border nation.
W hile the nation form among the Uyghurs and other colonized peoples m ay differ
m arkedly from that o f former empires, the ability o f dispersed local Uyghur com m unities in
the Ili valley to imagine themselves as part o f a larger Uyghur nation was facilitated by the
same technologies that allowed former colonial powers to unite around the ideology o f
nationalism. In both cases, the collective consciousness o f nationalism that is shared by
people who have never met face to face has been facilitated by the emergence o f what I refer
to as mediated culture. In providing a very persuasive argument for the im portance o f mass
reproduced printed m atter to the construction o f the nation concept, Benedict Anderson is
responsible for introducing students o f nationalism to the critical role o f mediated culture in
the creation o f nations. Anderson points out that only with the proliferation o f mass printing
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27
o f popular writings, what he calls print capitalism, could people who had never met begin to
conceive o f them selves as somehow belonging to the same community by sharing in the
same mass reproduced cultural products (See Anderson 1991:36-46). A t the same time, the
mass reproduction o f printed m atter broke down the power o f sacred written languages and
began the process o f normalizing vernaculars into national literary languages, two events
that were central to the emergence o f nationalism.
Throughout this study, I use the term mediated culture to refer to both the process
which Anderson explains as print capitalism and the logical outcomes o f this process in the
multiple forms o f mass produced m edia we encounter in the world today (see Hall 1996). In
using the term mediated culture, I am referring to a field o f shared cultural consum ption that
is facilitated by mass produced cultural products. For the most part, these cultural products
are various forms o f narrative expressed not only in print, but in film, television, recorded
music, internet, and even in material culture that bears symbolic meanings and serves as
markers o f identity such as posters and automobile decorations. This mediated culture
becomes critical to producing a shared ideology o f the nation among strangers when the
narrative they represent is a narrative o f the nation, a story o f the nation’s origins and
struggles that connects “our everyday lives with a national destiny that pre-existed us and
will outlive us” (Hall 1996:627). Such a mediated narrative of the nation plays a particularly
important role in the production o f a stateless nation since such a nation has no state
apparatus to guide the production o f nationalist ideology through institutional means such as
schools, official holidays, etc.
For this reason, this study pays attention not only to the practices o f neighborhoods
in the construction o f the Uyghur nation, but also to the Uyghur production and consum ption
o f mediated culture in the Ili valley borderlands as it has contributed to a common narrative
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2 8
o f the nation. Particularly in the twentieth century, these mass produced cultural products
have been instrumental in creating a common Uyghur language, culture, history, and destiny
that join the tightly knit local Uyghur neighborhoods scattered throughout this borderland.
If this mediated culture has been informed by Uyghur practice, the reverse has also
been true through the invention o f tradition in the mediated reconstruction o f traditional
Uyghur ways o f being (see Hobsbawm and Ranger 1983). More than once during my
fieldwork, for example, I noted that the re-birth o f traditional Uyghur rites and rituals were
conspicuously linked with the publication o f certain articles or books on the subject or with
the appearance o f videos and audio cassettes. Furthermore, perhaps more important than its
role in the invention o f tradition, Uyghur mediated culture in recent years has served to
standardize cultural practices by providing detailed descriptions o f correct practices. In this
sense, the negotiation o f community ideals through the competition for symbolic capital in
Uyghur neighborhoods in the Ili valley has taken place in the sphere o f mediated culture as
well as in daily practice.
In examining both the motivations and mechanics o f the imagining o f a Uyghur
stateless nation in the Ili valley borderland, therefore, this study continually returns to the
interaction between the nation form and the production o f local communities. Am ong a
stateless m inority such as the Uyghurs, these two processes are interactive and critical to
m aintaining global political engagement that, without the benefit o f a state structure,
necessarily is expressed in the grassroots from which it emerges. W hile this imaginied
community o f the stateless Uyghur nation has not achieved its ultimate goal o f Uyghur
national territorial sovereignty, it has maintained the Ili Uyghurs’ political engagem ent and
voice within the world order o f states, albeit at its extreme margins.
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29
6. The Study
As already noted, this study is based on both ethnographic and historical inquiry.
While the study is divided roughly equally between the past and the present, its intention is
to problematize both the separation o f these two moments in time and the distinction
between anthropology and history. It is with intentional irony, therefore, that the study is
divided into two sections— the ethnographic past and the ethnographic present. This
division serves to separate the chapters that are based on direct participant observation
(chapters six through ten) from those that have relied on various historical records and
memories (chapters two through five). Taken together, however, these two sections present
a single story that is continually unfolding and has no narrative end. It acknowledges,
therefore, that the ethnographic present once recorded already becomes a part o f the
ethnographic past.
The first chapter, however, is written in both the ethnographic past and the
ethnographic present by examining the specific ways in which Uyghur local com m unities
are constructed. This portrait o f the founding principles o f Uyghur com m unity practice and
structure is not m eant to suggest that Uyghur localities have been reproduced without
alteration for centuries. Instead, it presents some o f the attributes o f these localities that
emerge from the Central Asian context and have been expressed with significant consistency
over time. Consequently, this chapter provides an important baseline for understanding the
production o f Uyghur localities in the Ili valley borderland throughout the study and for the
examination o f the ways in which this production has altered to m eet the demands o f
changing contexts.
Chapters two through five comprise the historical ethnographic past section o f the
text, examining a fairly significant period o f history from the Qing colonization o f Eastern
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Turkestan in the 1760s to the twilight o f the Soviet Union in the late 1970s. Chapter two
explores the construction o f a Uyghur borderland community in the Ili valley by describing
this com m unity’s experience within the processes o f Qing and Russian colonial expansion
and imperial rules o f colonial difference. Chapter three looks at this period o f colonial rule
up to the early twentieth century from the perspective o f the Ili U yghurs’ struggle to produce
neighborhoods and villages in the context o f Russian and Qing colonial rule and in
opposition to m any colonial proscriptions. Chapter four describes this borderland
com m unity’s engagement with modernist ideologies o f anti-colonialism, including
nationalism, socialism, and revolution. As such, it provides the story o f the Ili U yghurs’
gradual introduction to the nation form and the production o f the initial Uyghur narrative o f
the nation that have dominated their constructions o f group consciousness throughout the
twentieth century. Finally, chapter five examines the Uyghurs’ further engagem ent with
modernity, nationalism, and socialism on the Chinese side o f the border as well as the
construction o f separate Soviet and Chinese Uyghur nations that were divided by a closed
border during the Sino-Soviet split.
Together, these chapters recount both the Ili Uyghurs’ incorporation into the world
system through the colonial experience and their subsequent struggles to attain a political
voice as a marginal population within this system through the construction o f social space
and the expression o f nationalism. This section, therefore, provides a picture o f both the
global historical processes that have marginalized the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley and this
com m unity’s resistance to these processes in the form o f the production o f locality and the
nation. In this sense, they also present the reader with the historical foundations for the
expression o f the Uyghur stateless nation in the Ili valley borderland today, a subject which
is examined in depth in the second half o f the study.
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31
The remaining five chapters comprise the ethnographic present section o f the study
and concentrate on the production o f a Uyghur stateless nation in the Uyghur neighborhoods
of Almaty, Kazakhstan today. This section focuses almost exclusively on the Uyghur
com m unity o f Almaty because it is in this borderland city outside China where the
construction o f the Uyghur stateless nation truly involves players from all localities that this
transnational nation inhabits. In addition to Uyghurs who have long lived in this city,
A lm aty’s environment o f relative liberalism economically and politically has attracted scores
o f Uyghurs from Xinjiang as well as Uyghurs from other diasporic locations. In this context,
the Uyghur com m unity in Alm aty today is a critical site for the production o f a Uyghur
stateless nation and the most important location in the Ili valley borderland for the
negotiation o f that nation.
Chapter six provides an introduction to the context o f the Ili valley borderland after
the fall o f the Soviet Union, accenting the roles o f the spread o f global neo-liberalism and
evolving Chinese-Kazakhstan relations in defining the socio-political and economic
environment o f both Kazakhstan and Xinjiang in the 1990s. In addition, the chapter places
the Uyghur communities o f both Kazakhstan and Xinjiang in the context o f a changing Ili
valley borderland. Chapter seven provides an account o f the transnationalization o f the
Uyghur com m unity in Alm aty during this time, stressing this com m unity’s role as a window
into the hom eland and a doorway out o f Xinjiang. This chapter further argues that the
transnational nature o f this community makes it a central site for the production o f the
stateless Uyghur nation that includes this nation’s m any disparate parts. Chapter eight charts
the re-construction o f Uyghur localities and the revival o f Uyghur com m unity practices in
Alm aty in the wake o f the fall o f the Soviet Union. Chapter nine examines the production o f
a new narrative o f the Uyghur stateless nation through the production and consum ption o f a
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32
transnational mediated culture in Almaty. Finally, chapter ten describes the negotiation o f
this narrative o f the nation through ritual and social practices in the Uyghur neighborhoods
o f Almaty.
These five chapters build on the interaction o f local and global histories presented
in the ethnographic past section o f the study and subsequently bring this interaction into the
present. W ith the benefit o f more ethnographic data compiled through participant
observation, however, these chapters also provide a more detailed look at m any o f the
processes described in the historical section o f the text. At the same time, they allow the
reader to ponder the question o f the future o f this community and the prospects for its future
engagement with the world system.
In the conclusion o f the study, the text returns to theoretical questions concerning
the production o f locality, the world system, and the nation form. In particular, the
conclusion presents a discussion o f the relevance o f this study to the greater understanding
o f stateless nations, cross-border populations, and other marginal communities in the global
hierarchy o f cultures and peoples in the world today. In doing so, it raises the question o f
the importance and future prospects o f localized strategies for engaging an increasingly
homognenizing and globalizing world system.
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33
CHAPTER ONE— The Production o f Location and Community in Central Asia:
Neighborhood and Village in Uyghur Social Organization
The Native inhabitants o f Little Bukhara (Eastern Turkestan) do not have a
general popular name, but call themselves by their cities: Kashgarlik,
Khotanlik, Komulik, etc., or they merely call themselves "yerlik"—local.
-Chokan Valikhanov, circa 1850s (1985:157-158).
This statement by the Kazakh explorer and officer o f the Tsarist Army Chokan
Valikhanov highlights the importance o f locality to Uyghur constructions o f community and
group consciousness in the mid-nineteenth century.1 Today, as in the nineteenth century,
Uyghur constructions o f community and identity in the Ili valley borderland are intimately
linked to localities and their production.2 This chapter provides a general portrait o f some
common attributes o f locality and its production among the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley
borderland that have been a part o f Uyghur social life since the nineteenth century.
In presenting these common attributes, however, I do not intend to suggest that local
Uyghur communities in this borderland have remained unchanged for the last two centuries.
The characteristics o f Uyghur communities in the Ili valley have changed multiple times
since the 1800s, and even the common attributes described here have disappeared entirely
during certain periods under the heavy hand o f Soviet or Chinese cultural policies.
Nonetheless, certain attributes o f Uyghur communities have remained relatively constant and
have come to represent the practices necessary to produce a Uyghur locality. In offering a
1 It should also be noted that Valikhanov’s assertion that there was no single popular (“narodnyi”) name to
represent all o f the Uyghurs during the nineteenth century is more or less correct (cf. Gladney 1990; Rudelson
1999). This began to change only in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries as local Muslims throughout
Central Asia began to engage modernist ideas about the historio-scientific foundations o f group identity including
that o f nationalism (see chapter four).
2 Despite the fact that the Uyghur ethnonym was not widely used in the nineteenth century, I use this name
throughout the text in writing about all time periods covered. In doing so, I do not wish to suggest that the
Uyghur nation is a primordial construction that reflects the true identity o f these people. Rather, using this
ethnonym throughout the text avoids the confusion o f clarifying different names for different periods and
highlights the fact that this population, regardless o f what they are called, has shared a common history and
general common cultural attributes both in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It should be noted that in
chapters two through four, however, I also refer to the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley as Taranchis, a regional ethnonym
specific to that area.
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34
discussion of these common attributes of locality and its production among the Ili Uyghurs,
therefore, this chapter provides a baseline for understanding the dynamics of local Uyghur
communities as discussed throughout this study and introduces the reader to the vocabulary
used in discussing Uyghur communities and their practices throughout the text. Before
addressing these common attributes and the vocabulary that describes them, however, it is
necessary to examine the close relationship between locality and community among the
Uyghurs more generally and to provide some background on the roots of this relationship.
1.1 The Nomadic-Sedentary Divide and Concepts o f Community in Central Asia
When the Sart [i.e. settled person] becomes rich, he builds a house.
When the Kyrgyz [i.e. nomadic person] becomes rich, he marries. 3
Central Asian proverb recorded by N.P. Ostroumov (1908:11)
The term community represents a flexible concept that evades simple definitions. To
most people, a community is a group of people who share a common bond to each other that
emerges from shared interests and/or practices. While traditionally communities are thought
to be located in a specific place, they may also be united through the mediated world of
ideology or the ties of kinship. For this reason, not only can villages, neighborhoods, and
cities be communities, but so can clans, tribes, nations, ethnic groups, and even on-line chat
groups. In order to understand the constructions of community among a specific group of
people, one must begin by looking at the context in which community is expressed.
While changing contexts have continually altered the construction of community
among the Uyghurs of the Ili valley, localities— neighborhoods, villages, and oases— have
continually served as the primary site for the production o f Uyghur com m unities both in this
borderland and throughout Central Asia. This continual salience of location as a means of
3 Most nineteenth century sources refer to the varied settled people as one “nationality” known as Sarts (cf.
Ostroumov 1908;). Likewise, most Turkish speaking nomads in the region excepting the Turkmen (today’s
Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and Karakalpaks) were usually referred to merely as Kyrgyz (see: Levshin 1832).
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35
organizing community among the Uyghurs emerges from the context o f Central A sia’s
environment and its human geography, particularly the nomadic/sedentary cultural divide.
Central Asia's physical geography is a dramatic combination o f desolate deserts,
fertile oases, high mountain ranges, and extensive steppe lands. Historically, this geography
helped to foster two interrelated human subsistence strategies: pastoral nomadism and
intensive oasis agriculture. The former— mostly identified with the Kyrgyz, Kazakhs, and
Turkmen— relied primarily on animal husbandry and involved seasonal movements to find
appropriate pastures in the steppe and mountains for livestock grazing. By contrast, the
later— identified primarily with the Uyghurs, Uzbeks, and Tajiks— was founded on stationary
farming and relied on intricate irrigation systems, most o f which brought mountain glacier
waters to oases at the edge o f arid desert and steppe.
While scholars vary in their portrayal o f the ways in which these two subsistence
strategies have interacted in Central Asia, there is much evidence that together they have long
formed an interconnected system in which one strategy blended into the other along a
"nomadic-sedentary continuum" (Fletcherl 995:1X40-1X41).4 While a wide range o f lifestyles
have existed along this continuum, the people o f the region have also long identified each
other distinctly as either nomadic or settled, labels that have come to suggest not only
variances in economic livelihood but divergence in worldview as well. Furthermore, while
few Central Asians follow a nomadic lifestyle today and the affects o f decades o f collective
agriculture have greatly altered the settlement patterns and make-up o f rural sedentary people
in the region, these labels continue to be used and to carry significant social meaning even in
4 Bacon, for example, has noted that the Inner Asian pastoralists o f the 19th century "scorned agriculture," and
were "self-sufficient," stressing that, having developed outside agricultural society, they did not have the type o f
symbiotic relationship with settled peoples found among Southwest Asian pastoral nomads (Bacon 1954:46).
Lattimore, on the other hand, notes that the political structure o f Inner Asian nomads demanded sustained contact
with settled populations, even suggesting that, contrary to popular belief, pastoralism in the region had its origins
in agricultural society rather than vice-versa (1940:159, 333). Most scholars, however, agree more with Lattimore
than with Bacon concerning the historical interrelationship o f steppe and oasis in Central Asia.
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36
current urban settings.5 Given the persistent salience o f these clear emic designations o f
nomadic and sedentary peoples in the region, one must acknowledge that along the nomadic-
sedentary continuum a distinct divide exists in the minds o f Central Asians that ignores the
gray areas in between the pastoral nomad and the oasis dweller.
The proverb cited at the onset o f this section, which is still said throughout Central
Asia today by people on both sides o f the divide, represents one popular articulation o f the
perceived difference in priorities and worldview between nomads and sedentary peoples in
the region. This proverb, however, is about more than personal priorities and worldview; it
also reflects two very different concepts o f community— one based on shared kinship and the
other on shared space, to put them in the most general terms. These divergent ideals of
community appear to emerge from differences in the economic necessity o f group solidarity
among the two groups.
Into the early twentieth century, the lives o f the pastoralists, to differing degrees,
were anchored in mobile herding groups that included both direct traceable kin and the fictive
kin o f fellow clan members.6 These kin-based herding groups became the most immediate
and important communities to the nomadic pastoralist. When marrying into a kin group,
therefore, the nomad was also entering a community based on kinship o f which he/she
immediately needed to become a contributing member. While the oasis dwellers also
possessed strong kin networks, their livelihood was linked inextricably to their land and their
neighbors, with whom they needed to coordinate agricultural work and the use o f water. The
central community to the settled people, thus, was their local neighborhood or village and
5 Today, those who identify with a nomadic heritage include the Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, Karakalpaks (all speaking
closely related Kipchak Turkish languages), and the Turkmen. Those who identify with a heritage o f oasis
agriculture include the Uyghurs, Uzbeks (speaking closely related Karluk Turkish languages with significant
lexicon borrowings from Persian), and Tajiks (speaking a Persian language).
6 Each o f the nomadic groups had complex clan identities that followed the pattern o f nested groups o f kin
affiliation common to many pastoralist peoples throughout the world [usually referred to as segmentary social
structure following Evans-Pritchard (1940)]. These clan identities continue to be salient today, but in very
different ways than they were when these people lived a more nomadic lifestyle. For an account o f the meaning of
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37
included both kin and non-kin. An oasis dweller entered such a community by establishing
his/her family home and/or farming land within the boundaries o f an existing neighborhood or
village.7
While today the people o f Central Asia are no longer bound so tightly to the
economic patterns that fostered these two divergent models o f community, these separate
ideals o f community persist, fostering different models o f socialization, social interaction, and
concepts o f wealth and power.8 I assert that these divergent concepts o f community, based on
kinship and locality respectively, provide the clearest behavioral marker o f who is considered
either a nomad or a sedentary person in Central A sia today when the divergent subsistence
strategies upon which this divide is based are no longer apparent. The persistence o f these
forms o f community is substantiated by several scholars who have recently pointed out the
importance o f clan-based and regional differences in the cultural and political interactions of
the people o f Central Asia (cf. Rudelson 1997, Schatz 2000, Roy 2000).
Given the importance o f these concepts o f community to understanding the group
allegiances, practices, and interactions o f different people in the region, their further study
could be among the most important contributions that anthropologists can make to the inter
disciplinary study o f Central Asia today. Unfortunately due to the scope o f this study, I am
concerned here only with the concept o f community that dominates among those people in the
region who have long been settled farmers and urban dwellers, the side o f the nomadic-
sedentary divide that corresponds to the Uyghurs.
clan affiliations to the Kazakhs today, see Schatz (2000).
7 It should be noted that the settled communities o f Central Asia have long been resistance to newcomers. While
circumstances have often forced these communities to accept new members, settled neighborhoods and villages in
the region tend to possess a large degree o f continuity in their membership. In this sense, community ties have
also become kinship ties through the tendency to marry within one’s neighborhood or village.
8 In addition to defining the supra-ethnic distinctions o f nomadic and sedentary peoples, these different ideals o f
community also foster two divergent modes o f sub-ethnic self-identification that persist today. Among the
Kazakhs, Turkmen, and Kyrgyz, for example, sub-ethnic identifications are articulated in the form one’s
relationship to a series o f nested kinship-based clans. Among the Tajiks, Uyghurs, and most Uzbeks, however, sub
ethnic identifications are expressed in terms o f regional differences and allegiances to a series o f nested locations
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1.2 “ Z huts” and “ Zhutdarchilik”: Locating Uvshur Communities in the Nested
Social Spaces o f the Oases and their Practices
If community among the Uyghurs is almost exclusively conceived of in terms of
locality, Uyghurs rarely see themselves as members of only one local community. Despite
Valikhanov’s description of Uyghur identity as being linked to different oases in the mid
nineteenth century, at that time as well as today Uyghur group consciousness could be
expressed in multiple ways dependent upon context. These multiple expressions of identity
mirror the different levels of local community to which Uyghurs belong, and they emerge
from the varied nested social spaces of the oasis, which possibly were initially determined by
irrigation patterns.9 To understand the different place-based communities to which Uyghurs
perceive themselves as belonging, therefore, one must examine the nested social spaces
within the oases of the region and their interaction in the social life of this population.
The contemporary Uyghur ethnographer Abdurahim Habibulla describes these nested
social spaces of the oasis in his explanation of an ideal Uyghur social structure.1 0 According
to Habibulla, the Uyghurs’ social structure consists of a series of five nested socio-geographic
bonds: 1) the household, 2) the mahalla, 3) the kent, 4) theyeza, and 5) the shdhdr (Habibulla
1993:222-223). The mdhdlla is a tightly knit neighborhood of several households, the kent is
a group of three or four such neighborhoods, the yeza is a grouping of several kents in a larger
village cluster, and the shdhdr is a collection ofyezas usually reflecting an entire oasis. In
addition, each oasis has an urban center, also referred to as a shdhdr, which serves as the
primary commercial and cultural locus point for all of the people of the oasis. This urban
r a n g in g fro m th e o a s is to th e n eig h b o r h o o d .
9 This is another area o f research that warrants further study. Given the importance o f irrigation to survival in the
oases o f Central Asia, it is plausible that settlements formed around the irrigation network rather than vice-versa,
but it would require further historical research to substantiate this hypothesis.
1 0 It should be explained that in Soviet and Communist Chinese ethnography, ethnographic descriptions o f social
structure and other aspects o f a given group’s cultural behavior have been reserved almost exclusively for the
study o f pre-revolutionary life (pre-1917 in the Soviet Union and pre-1949 in China). For this reason, Habibulla’s
description o f the five levels o f social structure among the Uyghurs is not meant to describe life today.
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39
shdhdr, in turn, is also divided into mdhdlla neighbourhoods, often reflecting their
populations’ ancestral roots in one o f the oasis’ yezas or kents.
W hile Habibulla’s description, like most ethnographic explanations o f social
structure, represents a generalization and simplification o f the complexity o f actual human
organizational behavior, it does offer us a useful road map for understanding the nested
communities to which Uyghurs have belonged historically and continue to belong today.
While circumstances have altered the boundaries and meanings o f the five nested social
spaces described by Habibulla at different moments in history, the general categories o f
households, neighborhoods, villages, village clusters, and oases have been among the primary
forms o f Uyghur community consistently since at least the mid-nineteenth century.
For the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley, these different nested localities can all be expressed
in a single word—zhut—the meaning o f which depends upon the situation in which it is
expressed." In any number o f situations, a Uyghur may express his/her zhut differently as
his/her neighborhood, village, or oasis. In addition, one’s zhut can be expressed as a place
where one has never been, but from where one’s ancestors are descended. None o f these
expressions o f one’s zhut is exclusive o f another, all o f them representing the situational
inclusion in a certain community. Furthermore, the term zhut means more than locality; it is a
self-regulated community where joint practices and a sense o f common responsibility to these
practices creates a strong and cohesive local social space that fosters a powerful community
group consciousness. While attachment to local oases is often characterized as central to
Uyghur identities, it is the attachment to neighborhood and/or village that long has provided
the strongest and most immediate social construction o f community from which other
communities emerge.
1 1 The word zhut is often spelled yurt (see St. John 1993:522) or zhurt (Nadzhip 1968:483). In the Ili valley,
however, it is pronounced, and often spelled, zhut. In general, the word means “one’s home,” but, as will be
elaborated in this study, the meaning o f zhut among the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley is nuanced and situational like the
expression o f the concept o f "home" in any culture.
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If Uyghurs of the Ili valley use the word zhut to refer to the various nested social
spaces to which they belong, the term zhutdarchilik represents the fulfillment of the necessary
responsibilities of belonging to a zhut. These responsibilities, for the most part, are subsumed
into practices o f coordination [see Bourdieu (1977) 1987:22] that bring the members of the
zhut together and reproduce community or, to use Arjun Appadurai’s terminology, produce
locality among the Uyghurs (see Appadurai 1997: 178-199). As the practices that produce
locality and maintain community boundaries, zhutdarchilik are also important to this study for
their role in helping to reproduce the stateless cross-border Uyghur nation in the Ili valley
during the twentieth century.
Since this study’s historical scope begins with the Ili Uyghurs’ incorporation into the
world system through the colonial encounter, its examination of the continuities and changes
in zhutdarchilik must also begin with the colonial period. For this reason, the reader can
benefit from a brief reconstruction of zhut attachments and zhutdarchilik practices under
colonialism. This reconstruction will assist the reader to better analyze the remainder of the
study by providing the cultural context in which Uyghur communities have traditionally been
produced as well as by offering a vocabulary for understanding the institutions and practices
of Uyghur localities. Given the sparse ethnographic sources about Uyghur socio-cultural
practices that exist prior to the mid-nineteenth century, however, a reconstruction of
zhutdarchilik in the colonial context necessarily must rely on descriptions of these practices
from the second half of the nineteenth century. While this was a time when colonial rule was
increasing the role of the state in Uyghurs’ lives, it was also a time when few pre-colonial
practices had been entirely obliterated.
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1.3 “ Zhuts” and “ Zhutdarchilik” in the Nineteenth Century
While Uyghur social life and practice involved multiple localities in the nineteenth
century, it was the mdhdlla, the most local site of community, which was at the heart of the
construction of community. In the nineteenth century, as well as today, the mdhdlla, or
neighbourhood, served as the primary community both in villages and in urban centers.
Working in Afghan Turkestan, anthropologist Audrey Shalinsky characterizes a typical
mdhdlla as "a series of interlocked lanes (or) kocha" that are formed by joining the walls of
household compounds (Shalinsky 1994:33). Observing a village mdhdlla in Xinjiang at the
turn of the twentieth century, N.V. Bogoiavlenskii, the Russian Consul-General in Chuchak,
noted a similar pattern, writing that “each courtyard is directly connected to that of the next
house as if there was no room to build when, in reality, there was as much land as one wanted
to use” (Bogoiavlenskii 1906:95).
These interconnected blocks of households created a close-knit social space where
ritual practice, religious observance and daily life were shared and where "an outsider could
not buy a house... without the permission of the community" [Bacon (1966) 1980:73].
Essentially, the closeness of the mdhdlla community created a social bond of almost fictive
kinship. Given the high rate of divorce among Uyghurs in the nineteenth century that has
been noted by many travelers and colonial administrators [cf. Pevstov (1895) 1949:130-131;
Roborovskii (1895) 1949:425; Seletskii 1904:269; Bogoiavlenskii 1906:64], this fictive
kinship may have proven even more stable than the kin relations established by marriage.
This primacy of the mdhdlla community to Uyghur social ties and group consciousness is
evoked by a proverb still said frequently by Uyghurs today: “a close neighbor is better than a
distant relative” (Habibulla 1993:513).
Life-cycle rituals, including the naming of children, the circumcision of boys,
marriage, and the proper burial of the dead, were an essential part of the collective practices
of zhutdarchilik in the mdhdlla. When a certain life-cycle ritual was performed within a
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family, the entire neighborhood would usually attend its public celebration, or toy. As the
Russian traveler V.I. Roborovskii notes concerning the final rite of the life cycle, “on hearing
at the mosque about a death, all the neighbors gather for the morning prayer to honor the
dead; each neighbor sees it as their duty to take part in funerals so that others will also partake
in theirs” [Roborovskii (1895) 1949:438].1 2 In addition to creating local subjects through the
initiation of a rite o f passage (see Appadurai 1997:179), therefore, these life-cycle rituals
helped to create common social space by cementing the relationships between people in the
community through unified practice and interdependence.
In addition to life-cycle rituals, the community celebrations of holidays such as Roza
Heyt, Qurban Heyt, and Novruz also presented opportunities for zhutdarchilik practices of
coordination. Each of these holidays lasted for three days during which time people
performed heytlap, going from household to household in the mdhdlla to visit each other and
eat together [Pevstov (1895) 1949:133-134; Roborovskii (1895) 1949:441-442].1 3 Each
member of the community was always prepared during this time to receive guests as well as
to make courtesy calls on others. Since nobody worked during the three days of these
holidays, these times of the year presented a special opportunity for community interaction
and for further solidifying the binds that tied the mdhdlla together.
The m ahalla’ s practices of zhutdarchilik were also closely tied to the practice of
work. Through the collective practice of hashar, everybody in the community assisted in
large construction projects affecting the entire community such as the building of mosques,
roads, bridges, and irrigation canals (see Kabirov 1975:86).1 4 Likewise, the community
1 2 Likewise, neighbors were expected to help in the preparations for such rituals— thus, taking an especially active
role in these practices o f coordination. As the Uyghur ethnographer Habibulla notes, “if a ritual (toy) is to take
place in one’s zhut or mdhdlla, all those who hear about it, whether it be neighbors, relatives or friends, come to
say ‘congratulations, let the work begin; what work do you have for us?”’ (Habibulla 1994:509).
1 3 Heytlap, used here as a noun, is a gerund formed from the root word heyt, which is a Uyghur adaptation o f the
Arabic word for holiday, ‘aid. It reflects activity undertaken during holidays when one visits neighbors, relatives,
and friends.
1 4 The term hashar literally means “a task,” but it is often employed to the communal tasks which are called upon
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would unite to perform a hashar in order to assist poorer households or those suffering
debilitating tragedies. As Habibulla notes, “when construction began among those from the
zhut with economic and health problems, migrants from neighboring zhuts, or those who were
temporarily homeless, the entire mahalla would gather together to help and, beyond building
them a house, would temporarily furnish their home” (Habibulla 1993:509).1 5
This communal labor was particularly important for the irrigation system upon which
all people in rural regions depended for their livelihood. While the irrigation system was
widespread and included a large interconnected network of canals, a separate canal usually
served each mahalla or, at least each kent [cf. Grum-Grzhmailo(l 899) 1948:229; Pevstov
(1895) 1949:117-118]. As such, the maintenance and proper use of this canal was a matter of
community responsibility and an essential part of the structure of practices of coordination in
a mahalla or kent. Knowledge of the irrigation system and its upkeep was imprinted on
individuals, mostly males, from an early age as a part of his habitus, and the collective
practice of maintaining the canal was reproduced throughout an individual’s life. As the
Russian traveler Mikhail Pevstov noted, “each native (sic) begins to learn its [i.e. irrigation’s]
practice from early childhood; .. .during the summer in Kashgaria’s oases, it is not uncommon
to see groups of boys building miniature canals onto their play fields, drawing water into
them from the actual irrigation canals or forming pools by building dams” [Pevstov (1895)
1949:117],
If families’ life-cycle rituals, the celebration of seasonal holidays, and community
work provided the context for the m ahalla’ s practices of coordination, it was the local mosque
and the local ulema, or Muslim clergy, which framed these practices in the nineteenth
century. As the primary public space of the mahalla, the local mosque facilitated practices of
by the mdhdlla or kent communities.
1 5 Habibulla notes that such community construction projects, whether for the public good or to assist the
disadvantaged, “were public gatherings where people with strength offered their labor and people with livestock
offered work animals instead” (Habibulla 1993:507).
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coordination in the community by acting as a conduit of information and community
negotiations. It was at the mosque that people learned about births, marriages, and deaths in
the community [Roborovskii (1895) 1949:438], and it was at the mosque that the elders of the
community discussed and negotiated issues of concern for the entire mahalla such as the
performance of community work. Furthermore, as the center of religious knowledge, the
mosque was the final authority on the correct practice of ritual, especially with regards to its
religious manifestations. As such, the mosque was the brain-center of the community’s
collective zhutdarchilik.
Furthermore, the local ulema, who oversaw the mosque’s activities, held great power
in the mahalla and was almost always deferred to in the resolution of disputes and the proper
administration of ritual. A molla was expected to be at every life-cycle ritual in the mahalla
to ensure its proper administration and to bless the person in whose honor it was held [cf.
Pevstov (1895) 1949:126-134; Roborovskii (1895) 1949:429-437], Likewise, the local ulema
was responsible for the mediation of all community disputes through the enforcement of
Shar ’ ia law. While the Muslims of Eastern Turkestan throughout the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries were also subject to Qing law and those in Russian Turkestan subject to
Tsarist law, it was mostly the Shar’ia that governed legal order in local communities.
Although serious disputes were handled by clergy on the yeza level (see Valikhanov
1985c: 173), the more mundane matters such as marriage, divorce, and inheritance were
handled by the local ulema at the m ahalla’ s mosque.
The symbolic capital [see Bourdieu 1997( 1987): 171 -183] of the ulema was not only
due to its role as representative of the religious domain, but also due to its status as the
educated segment of the population. Having studied at a medresse, the ulema often had a
monopoly on the knowledge o f books, especially in rural communities. As the Uyghur
historian Sadulla Tahir writes, “the mollas of this period, having attained the most knowledge,
were given a position of honor and necessity in the zhut” (Tahir 1988:332). The great
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authority of the ulema, in turn, helped to facilitate the structure of the community’s
zhutdarchilik by imbuing it with Islamic orthodoxy.
This position of prestige also made the members of the ulema the obvious
administrators of the local school, or mdktdp. The mdktdp, which was usually in a separate
room alongside the local mosque but sometimes was in a private home, served most of the
children in the community. Virtually all children, both boys and girls, from a given mdhdlla
or kent attended the school in winter months for approximately five years from the ages of six
to twelve, during which time they learned Muslim theology through the Q ur’ an as well as
basic literacy in their native language [Pevstov (1895) 1949:140-141; Radlov (1893)
1989:522],1 6 In describing the institution of the mdktdp in Western Turkestan in the late
nineteenth century, Adeeb Khalid notes that “the primary impulse [of the mdktdp] was
conservational, the transmission to future generations of the finite, fixed truths of God”
(Khalid 1998:20). These “finite, fixed truths of God” were to be found in the w ord o f the text
rather than in its interpretation. Being based on what Benedict Anderson calls the “silent
sacred language” of religious texts [Anderson (1983) 1991:12], most mdktdps encouraged
rote memorization in lieu of critical thinking. As Tahir notes of the mdktdp in nineteenth
century Eastern Turkestan, “the children were taught Islamic faith, Islamic knowledge, short
aydts, and surds as well as to cite the Qur ’ an by memory, (but) the molla did not explain the
meanings of what was being taught” (Tahir 1988:330).1 7 As is discussed in subsequent
chapters, however, this form of the mdktdp was supplemented in the late nineteenth century
by a continuum of more progressive schools that were influenced by the Jadidist reform
movement and that taught a wider range of subjects including various scientific disciplines.
1 6 While most children attended the mdktdp, many did not study for the entire five years due to financial
restrictions and household responsibilities.
1 7 This methodology o f education explains why, despite the prevalence o f mdktdps throughout Eastern Turkestan
in the nineteenth century, the population, especially in rural areas, was overwhelmingly illiterate (see Valikhanov
1985c: 164). While the mdktdp often offered instruction in the Arabic alphabet as it was used for both the Arab and
local Turkish vernacular, the instruction was not active and did not encourage the use o f writing as a tool in daily
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In general, the m ahalla’ s structure of community practices, or zhutdarchilik, relied
upon many assumptions in the nineteenth century. These included the strict observation of
respect for elders, the deference to the Muslim ulema as the bearers of wisdom and faith, the
participation and assistance in the performance of each other’s life-cycle rituals, and the
sharing of resources and information. Those who demonstrated the most thorough knowledge
of zhutdarchilik were allotted symbolic capital [see Bourdieu (1977) 1987] and were viewed
as the leaders of the mdhdlla, the values of which they helped to shape. With the guidance of
these leaders, however, fulfillment of zhutdarchilik was demanded of all members of the
community and, thus, served to reproduce the community as a unified social space. In this
context, the conventions of zhutdarchilik were also reproduced by the desire of individuals to
gain symbolic capital and demonstrate their fulfilment of community responsibilities.
While the mdhdlla provided the grounding for the development and expression of the
community’s structure of practices of co-ordination, the oasis’ networks of mosques, bazaars,
and irrigation canals forced the practice of daily life beyond that of the tightly knit
neighborhood. The practices of these networks intersected with those of the mdhdlla, shaping
a multiple sense of community that simultaneously evoked the individual’s membership in
several nested social groups. Furthermore, these nested social spaces in the oases of Eastern
Turkestan produced an intricate framework in which the struggle for symbolic capital was
waged on multiple levels within the oasis complex.
The oasis’ hierarchy of Muslim ulema and network of mosques were particularly
instrumental in forcing a person’s group consciousness beyond the mdhdlla while also
facilitating the links between different levels of community within the oasis. In addition to
there being a mosque in each mahalla, or at least each kent, there was a jum a (“Friday”)
mosque in every yeza and urban shdhdr where the larger male community would gather for
life. According to Vasilii Radlov, for example, if 30-40% o f the population in the Ili valley could read in 1861,
less than 10% could write [Radlov (1893) 1989:522].
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Friday prayer. Furthermore, there was usually a central jum a mosque in the urban center of
the oasis, such as the Heytgah in Kashgar, which served as a special meeting place for the
greater oasis community during holidays and other important events. In addition, each
separate mahalla in the urban center had a mosque. The hierarchy of the oasis’ ulema, which
ensured continuity in religious observance across social spaces, interconnected this network
of mosques. In addition to being under the supervision of a centralized oasis ulema, local
mollas all left their respective mahallas to study in the sanctuary of the medresse, usually in
the urban center of the oasis, only later to return to their native mdhdlla. The ulema in each
mahalla, therefore, served as an essential link between neighborhoods and the oasis
community as a whole as well as between each individual and the sacred world of religion in
general. Likewise, the network o f mosques throughout the oasis served as a place of
interaction and communion for the collective on every level of a male’s social life as well as a
symbol of the greater Muslim umma locally. In addition to the people with which a man
would interact daily at the local mosque, for example, relationships were developed with
those from outside his neighborhood with whom he interacted every Friday at the jum a
mosque.
Furthermore, the ulema of the oasis and yeza level mediated the more important legal
matters that were considered to be above the local community, linking the mdhdlla to the yeza
and oasis in yet another way.1 8 The ubiquitous nature of the Shar ’ ia and the hierarchy
charged with its enforcement, therefore, created another important link between the local
neighborhood and the yeza and from these locales to the oasis as a whole. As a result, the
Shar ’ia framed the practices of all people in the oasis, regardless of their home or immediate
1 8 Valikhanov characterized the power to mediate most o f these legal matters as being in the hands o f the alim-
akhun at the level o f the yeza who oversaw the activities o f qazi-akhuns, acting as judges, and mufti-akhuns, who
presented the cases to these judges as a lawyer might [Valikhanov (1859) 1985c: 172-173]. Pevstov adds that such
alim-akhuns answered to the head religious authority in the oasis in charge o f legal matters, the hukum-qazi
[Pevstov (1895) 1949:140],
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location. Furthermore, being under the authority of God, this legal system linked the
inhabitants of the oasis to the greater Muslim umma.
Similarly, the oasis’ network of bazaars offered a site of social interaction on multiple
levels of community. In an oasis, each yeza had its own bazaar day, during which the yeza
community came together and interacted with merchants from the neighboring yezas of a
given kent [Pevstov (1895) 1949:143]. Likewise, the oasis center in the shdhdr usually had
two bazaar days, allowing the greater oasis community to gather and interact twice weekly.
These bazaar days in both the yeza and the shdhdr offered a special place of communion
where people could learn news, view cultural events, and interact on a social level in addition
to trading. The importance of the bazaar as a social space in this regard is evident in the
following characterization of a bazaar day in an oasis shdhdr of Eastern Turkestan by a
Russian bureaucrat from the late nineteenth century:
The whole day from early morning to the closing of the city gates, people
gather in large numbers at the Sart [i.e. Uyghur] bazaar. The majority of them
have no commercial dealings, but everybody considers it their duty to be at the
bazaar. For the Eastern person (sic), and the Sart in particular, the bazaar is a
club where he can find out about news, meet friends and acquaintances, and
engage in some entertainment which, while not very diverse, is enjoyable
enough for his taste (Bogoiavlenskii 1906:99).
In many respects, one’s participation in the bazaar was often a matter of community
responsibility, which, without being said, was expected of all those who wished to participate
in the competition for symbolic capital within the oasis and/or yeza communities.
Furthermore, the ability to participate in the actual exchanges at the bazaar was a particular
mark of esteem since it indicated one’s accumulation of financial capital. As Pevstov noted
of the bazaars in the Tarim Basin during the late nineteenth century:
Internal trade in Kashgaria, especially petty trade, is considerably widespread.
It can definitely be said that the number of traders in this country is greater
than the demand for them. This excess of people in the trading class is an
outcome of either an excessive propensity [towards trading] or, more likely of
the passion that these people have for trade as some kind of zealous game. The
practice of trade is the lifelong dream of many poor city dwellers and people in
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49
the countryside. As soon as they are able to accumulate a small amount of
money, they immediately open trade [Pevstov (1895) 1949:143].
Another networked practice of coordination that helped facilitate a Uyghur’s
identification with the multiple levels of his/her social life was the system of irrigation canals
that physically defined the oasis. Unlike the networks of mosques and bazaars, however, the
irrigation system did not provide a common site of interaction on multiple social levels as
much as it created a mutual dependence within the oasis. In addition to being a communal
responsibility on the levels of the mdhdlla and kent, the maintenance of the interconnected
irrigation canals of the oasis was a task common to all of the oasis’ inhabitants. In this
context, it is not surprising that the most important local officials in daily life were often not
the hakim bags, who held central administrative power, but the miraps, who oversaw the
proper use of the irrigation system on multiple levels. The miraps on every level of social life
{mdhdlla, kent, yeza, and shdhdr) possessed great symbolic capital, being relied upon to make
sure that water was distributed fairly at each point of its common use [see Pevstov (1895)
1949:118]. While this system was frequently abused, it appears to have worked well enough
to provide a practice of coordination that crossed all of the nested levels of the Uyghur
community in the oasis.
In addition, holiday celebrations played an important role in reaffirming the binds
established on multiple levels of social space through all of these networks. During the
important Muslim holidays of Roza Heyt and Qurban Heyt, most people would go to either
the yeza or shdhdr mosque to pray and interact with the greater community [cf. Habibulla
1993:365, 368; Pevstov (1895) 1949:133; Roborovskii (1895) 1949:441-442], Furthermore,
during these two holidays as well as during Novruz, people’s cordial visits through the
practice of heytlap reinforced personal binds that crossed the nested social spaces of the oasis
as people traveled to other mahtillds, kents, and yezas to be guests at the homes of friends and
relatives.
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In general, all of these practices served to produce among the Uyghurs of Eastern
Turkestan a multi-dimensional complex of practices that brought them in communion with
different levels of community outside the mdhdlla. The reproduction of these practices on
various levels of social life, in turn, facilitated an interwoven practice of coordination in the
oasis as well as within each of its nested communities. In this context, individuals competed
on different levels for esteem and honor through demonstrating a mastery of the structures of
community practice in the multiple communities to which they belonged.
It should be noted, however, that the inscription of zhutdarchilik both as it related to
the production of the mahalla and the larger communities within the oasis was not
accomplished through the reproduction of unconscious practice alone as is the case in
Bourdieu’s articulation of habitus [Bourdieu 1977(1987)]. There existed at least one ritual,
the mashrap, which promoted the overtly conscious teaching of zhutdarchilik. While in
Western Turkestan, the mdktdp apparently was the primary medium for the transmission of
“proper modes of behavior and comportment,” or adab (see Khalid 1998:20), in Eastern
Turkestan, the mashrap taught youth these important practices that were expected of every
member of a given zhut. Given the importance of this ritual and the various ways in which it
has been altered and re-fashioned among the Uyghurs of the Ili valley in the last two
centuries, it warrants some special attention here.
1.4 The “ Mashrap ” as Transmitter o f “ Zhutdarchilik” and the Structural
Foundations o f the “ Z h u t’’
Unfortunately, accounts of the mashrap are almost absent from the ethnographic
record of the nineteenth century. The only substantial references I have found in nineteenth
century ethnographic texts regarding the mashrap are two short passages provided by Chokan
Valikhanov and Nikolai Pantusov respectively. Valikhanov briefly remarked on the ritual as
a Kashgar party in his observations of Uyghur culture in Kashgar during the mid-nineteenth
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51
century [Valikhanov (1859) 1985c: 169]. Since he does not explain the practices involved in
this party, however, Valikhanov only reaffirms that the existence of this ritual at this time.
Referring to the ritual as a game, however, Pantusov provides a somewhat clearer picture of
its practices in Kuldja in the last decades of the nineteenth century. According to Pantusov,
this game was a gathering of 20 to 30 people who donated money to the extent of their ability
and took turns reading passages from hand-written manuscripts (usually of religious
significance), playing music and dancing, reciting oral arts, and partaking in a communal
feast (Pantusov 1907:5, 10-12).1 9
Pantusov’s descriptions are further substantiated by an early Soviet Communist Party
document from 1926 that analyzes the mashrap for the purpose of determining its
appropriateness in socialist society. This document describes the pre-revolutionary practice
of this ritual similarly to the account provided by Pantusov while adding several important
details (AOGA Kaz SSR, f. 94, op. 1, d. 42, sv. 6:418-419).2 0 According to this document,
the mashrap was practiced in late fall and winter when agricultural work was less demanding,
was confined to age co-horts, and was performed once a week, each time at the house of a
different member.2 1 Furthermore, in addition to reaffirming the existence of the practices
described by Pantusov, this document notes that the mashrap enforced a code of discipline
among its members through a hierarchy of leaders who ascribed embarrassing punishments to
those who broke this code of conduct.
Indeed, to nineteenth century colonial officials and travelers such as Valikhanov and
Pantusov, the Uyghurs of the nineteenth century would have likely merely characterized the
mashrap as either a party or a game, both of which it technically was. The Soviet Communist
191 would like to thank Jay Dautcher for bringing this account of the mashrap to my attention. Also, see Dautcher
(1999:346-347).
2 0 Another more recent Soviet source from 1975 that is cited by Adeeb Khalid (1998:24) provides another
reaffirmation o f the practice o f reading from texts at these rituals.
2 1 The document mentions that in cities, adult mashrap groups were often based on common occupations rather
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Party document from 1926, however, portrays a more complex ritual that fulfilled a variety of
roles in the production of locality. This more complex portrayal of the mashrap is further
substantiated by a number of recent ethnographic texts in Uyghur that claim to describe the
traditional form of the ritual. While these sources provide few references and rely primarily
on the memories of elders who can recount how the ritual was taught to them by their parents,
they do offer us a more detailed idea of what a mashrap looked like in the nineteenth century.
In addition, these sources provide us with at least a popular understanding of the origins of
this ritual.
Most contemporary Uyghur sources on the mashrap suggest that it is a very old ritual
that pre-dates Islam in Eastern Turkestan, and that it received its present name, which means
“watering hole” in Arabic, only with the adoption of Islam in the region (see Abdilim
1994:17).2 2 According to Tahir, the practice of the mashrap prior to the Islamicization of
Eastern Turkestan (circa 934 A.D.) involved the drinking of wine, which may explain the
origin of its present name, and included both men and women (Tahir 1988:319-320). With
the establishment of Shar ’ia law, however, the ritual itself was altered to assist in the
inscription of a habitus that, at least in part, was based on a Muslim orthodoxy. In the form it
was practiced in the nineteenth century, therefore, the mashrap apparently forbade alcohol
and was sex segregated. At the same time, however, informal parties including both young
men and women might also have been referred to as mashraps.2 3 Furthermore, a parallel
structure of female gatherings with similar practices apparently also existed (see Pantusov
1890 :XI).
th an o n a g e co -h o rts.
2 2 The Soviet Communist Party document, however, notes that the Arabic name o f this ritual suggests that it had its
origins in the early Muslim period o f Eastern Turkestan.
2 3 One nineteenth-century Uyghur song transcribed by N.N. Pantusov, a colonial administrator in Kuldja during
the Russian occupation, substantiates this point. In giving up on the women he loves, the song’s narrator sings,
“leaving my girlfriend at home, we will play the mashrap in the garden; wiggling my eyebrows, we will play and
make my girlfriend jealous” (Pantusov 1890:137). While the text is somewhat ambiguous, its narrator suggests
that he will flirt with other women at the mashrap.
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The paucity of references to the mashrap in the colonial ethnographic record may
have been due to its role during the nineteenth century in creating local subjects who could
construct and maintain their community both outside and in resistance to colonial rule. More
specifically, this ritual served many purposes in the local community from a rite of passage to
the inscription of social organization, but in the opinion of contemporary Uyghur
ethnographers, the ritual was first and foremost a means of cultural education for young men.
According to recent Uyghur scholarly literature on the ritual, the traditional form of
the mashrap was a gathering of young men of the same age co-hort from a single mahalla or
kent that took place during the long hours of winter evenings. Meeting on a regular basis
each winter, this group of men self-identified collectively as the ottuz oghul or “thirty sons.”2 4
In the first meetings, the ritual was a rite of passage for young Uyghur men as they came of
age. As a boy reached puberty, he was properly initiated into a mashrap through being
brought to an already forming group by his father or his father’s representative (cf. Uyghur
1996:141-142; Abdilim 1994:21-22). In a rather dramatic representation of the rite of
passage that was symbolized in joining this ritual, the father or his representative allegedly
would say to the ottuz oghul, “the boy’s skeleton is ours, but his flesh is yours; teach him
morals and manners, for I have brought him to the mashrap.'” (Uyghur 1996:141).2 5 In this
theatrical manner, the family that raised the young man quite vividly expressed that it was
handing over the role of further socializing its son to his local peers, inducting him as an
active member of the community. In this sense, the mashrap’ s role as a rite of passage very
definitely contributed to the production of locality through the conscious reproduction of local
2 4 This name does not suggest that a mashrap should always consist o f thirty men. Rather, whatever the number
of participants, the group is known as ottuz oghul (see Zulfikar 1993:47), and the group is usually limited to no
more than thirty men (see Uyghur 1996:141).
2 5 It is significant that this phrase is used by various Muslims in Central Asia and elsewhere to express similar
events o f rites o f passage. It was typical, for example, to employ this statement when introducing a child to the
maktab as well (Ostroumov 1907:248; Khalid 1998:22).
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subjects.2 6
Once a group of young men began participating in a mashrap, it followed the
examples of older groups of ottuz oghul that had started before it and formed a hierarchy
within their group. While this hierarchy of the mashrap varied, it usually included a zhigit
beshi, or head male, who was responsible for the general planning and organization of the
ritual, a pashshap who was responsible for maintaining order during the mashrap, a saqchi, or
guard, who helped the pashshap, a qazibdg, or judge, who was the primary authority in
making decisions during the mashrap, and a kasir or kulbagi who was responsible for
handling all money affairs for the group (cf. Uyghur 1996:141; Abdilim 1994:20-21; Zulfikar
1993:47). These roles mirror or resemble many of the titles of the administrative officials, or
bags, in Eastern Turkestan in the nineteenth century, making the ritual also an internalized
articulation of the society’s larger socio-political structure.2 7
According to the literature, once such a hierarchy was established, the important
activity of moral and cultural education began. Indeed, this part of the ritual was one of the
most essential aspects of its efforts to inscribe zhutdarchilik in its members. As one Uyghur
writer recently poetically characterized the ritual, “at mashrap gatherings, learning traditions,
customs, and etiquette, mastering the true spirit of Islam, and listening to advice through
moral admonition are all accomplished via the inspirational avenues of laughter, jokes, and
music, making it the Uyghur people’s school for learning its cultural traditions” (Omar
1997:6). In this sense, the mashrap reproduced the practices of the community through a
gathering much like a party, ensuring that what were viewed as traditions, or in Uyghur—
urp-adatlar, were internalized by the members of the ottuz oghul as a part of their duty to the
2 6 Arjun Appadurai has noted more generally that “a great deal o f what have been termed rites o f passage is
concerned with the production o f what we might call local subjects, actors who properly belong to a situated
community o f kin, neighbours, friends, and enemies” (Appadurai 1997:179). The mashrap ritual would seem to
demonstrate an obvious case for this assertion.
27 Whether these bag titles originated historically from those adopted by different members o f the ottuz oghul in a
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community. Along these lines, Uyghurs in the Ili valley use the expression mashrapni
kormigan bala, “a boy who has not seen a mashrap,” to refer to a young man who is deemed
culturally uncouth due to his lack of mastery of the community’s expected behaviors.
The traditions learned at the mashrap included daily etiquette, such as respect for
elders, the proper way to shake hands and address people with honor, how to host guests, and
other mundane aspects of zhutdarchilik. The mashrap, however, also served as the primary
medium for transmitting the traditions of an oral culture of poetry, song, and humor as well as
the art of dance that was an important part of practices of coordination at Uyghur
celebrations. As a result, the ritual is often described in recent Uyghur written sources as a
san ’ at maktipi, or school o f art (see Abdilim 1994:31-34).
Most of these sources refer to numerous games which required the participants to
practice these various forms of oral tradition and folk art, helping them to internalize art
forms through repeated practice (cf. Abdilim 1994:31-33; Habibulla 1993:405-409; Uyghur
1996:143-144). Essentially, these games reproduced the oral tradition of Uyghurs in the
memories of individuals and, therefore, were an important medium for the transmission of
history and resistance, both of which were the subject of many Uyghur poems and songs.
Furthermore, these games were arenas for the accumulation of symbolic capital, as those who
were able to master oral arts were given high esteem in the mashrap and later in the
community at-large.
An especially important part of the mashrap in this respect is the art of joke telling,
known in Uyghur as chaqchaq. This practice involves not only pre-rehearsed jokes, many of
which are passed on from generation to generation, but also humorous exchanges between
two people who rapidly fire insults at each other in a manner similar to the African-American
practice of the dozens. The chaqchaqchi (“comedian” would be a rough translation) who
mashrap or vice-versa is unknown.
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mastered this art was venerated in the mdhdlla and was always an important guest at any
ritual celebration.
While the recent literature on this ritual also refers to the m ashrap’ s role in
establishing Muslim orthodoxy in addition to the community’s structure of practices, it tends
to downplay this role of the ritual, which is so pronounced in earlier accounts. Most of this
literature, for example, fails to discuss the important role of the mashrap in the reading and
study of religious manuscripts, which provided commentary on the proper interpretation and
practice of Islam. While it discusses in much more detail the ritual’s enforcement of a code
of behavior for its participants, in doing so, it stresses the moral rather than religious
dimensions of this code. According to recent sources, the enforcement of the m ashrap’ s code
of conduct, which usually included the basic laws of the Shar’ia, was established through
judgment sessions where punishments were levied on members of the ottuz oghul for moral
digressions. This judgment session, known as the orda, required the various members of the
ottuz oghul to inform on each other concerning minor infractions of Shar’ia law, which were
then punished in humorous ways that created great embarrassment for the violator. As one
Uyghur writing about the mashrap has stated, “the purpose of the m ashrap’ s punishments is
to create a public atmosphere of humor and laughter through which the youth can learn about
self-control and morality” (Abdilim 1994:26).
Both through the reciting and discussion of religious manuscripts and through the
enforcement of a code of conduct, therefore, the mashrap reinforced the mdktdp as a means of
spreading a Muslim worldview. In comparing the more active methodology of self-education
in the mashrap to the rote memorization required by the central authority of a molla at the
mdktdp, the former was also likely a more successful medium for the transmission of this
knowledge and its expected behaviors.
While these educational components are portrayed in recent Uyghur literature as the
central functions of the mashrap gatherings, it is the activities that the ottuz oghul undertook
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57
as a group in their later years that truly reproduced zhutdarchilik. In many respects, from the
inception of a mashrap, the ottuz oghul became an extended family of fictive kin within their
mahalla, helping each other with the organization and execution of their respective families’
life-cycle rituals as well as in the general economic maintenance of their households.
Furthermore, this co-hort of men would help to reinforce the unwritten rules of zhutdarchilik
among each other and among younger co-horts. In general, therefore, it could be said that a
group of ottuz oghul formed yet one more level of community within Uyghur social life
between that of the household and that of the mdhdlla, with each ottuz oghul group
representing a different age co-hort of men that crossed households in the neighborhood.
In an ideal local social structure based on mashrap age co-horts, the different groups
of ottuz oghul in the community formed a self-regulating hierarchy of male groups, the
relative power of each being determined by their respective ages. As a result, the men from
the oldest mashrap become the ultimate authorities in the community, and the middle-aged
groups of ottuz oghul become the most active in doing work for the community. In this sense,
the cohesiveness and livelihood of the community depended upon the active work o f different
mashrap groups, and each group worked to regulate itself by taking responsibility for the
proper behavior of its respective members. As one Uyghur writer plainly articulates the
importance of this activity in the creation of a cohesive community, “through the respect and
influence of the ottuz oghul in a community, the people of that community come closer
together” ( Uyghur 1996:143-144).
1.5 Ideal Structures o f Practice and Historical Change: Uvshur “Z huts” and
“ Zhutdarchilik" in the Ili Valiev During the Nineteenth and Twentieth Century
This chapter has provided an ideal portrait of Uyghur zhuts and zhutdarchilik in the
nineteenth century that is based mostly on observations of Uyghur practices in the network of
oases in the Tarim Basin. While much of what has been described has existed in practice
throughout the Ili valley in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the Uyghurs of the Ili
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borderlands also faced numerous obstacles to the reproduction of this lifestyle. First, the
forced migration of Uyghurs to the Ili valley from oases throughout the Tarim Basin took
these people out of the arid environment that apparently spawned this social structure and
placed them in a fertile valley where geography required new strategies for economic
livelihood and social organization. Second, the rule of colonial regimes and post-colonial
states in the Ili valley played an important role in limiting the power of Uyghur zhuts and the
practices of zhutdarchilik with varying degrees of success.
Given these obstacles, the Uyghurs of the Ili valley have been very flexible in their
expressions of zhuts and zhutdarchilik practices, demonstrating a continual ability to change
practices to meet the demands of new environments. Nonetheless, as is demonstrated in the
rest of this study, the Uyghur production of locality in the Ili valley during the nineteenth and
twentieth centuries has remained the primary vehicle for this community’s political, cultural,
and economic survival in an often hostile environment. Furthermore, the Uyghur production
of locality in the Ili valley during this time has been based both in the nested structure of zhuts
and the practices of zhutdarchilik described in this chapter. This reproduction of zhuts and
the practices of zhutdarhilik in the Ili valley has helped to create a context of social life that
has evaded the externally imposed proscriptions for Uyghur social life presented by colonial
rule, communist powers, and post-communist neo-authoritarian states alike.
While the role of the ulema in the reproduction of local communities was greatly
limited by Soviet and Chinese states during the twentieth century, other aspects of
zhutdarchilik did not disappear. Life cycle rituals and religious holidays were continually
observed throughout the communist period in the Ili valley. Likewise, bazaars continued to
play an important role in Uyghur social life even in a socialist economy, and the practices of
hashar found useful applications to life on collective farms. Even the mashrap, which was
always regarded with suspicion by communist and post-communist states in the region, found
expression in a variety of different forms. Furthermore, in the last decade of the twentieth
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century, those practices of zhutdarchilik that previously had been limited by communist states
have enjoyed a re-birth that has sought to reproduce many of the practices described above.
The rest of this study tells this story of the continuities and changes in Uyghur zhutdarchilik
in the Ili valley in more depth, stressing the ways that these practices also have served to
construct Uyghur social spaces that help to maintain a stateless cross-border Uyghur nation
against all odds.
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PA R T I; TH E E T H N O G R A PH IC PA ST
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C H A P T E R TW O — The Origins o f the Uyghur Community in the Ili Valley
Borderland: Im perial Rivalries and Taranchi M igrations (1760-1900)
The story o f the establishment o f the Uyghur community in the Ili valley is a
tum ultuous one that is intertwined with the historical meeting o f com peting colonial regimes
in this remote river valley. For the Uyghurs living there, this history o f double colonization is
remem bered for the multiple forms o f external domination the community faced and for the
m any displacements it was forced to undertake. The present chapter recounts this turbulent
history in relative detail in order to describe the origins o f the global and local contexts in
which the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley have lived in the twentieth century. In doing so, it
provides a narrative o f the Ili U yghurs’ incorporation into the world system, the origins o f
their marginal position in this system, and the roots o f their cross-border lifestyle.
2.1 Qins Colonization o f the Ili Valley and the Origins o f the Taranchis Frontier
Community
Those mountains, those high mountains,
They block the road o f the weary traveler.
I f the poor man dies, who will weep;
For the sufferer, only sufferers cry.
They say that I sing songs,
But what to do but sing?
For where is my home?
About that I would rather not think.
- A Uyghur song about the involuntary migration from Kashgar to Kuldja, circa 1767
(Pantusov 1881b).
The origins o f the Uyghur borderland community in the Ili valley date back to the
m id-eighteenth century, the time o f the Qing em pire’s colonization o f the U yghurs’
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6 1
homeland in Eastern Turkestan.1 W hile various dynasties o f the Middle Kingdom had
controlled the U yghurs’ homeland at different times throughout history, the Q ing’s
engagem ent with this region in the mid-eighteenth century marked the beginning o f a
decidedly different relationship between China and Eastern Turkestan. Among other things,
this relationship began a phase in the history o f the Uyghurs and their homeland during
which they have been subordinate to China proper and without international political
representation almost without exception into our present day.
The Qing colonization o f Eastern Turkestan was initiated with the Em pire’s defeat
o f the last o f the Mongol empires o f the steppe— the Junggar K hanate.2 From the early
seventeenth century, the Junggars, a powerful union o f nomadic M ongol tribes, had
controlled the Ili valley and used the region as a base for its empire-building endeavors that
included the conquest o f the Uyghurs and their homeland o f Eastern Turkestan.3 W hile the
Junggar K hanate’s expanding power worried both the Qing Empire that bordered it to the
east and the Russian Empire whose new territories in Siberia bordered it to the north, it was
ultimately the Qing that decided to halt the Junggars’ expansion.4
1 Again, I use the name Uyghur here although by most accounts this name was not in popular usage (see chapter
one, footnote 2).
2 The name Junggars literally translates as the left wing and refers to a confederation o f Oyirat M ongols including
the Choros, Khoit, Khoshuut, and Dorbot tribes. In the second half o f the seventeenth century, they formed a
powerful Khanate and became the most dominant power on the steppe. See Zlatkin (1983) for a comprehensive
study o f their rule.
3 The Junggars placed their capital near the present city o f Kuldja and the medieval city o f Alm alyk in the heart
o f the Ili valley (Bartold, 1956:161). In conquering the Uyghurs’ homeland o f Eastern Turkestan, the Junggars
took advantage o f the power struggle within the Uyghur Naqshabandi Sufi order M akhdumzada, whose two
separate lineages, the Ishaqiyya (“black mountain” or “black hat”) and the A paqiyya (“white mountain” or “white
hat”) groups, competed for political power. In 1678, Apaq Khoja, the leader o f the Apaqiyya group, asked the
Tibetan Dalai Lama to convince the Junggars to help him conquer his rival from the Ishaqiyya (Grigor’ev
1873:358). Having assisted Apaq Khoja to conquer his rivals, the Junggars subsequently ruled the Tarim Basin
through their Apaqiyya Sufi allies.
4 Given the legacy o f the M ongol Empire o f Chingis Khan, both the Russian and Qing Empires may have
considered the Junggars a potential threat not only to their colonies, but even to the control o f their Imperial
centers.
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In 1755, the Qing took advantage o f internal power struggles within the Junggars’
elite to launch a campaign against the Khanate.5 By 1757 the Qing had solidly defeated the
Junggars, annexing much o f their land for the Empire. The Qing defeat o f Junggaria was
ruthless and swift, and, with the help o f a smallpox epidemic, the conquest killed m ost o f the
Junggar people.6 As Rene Grousett, the chronicler o f the empires o f the steppes, writes, “the
last M ongol empire [i.e. the Junggarian Khanate] crumbled even as it arose because it was an
historical anachronism ” (Grousett 1970:541). Indeed, a new era o f empire had arrived in
Central Asia with the Qing defeat o f the Junggars, and the Uyghurs would be am ong the first
o f the local peoples to experience its style o f colonialism first hand.
The Qing Imperial Court regarded the conquest o f the Uyghur hom eland south o f the
Ili valley to be a natural continuation o f its campaign against the Junggars. W hile the Qing
hoped to subjugate the Tarim Basin in the same m anner that the Junggars had, by exploiting
the long-standing competition between Uyghur Sufi orders in the region, this strategy
backfired. Instead o f contributing to the colonization o f the Tarim Basin, the two
grandchildren o f the Naqshabandi Sufi leader Apaq Khoja— Burkhan ad-Din and his
younger brother Jihan— began a resistance movement that, at least initially, presented a
serious obstacle to Qing encroachment. By October 1759, however, the power o f the Qing
troops was too much for the resistance, and the Uyghurs submitted to Qing rule.7 In 1763,
5 In the autumn 1754, the Qing entered into an alliance with Amursana, a Khoit chieftan and one o f the
competitors for control o f the Junggar Khanate, launching a joint campaign in 1755 that defeated the reigning
Khan Davitsi (Millward 1998:29). W hile Amursana received a title o f prince (Qinwang) within the Qing Empire
for his assistance, he had expected more from his allies (Duman 1966:265). Amursana, therefore, began a
counter-attack against his former allies the same year (Zlatkin 1983:295-296). Amursana’s attack on the Qing
was helpless and by the end o f 1756 he had fled Kuldja, which had been taken by Qing troops. W hile trying to
launch several other offenses against the Qing, Amursana met with defeat every time. In 1757, Amursana died o f
smallpox in Tobolsk on Russian territory (Schuyler 1878:168).
6 O f the som e 600,000 people living in Junggaria previously, only 30,000 to 40,000 remained alive after the
conquest, most o f whom fled to Russian territory (Zlatkin 1983:303).
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the bones o f Burkhan ad-Din were brought to Beijing, along with his children and wives still
alive, to show the em peror that Eastern Turkestan now belonged to the M iddle Kingdom
(G rigori’ev 1873:437). Five years later, Emperor Qianlong proclaimed the Ili valley and the
Tarim Basin together to be Xinjiang, or the “new domain,” officially confirming that the
Uyghurs were now Qing subjects and their homeland a part o f Qing territory (Paine
1996:114).8
The Qing placed the frontier capital o f its new annexations in the same area as the
Junggars’ capital, near the present-day city o f Kuldja (also known as Yining) in the Ili
valley. By 1760, the Qing began settling the Kuldja area as a m ilitary post, transferring to
the region M anchu, Chahar, Solon, Sibo, and Oyirat banner troops as well as Han Chinese
green banner troops (M illward 1998:77).9 Due to the de-population o f the area after the
conquest, however, the new Qing militarized frontier post in Kuldja lacked the foodstuffs to
keep its growing soldier population fed. It was this situation that precipitated the
establishm ent o f a significant community o f Uyghurs in this frontier valley— a group o f
involuntary migrants that became known as the Taranchis. 1 0
7 After successive defeats in the north o f Eastern Turkestan, the Khoja brothers retreated south towards Yarkand
where a standoff took place in the fall o f 1758. Although they were able to muster some 20,000 troops and hold
the Qing armies at bay for three months, the Qing General Zhao-hui finally received reinforcements and took
Yarkand (Millward 1998:31-32). The grandsons o f Apaq Khoja, in turn, fled to Badakhshan in present day
Afghanistan where local Muslim leaders who had entered into an alliance with the Qing killed them.
Subsequently, the Qing army was able to repress the remainder o f serious resistance among the Uyghurs by
October 1759, leaving alive only one Apaqiyya Khoja— Jihan’s son Sarymsak— who fled to the Kokand Khanate
with many o f the Khojas’ supporters (Duman 1966:270-271).
8 This proclamation, however, did not officially make Xinjiang a province. That would happen only much later
in the late nineteenth century.
9 The Oyirat banner troops were not “transferred” the area, but were made up o f the few local Junggars that
remained in the region and had proclaimed loyalty to the Qing.
1 0 Taranchi is an ethnonym that became associated with the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley during the colonial and early
Soviet periods. According to Vasily Radlov, the label Taranchi means “wheat farmer” in M ongolian (from the
root word taran or “wheat”) [Radlov 1989(1893): 101], suggesting that this name was externally imposed likely
by the Junggars. W hile this is the most popular etym ology o f the ethnonym, som e scholars claim that the word’s
origins com e from the Uyghur language. The Russian scholar V. Seletskii, for example, suggests that the name
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W hile a modest community o f Uyghurs, or Taranchis, lived in the Ili valley under
the Junggars and probably earlier,1 1 under Qing rule their number in the Ili valley grew
significantly by comparison. As soon as the Qing had established control over all o f Eastern
Turkestan in 1760, they forcibly re-settled some 600 to 700 families o f M uslim farmers (i.e.
Uyghurs) from the oases o f Kashgar, Yarkand, Khotan, Aksu, Uch Turpan, and Turpan,
forcing them to till land in the valley in order to feed the new m ilitary outpost o f Kuldja
(Shakhmatov 1935:63; Radlov 1887:15). In addition, the newly settled M uslims were
utilized as uncompensated laborers in the building o f the huge Kuldja military complex.
By 1768 some 6,383 Uyghur families had been sent to the Ili valley and the
majority, over 6,000 families, were divided into communities/work units (huitun) o f 100
households each to work state land and provide the military administration with grain
(Duman 1935:90; 1936b: 156). This re-settlement targeted primarily those M uslim farmers
from the Tarim Basin who had been the most active in the resistance to Qing colonization.
Thus, as Vasily Radlov notes, “the re-settlement served a dual purpose - first, to separate
dangerous elements from their provinces [in the Tarim Basin] and, second, to establish
wheat farming in the Ili valley” (Radlov 1877:15). The Qing placed the Taranchis
throughout the valley on 14 different settlements, 7 on each bank o f the Ili river, and each
com es from the Uyghur verb termaq that means “to farm land” (Seletskii 1904:244) Likewise, several Uyghurs
have told me that they suspect the ethnonym is based on the Uyghur verb tarmaq, “to scatter.”
1 1 Soviet historian il'ya Zlatkin notes that, already in 1654, when the Russian envoy Fedor Baikov travelled
among the Junggars, there were significant numbers o f Bukharans (a general Russian label for settled Central
Asian Muslims), living and growing wheat near Kuldja (Zlatkin 1983:119). Likewise, Bartold cites a later
Russian envoy to Junggaria in 1722, Captain Unkovsky, who observed a community o f Bukharans constructing a
town at the mouth o f the Khorgus river in the Ili valley (Bartol’d 1956:163). This is further substantiated both by
Joseph Fletcher, who notes that the Junggars also settled Uyghurs in the Ili valley to cultivate wheat (see Fletcher
1995b:35), and by Vasily Radlov, who cites the Babur-Name as calling the Uyghurs the original inhabitants o f
the valley [Radlov (1893) 1989:520], The Uyghurs referred to in this text, however, would have been those o f
the ancient Uyghur Empire, and, as noted in the introduction, these people were likely only one o f many groups
who could be considered ancestors o f the modern Uyghurs.
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65
settlement initially contained one to several huitun communities o f 100 households each (see
table 1).
Table 1: Distribution of First Qing Re-settlement of
Taranchi Households in Ili Valiev
On Right Bank o f Ili River On Left Bank o f Ili River
Location # of Households Location # of Households
Near the Kash river 500 households On the Tarksyl river 100 households
On the Ariosten canal 600 households On the Kogushi river 200 households
On the Baytukay canal 500 households On the Yagystay river 200 households
On the Nilka river 400 households On the Kaynak river 200 households
On the Olatay river 600 households On the Bugra river 200 households
On the Boroburgazun, 500 households On the Dolaty, Galdzhan, 600 households
On the Iyrgalan river 1,000 households On the Khonokay river 400 households
Total 4,100 Households Total 1,900
Adapted from: Radlov, V.V. Iz Siberii: Stranitsy Dnevnika. [(1893) Moskva: Nauk,
1989, p. 516],
By the end o f the 1760s, several new walled cities had been built up in the Ili valley
with the help o f the Taranchi exiles, including Suiding, N ew Kuldja (or M anchu Kuldja),
and old Kuldja (or M uslim Kuldja) (Shakhmatov 1935:64). As Jam es M illward notes,
Kuldja was not just a city; it had become a sprawling military com plex made up o f nine
walled cities that spread over 3,750 square kilometers on the northern bank o f the Ili river
(M illward 1998:77). W hile the Taranchis were forced to live outside the walled cities and to
farm state land without compensation, they had settled into the Kuldja area and made it their
new home.
2.2 From F rontier to Borderland: Q ine F rontier Trade and the Rise o f Russian
Influence in the Ili Valiev
Although located at the frontier o f Qing rule, this new home o f the Taranchis was
not yet a borderland because no distinct border existed. W ith the establishm ent o f a Qing
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6 6
frontier m ilitary force in Kuldja and the re-settlement o f thousands o f Uyghurs there, it is
interesting that the M anchu court in Beijing did not carry their conquest further west in order
to extend their frontier. W hile the Russians claimed that the Kazakh pastoralists to the west
o f K uldja were their subjects, the Tsarist Empire had yet to build any colonies in the south
western steppe up to the mid-nineteenth century, and most Kazakhs still did not identify as
Russian subjects. In this context, the fairly weakly unified Kazakh nomads presum ably
would have been an easy target for further Qing colonization to the w est.1 2
Despite apparent opportunities for expansion, the Qing held their colonial frontier in
the Ili valley near the military outpost o f Kuldja, dealing with the Kazakhs to the west,
prim arily o f the m iddle zhuz, 1 3 as an important trading partner.1 4 The Qing tightly regulated
its trade with the Kazakhs to assure that its profits went almost entirely to the E m pire.1 5
While the trade between the Qing and the Kazakhs was obviously important in helping pay
for the budget o f the new colony, it also had a less apparent importance that would only be
truly realized in the future. The trade inadvertently fostered increased Russian influence in
the Ili valley and, thus, foreshadowed the future geo-political rivalry between Russia and the
1 2 According to Millward, many influential Qing officials in Beijing questioned the wisdom o f establishing any
colonial outpost in the west, doubting the economic viability o f such an endeavor (Millward 1998:41-43). If the
Imperial court’s ambivalence towards the new colonial endeavor in Eastern Turkestan was already as strong as
Millward indicates, it would make sense that the Qing did not want to embark on further campaigns that might
also cause conflict with Russia or Kokand and, hence, even more costs.
1 3 The Kazakh word zhuz literally means one hundred, but in this context it refers to a confederation o f clans. In
the eighteenth century, there were three zhuzes— the Greater, the Middle, and the Small— that represented
different Kazakh populations. Today, most Kazakhs retain a consciousness o f their affiliation to one o f these
zhuzes. See Schatz (2000) for more on the contemporary meaning o f zhuzhes among the Kazakhs.
1 4 While som e historians have maintained that the Qing relationship with the Kazakhs and other nomadic
borderlands people in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was a tributary one (see Fletcher 1978c:62;
Fairbank 1968), there appears to be ample evidence that the relations with the Kazkahs were merely those o f
regulated trade (see Millward 1998:45-52).
1 5 The time and place o f the trade was fixed in the summer and autumn at a trade pavilion outside the city walls
o f Kuldja to which border guards escorted the Kazakhs all the way from the border (Millward 1998:46). The
Kazakhs who came to trade livestock were limited in movement primarily to the pavilion itself and were not
allowed to enter the Kuldja city walls [Andreev (1758) 1998:69].
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Qing in this borderland. W hile the Qing forbade both Russian traders and Russian goods
from the regulated trade at K uldja’s trade pavilion, there is evidence that some Russian
merchants were able to circumvent this moratorium by using Kazakhs and other M uslims
from western Turkestan as middlemen in an illicit trade (Fletcher 1978a:320). Furthermore,
this illicit trade was tacitly allowed to take place by the graces o f the Qing adm inistration,
which enjoyed its profits and the opportunity to attain Russian goods.
By the 1830s, the Russians’ involvement in the trade o f the Ili valley had increased
significantly. At this time, the Russian Empire began more strongly enforcing its assum ed
rule over the M iddle zhuz o f the Kazakhs, using their territory, the western Ili valley
included, as a base from which to limit the northern influence o f the Kokand Khanate and to
launch its trade with China. As historian Joseph Fletcher notes, R ussia’s increasing control
o f the Kazakh middle zhuz m eant that by the 1830s, “the facade o f a Qing-Kazakh trade
m onopoly could no longer conceal the fact o f Flan Chinese-Russian com m erce” (Fletcher
1978a:327,329).
Given that this trade had already built up such momentum that the Imperial court in
Beijing could no longer stop it, the Qing gradually lightened their stance towards the trade in
Russian goods. In the 1840s, the Qing legalized trade in Russian goods conducted by
Central Asian M uslims, and in 1851 it signed the Treaty o f Kuldja that allowed for direct
Russian-Qing trade. The Treaty o f Kuldja fully legalized Russian trade in Xinjiang in the
cities o f Kuldja and Chuguchak, allowing Russian traders to open businesses in these cities
without Qing intervention and providing for a Russian consul’s presence in each city to
oversee the activities and trade o f Russian merchants (Savvin 1930:44).1 6 Furtherm ore, in
1 6 Under the terms o f the treaty, the Russian traders were highly regulated by the Russian consul. Merchants
were only allowed to stay in Kuldja and Chuguchak for eight and one half months each year and only with an
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the spirit o f “the mutual friendship o f the two powers,” there were no custom tariffs set on
the Russo-Qing trade in Kuldja from either side (Antonov 1982:113). W hile the treaty did
not draw a distinct border between the Tsarist and Qing Empires, its acceptance o f the
Russians as a constant trading partner in Kuldja was a nascent recognition o f R ussia’s
control over the Kazakhs to the west and, thus, o f a split between Russian and Qing spheres
in the Ili valley.
R ussia’s new trading positions in Kuldja and Chuguchak also gave the Tsarist
Empire a reason to further colonize the southern Kazakh steppe, including the Ili valley.
Within three years o f signing the Treaty o f Kuldja, the export o f Russian goods to Xinjiang
had increased four-fold (Kasymbaev 1996:82). To support this growing trade and to
establish Russia’s presence in the Ili valley vis a vis both the Qing Em pire and the Kokand
Khanate, the Tsarist administration sought a site for building a frontier fortress.1 7
U nderlining the importance o f the Kuldja trade to this endeavor, the Russian military M ajor
Perem yshl’ski made it clear to the Kazakh expeditionary team seeking a site for the fortress
that it should be on the trade route to China up the Ili river (Dzhusunbekov 1980:16). The
Russians eventually built the fortress near the site o f an abandoned city the local Kazakhs
called Almaty which was located on the left bank o f the Almatinka river and 45 versts
(approx. 45 kilometers) from the Ili river (Dzhusunbekov 1980:17). Built between 1853 and
1855 and officially recognized in 1854, this colonial outpost was named Verny, or
“Faithful.” 1 8
official certificate from the Russian authorities (Fletcher 1978a:330). Chugachak, also known as Tarbaghatai, is
located north o f the Ili valley in what is often referred to as the Junggar steppe, and its close proximity to the
Russian-ruled city o f Semipalitinsk made it, like Kuldja, important in trade with Russia.
1 7 W hile the Tsarist administration encouraged Siberian Cossack soldiers to settle in the Ili valley with their
fam ilies in the 1830s, Cossacks only established their first small settlement at the western edges o f the Ili valley
in 1841 (M itrpol’skaya 1997:12-13).
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69
Illustrations 1: Kuldja under the Qing Empire until 1864
« *#«* /gV
Illustration 1.1: The Kuldja military complex, circa 1809 (Millward 1998:78)
1 8 In 1855 and 1856, to settle the area around Verny, the Tsarist administration sent from Siberia 456 farmer
families and 332 Cossack soldier families who established the new Cossack stations o f Urdrazhckaya,
Lepsinskaya, and Almatinskaya near the Verny fortress (M itropol’skaya 1997:14). These early settlements laid
the foundatins for the city o f Verny, latter to become the Soviet city o f Alma-Ata, and even later the post-Soviet
Kazakh city o f Almaty, the name originally used by the Kazakhs for its former ruins.
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70
W hile Verny, like Kuldja, was established as a colonial fortress to house troops and
conduct trade at the edge o f an empire, throughout the 1850s the city remained a small
outpost, paling in comparison with the substantial size o f the Kuldja military com plex.1 9
Valikhanov notes that in 1856 the Kuldja police administration told him that K uldja’s city
population alone was as high as 70,000 and included some 8,000 soldiers (Valikhanov
1985a:231). In comparison, there were still only 5,000 inhabitants o f Verny in 1859
(Dzhusunbekov 1980:20).
Gradually throughout the 1850s, Russia began colonizing the areas between Verny
and the still ambiguous Chinese border, settling Cossacks from Siberia in the region. In
doing so, the Tsarist Empire was defacto establishing new borders with both the Kokand
Khanate and the Qing Empire. In 1860, the signing o f the Treaty o f Beijing officially
recognized what was until then a nascent border between the Russian and Qing Empires,
m arking the line o f demarcation at Borokhudzir (Savvin 1930:48).2 0
By 1860, therefore, the Ili valley had transformed from an open frontier o f Qing rule
in Central Asia to a borderland distinctly divided between the Russian and Qing Empires.
As trade increased, the mirrored colonial outposts o f K uldja and V erny on each side o f the
border became increasingly dependent upon each other economically given the open road
between the cities and the great distance between these outposts and their imperial centers.
1 9 The Russian explorer Petr Sem enov-T’ian-Shanskii, on travelling to Verny in 1856, remarked that the Cossack
colonialists had yet to build any homes and were still preparing foundations and collecting wood for construction
[Sem enov-T’ian-Shanskii (1858)1947:142], On returning to Verny in 1857, Sem enov-T’ian-Shanskii found that
most o f the colonial settlers had succeeded in building homes with small gardens and bee farms and that new
settlers had even begun building a community in nearby Talgar [Sem enov-T’ian-Shanskii (1858)1947:208],
20 This is where the Kazakh explorer and diplomat o f the Tsarist Empire Chokan Valikhanov had encountered the
first Qing border post when he crossed over to Kuldja in 1856 to hold trade discussions with the Qing
administration (Valikhanov 1985a: 189, 201; 1985b:331). Borokhudzir is some 77 versts (approx. 77 kilometers)
west o f the present border between Kazakhstan and the People’s Republic o f China on the river Khorgus and
nearly 200 kilometers to the east o f Verny.
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71
In the process, the Taranchis had increased contact with Russians and their Empire, a people
and colonial pow er that would soon play a much more direct role in their lives.
2.3 Rebellion and the Establishm ent o f The Ili Sultanate (1860-1871)
At the same time that the Ili valley had been transformed from a frontier into a
borderland, the Qing Em pire’s hold on Xinjiang was becoming increasingly tenuous. Since
1820, the descendants o f the Apaq Khoja line in the Ferghana valley had been launching
consecutive raids against Qing positions in the south o f X injiang.2 1 W hile each time the
Qing had succeeded in retaining control o f the region, by the 1860s, the strength o f the
Em pire was waning and faced threats from Han Chinese, colonial subjects, and foreign
powers. The time was ripe for resistance to Qing rule in Xinjiang by the local M uslim
population who found little benefit in outside rule. As Joseph Fletcher notes, “the Opium
War, the Taiping and N ien rebellons, the Russian annexation o f northern M anchuria, the
upheavals among the M iao aborigines in Kweichow (sic), the Anglo-French seizure o f
Peiking (sic) and the flight o f the emperor, coupled perhaps with the unrest created by the
Apaqiyya among the Sinkiang (sic) M uslims, made for an atomsphere in which jih a d may
have seemed to hold some possible chance o f success” (Fletcher 1995b:39).
W hen a M uslim revolt finally erupted in Xinjiang, however, it was not the Apaqiyya
Khojas who led it; rather, an unlikely M uslim force from the east led Xinjiang into
rebellion— the Dungans o f Gansu and Shaanxi, a M uslim people that linguistically and
2 1 With each o f these incursions into the Tarim Basin, more and more local Muslims fled to the Kokand Khanate
to join the legions o f the Apaqiyya Khojas in exile. In 1847 alone, nearly 20,000 families apparently fled
Kashgar for the Kokand Khanate (Shakhmatov 1935:73). Writing in 1858, Valikhanov noted that approximately
200 family members o f the Apaqiyya lineage lived in Kokand and Margelan alone, roughly 50,000 fam ilies o f
Kashgar emigres and supporters o f the Apaqiyya Khojas (known locally as Taghliklar) lived in the villages
surrounding Andijan, Shakhri-khan, and Karasu, and an entire village o f Apaqiyya follow ers from Kashgar
numbering about 56,000 was located on the outskirts o f Tashkent in an area known as Yangi-Shaar (Valikhanov
1952:523).
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culturally shared much with the Han C hinese.2 2 In M ay 1862 a riot broke out in the Shaanxi
as a result o f Chinese merchants charging Dungans inflated prices for bamboo at a local
market. As the riot quickly turned into a bloody battle between ethnic communities, it
spread into neighboring Gansu and became a full-fledged Dungan rebellion against Qing
rule that eventually enveloped Xinjiang as well (Hsu 1965:25; Fletcher 1995b:40).2 3
By M arch 1863, the Dungan rebellion inspired a short-lived revolt o f M uslim s in
Suiding, one o f the nine cities o f the Kuldja m ilitary complex. W hile the Qing military in
the region quickly suppressed this insurrection, executing the rebel leaders and arresting over
one hundred Muslims, the spirit o f rebellion had not been killed (Hsu 1965:25-26). Despite
the unsuccessful nature o f the Suiding revolt, in 1864 alone, six entirely separate M uslim-led
rebellions against Qing rule were launched in Xinjiang by Dungans and Uyghurs (Fletcher
1995b:40).2 4 W hile the best known and farthest-reaching o f these rebellions was that
associated with the Kokandi invader Yakub Beg in Kashgar, for the purposes o f this study
the Kuldja rebellion is the most pertinent.
In 1864, an attack on Kuldja by Dungans from Gansu initiated a revolt that, in
addition to leading to widespread destruction and death, ended with the Qing withdraw l from
22 Known officially in the People’s Republic o f China today as the Hui, the Dungans are a varied ethnic group
whose language, physical appearance, and dress greatly resembles that o f the Han Chinese but who are devote
M uslims. Numerous groups o f Hui exist in China in various regions from the south-east to the north-west, but
those in Xinjiang in the nineteenth century were primarily from Shaanxi and Gansu, living in the regions
immediately bordering on Eastern Turkestan. See Gladney (1990) for an intensive study o f Hui ethnic identity.
2 3 This conflict emerged in part from the Taiping Rebellion. When Taiping rebels entered Shaanxi in early 1862,
they wrecked havoc on the Chinese and Manchus living there, but they left the Dungan villages untouched,
leading the authorities to execute many Dungans on suspicion o f supporting the Taiping rebels (Shakhmatov
1935:78). This increased the tension that already existed between the Dungans and their Qing overlords, setting
the stage for further conflict in the region.
24 On June 4, 1864, the first o f these revolts began in Kucha under the leadership o f Khoja Arshad ar-Rashidin
with the assisstance o f eight prominent Dungans [see Yudin (1962) and Hsu (1965:26) for more on this revolt].
M eanwhile, a Dungan from Shaanxi by the name o f T ’o-m ing led a revolt against the Qing in Urumchi, and
similar rebellions broke out in Kashgar, Khotan, Yarkand, and Kuldja (Fletcher 1995b:40).
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73
the Ili valley and the eventual establishment o f a Taranchi Sultanate in the area.2 5 With the
Dungan attack inspiring local Dungans and Uyghurs to rise up, the local M uslims, armed
only with wooden poles sporting sharp metal ends, began attacking all signs o f Qing power
(see D ’iakov 1909).2 6 Outside the walls o f the M anchu city of Kuldja, the once splendid
m ilitary com plex o f Kuldja was soon in complete disarray. Inside the walls o f the M anchu
compound, the Kuldja military governor Zhang Qin tried in vain to command troops who
demonstrated only minimal allegiance to the Empire.2 7
Cut o ff from Beijing, refused help by Russia, and unable to command their troops,
the Qing officials in the compound were stranded as the rebels attacked the other eight cities
o f the m ilitary complex. As one M anchu position fell after another, refugees streamed
towards Russian territory, with some 5,000 being settled tem porarily by the Russians near
Kopal and Verny (Schuyler 1878:183; Aristov 1873b: 165). Others, including m ost o f the
Solons and Sibo, gradually submitted to the rebels, asking mercy as neutral parties in the war
(D ’iakov 1909:264-265). Thus, by 1866, the only M anchu position left outside the rebels’
control was M anchu Kuldja itself where the M anchu elite was facing starvation.2 8
25 Although these Dungans from Gansu received only token support from local Dungans and none from the
Taranchis, the Manchu military garrison began a blind retaliation against all Dungans living in the Ili valley in
October 1864 (D ’yakov 1909:243). This act inspired a rebellion by local Dungans who were able to attract many
o f the disenfranchised Taranchis to their cause.
26 This initial success won over the elite o f the two communities who, having formerly administered colonial rule
for the Qing, now organized the rebels. It is important to note, however, that many Taranchi bags did not
immediately betray their Manchu overlords. Instead, they watched the fight carefully to determine which side
would emerge victorious (Diyakov 1909:243).
27 This situation became even more tenuous after the fall o f Chuguchak to Muslim rebels in 1865, an act which
cut Kuldja o ff from China entirely except via routes through Russian territory (Schuyler 1878:180). The Russian
ambassador and his Cossack attendents had already left Kuldja several months earlier when it became apparent
that the region was unstable (Schuyler 1878:179). W hile the Qing contacted the Russians for support after their
departure, their requests were mostly ignored, the Russians only promising to allow relief funds and official
dispatches to Kuldja to pass through Russian territory (Hsu 1965:27). The Russians, however, did take care to
secure the border in order to prevent the unrest from spreading to their portion o f the Ili valley.
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W hen the Taranchi and Dungan rebels finally fell on the fortress, they easily
defeated whatever weak resistance remained. The fortress was destroyed and virtually all of
its residents were slaughtered, with the exception o f 300 prisoner exiles from China proper
who escaped to Khorgus and later to Russian territory (D ’iakov 1909:265). The M ilitary
Governor Ming, who had replaced Qin after the M anchus’ inability to suppress the initial
revolts in 1864, set fire to his residence and jum ped with his family to their death from a
high w indow (D ’iakov 1909:265).2 9
Having defeated the Qing, the Taranchis and Dungans founded a M uslim Sultanate
based in the city o f M uslim Kuldja. Alm ost immediately, however, tension arose between
the Taranchis and Dungans who shared little in common with the exception o f the M uslim
faith and a distaste for Qing rule. This tension turned into conflict in M ay 1867 w ith the
discovery o f an alleged Dungan plot to otherthrow the Taranchi Sultan Obul-aghla. Hearing
that the group o f Dungans behind this plot were already heading towards M uslim K uldja
from Suiding and M anchu Kuldja, where the majority o f Dungans lived, Obul-aghla
mustered 10,000 Taranchi soldiers and defeated them on route (D ’iakov 1909:269-270).
The next day the Taranchis attacked M anchu Kuldja once again and destroyed m ost o f the
city. As a result, the majority o f the Dungans in the Kuldja region were killed or fled east,
leaving only some 1,000 Dungan families in the Ili Sultanate. By 1867, therefore, the once
outnumbered and impoverished Taranchi exiles became the sole rulers o f the great Qing
Kuldja m ilitary complex, but one completely in ruins and significantly depopulated.
28 One eyewitness account o f the rebellion notes that the people who remained alive in the fortress at this time ate
anything they could find, including cats, dogs, leather products and even human corpses (Diyakov 1909:265).
29 Deprived o f o f the chance to execute the Military Governor, the Taranchis and Dungans seized his deputy Zhan
and his fam ily and brought them to Muslim Kuldja. In Kuldja, Zhan’s head was shaved and, dressed in a sheep’s
pelt, he was tied up facing backwards on a donkey and paraded around the city (D ’iakov 1909:266). Following
this humiliation, however, Zhan apparently was allowed to live with his family peacefully in M uslim Kuldja, and
his daughters married Taranchi men (D ’iakov 1909:266).
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Indeed, the Taranchi victory had come at great cost. According to one source, the
Taranchis and Dungans had slaughtered nearly one half million Chinese and M anchus
(Kostenko 1887:94). O f the nine thriving cities o f the Kuldja region, only M uslim Kuldja
remained intact, and many o f the villages that had fed the cities were likewise decimated.
Nonetheless, the Taranchis successfully transformed their role in the area from that o f
indentured laborers at the bottom o f the social latter to the ultimate rulers.
Divided by power struggles and suffering from a lack o f administrative experience,
however, the Sultanate was not stable. During the revolt, the Taranchi leadership already had
been plagued by internal intrigues, and afterwards these intrigues continued.3 0 W hile Obul-
aghla arrested the two most powerful pretenders to his throne early in his rule, Alyam -akhun
Nasyr and Akhmedjan-Khoja, he continued to fear the power of those in his own court
(Aristov 1873a:21 4 ).3 1 These intrigues must have contributed to the Sultanate’s inability to
defend itself when it faced its first serious challenge.
2.4 R ussian Interests and the F all o f Ili Sultanate
W hile the Tranachis were securing rule over the eastern portion o f the Ili valley, the
Russians were growing in power in western Central Asia. In 1864, the Russians conquered
the important northern positions o f the Kokand Khanate in Turkistan and Chimkent, and in
30 There were five changes in Taranchi leadership during the revolt, each being accomplished by murder (cf.
Fletcher 1995b:41; Schuyler 1878:183; Aristov 1873a:205; Diyakov 1909:253). The last o f these changes
transpired as Malchzhat-akhun, who led the Taranchis in their attack on the walled city o f Manchu Kuldja, was
captured, tied in a sack and thrown into the Ili river by Obul-aghla and his allies (Aristov 1873a:205). This last
act o f treachery allowed Obul-aghla to become the first and last Ili Sultan.
3 1 In discussions with the Russian administrator Konstantin Von Kaufman in Verny after the fall o f the Ili
Sultanate, the Sultan Obul-aghla admitted that he was constantly in fear o f dissention in his small state, intimating
that only after arriving in Verny was he able to rest after three years o f sleepless nights (M aev 1873:300). N.
Aristov further notes that the Sultan in Kuldja “rarely slept at home and would secretly slip away in the night to
the home o f one o f his trusted friends” (Aristov 1873a:214).
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76
1865, they took the neighboring large oasis of Tashkent. With these significant gains,
Russia reorganized its colonial territories in Central Asia into a Governorship o f Turkestan
with its headquarters in Tashkent run by General Konstantin Yon Kaufman. The Russian
portion o f the Ili valley, in turn, was reorganized administratively into a part o f Turkestan
called the Governorship o f Sem irech’e, or the seven rivers, under the command o f General
Gerasim Kolpakovskii. W orking to solidify Russia’s position in Central Asia, Von Kaufman
and Kolpakovski were very concerned about the stability, economic livelihood, and political
allegiances o f the Ili Sultanate.
The immediate concern o f the Russian administration in Central A sia regarding the
Ili Sultanate was economic. Russian Semirech’e was suffering from a significant loss in
trade with K uldja and from a refugee problem as a result o f the rebellion (Hsu 1965:29-30).3 2
In addition to these economic concerns, however, the Tsarist administration was even more
worried about the Ili Sultanate for political reasons, the spread o f Yakub B eg’s power in
particular. Yakub Beg had come to Kashgar from Kokand with the Apaqiyya son o f
Jahangir Buzurg Khan Tura during the revolts o f 1864 on the request o f K ashgar’s Khan,
Saddiq Beg. Saddiq Beg hoped to use Buzurg Khan T ura’s connection to the Apaqiyya
lineage to help him take control o f the Tarim Basin, and invited him with an army from
Kokand for this purpose. Saddiq B eg’s plan, however, was not realized and instead it was
Yakub Beg, a w arrior and adventurer from the Kokand Khanate, who became the de-facto
ruler o f the region by making strategic allies that he was able to later double-cross.3 3 By
32 A s the Director o f the Asian Department o f the Russian Ministry o f Foreign Affairs, P.N. Stremoukhov, would
note in 1871, “the development and prosperity o f all o f our Semirech’e territory depends upon the establishment
o f order in the lands neighboring on ours [i.e the Kuldja area] ... commerce there is now entirely dead”
(Dubrovskaya 1998:139).
3 ’ After ridding southern Xinjiang o f the remaining Qing troops in 1868, Yakub B eg and Buzurg Khan Tura were
able to consolidate their power in the Tarim Basin by displacing Saddiq Khan in Kashgar and defeating Rashidin
Khoja in Aqsu, Mufti Habitulla in Khotan, and Abderrahman in Yarkand (Fletcher 1995:41; Hsu 1965:28).
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1868, Yakub Beg controlled virtually all of Eastern Turkestan with the exception o f the
Kuldja region, Urumchi, and Turpan. He renamed this vast area the state o f Yettishaar, or
seven cities, also known as the Bidaulet, and declared him self its Ataliq Ghazi, or ultimate
ruler.
Yakub B eg’s Yettishaar worried Russia for several reasons. Firstly, Yakub Beg had
come from the Kokand Khanate and had previously fought against Tsarist troops in the
Khanate’s battles over Chimkent and Turkestan. Given this background, Yakub Beg and the
state he ruled could be expected to be hostile to the Russians’ presence in Central A sia and
to assist Kokand in keeping its autonomy vis a vis Russia. Secondly, Yakub Beg enjoyed a
good relationship with the British Empire, Russia’s main diplomatic rival in Central Asia. In
particular, Russia feared that Yakub B eg’s relationship with Britain could lead to the United
Kingdom using his Yettishaar state to destabalize Russian territories in the region.3 4 In any
event, if Yakub Beg was to pose a threat to Russia’s interests in Central Asia, it seemed
likely that it would be through his annexation o f or alliance with the Ili Sultanate. After all,
the same open geography that made the Ili valley a natural borderland for trade also made it
ideal for conquest and conflict if enemies were to occupy opposite sides o f the border.
While at first this campaign appeared to be a renewal o f the power struggle between the Apaqiyya and Ishaqiyya
in the Tarim Basin, Yakub B eg turned against his Apaqiyya patron, Buzurg Khan Tura, soon after they were in
control o f the southern oases. Sending the Apaqiyya Khoja to M ecca for the Hajj in 1868, Yakub declared
him self ruler o f the Tarim Basin (Shakhmatov 1935:96). Thereafter, Yakub moved further north, attacking the
Dungan state o f T ’o-ming in 1869.
34 In general, Yakub B eg played Russia and the United Kingdom o ff o f each other, but he also displayed a favor
for the British witnessed by his state’s trade with British India, which increased over ten-fold between 1864 and
1868 (Kozhirova 1997:71). Yakub B eg likeky saw the Russian overland expansion into Central Asia as more
threatening than British expansion out o f India. As the British president o f the Royal Geographic Society at the
time, Sir Henry Rowlinson, noted, “Yacub (sic) B eg had witnessed the Russian encroachments in Kokand and
Bukhara, and he naturally anticipated a similar fate for Kashgar in due course o f time” [see Rawlinson (1875)
1980:331],
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78
Aware o f Russia’s worries, the Ili Sultanate did all in its power to make it clear to
the Russians that they wanted to have friendly relations.3 5 Nonetheless, the Russians
continued to be concerned, and, in 1868-69, the Governor o f Sem irech’e began fortifying the
border post at Borokhudzir, building arms depots, a hospital, and troops barracks (M aev
1873:306). Furthermore, the situation in the border area was all the more tense due to
periodic raids on both the Russian and Taranchi settlements by Kazakhs straddling the
border (Schuyler 1878:185). Due to the tense relations on the border, a m eeting between the
administrations o f Sem irech’e and the Taranchi Sultanate took place in Kuldja at the end o f
1870. W hile the official agenda for this meeting focused on the problem o f Kazakh cross-
border raids and the renewal o f trade relations, the Sultanate’s relations with Yakub Beg
were likely more central to Russia’s decision to enter into talks.3 6 The m eeting produced no
results, and the Russians claimed bad faith on the Taranchi side.3 7 Eugene Schuyler,
however, has speculated that the Russians intentionally stymied the talks because they had
already decided to move against the Taranchi Sultanate before it fell under the sway o f
Yakub Beg (Schuyler 1878:186).3 8
35 When the Russians heard rumor o f a plan within the Taranchi Sultanate to send an army o f 40,000 men to sack
Verny in 1868, the Taranchi Sultan Obul-aghla sent a Kazakh Khan messenger across the border to relay to the
Russians that no such intentions existed and that the Taranchi state wanted peaceful relations (Schuyler
1878:185).
36 Already that year Yakub Beg had made serious gains against the Dungan Khanate o f T ’o-M ing in Urumchi and
against Turpan. Fearing that Yakub Beg might next either move against or forge an alliance with Kuldja, in
August o f 1870 the Tsarist army occupied the Muzart pass, the main entry point to the Ili valley from the Tarim
Basin (Hsu 1965:30). Additionally, in the autumn o f 1870 a Russian envoy to Kuldja crossed paths with a
delegation from Yakub B eg’s government that also had been sent to meet with Obul-aghla (Gurevich 1985:308-
309).
37 The Russians suspected that the Taranchis’ reluctance to enter into agreements concerning trade with Russia
was being encouraged by Yakub Beg. A s Baron A.V. Kaulbars, who was sent by Kolpakovskii to negotiate for
Russia, would write to his superiors in the Governorship o f Turkestan, “Yakub B eg ’s attitude towards us is
doubtless a tempting example for the ruler o f Kuldja” (Gurevich 1985:309). In public writings, however,
Kaulbars described a fairly congenial series o f meetings with Obul-aghla and his court (see Kaulbars 1873).
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Illustrations 2: The Ili Sultanate
79
Illustration 2.1- Obul-aghla, the
Sultan of the short-lived Ili
Sultanate (Sabirjan 1949:22)
Illustration 2.2 - Sadyr Pavlan, the
Taranchi bard and popular hero of the
revolt (Narynbaev 1995:22)
Illustration 2.3 - A Taranchi Bag and his attendents after the revolt
(Schuyler 1878:166)
38 In 1869, Von Kaufman had suggested to his superiors in Saint Petersburg that the Tsarist Empire m ove to take
the Kuldja area temporarily until the Qing could regain control o f the region, but his opinion was disregarded as
too dangerous diplomatically (Dubrovskaya 1998:141). Failed trade talks would be one way for him to justify
further pushing for such an action.
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8 0
Following the failed talks in Kuldja, Von Kaufman lobbied for military
intervention in the Ili valley, and talks were held with the Qing in March 1871
regarding a possible joint attack on the Sultanate (Kabirov 1951:42-43). While these
negotiations failed due to the Qing’s suspicions of the Russians (Gurevich 1985:310-
311), the Tsarist army, with troops present at the Muzart pass, were still apparently
considering taking such action on its own. Von Kaufman and Kolpakovskii seem to
have been waiting merely for an excuse to invade the Taranchi Sultanate, and it
would not take long for them to find one.
In April 1871 a band o f armed Kazakhs, led by the former local colonial
adm insitrator (volost'noi upravitel’ ) o f M erkenskoi volost’ Tazabek Busurman, attacked a
Russian border post in the Ili valley and reportedly fled into the territory o f the Taranchi
Sultanate (Kabirov 1951:40). Accusing the Sultanate o f being behind the raids, the Russians
sent a punitive force into the Kuldja area in M ay 1871 and began amassing troops in the
border region, with a legion o f 1,785 at the border in Borokhudzir and a sm aller troop at
Ketman (Kabirov 1951:43). Despite the Taranchis’ attempts to establish friendly relations
with their Russian neighbors, they were about to get their first, but not last, taste o f w hat it
meant to be caught in a relatively little known frontier valley between rival powers.
Kopalkovskii had already sent a “shrewd and well written report” to the Tsar in
Saint Petersburg explaining the reasons for what he was about to do, but he did not w ait for
an official response (Schuyler 1878:186). On June 6, 1871, Kopalkovskii addressed the
Cossack troops at the border post in Borokhudzir. In an impassioned speech, he told the
troops:
Our patience has already been tried, and I, with the troops in my pow er and by
the will o f the Great State o f Russia, go forth to punish the Kuldja government
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81
and its evil advisors for their constant antagonism and disrespect towards
Russia as well as for their bold attack on our troops and invasion into our
territory (Kabirov 1951:43-46).
Kopalkovskii him self led the troops as they crossed the border on the twelfth o f June.
Already greatly disabled by their long fight with the Qing and the Dungans and
suffering from internal power struggles, the Taranchis were little m atch for K olpakovskii’s
Cossack troops.3 9 On 21 June, after having taken Alimtu, Chinchahodzi, and Suiding,
K olpakovskii met the Taranchi Sultan Obul-aghla for talks. The Governor o f Sem irech’e
offers the following account o f the meeting:
At night in the ruined city o f Bayandaya, the Sultan appeared at my camp with
all o f the important Taranchi leaders and explained that he considered him self
alone responsible for all that we [i.e. the Russians] held against the Taranchis,
offering him self entirely to the will o f the Russian state. The Sultan only
asked mercy towards his people, noting that he and his people henceforth will
submit unquestionably to our command (Kabirov 1951:45-46).
Following this meeting, Kolpakovskii and his troops were led to Kuldja and given control o f
the city. In return, Kolpakovskii promised the Sultan that he could retain his wealth and
settle wherever he desired. As a result, in August 1871 Obul-aghla, his family, and his
livestock moved to a large tract o f land on the edge o f Verny in an area that would later
become one o f the city’s largest Uyghur settlements.4 0 Separated from his former subjects,
the Sultan received 2,500 roubles a year and a total o f 200 dectares o f land from the Tsarist
Empire (Pantusov 1881 b:56).4 1 The Taranchis had become Russian subjects.
39 Furthermore, according to one Uyghur source, the Taranchi troops began fighting each other in Ketmen shortly
after the Russians’ first offensive against them began [Abdusemetov (1921) 1991:50].
40 To this day, this area is known among Uighurs in Almaty as Sultan-Kurgan.
4 1 In 1880, however, he returned to Kuldja where he died at the age o f 62 (Sabirjan 1949:22)
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8 2
2.5 The Russian O ccupation o f K uldja a n d the “ Ili C risis” (1871-1881)
According to Immanuel Hsu, the Qing first learned about the Russian occupation o f
K uldja only in September o f 1871 when they received a notification from the Russian
minister in Beijing, General Vlangaly, stating that Russia had recovered the area from the
M uslim rebels
(Hsu 1965:32). W hile the Russians couched this recovery o f the Ili valley in term s that
suggested they were assisting the Qing Empire and would eventually return the area to Qing
control, officials in Beijing understandably were suspicious of Russian intentions. To Qing
officials, Russia’s conquest and annexation o f the Ili Sultanate represented yet one more
foreign encroachment on what they saw as the Qing domain. As a result, the question o f the
Ili valley’s future led to a diplomatic conflict between Russia and China that became known
as the Ili crisis. Since the Ili crisis has been explored in depth elsewhere (cf. Hsu 1965;
Jelavich and Jelavich 1959; Gurevich 1985; Clubb 1971; Paine 1996; Dubrovskaia 1998), it
will not be examined fully here. Below, I merely present the issues most significant to this
study: the general positions o f the two Empires in this dispute, its outcome, and the
significance o f its outcome to the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley.
W hile some accounts, particularly those written by Russian and Soviet historians
(see, for example, Kabirov 1951 and Gurevich 1985), suggest that Russia was sincere in its
desire to eventually return the Ili valley to the Qing, there is ample evidence that the Russian
Empire did not intend its annexation o f the Ili valley to be so temporary. Given the dire
conditions o f the Qing Empire at this time and the ruthlessness with which the M uslim s o f
Eastern Turkestan drove the Qing out, the Russians did not expect that the Qing w ould soon
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83
be able to re-establish its position in the area. As the Russian scholar-bureaucrat N. Aristov
wrote in published writings in 1874:
The Chinese cannot seriously hope to re-establish their rule through some
change in the conditions o f their lost province because the hatred o f them by
the M uslims living in western China, strengthened by the martyrdoms o f the
last rebellion, will not even entertain the thought o f submitting to the kafir-
Chinese (Aristov 1873b 159).
Given this attitude, it is likely that many in Russia regarded the occupation o f K uldja not as
tem porary but as one more advance in the Em pire’s campaigns in Central Asia.4 2 Even if the
perm anent annexation o f the Ili valley did not lead to the conquest o f all o f Eastern
Turkestan, it would offer Russia constant trading access to China in the east and to Kashgar
in the south. Furthermore, in the event that the Russians did eventually return the area to the
Qing, they likely felt that they could gain some territory in the process. This is substantiated
by fact that the first Russian envoy to negotiate with the Qing on this issue in 1872, Colonel
Boguslavskii, was instructed to “refrain from discussing the demarcation line between
Russia and China” and to “declare that Russia could not return Ili before the arrival o f
sufficient Chinese troops” (Hsu 1965:32-33).
W hile official communications from Beijing on the issue demanded the immediate
return o f the region, Qing officials vigorously debated the question o f their re-conquest o f
Xinjiang in closed quarters. The nature o f the Qing’s future relationship to Xinjiang was
especially debated among the m ilitary generals Li Hunchang and Zuo Zungtang (See
Dubrovskaia 1998:81-127). Li Hunchang argued a policy o f “self-strengthening” the empire
42 Russian domestic policy in Kuldja reflected the intention o f a permanent, or at least a long-term occupation.
A s soon as the occupation began, the Russians put significant resources into drawing up plans for rebuilding the
important Tash-Ustan and Ak-Ustan canals that fed waters to the fields around Kuldja (TsGIAK f.21, d.C B -l-a,
No. 12, pp. 3-10). In addition, the Russians immediately worked to develop Kuldja’s cultural institutions,
obviously intending to extend their civilizing mission in Central Asia. By February o f 1873, the Russians had
founded a small bi-lingual school (Pantusov 1876:162-163) and had established a hospital in Kuldja (Maev
1873:319), and in 1875 a Russian Orthodox church was built in the city (Pantusov 1881a:46).
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84
without Xinjiang, and Zuo Zungzang considered the re-conquest o f the region to be a
priority for the security o f the whole empire. W hile L i’s arguments were supported by the
dire straits o f the Qing Empire in the early 1870s, it was Zuo whose opinions were finally
heeded by the Emperor. After Zuo provided a policy paper to the Em peror in April 1875
where he convincingly argued the strategic importance o f Xinjiang, the Qing court approved
a military re-conquest o f Eastern Turkestan that same month (Dubrovskaia 1998:127).
While this campaign focused on retaking Yakub B eg’s Yettishaar rather than the Hi valley,
the Qing believed that a successful conquest o f Yakub B eg’s territories would force the
Russians to return the Kuldja area as well. The Qing were able to defeat Yakub B eg’s army
relatively quickly, establishing control o f Kashgar by late December 1877, and it
immediately demanded more forcefully that Russia return the Kuldja area.4 3
As it became apparent that Russia would be called upon to honor their prom ise to
return Kuldja, a large group o f the Taranchis and remaining Dungans o f the Kuldja area sent
an official letter to the Tsarist administration o f Turkestan. The people o f Kuldja who
drafted this letter dated January 24, 1878 asked Russia to accept them as Tsarist subjects,
expressing their fear o f a Qing return with obvious overtures o f obedience to Russia:
For more than one hundred years, our grandfathers and fathers had suffered all
the horrors as silent slaves and even beasts o f burden... Nobody knew what
the next day held in store. Neither our lives and property nor the honor o f our
wives and daughters were safe for even an instant: everything could vanish
and die due to a lowly Chinese official... Now, at last, for nearly seven years,
we have enjoyed... peace, tranquility, and freedom ... Suddenly, like a
43 Once the Qing offensive against Yettishaar began, Z uo’s army quickly enjoyed victories in the north. W hile
Yakub B eg sought Britain’s assistance in brokering a treaty with his opponents, the Q ing’s success in its
campaign led the Empire to oppose any compromises (Hsu 1965:41). Quickly losing ground against Z uo’s
troops, Yakub B eg pleaded with Russia for assistance, but this also was denied (Clubb 1971:112). On M ay 29,
1877, Yakub Beg died in Korla as his outnumbered and poorly equipped troops tried to hold back the Qing.
W hile the details o f the Ataliq G hazi's death are not known, Zuo attributed his demise to suicide by poisoning
(Hsu 1965:43). Others, however, have suggested that he died o f a stroke (Kim 1978). Regardless o f the cause o f
his death, with the Emir gone, Yettishaar was further defenseless against the Qing.
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85
thunderbolt, threatening and unexpected tidings came [i.e. rum or o f Russia
returning Kuldja to the Qing] and everyone, young and old is in despair and
sorrow (Gurevich 1985:320).
In 1879, the Qing and Russian Empires finally met to draw up a treaty concerning the
return o f the Hi valley to the M iddle Kingdom. In late 1879, Russian officials and the Qing
representative Chung Hou came to an agreement and signed the Treaty o f Livadia as a
resolution to the crisis.4 4 Given that this treaty provided for a very favorable territorial and
m onetary compensation to Russia for their tem porary maintenance o f the Ili valley, however,
the Qing court in Beijing refused to ratify the treaty signed by their representative, calling it a
“humiliation for the empire” (Gurevich 1985:321). The Russians, in turn, stated that the
treaty had been signed by an official Qing representative and should be recognized.
As a result, the two Empires began amassing troops and threatening to enter a
conflict with each other over the Ili valley despite the financial and political problems that
beset both imperial powers. While the Qing sought British assistance in forging a diplomatic
resolution, the British Foreign Office initially only encouraged China to accept the Treaty o f
Lividia, something Beijing refused to do.4 5 After convincing the Qing to not execute Chung
Hou for his poor diplomatic skills, however, the British agreed to assist in diplomatic
discussions with Russia that could give the Qing more favorable terms (Clubb 1971:113).
Convinced that the Russians were too weak to wage a war against the M iddle Kingdom, the
French also pledged to assist the Qing.
44 The Treaty o f Livadia provided the Russians large tracts o f land within the Kuldja area, including the city o f
Jarkent, the Tekes valley, and the Muzart and Talki passes that link the Ili valley with the Tarim Basin and the
rest o f Dzhungaria respectively (Paine 1996:133). In addition, the Qing court was to pay the Russians 5 million
rubles in retribution for maintaining the Kuldja area while under Tsarist control (Savvin 1930:51).
45 As the British minister in Beijing, Thomas Wade, told Prince Kung o f the Qing Foreign Office, “were I a
Chinese minister, I should say let the Russians keep Kuldja, which they have got, which has been voted ever
since China annexed it last century to be a burden to the state, and declare yourself ready to pay, if neccesary,
even a larger sum” (Hsu 1965:113). The British General C.G. “Chinese” Gordon was more cynical in dissuading
against military action, telling his contacts in the Qing court “if you make war, burn the suburbs o f Peking [sic],
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8 6
Illustrations 3: Kuldja Under Russian Occupation, 1871-1881
Illustration 3.1-The main square of "Old" or
Muslim Kuldja, circa 1880 (Hambly 1966,
figure 40)
Illustration 3.2-Main Taranchi Mosque,
Kuldja circa 1880 (Hambly 1966: picture 41)
Illustration 3.4-Kuldja Russo-Chinese-Taranchi Public School, circa
1878 (Kazakhstan State Archives, Arkhiv Kino-Foto Dokumentev)
When the Qing representative Zeng Jize arrived in St. Petersburg on July 30, 1880 to
resume talks w ith the Russians, he was accompanied by Sir Halliday M acartney and M.
Prosper Giquel as his English and French advisors respectively (Hsu 1965:153). After initial
disagreements, official negotiations were set for late 1880 (Jelavich and Jelavich 1959:100).
remove the archives and Emperor from Peking [sic], put them in the center o f the country and fight (a guerilla
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87
W hile the Russians had the advantage o f initial Qing approval o f the Treaty o f Lividia, the
Tsarist adm inistration proved willing to cede many o f the former treaty’s stipulations. As a
result, a new treaty, the Treaty o f St. Petersburg, was signed on February 12, 1881. In May,
the Qing court officially approved the signed version, and the Ili crisis was over (Kabirov
1951:65). The ramifications o f this new treaty for the Taranchis o f the Ili valley, however,
would be significant.
2.6 The Treaty o f St. Petersburg, the Re-Drawing o f Borders. and the Division o f the
Taranchis (1881-1890)
As we took our leave o f Ili,
We approached the edge o f the spring.
From our places o f birth
Still alive we were separated.
The Russian wagon, it is said,
Has its front wheels on the bottom.
To go to another person’ s country
And make a living is difficult they say.
- Koch-Koch Nakhshisi (“The M igration Song”— circa 1880s) (Ili 1986:35-36).
According to the terms o f the Treaty o f St. Petersburg, the M uzart and Talki passes,
as well as the Tekes valley, were returned to the Qing along with Kuldja proper, but the
Russians retained Jarkent and additional parts o f the western Kuldja region (see m ap 3).4 6 As
reparation for Russia maintaining the Kuldja area for the Qing, Beijing also paid St.
Petersburg a sum o f 9 million rubles in accordance with article VI o f the treaty. Finally, the
Treaty o f St. Petersburg gave Russia special duty-free trading rights, the right to establish
war) for five years, Russia will not be able to hurt you” (Jelavich and Jelavich 1959:99).
46 Article VII o f the treaty declared that “the border between Russia and the neighboring territory o f the Ili region
o f China will follow , starting in the Be-dzhin-Tau mountains, the flow o f the river Khorgos into the Ili river, and
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Russian businesses, and the ability to open several new consular offices in Xinjiang (Sbornik
1952:218).
M ore importantly to the Uighurs o f the Ili valley, however, the Treaty o f St.
Petersburg provided for two stipulations ensuring the protection o f the local M uslim
population. Firstly, the local M uslims o f the Kuldja region were to be given am nesty from
any retribution for their previous actions against the Qing Empire, and, secondly, all
inhabitants in the area were given the option to move to Russian territory. According to
article III o f the treaty, the option to become a Russian subject was open until one year from
the day that the area was officially returned to the Qing (Sbornik 1952:212), but this was later
revised to a year and one month from the signing o f the treaty, until M arch 10, 1882 (Kabirov
1951:72). To facilitate the migration o f people from the Kuldja area to Russian territory,
therefore, a special commission was formed in August 1881 to manage issues related to the
migration and to give tickets to those Tanachi and Dungan families who wished to move to
Russian territory. Between August and December 1881, this commission, which was
protected by Tsarist troops remaining in Kuldja, compiled a list o f 1,308 Dungan families and
11,365 Taranchi families who had asked to be re-settled (Zapiski 1884:15).
This was already far more migrants than the Russians had anticipated. As early as
1880, Von Kaufman instructed la. Shishmarev, the representative o f the Russian M inistry o f
Foreign Affairs in Kuldja, that it was “necessary to convince the M uslim population to
remain on their land even if the Chinese return to rule the country” because “in Sem irech’e
there is not enough room to settle more than 2,000 families” (Baranova 1959:41). W hile the
Russian administration initially tried to keep the migration limited to 2,000 families (1,500
Taranchi and 500 Dungan), Kolpakovskii allowed 1,500 more families to migrate in the
crossing it, m ove south towards the Uzun-Tau mountains, staying to the east o f the village o f Koljat” (Sbornik
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89
spring o f 1882 (Baranova 1959:44). In addition, the period during which m igrants and the
Russian troops supervising their move were to leave Qing territory was extended an
additional year, until March 10, 1883 (Zapiski 1884:15).
As the number o f people requesting migration increased, the Russians tried to avoid
placing the migrants too close to the border itself “for political resasons.” As the Sem irech’e
Governorship comments in an official document concerning the creation o f the Jarkent Uezd
on new land received by Russia in accordance with the Treaty o f St. Petersburg:
For political reasons, the Taranchi and Dungan migrants should be settled on
land more or less separated from the border, more concretely: a) the Dungans
prim arily in the Tokm ak Uezd [near Issyk Kul] and b) the Taranchis m ostly in
the area between the rivers Charyn and Turgenem as well as on the left bank
o f the Usek river between the postal road and the Ili river, and only the trade
and industrial class among these two peoples should be close to the new city
along the Chinese road known as Jarkent, which is on the prim ary trade (not
postal) road to the Ili region, only 38 versts to the west o f Khorgus and the
border (TsGIAK f.64, op. 1, d .l 18, cv.9, p. 8.).
W hile the specifics o f the political reasons for this proposed pattern o f settlem ent are not
outlined in the document, it is fair to assume that the Russians feared the potential for a joint
cross-border Taranchi and Dungan uprising against Russian rule in the future.
W ith these issues in mind, the first Taranchi migrants were settled in the Chilik river
valley, a good distance from the border in the autumn o f 1881. Having sold m ost o f their
belongings before leaving Kuldja, these first migrants faced grave difficulties over the winter.
They were forced to live in yurts supplied by neighboring Kazakhs and eat what little bread
the Russian administration was able to give them (Zapiski 1884:16). M any died during the
winter before the migrants were able to establish them selves and begin the difficult work o f
building irrigation canals in the spring (Zapiski 1884:19). W hile in 1881 the Sem irech’e
leadership discussed settling all Taranchis in the Chilik area, by January 1882 some 1,500
1952:214).
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90
Taranchi and 500 Dungan families were also re-settled in the new Russian territory o f the Ili
valley between the rivers Khorgos and Usek much closer to the border (Zapiski 1884:15-16,
41). Given that this second group o f migrants moved to land with which they were more
familiar and which already had irrigation canals, they fared slightly better over the winter
than those in Chilik.
W hile the conditions were difficult, more and more Taranchis in Kuldja requested to
be included on the list o f those who would be allowed to migrate. With the Qing gradually
taking over control o f the Kuldja area, the race to be allowed to migrate to Russia intensified,
becoming frantic by early M arch 1883, when the migration was scheduled to end. In the
final analysis, far more migrants than officially sanctioned entered Russian territory. In
February 1883 alone, some 5,000 carts o f migrants reportedly crossed the border into Russian
territory (Zapiski 1884:37). Still, on M arch 10, 1883, Russian troops pulled out o f Kuldja as
promised, bringing the last o f the migrants with them. W hile figures vary, an 1884 report by
General Fride, who was charged with oversight o f the migration and re-settlement, indicates
that a total o f 9,752 Taranchi families, or 45,373 individuals, came to Russian territory along
with 1,147 Dungan families, numbering 4,682 individuals (Zapiski 1884:119). In addition,
approxim ately 20,000 Kazakhs migrated, bringing the total to some 70,000 people, far more
than the number o f new subjects on which the Russian Empire had planned (Baranova
1959:51).
Despite Russian attempts to keep the migrants from settling near the border, Taranchi
villages quickly developed even on the river Khorgus itself, which formed the Russo-Qing
border (Selitskii 1904:320). In particular, it proved useless to prevent Taranchis and
Dungans from settling close to the city o f Jarkent near the border, which had 538 new homes
in the city by the end o f 1882 (Zapiski 1884:40). W hile the upper part o f the city was m ostly
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populated by Russians, the lower more populated part quickly became overwhelm ingly
Taranchi and Dungan, resembling the M uslim cities o f the Kuldja area (Zapiski 1884:40).
Indeed, the growth o f Jarkent was rapid, and by July 1882, it already had a Taranchi and
Dungan population o f about 2,000 and a bustling bazaar facilitating cross-border trade.4 7
Despite initial Russian concerns about the loyalties o f the new migrants, Tsarist
officials also saw the positive aspects o f having a population buffer on the Russian-Qing
border that was decidely anti-Qing. Kolpakovskii makes this clear in the following
statement made shortly after the migration:
In the event o f a worsening o f relations with the Qing government in the
future, we have waiting at the border with China a contingent population
ready at any moment to fight against the Chinese whom they hate with all
their m ight for their treachery and because, due to the Chinese, these people
were forced to abandon their homeland, homes, and fields (Galuzo 1961:78).
The Russians were likely especially aware o f the significance o f the Taranchis as a
buffer population at this time given the continued tense relations between the Qing
and Russia following the Ili crisis.4 8
In the long-term analysis, however, the most important aspect o f the Taranchi
migration for Russia was this resettlem ent’s contribution to the physical and economic
colonization o f Russia’s portion o f the Ili valley. Despite Russian attempts to settle the Ili
valley with Cossacks from Siberia, the area remained sparsely populated until the m igration
o f Taranchis and Dungans. W ith the influx o f new migrants, the Russian Em pire saw an
47 Writing in 1883, before the migration o f Taranchis and Dungans had ended, a Russian bureaucrat was already
proclaiming Jarkent “a center o f trade, industry, and agriculture,” noting that militarally it also “held importance
as a location for the reserves o f the front border guards, a base for military supplies, and a post for protecting the
primary access point from Chinese territory in the Ili valley” (TsGIAK f.64, op. 1, d .l 18, cv.9, p. 15).
48 In writing a military guide to Jungaria in 1887, the Russian bureaucrat Kostenko voiced the animosity that had
been developed in these relations: “After the signing o f the Treaty between our two neighboring empires in Asia,
our former friendly relations disappeared, and the Chinese, with the urging o f our European rivals, have begun
developing their military strength and arms with the goal o f sooner or later invading our border... [Thus,] it has
been necessary on our side to make some preperations for war” (Kostenko 1887:III-IV).
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opportunity to settle and irrigate large tracts o f land, which had formerly been primarily
grazing ground for the nomadic Kazakhs. By spreading the Taranchi villages along the
postal road from Verny to Kuldja, the local administration in Semirech’e established the
fram ework for a substantial irrigation system throughout the western Ili valley that could
potentially yield large crop returns. As the table below illustrates, the Taranchi migrants
were settled over a large area o f the Ili valley in both the Jarkent and Verny Uezds, thus
inhabiting the entire road from Verny to the new border in Khorgus.
Table 2: Taranchi Settlements in the Russian portion of the Ili valley. 1884
Administrative Location Families Individuals
Jarkent Uezd
Jarkent volost’ 2,479 9,489
Aksu-Charyn volost’ 1,238 5,933
Ketmen volost’ 760 3,787
Uezd total 4,477 19,209
Verny Uezd
Malabay volost’ 1,442 7,262
Koram volost’ 2,285 13,304
Karasu volost’ 1,548 5,598
Uezd total 5,275 26,164
Total migrants 9,752 45,373
From: Zapiski o Pereselenii Kul’dzhinskikh Osedlykh MusuPman v
Semirechinskuyu Oblast’ Sostavlena 10 Iyunia 1884 g., g. Verny. (Handwritten
Manuscript Fund of the National Library of Kazakhstan, No. 63, 1884, p. 119).
The migration also had significantly changed the demographic dynam ics o f the Ili
borderlands on both sides o f the border. Calculating from the 1880 population figures o f the
Russian occupying administration in the Kuldja region, approximately 80% o f the regions’
Taranchis and Dungans had become Russian subjects between 1881 and 1883, leaving only
some 2,565 Taranchi families and 346 Dungan families in the Qing-ruled Kuldja area
(Zapiski 1884:82). The Qing, however, transferred approximately 8,000 more Uyghur
families (soon to become Taranchis) to the Ili valley in the 1880s and 1890s, leading Aristov
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in 1896 to estimate the Taranchi population on both sides o f the border to be equal, with
approxim ately 50,000 living on each side (Aristov 1896:442). With the gradual
establishm ent o f Jarkent as a frontier trading center, which housed a bazaar with 286 shops
by 1884 and could also support a significant m ilitary population that would rival that o f
K uldja (Zapiski 1884:40), the Ili valley borderlands was destined to become a bustling site
for transnational trading and international intrigue between Russia and China. In short, the Ili
valley was rapidly developing into a modern borderlands, politically, culturally, and
economically, and the Taranchis, approximately equally distributed on both sides o f the
border, were destined to play an important role in its cross-border developments.
2.7 Conclusions: Im perial Rivalries a n d the Transnationalization o f the Uyghurs in
the Ili Valley
As this history demonstrates, the establishment o f a borderland Uyghur com m unity
in the Ili valley was a long and tumultuous process. This history greatly disrupted the Ili
U yghurs’ notions o f home and homeland and effectively transnationalized them as a people.
Having first been involuntarily moved from their local communities to the Ili valley, this
population was once again drastically uprooted during its migration to Russia. This was
likely a very traumatic experience for the Taranchis since, as pointed out in the previous
chapter, they relied so heavily upon the production o f location to shape the practice and
construction o f their communities. The transnationalization of the Uyghurs, however,
involved more than displacement and new more flexible notions o f home. During the
eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, this community was forced to engage two different
colonial regimes and adapt to the requirements o f being colonial subjects under both.
Among other things, this experience had placed this community at the center o f the inter-
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imperial processes that formed borders and the modem/colonial world system. At the same
time, the results o f these processes had ensured that the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley would
remain marginal in this world system. As will be demonstrated throughout the rest o f this
study, however, the Uyghurs in the Ili valley have not adopted this position passively.
Rather, throughout the colonial period, post-colonialism, and today, this population has
continually engaged global processes in resistance to marginalization. Furthermore, if the
forces establishing their marginalization have remained mostly global in scope, their
resistance has been expressed prim arily in the local context.
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CHAPTER THREE—Locality Production and Competing Colonialisms in the
Borderland: Uyghur Neighborhoods under Qing and Russian Rule
As the previous chapter demonstrates, the history of the Uyghurs in the Ili valley up
to the beginning of the twentieth century was a turbulent one in which this community faced
the challenges of multiple colonizations and migrations. In this context, the domain of the
community, the mdhdlla neighborhood in particular, provided a structure of life that could
circumvent and subvert the structures of colonial rule. More specifically, through the
reproduction of mahallds on both Qing and Russian territory, the Taranchis were able to
create a social space of their own that gave them at least some political representation and
autonomy within the context of colonial rule. In addition, the production of these localities
provided the Taranchis an anchoring of community in the unsettling context of their multiple
migrations. This chapter charts the history o f the production of Uyghur social space in the
mdhdllas of the Ili valley borderland during the colonial period. In doing so, it also discusses
those colonial policies of the Qing and Russian Empires that sought to control Uyghur social
spaces in the Ili valley as well as the indigenous Taranchi forces that competed for the
symbolic capital to define these localities. Given the sources available for the reconstruction
of this history, however, the chapter concentrates almost exclusively on the second half o f the
nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries. During this time, the production of
neighborhoods among the Uyghurs of the Ili valley involved a persistent and difficult struggle
between the will of this population to construct their own communities and the forces of
globalization and empire-building in the borderland that promoted quite different colonial
localities.
3.1: Colonial Localities and Communities in the Ili Valley: The Early Qing and the
Rule o f Colonial Difference (1750-1863)
Interlinked with one another, ...the census, the map, and the museum
illuminate the late colonial state’ s style o f thinking about its domain. The
‘ warp ’ o f this thinking was a totalizing class ificatory grid, which could be
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applied with great flexibility to anything under the state's real or
contemplated control: peoples, regions, religions, languages, products,
monuments, and so forth. The effect o f the grid was to always be able to
say o f anything that it was this, not that; it belonged here, not there.
- Benedict Anderson [(1983) 1990:184],
This statement by Benedict Anderson about the imperial fetish for categorizing
colonial subjects, while meant to describe the European colonial imagination, could easily
have been said about the Qing Empire in Xinjiang during the eighteenth and early nineteenth
centuries (see Millward 2000). For the Qing Empire in this far-flung western colony,
however, the obsession for categorizing subjects did not manifest itself in the representational
sphere alone (i.e. the map, census, and museum). The Qing imperial preoccupation with
categories was firmly established in the Empire’s actual construction of social spaces, the
segregation of which ensured the division of colonizer and colonized. Until the revolts of the
1860s, these segregated colonial social spaces presented serious obstacles to Uyghur attempts
to construct their own local communities in the shifting socio-political terrain of the Ili valley
borderland.
The Qing’s policies of ethnic segregation and control of social space in the Ili valley
were most obvious in the construction of the nine walled garrison cities of the military
complex that housed Manchu and Elan Chinese troops and administrators. These cities, into
which Taranchis were not allowed to enter, strictly segregated the domains of the Han
Chinese and Manchus from that of the Taranchis and other peoples in the region (see
Millward 1998:79 and illustration 1.1). With the implementation of this policy, the nine
walled cities of the Ili valley and other similar walled cities elsewhere in Xinjiang became
oases of Manchu and Chinese culture where there was no danger of being polluted by the
local Muslims and vice-versa.'
1 It is significant, for example, that Valikhanov describes his stay in Manchu Kuldja in 1856 as being a Manchu
and Chinese experience, and he rarely mentions any interaction with the Taranchis [Valikhanov (1856) 1985a].
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The walled cities, however, were only one aspect of the Qing Empire’s policies of
physical segregation in the Ili military complex. Outside the walls of the cities, there were
enclosed agricultural encampments that also strictly segregated different segments of colonial
society. These encampments included the bingtun (for Han Chinese troops), the qitun (for
Manchu and other non-Han troops), the qiantun (for exiled criminals), and the huitun (for
Muslims). The huitun work unit, exclusively made up of Uyghurs (or Taranchis), had the
worse conditions and most taxing requirements of the four agricultural settlements. The
Taranchis living on the huitun were expected to pay higher wheat taxes than anyone else in
the Ili valley and more than Uyghurs elsewhere in Eastern Turkestan, each family being held
responsible for providing nine 72 kilogram sacks of clean wheat to the Ili Military governor
annually (Shakhmatov 1935:65). According to the calculations of the Soviet economic
historian Duman, Taranchi households were able to produce barely enough from this state-
owned land to feed themselves once they gave over the majority of their yield to the military
and fed their livestock (Duman 1936b: 162-163). To add to this burden, the Taranchis of the
huitun were also called upon to help in the labor-intensive effort of building the military
complex and borderland colony in which they were virtually being held captive (Kabirov
1951:21; Duman 1936b:131).2
In addition to the taxing demands of working on the huitun and providing the Military
Governor with grain, the work camp’s structure and administration, which were decreed by
the Qing Empire, stood in distinct opposition to indigenous notions of the structure of Uyghur
communities. Each huitun had exactly one hundred families who were chosen by the Qing
2 In contrast, the other encampments had increasingly less responsibilities. The qiantun settlements for the exiled
convicts from China proper were the next most difficult to live on after the huitun. While the exiles on the qiantun
were forced to work without a stipend and with only small rations o f seed, they were responsible for significantly
less wheat than were the Muslims o f the huitun (Waley-Cohen 1991:170-171). Responsible for roughly the same
amount o f wheat as the qiantun, the soldiers on the bingtun benefitted from military stipends and were allotted all
the necessary tools and livestock needed to farm (Duman 1936b:130-131). Finally, the qitun reserved for Manchu
and other non-Han banner troops was allotted the best land and that closest to the walled cities as well as the best
resources. Furthermore, the Manchu, Solon, and Chahar soldiers working on them were able to retain more of
their crop for themselves than was the case on the bingtun, qiantun, or huitun (Duman 1936b: 140-141).
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98
authorities rather than by the Uyghur-Taranchis themselves. In addition, the Qing
administration ensured that each Taranchi village had inhabitants from different regions of
Xinjiang who had never before met. As Vasili Radlov notes, “it appears as if the Chinese
attempted to mix them during their migration, and now we find in every Taranchi village
people from Kashgar, Yarkand, Aksu, etc.” [Radlov (1893) 1989:100]. While these policies
decreed social spaces for the Taranchis, they worked against the creation of cohesive
Taranchi communities at the same time.
If this mixing of migrants and imperial prescription of a given village’s population
size did not make the production of community difficult enough for the Taranchis in their new
environment, the Qing also decreed that Taranchi community leaders should be chosen by the
colonial administration rather than by community members. This was done by instituting a
modified version of the Uyghurs’ own bag system. While the structure of this system
mirrored the administrative structure in Eastern Turkestan before Qing rule, the appointment
of bags by Qing authorities significantly changed these indigenous colonial officials’
relationship with common Taranchis.3
Until the rebellions of the 1860s, Uyghur bags appointed by the Qing enforced a
system of regulation and administration on each level of community in Eastern Turkestan.
According to Uyghur ethnographer Abdurahim Habibulla, the bag system was based on a
framework of nested administrators that mirrored the local zhuts: the on bag (leader of ten)
who oversaw all activities of the mahalla, the yiXz begi (leader of one hundred) who oversaw
the activities of the kent, the ming begi (leader of one thousand) who watched over the yeza,
3 According to the historian Isenbike Togan, the “bag system” had its origins in the Mongol period, and the bags
themselves represented the settled descendents of nomadic aristocracy known as the tore (Togan 1992:143).
According to Valikhanov, however, the bags were elected by the populace and from within local communities
during the period o f Khoja and Junggar rule, indicating that, at least after the fall o f the Timurids, they may indeed
have been tied to the roles o f the mashrap's ottuz oghul locally [Valikhanov (1859) 1985c:173]. Whichever was
the case, the bags, in alliance with the religious authority o f the Khojas, were the primary administrative authority
in the seventeenth century, and their existing system o f rule was adopted by the Junggars to indirectly control the
Muslims o f Eastern Turkestan after 1673. The Qing followed this precedence, also employing indirect rule of
Eastern Turkestan through the bags until the rebellions o f the 1860s temporarily removed Qing sovereignty from
the area (Duman 1936b:104).
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and the hakim bag who was the primary leader of the shahar or oasis (Habibulla 1993:224-
225; also see table 6). In addition, numerous other bags formed a local elite that carried out
various duties for the Qing Empire from the regulation of irrigation to the enforcement of law
and the collection of taxes [see Duman 1936:109-113; Habibulla 1993:225-226; Valikhanov
(1859) 1985c: 172-173].
Table 3: The Bag System in the Hi Valley [Early 19th Century)
Title # of Bags Duties
Hakim B ag 1 R esponsible for all Taranchi in Ili valley
Ishik-aga Bag 1 Primary assistant to the Hakim B ag
Kaznachi B ag Responsible for the collection o f wheat for state
Shan B ag R esponsible for collection o f all taxes
K azii B ag 1 Responsible for all legal matters
Mirap Bag 1 Responsible for overseeing the distribution o f water
through irrigation
Duguan Bag 1 Responsible for Taranchi relations w ith military and
postal stations
M ing B ag Responsible for all Taranchi in a given y e z a
Shikhur B ag 1 Primary assistant to the Duguan in regards to the postal
system
Padishap Bag 1 To oversee the arrest o f criminals and the matters o f
prisons
Bachzhgir B ag 1 To oversee the collection o f taxes for livestock and
their trading
Sadyr B ag 1 To oversee the activities o f trading and bazaars
Y uz Bag 60 Responsible for 100 Taranchi households in a given
huitun
On Bag 600 R esponsible for 10 Taranchi households within a given
huitun
Adapted from: L.I. Dum an, Agrarnaia Politika Tsinskogo (Manchzhurskogo) Pravitel’stva v
Sin’tsiane v Kontse X V III veka (M oskva-Leningrad: Izdat. A N SSSR , 1936, p. 164).
Given that imperial authorities both appointed the bags and oversaw their system of
administration, these native colonial administrators held little symbolic capital among local
Uyghurs. This is substantiated by the writings of numerous nineteenth century travellers to
Eastern Turkestan who observed that the Uyghurs held as much distaste for the bags as they
did for the Manchus and Han Chinese [cf. Valikhanov (1859) 1985c: 173; Pevtsov (1895)
1949:146]. This sentiment was undoubtedly further aggravated by the fact that many bags
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100
also acted essentially as feudal lords, maintaining large tracts of land and overseeing
anywhere from 2 to 100 families of Muslims who worked this land for them (Duman
1935:88).4 Furthermore, the power of the bags was especially tenuous in the Ili valley where
the hakim bag, a position held by the same family at least until 1805, was descended from the
princes of the northern oasis of Turpan, whereas the majority of Taranchis had come to the
area were from the south of Eastern Turkestan (Duman 1936b: 163-164).
In general, the Taranchis faced significant obstacles in attempting to produce
localities as marginal migrants and forced laborers in the Ili valley during the first half of the
nineteenth century. Qing imperial authorities, with the assistance of Uyghur bags, prescribed
the form, leadership, and make-up of the Taranchi villages, greatly limiting the Taranchis’
own agency in the production of their communities. Despite these obstacles, however, the
Taranchis successfully did established their own communities and localities in the Ili valley
by the mid-nineteenth century if not significantly earlier. Furthermore, the power of these
communities to challenge colonial constructions of proper behavior and social life was
bolstered by an increasingly strong Muslim ulema that played an active role in the production
of Taranchi localities.
3.2 Islam and the Production o f Taranchi Localities in the Ili Valley to 1863
Unfortunately, the historical record offers sparse evidence of the structure and daily
life of Taranchi local communities in the Ili valley during the eighteenth and early nineteenth
century. Sources from the mid-nineteenth century, however, suggest that the Taranchis had
succeeded by that time if not earlier in establishing their own social spaces increasingly based
4 These Muslim indentured servants did not include all those who were not bags; rather, they were a separate class
in society that is referred to in Qing sources as yantsi (see Duman 1935). Even those who were notyantsi,
however, served the bags economically through a system o f corruption and clientelism. As Valikhanov noted
about the clientelism of the bags, “each of them has clients; their city clients are made to bring them meat, lard,
and other products while their clients from the countryside help to farm their land and, on a rotating basis, do their
housework” [Valikhanov (1859) 1985c: 162]. Since the Qing administrators did not pay a significant stipend to the
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on the religious authority of the Muslim clergy. Vasili Radlov, an ethnographer-linguist
employed by the Tsarist administration to study the Kuldja area in 1861, presents convincing
evidence of this fact in his accounts of Taranchi settlements in the area.
Radlov notes that by 1861, the Taranchi Muslim leaders, or akhuns, had become an
important force in the Ili valley, especially in the city of Muslim Kuldja where the Uyghur
population was more independent and prosperous than the rural Taranchis living on the huitun
[Radlov (1893) 1989:520].5 From within this burgeoning Muslim city, a strong Islamic ulema
took shape that helped to redefine Taranchi practices and promote the production of Uyghur
localities throughout the Ili valley. As Radlov notes, the power of the ulema was significant
enough that by 1861 each Taranchi huitun community had its own mosques and schools as
well as their own Muslim clergy who answered to the central Muslim authority in Old Kuldja
[Radlov (1893) 1989:522],
With the assistance of the akhuns and their institutions, the Taranchis were able to
successfully reproduce a social life based in practices of zhutdarchilik that, at least in part,
escaped the purview of the bags and the colonial administration. The maktdps, which were
overseen by the akhuns, played a particularly important role in reproducing this zhutdarchilik,
which was highly influenced by Muslim ideals. While this resulted in the construction of
Uyghur localities steeped in religion, these communities also expressed a nascent form of
anti-colonial nationalism. Radlov makes this clear in his observations of Kuldja from 1861:
...alongside the bureaucratic apparatus appointed by the government, a national
form of regulation [i.e. local self-regulation] developed that is based on the
networked system of Muslim clergy that operates on the religious feeling of the
people and whose mission is the maintenance of national [i.e. cultural]
bags, this corruption was also tacitly encouraged by the local Qing bureaucrats as a means of reimbursing the bags
for their services to the empire (Kuznetsov 1961:81-82).
5 According to Radlov, this city was also home to many Uyghurs who had lived in the area before the Qing
colonization and whose status in the Kuldja military complex was better than that o f the Taranchi migrants
[Radlov (1893) 1989:520]. In addition, following the Jahangir revolts o f the 1820s and the signing of the Treaty of
Kuldja in 1851, many Uyghurs came to the Taranchi city of Muslim or Old Kuldja on their own accord to take
advantage of the increasing trade opportunities.
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foundations and their protection from the dangerous influences of surrounding
peoples [Radlov (1893) 1989:522],
To add credence to Radlov’s assertion that Islam in the Ili valley was increasingly
imbued with a nascent nationalism, at least one source maintains that many of the maktdps in
the Kuldja area at this time were particularly progressive. The present-day Uyghur scholar
Aysa-jan Musa notes that due to the Ili valley's position on trade routes to the west, local
progressive Muslim thinkers were already teaching scientific subjects in the 1840s, and by the
1860s most maktdps taught history, geography, and literature (Musa 1993:157). If these
assertions are correct, we can assume that the maktdps in the Kuldja area at this time were
among the most progressive in either Western or Eastern Turkestan. Furthermore, it suggests
that the Kuldja akhuns were interested in more than merely promoting Islam; they wanted to
promote the Taranchis' development in the colonial context and perhaps even their resistance
to colonial rule.
Two separate power structures, therefore, became engaged in the struggle for the
power to define Taranchis’ daily life and the structures of their communities in the mid
nineteenth century— the native colonial administrators, or bags, and the religious elite, or
akhuns. While the bags possessed political power due to their recognition as administrators
by the Qing colonists, the akhuns enjoyed the authority of being bearers of symbolic capital in
local Taranchi communities. Given this situation, there appears to have been an uneasy
alliance between the akhuns and bags in the Ili valley in the mid-nineteenth century. On the
one hand, the akhuns necessarily worked with the bags in the mediation of legal disputes and
a multitude of other duties that required the good graces of the Qing administration. On the
other hand, the bags were equally dependent upon the akhuns to allow them access to the
Taranchis’ local communities.6 Despite this uneasy alliance, the authority of the akhuns
6 This relationship appears to mirror that experienced in Uyghur communities prior to Qing conquest. For, as
Isenbike Togan has noted, the bags had always ruled only by virtue o f their alliance with a religious elite (see
Togan 1993).
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among the Taranchis was gradually replacing that of the bags. This shift in popular authority
also improved the prestige of the akhuns among both the bags and the Qing administrators of
the Ili valley. Radlov again substantiates this in his observations:
While they [i.e. the Kuldja Muslim clergy] were not supported in the least by the
government, the religious feelings of the people gave them such power that not
only the Tatar bureaucrats [i.e. Uyghur bags], but also the Manchus, listened to
their voice, for it could easily ignite a fanatic crowd [Radlov (1893) 1989:523].7
While the akhuns had fully established their role in the cultural politics of Taranchi
communities in the Ili valley by the 1860s, their influence on the Taranchis’ daily life was not
all-powerful, especially on the huituns. The Taranchi agriculturalists suffered great
difficulties under Qing rule, and the akhuns at least implicitly worked in tandem with the
colonial administration. In this context, other individuals also held significant symbolic
capital in Taranchi communities. Sufi Khojas, while not necessarily associated with the
Apaqiyya, were often able to attain esteem among the Taranchis. As the Taranchi songs and
poems about the Sufi Khoja Chan-Mozy Yusupjan demonstrate, however, these popular
religious leaders also often faced opposition from both the bags and the akhuns and,
consequently, were frequently arrested and executed (see Pantusov 1909:14-29).
Outside the religious world, another important contender for the symbolic capital
required to define Taranchis’ daily lives and communities also existed—the producers of
Taranchi poetry and songs. In almost every account of Uyghur life during the nineteenth
century, whether in the Ili valley or elsewhere, travellers noted the importance of song and
dance in the lives ofthe Uyghurs [cf. Valikhanov (1859) 1985c:164-165; Pevtsov (1895)
1949:133; Radlov (1893) 1989:527; Pantusov 1890:XI-XII]. The richness and importance of
Uyghur songs and poetry in the Ili valley and elsewhere in Eastern Turkestan likely owed
7 To support this assertion, Radlov recounts an incident where the akhuns of Muslim Kuldja succeeded in bringing
the Ili hakim bag to justice under Shar 'ia law in the 1830s through the intervention of the Qing administration.
Accusing the hakim bag Khalisat of violating the Shar 'ia by adopting Chinese practices, wearing Chinese clothes,
and refusing to carry out the religious practices o f Islam, the akhuns were able to convince the Ili military governor
to discharge him from his position and send him back to Turpan [Radlov (1893) 1989:523],
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104
much to the mashrap ritual that served as an important site of these arts’ transmission.
Learning songs and poems at mdshrdps, the Taranchis reproduced them at almost every
opportunity during community practices of coordination.8 As Pevtsov notes, “passionate
lovers of music, dance, and song, the Kashgarians [i.e. Uyghurs] utilize every available daily
opportunity (circumcision, wedding, etc.) to hold a concert (tamasha) despite the significant
economic difficulties of the majority ofthe population” [Pevtsov (1895) 1949:133].9
During the first phase of Qing rule in the Ili valley, therefore, the Taranchis had
gradually found the resources to produce their own zhuts despite extreme material difficulties
and the tight controls of the colonial administration. In the struggle to produce Taranchi
localities under Qing rule, the Uyghur religious elite in the area played an important role.
Through the construction of mosques and maktdps in local communities, the Taranchis
transformed the space of the huitun from a colonial labor camp to a cohesive Muslim social
space where zhutdarchilik was practiced and reproduced among the inhabitants. Furthermore,
these Muslim social spaces had developed a strong anti-colonial character that was soon
manifested in the bloody revolt that drove the Qing out of the Ili valley and led to the
establishment of the Ili Sultanate.
3.3 Practicing "Taranchiness" in the Ili Sultanate
We elected from amongst us a Sultan and for several years Islam reigned.
Shar ’ ia law was introduced and was carried out with exactness;
On all the poor citizens, the Sultan took mercy.
8 While the majority of Taranchi songs and poems were about love and its discontents (see Pantusov 1890:75-122),
historical dastans and qoshaqs also existed and offered opportunities for political expression and the reproduction
of anti-colonial ideology. In essence, these oral arts represented the unofficial history o f the Taranchis as a people,
helping to promote Taranchi political consciousness and a spirit o f anti-colonial resistance.
9 While Pevstov translates tamasha as a concert, it was actually much more than this. Tamasha could be used to
describe virtutally any community practice o f coordination where song, dance, or performance took place.
According to James Millward (personal communication), the word, at least as it is used in Hindi, can also refer to
“any kind o f excitement, performance, and so on in the marketplace, bazaar, or other public place that one might
go stroll around and take in.”
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As a result, all the poor became rich;
The sky, envious o f the people’ s happiness, robbed them o f independence.
- Seyd Mukhammed Kashii, Sherkhi Shekeste, 1882 (Pantusov 1909:192-194).
During the brief period of the Ili Sultanate in Kuldja (1864-1871), the Taranchis were
freed from the institutional subservience to the Qing Empire that they had experienced for
over a century. This new freedom allowed the Taranchis of the Ili valley to re-establish
localities and zhutdarchilik in ways that had been impossible under the tight control of Qing
rule.
While little is known about the actual practices of Taranchi communities under the Ili
Sultanate, it is known that these communities became increasingly autonomous and self
regulating.1 0 The Ili Sultan reorganized the bags, removing many of those who had zealously
served the Qing administration. In stripping former bags of their titles, the Sultanate also
confiscated their land and redistributed it to those Taranchi farmers who previously had
served the bags (Pantusov 1881b:41).u This re-organization, along with the promotion to
bag positions of common Taranchis who had fought courageously during the war, must have
served to change the relationship between bags and commoners significantly.1 2 In this
context, the Sultanate’s 83 yiiz bags and 747 on bags in the Kuldja area likely facilitated and
promoted local zhutdarchilik in their mahallas and yezas rather than regulating and limiting
its power as was the case under Qing rule (Pantusov 1876:199). Furthermore, as a Muslim
state, power in the Ili Sultanate was officially shared between the bags and the ulema,
creating a partial balance of powers that discouraged abuses of power and favored the
1 0 The Russians confiscated the Ili Sultanate’s archives when taking Kuldja, and the Sultan’s records likely still lie
in archives both in Russia and Kazakhstan. Unfortunately, the body o f archival documents from the Chancellory
of Kuldja Affairs under the Military Governorship o f Semirech’e Oblast’ remain closed due to their potentially
sensitive information concerning the present-day border between Kazakhstan and China.
1 1 According to at least one source, however, the Sultanate’s existing bags continued to control large tracts o f land
and to employ indentured laborers from amongst the Taranchis as well as from other peoples in the region
(Kabirov 1951:35).
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1 0 6
empowerment of localities and local subjects. This balance of power was evident even in the
Sultan’s immediate court of advisors which included four kazanchi, or lay officials similar to
bags, and three elders from the ulema— the qazi-akhun, mufti-akhun, and satyb-akhun (see
Aristov 1873a:214-215).
The most significant changes in the practices of Taranchi communities during the Ili
Sultanate, however, emerged out ofthe improved conditions for the accumulation of both
financial and symbolic capital. With the abolishment of segregated farming encampments
and the dissolution of the Qing state-owned stores, most Taranchis were able to establish their
own means of subsistence independent of the state. Furthermore, the tax regime was greatly
reduced, allowing common Taranchis greater wealth. According to Aristov, “for the
maintenance of his court, the Sultan took only the minimum necessities [from the people] and
he himself lived modestly, helping the poorest of his subjects with donations of grain and
livestock” (Aristov 1873a:214). By allowing the Taranchis these opportunities to support
themselves, the conditions in the Sultanate also offered them more time and resources for the
practices of zhutdarchilik, furthering the development and strength of local communities.
At the same time, the Ili Sultanate had essentially reversed the Qing’s politics of
colonial difference and formed ethnic policies that favored Taranchis as the masters of the
country. Following the defeat of the Dungans by the Taranchis, the Sultanate discharged all
Dungans from positions of power in the government and placed a Taranchi bag in charge of
overseeing their largely depleted community (Kabirov 1951:33). As infidels living under a
Muslim state, the non-Muslim peoples in the region were likewise left out of the central
government and were overseen by Taranchi bags (see Pantusov 1876:198).
While little is known about the daily life of Taranchis during this very short period in
the history of the Ili valley, it can be said authoritatively that the Taranchis under the Ili
1 2 It is significant, for example, that a popular hero of the rebellion and one o f the area’s best known composers o f
poems, Sadyr Pavlan, was given the position of ming begi in charge o f the Kalmyks o f the border region (see
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Sultanate gained significantly more control over both their social lives and their local
communities. The abolishment of the huitun and its demanding labor and taxes along with
the establishment of Taranchi sovereignty permanently dislodged the Taranchis from their
former immobile position at the bottom of the Ili military complex’s ethno-social hierarchy.
The ways in which these changes would have influenced Taranchis further through the
reproduction of habitus born of the conditions in the Ili Sultanate over generations, however,
is pure speculation because by 1871 these conditions had once again significantly changed.
3.4 Taranchi Practice Encounters the Russian “ Rule o f Colonial Difference ”
When the Russians took over control of Kuldja, they brought with them new
institutions of colonial difference that differed from those of the Qing. While an objective
rendering of all the differences in Russian and Qing styles of colonialism is beyond the scope
of this study, some general differences can be noted, particularly as they affected the lives of
the Taranchis.
Unlike the Qing, the Russians entered the Ili valley in 1871 with an understanding of
colonialism that had been highly influenced by the modernist ideals of social mobility and
progress popular in Europe at the time. The most important difference in this style of
colonialism from that of the Qing was the Russians’ belief that, in addition to being
conquered and orderly ruled, the colonized needed to be reformed and enlightened. This
attitude owed much of its formulation to Russia’s experience in administrating colonies in the
Caucasus during the 1840s under Prince Mikhail Vorontsov. Vorontsov’s rule typified the
enlightenment approach to colonialism that emerged from the progressive ideas of Catherine
II in the eighteenth century.1 3 According to Daniel Brower, the Russian version of this style
of colonialism posited that ’’primitive society was a stage of history, not a mark of the devil,”
Kabirov 1951:3In. 1; see also illustration 2.3).
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and “all peoples would ultimately rise to the level of civilization if given the proper guidance”
(Brower 1997:116). It should be added, however, that if all peoples could “rise to the level of
civilization,” they could not necessarily rise to the level of the Great Russians in the eyes of
the empire since, despite encouraging the development of colonized peoples, the Russians
still employed a rule o f colonial difference that promoted their superiority over their subjects.
For the Taranchis, this new style of colonialism produced many challenges. Most
importantly, the Russians wished to be more involved in their lives and practices than had the
Qing. Qing policies had influenced Taranchi practices through the construction and
regulation of colonial localities, but this was always done either to enforce segregation or to
exploit the Taranchis’ labor. The Russians, on the other hand, wished to engage the
Taranchis, showing them the benefits of a greater civilization and teaching them new ideas
through practice. In other words, the Russians wished to reform the Taranchis by
simultaneously enlightening them and ruling over them.
During the occupation, the most directed Russian effort to reform the Taranchis was
the establishment of the Kuldja Russo-Chinese-Taranchi Public School, which taught both the
Russian children of colonial administrators and soldiers and Taranchi children from the local
population (see illustration 3.2).1 4 This small school appears to have been created with the
aspirations of fostering the rapid development of a cadre of Russified Taranchi elites that
would be loyal to Russian rule and presumably remain pro-Russian even if Kuldja was
eventually returned to the Qing Empire. Nikolai Pantusov offers the following articulation of
this policy:
1 3 Having served in the Caucasus under prince Vorontsov, the Governor General o f Turkestan in 1871, Von
Kaufman, mimicked much o f the Russians’ colonial attitude in the Caucasus in his rule over Kuldja.
1 4 While a full-fledged attempt to establish Russian-Native combined schools (Russko-Tuzemnye Shkoly) in
Russian controlled Central Asia did not start until the 1880s (see Bartold 1927:125; Ostroumov 1907:173), the
Kuldja school was founded already in 1873, only two years after the occupation began. It is unknown why the
Russians attempted to create such a school in Kuldja immediately after taking over the region, but they may have
been concerned about establishing Russian influence more quickly in the event that the area was returned to the
Qing in the future.
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In establishing the Russo-Chinese-Taranchi Public School, it was especially taken
into account that the native children, studying in the school for two or three years,
should receive not only an elementary education, but learn Russian as well, and
that several of them could become good interpreters, the rest receiving education
and a knowledge of Russian language to serve them in their industry and trade as
well as in civil service (Pantusov 1881a:72).
The limited success of the school, however, demonstrates the general limits of
Russian colonial rule and its aspirations of reforming the Taranchis. The Russian
administration was at first able to convince many Taranchis to enroll in the school, and it even
enjoyed the acceptance of the ulema once they were assured that the classes would not be
anti-Muslim in nature (Pantusov 1881 a:72). In the first year, the students included two
children of Russian diplomats, one child of a Russian military officer, four Cossack children,
five children of Taranchi bags, twenty children of average Taranchi families, one Chinese
child, and one Kalmyk (Pantusov 1876:34). The students from average Taranchi families
were by far the most numerous, and they were sponsored by their zhuts in the hopes that they
could help their local communities in the future. Within a year, however, this sponsorship of
poorer children ceased, and the school’s enrollment dropped significantly (Pantusov
1881 a:73). By the end of 1874, the school had fourteen Taranchi students and seventeen
Russians, and by 1876, only one Taranchi student remained (Pantusov 1876:34; 1881 a:75).1 5
By contrast, in 1876 the region had 458 Taranchi maktaps and medresses, serving 5,368 boys
and 2,514 girls (Pantusov 188la: 112). Given these figures, we can assume that the Taranchis
continued to find the education offered by their own ulema to be much more useful than that
provided by the Russians.
1 5 One possible reason for the rapid decline in Taranchi enrollment was that for the Taranchis disposed towards
secular and modernist pedagogy there was another option that was controlled by Taranchis themselves. Two young
Uyghur traders named Hiisan-bay and Bahavudun-bay, the sons o f the wealthy merchant Musa-bay Haji from
Astan-Atush, came to Kuldja in 1873 to teach new secular classes at the medresse, and they were welcomed by a
reformist-minded member of Kuldja's ulema named Nasir-akhun Khalip Damolla (Qadiri 1995:10;
Khushtarl 993:1). Another source claims that this did not occur until 1875 (see Musa 1993:157). While either may
be correct, if these classes did begin in 1873, it might explain why many of the students at the Russian school left
in mid-year.
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110
If this school provides the most vivid example of the Russians’ style of colonial
enlightenment in Kuldja, it was Tsarist policy towards local Taranchi communities that most
directly affected Taranchis’ daily lives and their production of locality. Instead of accepting
the existing bags as community leaders and administrators, the Russians demanded that the
people of a given community elect their own new local leaders, known as aqsakols (see
Pantusov 1881a:7). While the Russians encouraged what they considered to be a democratic
system of local administration elected by the people and based on previous practice, this
system was contrary to the Taranchis’ own sensibilities. To the Taranchis, the leader of a
local community should be a person who had demonstrated his mastery of zhutdarchilik and
who, in the eyes of the community, possessed great symbolic capital. A leader's election was
not a consciously pursued activity, but an unsaid part of community practice emerging from
male mashrap cohorts. Furthermore, according to Taranchi sensibilities, not only did leaders
emerge informally from the unanimous "will of the community," but they also were subject to
dismissal at any time if their esteem in the community fell.
This conflict between Taranchi sensibilities and Russian ideals of community
representation is demonstrated in the report of a Russian bureaucrat in Kuldja who tried to
stop a mutiny against the aqsakol of Kagunchi, one of the villages under his jurisdiction
(TsGIAK, f. 21, op. 1, d. 729, pp. 1-3). His report, dated January 1881, describes some 200-
300 villagers calling upon him to ask for the removal of their aqsakol Idris Nadyrov. When
the Russian bureaucrat refused, noting that there would be new elections soon, the Taranchis
responded by threatening to kill Nadyrov. As these complaints continued for three days, the
Russian bureaucrat could not understand why the villagers would not honor Nadyrov until the
next elections. At the same time, the Taranchis were confused as to why the Russian would
not listen to them. As one Taranchi said to the Russian bureaucrat, “we are many, Idris is
only one; why will you not believe us that Idris is a bad person and remove him?” (TsGIAK,
f. 21, op. l,d. 729, p. 3).
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I l l
While the Russians’ attempts to reform both Taranchis and Taranchi local
communities during their decade of rule over Kuldja hindered the Hi Uyghurs’ own
production of locality, Tsarist rule also brought economic independence and prosperity to the
H i valley, factors that assisted the Taranchis in the construction of communities. For much of
the Russian occupation, there were no taxes on trade,,s and cross-border commerce increased
substantially (Pantusov 1881 a:32).1 7 Furthermore, the taxes on each family in Kuldja were
fairly reasonable and remained within the realm of the possible for the Taranchi farmer.1 8
This material improvement in the Taranchis’ lives helped significantly to bolster their ability
to produce locality and to practice zhutdarchilik.
The increase in Taranchi/Uyghur involvement in international trade under Russian
rule of Kuldja also altered the competition for symbolic capital in local communities. With
the bags mostly replaced by aqsakols who had to answer to their communities and with the
ulema mildly weakened by the fall of the Ili Sultanate, a wealthy merchant class was
beginning to make its mark in the cultural politics of Taranchi communities.
This new class of traders was well travelled and, like the ulema, could claim access to
knowledge. The caravans coming and leaving Kuldja in 1874 had varied points of origin and
destination outside the Ili valley, including Kokand, Petropavlovsk, Verny, Tashkent, Kapal,
Semipalatinsk, Kazan and Ufa (Pantusov 1876:172-195). The Taranchi traders who either
travelled to these locations or interacted significantly with merchants from these locations
were able to exchange experiences and ideas as well as goods. Travelling to Kazan and Ufa
must have left a particularly strong impression on many of the Taranchi traders who likely
1 6 Pantusov (1881 a:32) notes that for the first several years, there was no tax on trade in order to encourage
commerce, especially with Russian citizens from Western Turkestan and southern Siberia. In 1875, however,
taxes were introduced.
1 7 In 1874 alone, 154 trade caravans came to Kuldja with 478,471 roubles in goods, and 482 caravans left the city
with items worth 336,873.32 roubles to be sold in other locations (Pantusov 1876:172-195). While these figures
show a serious trade deficit reflecting Kuldja’s poor production capacity, they also demonstrate an active port o f
trade within Central Asia’s extensive overland trade network.
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began encountering new forms of mediated culture being produced by modernist Muslim
reformers. While the real explosion of the usul-i-jadid (new method) movement of reformed
Muslim education and publication among Russia’s Tatars would occur in the 1880s, already
in the 1870s, Kazan was a place of new ideas about Islam which simultaneously provided a
critique of colonial domination. In this context, it would not be surprising if among the
incidental purchases that Taranchi traders made in the Volga area in the 1870s were copies of
the informational calendars produced by the reformer Kayyum Nasiri (see Rorlich 1986:65-
67). Whether or not most Taranchi traders encountered this nascent Muslim modernist press
in the 1870s, the sons of Musa-bay Haji, Hiisan-bay and Bahavudun-bay, who had opened the
new classes at the Kuldja medresse (see footnote 15), were certainly aware of the Jadid
reformist developments in the Volga region and propagated these ideas in the Kuldja area.
Among other things, the spread of usul-i-jadid ideas in Kuldja at this time, in turn, likely
promoted increased awareness of the colonial situation and the possibilities of resistance in
local Taranchi communities.
While the Russian rule o f colonial difference came into conflict with the Taranchi
production of locality, therefore, Russian rule continued to offer Taranchis in Kuldja the
ability to reconstruct their zhuts and reproduce the practices of zhutdarchilik in ways which
would have been impossible under Qing rule previously. At the same time, the Taranchis’
increased involvement in international trade gave this population increased exposure to new
ideas and forms of mediated culture that would continue to play an important role in Taranchi
localities in the Ili valley during the next several decades. In this context, it is understandable
why so many Taranchis sought Russian citizenship when it was announced that Kuldja would
be returned to the Qing.
1 8 At first, each family was required to pay only three roubles annually to the Tsarist Empire, but after 1875, they
also had to pay a 20% harvest tax in grain (Pantusov 881 a:35,37).
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113
3.5 Establishing Practices o f "Zhutdarchilik" in New Environs Again: Local
Communities and the Taranchi Migration to Semirech ’ e
The High General then announced to all the citizens
That the Ili region was to be returned to the Chinese;
To migrate or not to migrate was left to the will o f the people.
Then, only sand and grass agreed to stay under the Chinese’ s jurisdiction;
Hard times have been thrown unto our heads; come on, let’ s save ourselves.
- Seyd Mukhammed Kashii, Sherkhi Shekeste, 1882 (Pantusov 1909:192-196)
When the Taranchis first came to Russian territory in the 1880s, they faced grave
difficulties. Having deserted their homes and belongings in Kuldja and having resettled on
land that was still not irrigated, the first Taranchi migrants in Semirech’e were not able to
grow enough to feed themselves, let alone to pay taxes to the Empire (Zapiski 1884:63).
Setting aside 300,000 roubles from the nine million paid to Russia by the Qing according to
the terms of the Treaty of St. Petersburg, the Russian administration helped feed their new
subjects during this first difficult harvest (Zapiski 1884:64). In addition, the Taranchis were
freed from land taxes for the first three years, until 1 January, 1886 (TsGIAK, f. 64, op. 1, d.
115, sv. 9, p. 162). This policy was enacted to allow the Taranchis time to build their
communities and, especially, to build irrigation canals. Still, by 1886, most Taranchi
communities were not producing enough to both pay taxes and maintain subsistence. They
faced large obstacles in trying to irrigate the Ili valley, and corruption among both Russian
and local officials aggravated the problem through the hording of water. A letter written
collectively by the Taranchi inhabitants of Qoram to the Semirech'e oblast administration at
this time demonstrates the extent of the migrants’ frustration:
You are acting unfairly towards us. In place of the ready-made canals you gave the
peasants [i.e. Russian/Cossack migrants], you gave us waterless land, which,
without us, would bring nothing to the state budget. We try to irrigate it, expend
large amounts of labor and resources, and lose many people— and this is really all
done just so we can begin to pay taxes? (TsGIAK, f. 64, op. 1, d. 4184, sv. 266, p.
53).
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While the citizens of Qoram were not allotted the thirty year tax-free period for which they
asked in their letter (not in the quotation), the Russian administration did extend the period
during which all Taranchis were freed from land tax for another seven years, until 1891 [see
Rumiantsev (1914) 1998:14].1 9 These tax breaks helped the Taranchis to rebuild their
communities and to begin agricultural production, but the new migrants continued to
experience problems attaining sufficient water for their fields into the 1890s.2 0
These material hardships obviously limited Taranchi efforts to produce locality and
rebuild the zhuts from which they had left in Kuldja. To add to the economic obstacles facing
the Taranchi production of locality, the Russians also demanded that the migrants settle in
patterns that were contrary to the wishes of their new subjects. When the Taranchis came to
Russian territory, they wanted to resettle in their former zhuts. In most cases, entire villages
or neighborhoods migrated together, taking part in all phases of the move together from the
registration with the Russians in Kuldja to the assembly of carts and horses, and it was natural
to the Taranchis that these communities should remain together. The Russian administration,
however, did not intend to recreate the former communities of Kuldja across the border.
Once in Semirech'e, the migrants were assigned land by the Oblast' Administration.
While the Russians did not split up migration parties, they placed them on larger settlements
than had existed in Kuldja. Most villages in Kuldja consisted of about 100 households
(created on the basis of the huituri), and the Russians saw such small settlements as
unmanageable and unable to support the Russian schools they hoped to build for the
Taranchis (Zapiski 1884:67). Instead, the Russians demanded that the Taranchis settle in
villages, called obschestva, made up of several hundred households which were joined in one
1 9 It should be mentioned, however, that the area of Koljat, which had not been resettled, but merely operated as
before, but now on Russian territory, was required to pay taxes already in 1886 (see TsGIAK f. 64, op. 1, d. 41184,
sv.266, pp. 12-13).
20 This may have played a role in the decision of some 250 Taranchi families and 500 Taranchi bachelors who
agreed, for miserable wages, to go to the Merv oasis of present-day Turkmenistan in 1890 to help revive its ancient
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115
of five volosts of some 1,500-2,500 households, each of which were under the jurisdiction of
one of the two uezds~W tm y or Jarkent (Zapiski 1884:79).
The Taranchi settlers had little choice but to accept this structure, but within it, they
also reproduced the zhuts in which they formerly lived in the Kuldja area. N.N. Rumianstev,
who collected statistics for the Semirech'e oblast' administration in the early twentieth
century, characterized this settlement process in the Jarkent volost' as follows:
A surveyor from the Oblast Administration for the Division of Homestead
Settlement Plots came to them. They chose the place of settlement themselves; the
majority were settled on the old route between Kuldja and Jarkent. The divisions
placed a single obschestvo in each assigned place. Since each obschestvo had
migrants from different villages [in Kuldja], the obschestvo, despite being marked
as the primary settlement by the surveyor from the Oblast' Administration, broke
down into neighborhoods approximating former villages [in Kuldja]... Each of
these neighborhoods was named after the place from which its settlers had come
[Rumiantsev (1914) 1996:7],
These smaller rural mahdllas became more or less self-sufficient, and some even chose to
leave their assigned obschestvo entirely and start new, smaller settlements on idle land.
While these practices made perfect sense to the Taranchis, it disturbed Russian
bureaucrats concerned about the orderly settlement of their new subjects. The displeasure of
the Russians with regards to such acts is demonstrated in a report by a Russian administrator
of the Jarkent Ministry of Internal Affairs from 1885. Finding a village near Khorgus
disconnected from a proper obschestvo and living on land reserved for Cossacks, the
administrator wrote:
Leaving Khorgus to go and see the canal that feeds Pinzhin and other neighboring
villages, within about 10 versts, I ran into a group of farmers scattered on a
Cossack plot of land, on which they had formed a separate aqsakolstvo [i.e. zhut]
from Churuk which called itself Urto-Kurchan and which, according to their
records, included 84 households. Since the unsanctioned settlement of Taranchis
on Cossack land is, of course, impossible, and since the cultivation of land by
separate groups from the village would contradict the advisable aims of the order
by Your Preeminence [i.e. Governor-General of Semirech'e] of 22 May, 1884, No.
9817,1 declared the further existence of Urto-Kurchan impossible and united the
aqsakolstvo with the Khorgus rural obschestvo, after which will now consist of 132
irrigation system (Gabitov 1990:12-14). Other Taranchis in desperation left Russian territory alltogether and
returned to their former villages in Kuldja (Ruziev 1982:75-76).
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116
households, more or less fulfilling the number of settlers required for the proper
cultivation of land (TsGIAK, f. 44, op. 111, d. 228, sv. 18, p. 2).
As in Kuldja, therefore, the divergence between the Taranchis' local practices and the Russian
administrators' designs was destined to create problems for both parties in Semirech’e.
Illustrations 4: Taranchi Life in Sem irech’e After the M igration (1880s-1910st
Illu stration 4.1- Taranchi fam ily in the
Yarkent U ezd, circa 1910s (Rum yantsev
1914: table 1).
Illu stration 4.2-Taranchi m en from Yarkent
U ezd, circa 1910s (Rum yantsev 1914:
table 1).
In addition to such instances of Taranchi zhuts breaking off from their assigned
obschestvo, the existence of multiple zhuts in one large village that was supposed to be headed
by a single aqsakol inevitably led to serious divisions within Taranchi local communities.
During the first two decades of the Taranchi settlement, there were numerous local conflicts in
communities recounted in the reports of Tsarist bureaucrats. Furthermore, these conflicts were
widespread throughout all of the volosts, indicating that they were endemic to the conditions
of the migration.2' While no reports mention the parties in the conflicts as being from
different zhuts in Kuldja, it is likely that this was the source of the problem, which was always
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117
described by Russian administrators as competition between warring parties. At a loss to
explain why all of the Taranchis of the village of Alekseev in the Karasu volost' would not
gather together at a general meeting, for example, one Russian administrator wrote:
Alekseev, as I came to understand after staying there four days and having
encountered numerous complaints, as well as is evident from official
correspondence, is divided into two warring parties. At the head of one stands
[name removed] with his relatives and at the head of the other—the present
volostnoi upravitel' and the village elders. A strong antagonism exists between
these two parties, each of which has many supporters. Both parties are not shy to
stigmatize each other with all kinds of nonsense, bringing numerous complaints
against each other without any evidence (TsGIAK, f. 44, op. 2, d. 1541, sv. 64, p.
2).
While it appeared to this bureaucrat that these competing groups were founded on kinship ties,
it is certainly more likely that they were representatives of different communities in Kuldja
that could not stand to listen to a leader from another zhut.
In addition to being caused by the confusing way in which the zhuts from Kuldja had
been settled in Semirech’e, conflicts also arose from problems of corruption in the Taranchi
leadership that worked with the Russian authorities. In setting up the structure for the
Taranchi migration, the Russian administration appointed the leaders of the five volosts—
naming them volostnoi upravitel'. For these positions, which local Taranchis called
volostnois, the Russians appointed migrants who had assisted in the Tsarist occupation of
Kuldja and, therefore, were considered trustworthy by the Russian government in
Semirech'e.2 2 These local administrators, in turn, answered to the Russian bureaucrats in
charge of the Verny and Jarkent uezds— uezdnye nachalniki. Put in charge of the settlement of
the Taranchis, these volostnois, often in tandem with local Russian administrators, had far-
reaching power over the future lives of each new settler. They determined the parceling of
2 1 See for examples: TsGIAK, f. 44, op. 21, d. 1172, sv, 33, pp. 195-196; f. 44, op. 2, d. 1097, sv. 57, pp. 1-2; f.
44, op. 6, d. 3026, sv. 78, p. 3.
2 2 The first of these leaders to be appointed were: 1) Aksu-Charyn volost— Khuday-berdi, former head o f the
Khonokhay uchastok in the Kuldja area; 2) Jarkent volost—Kasymbek, former head of the Kuldja uchastok; 3)
Qoram vo/o.vl— Ababakhri, the former mi rap of the Tash-Ustan canal; 4) Karasu volost—Jamalidin, another former
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land, the management of water, and the delegation of positions of authority. It is not
surprising, therefore, that these first volostnois often took advantage of their positions to make
themselves and their allies wealthy.2 3 In particular, the volostnois were able to take advantage
of the land and water partitions to build agricultural empires of their own, a practice they
evidently learned from the bags of Eastern Turkestan.
One of the most blatant cases of corruption occurred in Qoram, where the volostnoi
upravitel’ , Ababakhri, apparently created a kingdom of his own, controlling the best land and
using public money for his own purposes, perhaps with the support of the uezd administration.
While Ababakhri also produced several public works in Qoram including a large medresse,
these projects greatly taxed the village's inhabitants who were still trying to build their own
houses. Archival documents from the 1880s show a long paper-trail of complaints by the
people of the Qoram volost’ against Ababakhri and the Russian officer who administered the
Verny uezd, but the accused remained in their positions for a long time before being dealt with
by the colonial administration (TsGIAK, f. 44, op. 8, d. 26-a).2 4
Local and volost ’ leadership, therefore, was overwhelmingly corrupted and included
mostly self-serving officials who, like the bags under the Qing, held political power without
the symbolic capital needed for esteem within local Taranchi communities. The primary
example of this phenomenon was a gold merchant named Vali-Akhun Yuldash, or Vali-bay,
who controlled virtually all of the land and irrigation resources of the Jarkent volost’ , of which
his son was upravitel’ (see illustration 5.1). While Soviet historiography saw in Yuldash an
easy target for the role of the ultimate capitalist exploiter on the eve of revolution and
leader from the Kuldja uchastok; and 5) Malybay volost—Nasyr, whose former position is unknown (see Zapiski
1884:79).
2 3 Again there are numerous archival documents outlining the complaints o f Taranchis about the corrupt practices
o f their volostnoi upravitel'. See: TsGIAK, f. 44, op. 6, d. 2140, sv. 60, p. 4; f. 64, op. 1, d. 1609, sv. 101, pp. 65-
6 6 .
2 4 When Ababakhri was finally removed from his position for corruption, it was the Russian bureaucrat-scholar
and former head of the Russian administration in Kuldja, Nikolai Pantusov, who carried out the investigation
(TsGIAK, f. 44, op. 8, d. 26-a, pp. 50-51, 60-62).
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119
exaggerated his evilness accordingly (see Kabirov 1951:106-109, 1975:79-85; Ruziev
1982:79-81), his exploitation of the Taranchis of the Jarkent region should not be overlooked.
By controlling land and water, Yuldash completely disempowered local communities and,
while not officially the volostnoi, controlled the life of virtually every agriculturalist in the
region. Later, in 1902, a Russian administrator characterized Vali-bay's control of water as
follows:
Almost all of the water is in the hands of one person, who for the surveillance of
the orderly use of water has 105 kokbdshi in place of elected miraps. These
kokbashi, in the interests of their powerful master, retain order and that situation
gives the administration reason to consider their master, the Taranchi Yuldashev
[sic], a benefactor of the people. Besides which, behind this veneer of order, there
are being committed a series of illegal acts, demoralizing the population as well as
destroying and repressing half of the uezd (TsGIAK f. 19, op. 1, d. 111, p. 110).
Vali-bay, however, was virtually untouchable. The Russians appreciated Yuldash's
role in the trade with Kuldja and could not afford to lose his contribution to this cross-border
commerce. Through the initiative of the Russian engineer from Verny, I.I. Paklevskii,
Yuldash became a partner in an influential trade company that in 1883 built a barge called
“Kolpakovskii,” named after the Governor of the Steppe administration, to ship goods back
and forth from Kuldja on the Ili River (Kozhirova 1997:102; see also illustration 5.2).
Certainly, this homage to the General who had led troops into Yuldash's hometown only
twelve years earlier must have delighted the aging Russian bureaucrat, further ensuring
Yuldash's immunity.2 5 Yuldash, therefore, both dominated the trade with Kuldja and
controlled all the land in his volost’ , sources of wealth that allowed him to complete large
construction projects in his new home city of Jarkent which, according to Rumiantsev, the
Taranchi baron had virtually “founded” [Rumiantsev 1914 (1996):5].2 6
2 5 While the initial voyages of the “Kolpakopvskii” were successful, the barge was shipwrecked in 1885 due to a
strong storm (Kozhirova 1997:103).
2 6 The most famous structure which Yuldash built in Jarkent, a beautiful and unique jum a mosque of hybrid
Chinese and Muslim design matching one formerly in Kuldja, still stands today (see illustration 5.3).
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120
If the volostnois were not well respected by the populace at large, the ulema still
possessed great symbolic capital in Taranchi communities. Within a year of the first
settlement, Taranchis had already built 86 mosques in the Jarkent uezd alone, and 39 maktaps
operated where 559 boys and 266 girls studied (Zapiski 1884:95). As had been the case in
Kuldja among the bags before the 1860s, however, the volostnois worked closely with the
ulema, which limited the religious elite’s power as potential leaders in popular resistance to
colonial rule. In this context, Sufis, baqshis (faith healers), performers of oral arts, and other
contenders for symbolic capital remained important to the trials and tribulations of daily life
(see Selitskii 1904:253, 278).2 7 As in Kuldja, however, neither mystical religious leaders nor
the popular social and historical commentators were able to play an extensive role in the
struggle for political power or in mobilizing people for political ends.
After migrating to Semirech’e, therefore, the Taranchis faced many obstacles to the
production of new localities. Difficult material conditions, the prescriptions of the Russian
colonial administration, and the corruption of indigenous leaders working with colonial
authorities all hindered the creation of cohesive Taranchi communities. Despite these
difficulties, however, the Taranchi migrants did establish new zhuts and did reproduce
zhutdarchilik practices in Semirech’e. Furthermore, most of these local zhuts would remain
distinctively Uyghur communities into the present day.
3.6 Taranchi Practice Under a New Qing Administration
The Qing Empire re-entered Xinjiang in the 1880s with a completely different
attitude towards colonial rule. In particular, the Empire’s administration understood that it
needed to be more conciliatory towards its Muslim subjects in Eastern Turkestan than in the
21 It is significant, for example, that two o f the most influential composers o f poems in Kuldja had been part o f the
migration— Bilal Nazim and Seyd Mukhammed Kashii, who are most famous for their das tans characterizing the
Taranchi war against the Qing and the migration to semirech'e respectively (see Pantusov 1880, 1909:182-220).
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121
past. The new Qing system of administration, now increasingly dominated by Han Chinese,
combined the laissez-faire approach to local administration employed before with the
recognition of a more integral role for the population of Eastern Turkestan in the Empire at
large. This is not to say, however, that it no longer reflected policies of colonial difference.
Chinese bureaucrats directly ruled the Xinjiang Province, as it was now officially called,
merely allowing local officials to oversee the daily affairs of Taranchi communities.2 8 In this
context, Han attitudes towards local Muslim subjects continued to influence policies that
called for ethnic segregation and that promoted the idea of the Han Chinese as superior to the
colonial subjects in Xinjiang. Nonetheless, the changes that had occurred in the Qing
administration provided for conditions in which the Uyghur-Taranchis in the Ili valley could
engage much more actively in zhutdarchilik practices and the production of locality.
While the Qing still ruled through the local elite, they realized that it could no longer
be a Qing-appointed elite, especially given the success of the revolts against Qing rule in the
1860s. Along these lines, with the bag system having lost its authority, the new mostly Han
Chinese administration began to rule through aqsakols or community elders, who were once
again elected by the members of their community likely in the informal way to which the
Taranchis were accustomed (Bogoiavlenskii 1906:138).2 9 By allowing the Taranchis to elect
their own aqsakols, the Qing provided a situation in which the Taranchis could rebuild their
own zhuts in the manner they chose.
While a bag system remained in place to take care of other matters within the
community, the bags no longer had authority over territorial units and only oversaw economic
activities and attended to legal matters among the agricultural, crafts, and merchant
2 8 A Chinese Governor, Syun-fu, had full oversight over the province from his seat in Urumchi, working closely
with his assistants the Dotaya and Fantaya who were in charge o f military and financial matters respectively
(Bogoiavlenskii 1906:124-125). The province was then broken into four regions— Ili, Urumchi, Kashgar, and
Aksu— which were, in turn, administered on a more local level in units called Fus and Syans, in descending order
of size (Bogoiavlenskii 1906:126).
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122
communities respectively (Habibulla 1993:24-26; see table 8). As with the aqsakols of
communities, these bags also were chosen by the Taranchis themselves instead of being
appointed by the Qing or inherited through descent, giving them a significant degree of
symbolic capital within local Taranchi communities.3 0
Illustrations 5: Vali-Akhun Yuldash, Cross-Border Trade, and Capitalism
Illu stration 5.1 -Vali-Akhun
Yuldash with medals given to
him by the Tsarist
government (Gnis 1911:705)
Illu stration 5.2- Taranchis leaving the large
mosque built by Yuldash in Yarkent, 1910s
(Rumyantsev 1914: table 3)
■ ,£ i * ..< * \ i ~ r # ■
Illu stration 5.3-The first barge used in the cross-border trade on the Ili river by
Yuldash’s company (Kazakhstan State Archives, Arkhiv Kino-Foto Dokumentev)
29 The colonial administration, however, did retain the right to approve these aqsakols.
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123
This new autonomy in the Taranchi communities was also facilitated by improved
economic conditions for their inhabitants. A more favorable taxation system and the
abolishment of the state monopoly on trade meant that the Taranchis could establish self-
sufficiency through land ownership and trade (Kozhirova 1997:122). As Bogoiavlenskii
wrote regarding the situation at the turn of the century, “at present, almost all of the Ili
Taranchis are free with the exception of a small group that must perform work for the hakim
beg (sic), and even with regards to this group, the hakim beg does not possess ultimate
power” (Bogoiavlenskii 1906:70). Given this economic prosperity, the conditions for the
reproduction of zhutdarchilik were probably even more favorable for the Taranchis in Kuldja
than in Semirech'e.
The Taranchis of Kuldja also benefited from a more enlightened merchant elite than
existed in Semirech'e. While Yuldash represented more of a constraint on the local
population and its production of locality than a source of enlightenment, the continued
presence in Kuldja of the sons of the wealthy trader and leather producer from Artush, Musa-
bay, opened up numerous opportunities to the population. Foreseeing the increased potential
for cross-border trade with the re-structuring of the Ili borderland after 1881, the sons of
Musa-bay concentrated the majority of their operations in the Ili valley. In 1885, they opened
up a leather factory in the city of Kura near the border with Russia at Khorgus (Khushtar
1993:2). Alongside this factory, four years later they opened up a new school called the
husayniya maktap that was heavily influenced by the modernist Muslim ideology of usul-I-
jadid, with which the Musa-bay brothers had come into contact on their travels westward
(Qadiri 1995:3). Having already sponsored the founding of a similar school in their zhut of
30 In general, what remained o f the former bag system was the aristocratic bags who claimed their title by virtue of
birth. Instead o f being recognized as colonial officials, however, these former hereditary bags were now primarily
merely owners o f large tracts o f land (see Bogoiavlenskii 1906:70).
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124
Asten-Artush in 1885, the Musa-bay brothers stayed abreast of the most contemporary
developments in the Jadid movement and promoted these new ideas through their schools.3 1
Table 4: The Bag System After the 1880s
Title Duties
Agriculture Bags
Hazinchi Bag To collect grain grown for the colonial administration
ShangBegi To oversee the collection of grain for the colonial administration
Motvalli Bag To oversee the buying and selling of land
Arbab Bag To oversee construction
Baghvan Bag To oversee activities relating to garden cultivation
Dop Begi To oversee the activities of 2,000 families
Yuz Begi To oversee the activities of 100 families
On Begi To oversee the activities of 10-20 families
Mirap Bag To oversee the distribution of irrigation waters
Crafts Bags
Teqip Bag To oversee the general work of craftsmen
Katival Bag To oversee the building of houses and other buildings
Qash Bag To oversee jade work
Mis Begi To oversee work with copper
Trading Bags
Kerak-Yaraq Begi To oversee the activities of trade and commerce
Bajigar Bag To oversee trade duties and prices
Bazar Begi To oversee the activities at specific bazaars
Law and Order Bags
Qazi Bag To oversee all legal matters
Sipa Qazi Bag To oversee unusual legal matters pertaining to higher classes
Layaqazi Bag To oversee usual legal matters pertaining to lower classes
Pashshap Begi To undertake investigation of crimes and the apprehension of
criminals
Adapted from: Abdurahim Habibulla, U y g h u r E tnogrnfivisi (Urumchi: Shinjang
Khalq Nashriyati, 1993, pp. 224-226).
The school in Kura opened by the M usabaev brothers— they instituted this
Russified form o f M usa-bay in 1895 as hom age to their Europeanized ideals (see
Khushtar 1993:2)— represented an im portant alteration in Taranchis' habitus. A look
at the school's schedule o f classes (see table 5) reveals courses providing a wealth o f
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125
inform ation that had form erly been unavailable to m ost Taranchis. W hile the num ber
o f students was lim ited at the school, it produced num erous graduates from all sectors
o f society since the M usabaevs them selves often funded poorer students. The first
graduates, in turn, further propagated the ideals o f the usul-I-jadid, form ing a new
segm ent o f the Taranchi population that could be seen as bearers o f know ledge
outside the older ulema?2
Table 5: Schedule from the husavniva maktav-1888
C lass P eriod
7 6 5 4 3 2 1 D a y
Music
and Art
Sports Work Arithmetic Song Native
language
Native
language
Saturday
Music
and Art
Sports Work Reading-
reciting
Geography History Physical
science
Sunday
Music
and Art
Sports Work Physical
education
Physical
science
Arithmetic History Monday
Music
and Art
Sports Work Drawing Vocabulary Geography Reading-
reciting
Tuesday
Music
and Art
Sports Work History Russian
language
Literature Arab-
Persian
Wednesday
Music
and Art
Sports Work Moral education and cleaning o f school Thursday
No School (Day of Rest) Friday
(Azad)
Adapted from: A bdulla T alip,U yghur Ma’aripi Tarikhidin Ocherklar (UrUmchi: Shinjang
Khalq Nashriyati, 1986, p. 159).
Another important development among the merchant classes of Kuldja at this time
was the establishment of trading societies known as shanghui (Mandarin) or shirkadar
(Uyghur) (Habibulla 1993:226). According to Bogoiavlenskii, these merchant guilds operated
entirely outside the supervision of the Qing apparatus (Bogoiavlenskii 1906:128). They were
both cultural associations and trading cooperatives, and, in all likelihood, they emerged out of
a mashrap-like structure. Bogoiavlenskii notes, for example, that they had a single aqsakol,
3 1 In 1883, the same year that the first issue o f Ismail Bey Gaspirinskii's newspaper Terjiman came out in the
Crimea (see Khalid 1998:89-90), the Musa-bay brothers sent a talanted young student from their zhut, Kerim-
akhun, to Kazan to study for two years in preparation o f taking over the Atush school (Davut 1985:11).
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who supported their interests and took care of organizational work, including the decisions of
what kinds of charitable donations should be made to families of the cooperative's members as
well as to others in the wider society (Bogoiavlenskii 1906:128-129). In addition, they
supported clubs where they would gather for discussions, and perhaps mashraps, as well as
hold social activities for the larger community (Bogoiavlenskii 1906:130). These guilds,
along with new Jadid schools, would play an increasingly important role in the production of
Taranchi localities into the early twentieth century as this borderland community came into
more contact with transnational forces and became more sophisticated in its resistance to
colonial rule.
In general, the conditions in the Qing portion of the Ili valley after 1881 were
favorable to the Taranchis’ production of locality. Increased economic empowerment, control
over the mechanisms of their communities’ regulation, and a new enlightened merchant class
all contributed to allowing the Taranchis great freedom and flexibility in the construction of
their local communities. At the same time, increased cross-border trade and travel allowed for
communication and collaboration between the Taranchi communities on both Qing and
Russian territory, a trend that would continue into the early twentieth century and would worry
both Empires.3 3
3.7 Conclusions: The Struggle Between Local and Colonial Places
In general, the production of Taranchi localities during the colonial period entailed a
contentious struggle between colonizers and colonized over the definition of the material and
social context of life. The rule o f colonial difference, as manifested in both Qing and Russian
3 2 Given the location of the Musabaevs' school near Khorgus, it is likely that it also attracted students from
Semirech'e who at this time mostly had to choose between the Russko-Tuzemnye schools and traditional maktaps.
3 3 Both Empires were aware of the potential threat to their control of colonial lands in Central Asia that was posed
by the increasingly cross-border nature of this community. As the Russian Counsel-General of Tarbagatai would
write “A significant portion o f the population on this and that side o f the border are Muslims who have constant
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127
policies, sought to control local constructions of community and to keep the colonized
Taranchis in their place. In doing so, the colonial regimes enlisted the assistance of local
Taranchi leaders who implemented imperial policies of domination in Taranchi communities
in exchange for personal wealth and power. Despite these mechanisms of control, the
Taranchis in both the Qing and Russian Empires succeeded in establishing local social spaces
based on indigenous ideals of community that defied colonial prescriptions.
In the context of the late colonial period, this struggle over the definition of Taranchi
communities can also be understood as a struggle for political representation and power
within the emerging modern/colonial world system. Colonial attempts to define Taranchi
communities were always informed by an ideology of imperial supremacy (whether European
or Chinese). They implied the right of the colonizer to dominate the colonized and define the
context of their social lives. In this sense, they also soon imply the relegation of the colonized
to the margins of an evolving post-colonial world order, which would be based on the power
configurations established during the colonial period. In contrast, indigenous Taranchi
constructions of community sought to empower this population and establish its own material
and social context for life. As such, they denied the foundations of colonial domination and
their implications for the post-colonial world.
For the majority of the colonial period, the local Taranchi religious elite was
instrumental in promoting the indigenous production of locality. As a result, Taranchi
resistance to colonialism was overwhelmingly articulated in religious terms, with Islam
representing the antithesis of the world of the colonizers whether Russian or Chinese. In the
twilight of colonial rule, however, a wealthy merchant class influenced by modernist reform
movements within Islam began to play a critical role in this struggle. This part of the
Taranchi population and its intellectual descendents would continue to be instrumental in the
contact with each other, and this or that temperment in China or any sort o f movement can always spread among
our Muslims as well” (Bogoiavlenskii 1909:111).
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post-colonial production of Taranchi localities and help to define the Uyghurs’ struggle for
representation in the world system during the twentieth century. In this struggle, the Ili
Uyghurs’ would engage new and powerful global ideologies that would be a source of
empowerment for overcoming colonial rule and for establishing their place in a post-colonial
world. These ideologies included modernism, nationalism, and socialism.
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129
C H A PT E R FO UR: M odernism and its Discontents in the Borderland: The Rise
and F all o f the F irst Uyghur National Communists (1900-1937)
M any things began to change for the Ili valley borderland and the Uyghurs living
there during the first four decades o f the twentieth century. It was to be an age o f rapid
socio-political transformations, technological innovations, ideologies o f liberation, and
experiences o f rising expectations and dashed hopes. During this time, the Ili Uyghurs
experienced four revolutions, periodic political repressions, and the engagem ent with a host
o f new ideologies through a much more extensive and powerful mediated culture than they
had ever encountered before. W hile these trends were present among all Uyghurs, the
Taranchis o f the Ili valley were the most affected by their influence. Inhabiting two different
states and located on a well-traveled international trade route, the Taranchis had m ore access
to new ideas and technologies in the early twentieth century than any other Uyghur
population. For this reason, it is not surprising that this borderland com m unity was also at
the forefront o f propagating a new group consciousness o f a larger Uyghur nation that would
soon frame their engagements with the world system. This chapter outlines this dynam ic
history during the early twentieth century when the Ili Uyghurs first engaged the utopian
vision o f global modernism only to find its promises unfulfilled.
4.1 The Revolutions o f 1905 and 1911, Jadidism, a n d Early Intellectual D iscourses
on M odernism and the N ation
During the first eleven years o f the twentieth century, the Ili valley saw tw o separate
revolutions that radically altered the political roles o f the Russian and Qing M onarchs
respectively. In 1905, a revolution in Russia significantly diluted the power o f the Tsarist
m onarchy’s absolutism through the creation o f a semi-autonomous parliam ent called the
Duma. W hile this event claimed to herald a new era in Russia and its territories, it brought
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130
few significant reforms to the colonial system o f Central Asia. Furthermore, as an already
marginal population in Russian Central Asia, the Taranchis were less affected by the
revolution o f 1905 than other M uslims in the region. The 1911 revolution in China, while
effectively revoking the absolutism o f the Qing Emperor, also had limited effect upon
Xinjiang and its inhabitants. In fact, rather than providing the Uyghurs o f Xinjiang with new
freedoms, this revolution initially led to slightly m ore meddling and constraining colonial
policies. If these revolutions produced very few tangible improvements in the lives o f the Ili
valley Uyghurs, they did serve to further this com m unity’s already existing interest in new
ideas o f progress and change that all fell under the rubric o f the nebulous ideology o f
modernism. The Uyghurs o f the Ili valley, along with others in Central Asia, w ould engage
these new ideas and reformulate them to their own cultural context, a process which resulted
in rising expectations o f a new life beyond colonialism.
The Ili valley U yghurs’ initial active engagement with m odernist ideas at this time
was through the indigenous M uslim reform movement usul-u-jadid. As noted in the
previous chapter, the Ili Uyghurs were already involved in the Jadid m ovem ent in the later
nineteenth century through the M usabaev fam ily’s introduction o f new method pedagogy
into the Kuldja area. In the early twentieth century, however, this movem ent became an
important force on both sides o f the border and addressed social and political issues that
went far beyond educational methodologies.
As Adeeb Khalid has maintained, Jadidism in Central Asia was a “m odern response
to modernity, which sought to reconfigure the entire world” (Khalid 1998:102). In other
words, it offered a means for the M uslims o f Central A sia to interpret new ideas o f progress
in a way that did not contradict their faith and cultural sensibilities. The cornerstone o f the
Jadid engagem ent with modernism was the belief that Islam was compatible with the ideas
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131
o f progress that characterized the modem age and that the M uslim faith could guide them
towards achieving this progress. Beyond these very general statements, however, it is
difficult to characterize a particular Jadid ideology. All o f those in Central Asia who
became known as Jadids shared a critical view o f colonial rule and a desire to em pow er their
own people to take more control o f their destiny in the context o f a rapidly changing world,
but their opinions about the path to this goal varied. The Jadids ’ views on the Central
A sians’ relationship with their non-M uslim rulers and the utility o f cultural traditions
differed, and their generally critical view o f colonial rule translated into divergent m odernist
cultural and political movements that were pan-M uslim, pan-Turkish, or nationalist in
orientation [see Galuzo (1929) 1986:209-219], Jadidism in Central Asia, therefore, reflected
more a sphere o f socio-political discourse than a unified ideological movement. Common
throughout this field o f discourse, however, was a belief that the M uslims o f Central Asia
needed to change to meet the challenges o f a new age and that Islam provided the best
framework for engaging the modernist ideas that characterized this new age.1
Due to the schools sponsored by the M usabaev family, the Jadid m ovem ent was
initially stronger in the Kuldja area than it was among the Uyghurs on the Russian side o f the
border (see figure 6.1). W hile the M usabaevs promoted Jadidism throughout Xinjiang, the
fam ily’s economic interest in the Kuldja area, where they had one o f their largest tanneries,
led them to concentrate much o f their reform ist work on this borderland region. In the early
years o f the twentieth century, the M usabaevs established two new Jadid-inspired schools in
1 Due to the scope o f this study, there is not room to fully address the development o f the Jadid movement in
Central Asia more generally. This, however, has been covered in the work o f numerous scholars who conducted
more intensive research on Jadidism (cf. Bennigsen and Lemercier-Quelquejay 1964; Khalid 1998; Lazzerini
1988, 1992; Rorlich 1984, 1986).
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the Kuldja area.2 Beyond the promotion o f Jadid schools and their method o f pedagogy, the
M usabayev family also began to publish more books in the early twentieth century than they
had in the nineteenth century, and they even began to import books and journals through the
Kuldja cross-border trade from Kazan and various cities in Russian controlled Central Asia
(Khushtar 1993:7). The availability o f these reading materials in the K uldja area and
elsewhere in Xinjiang would further increase interest in the Jadid movem ent am ong the
Uyghurs. It was not uncommon in the early twentieth century, for example, to see Uyghurs
from Xinjiang addressing the social and political issues o f Qing colonialism in articles
published in the m any Jadidist journals from the Russian Empire. Furthermore, some
Uyghurs from Xinjiang even traveled to Sem irech’e to propagate Jadidist ideas am ong the
Uyghurs living there.3
Ironically, while the Jadidist movement in Xinjiang was strongly influenced by
cultural and political events happening among the M uslims on Russian territory and
particularly among the Tatars o f Kazan, the Uyghurs in Sem irech’e were at first only
minim ally involved in the Jadidist movement o f their fellow M uslim Russian subjects. As
already noted, the most prominent Uyghur businessman in Semirech’e, Vali-Bay Yuldash,
was not as interested in promoting Jadidism as were the M usabaevs, and few others am ong
2 These two new schools were established in the town o f Kura in the Ili valley to take the place o f the husayniya
m dktdp they had opened there some fifteen years earlier. These schools, the ishchilar teknik m aktibi (“workers’
technical school”) and the ayalar qo l hiindr m aktibi (“w om en’s handicraft school”), both offered classes typical
o f the usul-u-jadid institutions elsewhere in addition to providing a vocational education that met the demands o f
new technologies (Khushtar 1996:136, 140). With the establishment o f new technology from Germany at their
leather factory in Kura, the Musabayevs hoped these new schools would provide them with qualified workers in
addition to offering a more well-rounded education to the population as a whole (Khushtar 1993:4; 1996:135).
3 While it is unknown how widespread this practice was, I found at least one such instance in the Russian
Empire’s archival documents from this period. In 1903, Russian authorities detained three Uyghurs from China
and a Turk from Turkey for propagating pan-Turkish and pan-Muslim ideas in Semirech’e. According the
document, the four men were calling for “the unification o f all Muslims under the power o f Turkey” (TsGIAK f.
44, op. 1, d. 8582).
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the Taranchi settlers in Semirech’e had the means to do so. In the early twentieth century,
however, Tatars were opening Jadid schools in Sem irech’e, and it was not uncommon for
Uyghurs to attend these schools. Furthermore, other Taranchis studied in Russian-Native
schools where they were introduced to modernist ideas from a Russian imperial perspective.
Although the Sem irech’e Taranchis did not have the financial capital to establish significant
Jadidist institutions at this time, therefore, they were beginning to accumulate some
influential human capital that was attracted to modernist ideas.
In 1902, several o f these Sem irech’e Uyghurs who had already been influenced by
modernist ideas opened a Taranchi usul-u-Jadidmaktap in Vernyi (Ruziev 1982:88). Due to
the negative reactions o f the government and the Taranchi ulema to this school, however, it
only operated informally in the houses o f reformist Taranchis. Despite the limited reach o f
this school, its establishment along with the changes to the Russian Em pire resulting from
the revolution o f 1905 was to gradually awaken the Sem irech’e Taranchis to the new ideas
o f Jadidism,4
This interest in change was apparent in a group o f young Uyghur intellectuals from
Jarkent who in 1906 began a movement aimed at reforming both the local educational
system and Uyghur society more generally (Rumyanstev 1914:11). This group became
known as the Kalta Chapanlar ("short coats") due to their habit o f wearing short suitcoats in
a European style instead o f the traditional long coat chapan favored by Central Asians
(Rumyantsev 1914:11; Ruziev 1982:87). W hile the success of the Kalta Chapanlar was
limited by the power o f the relatively conservative Jarkent ulema, they were able to open
several Jadid schools and to promote the reading o f Jadid journals and newspapers printed
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134
in the Russian Empire such as Tarjiman, Yultuz, Shura, Turk Yurti, and Ayal [Abdusematov
(1914) 1991:99-108].5 This small group’s work, therefore, stimulated the Taranchis’ interest
in the Jadidist movement and served to facilitate the growth of a larger Uyghur Jadidist
movem ent in Sem irech’e.
The growing popularity o f Jadidjournals among the Taranchis living on Russian
territory soon inspired increasing numbers o f them, whether they were pro-Jadid or anti-
Jadid, to regularly write articles and letters for publication in these periodicals. The
journals, therefore, represented an important new form o f mediated culture for the Uyghurs
o f Sem irech’e that allowed this community to negotiate political, social, and cultural issues
that affected them as a group. Furthermore, the print capitalism that propelled the journals’
distribution was to ensure that this mediated culture was widespread enough to foster the
construction o f imagined communities o f various kinds among people who had never met
face to face.
The best known o f the Uyghur writers to appear in these journals was a young man
from Sem irech’e named Nazarghoja Abdusematov (see figure 6.2). W hile A bdusem atov’s
ideas and writings did not represent the perspectives o f all o f the Uyghur Jadids in
Sem irech’e, his contribution to Uyghur intellectual life on the Russian side o f the border at
4 While the revolution had changed the lives and socio-political situation o f the Semirech’e Taranchis very little,
it did stimulate their interest in m odernism , political change, and the possibilities for the future.
5 It should be noted that the revolution o f 1905 in Russia created an explosion in the Muslim printing industry.
N ew legislation greatly increased the freedom o f Muslims in the Russian Empire to establish their own journals
and newspapers. W hile a portion o f the Muslim press in the Russian Empire predated 1905, these earlier journals
and newspapers were constantly being suppressed by Imperial authorities. Although the Muslim press after 1905
continued to be closely monitored by the Russian government, the new political conditions allowed for at least a
semblance o ffreedom o f speech (see Bennigsen and Quelquejay 1964).
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135
this time was more significant than that o f any o f his Jadidist peers.6 Furthermore,
A bdusem atov’s influence was also felt in Xinjiang, an area that he saw as the hom eland o f
his people. Taking the pen-name Uyghur Balisi (“child o f the Uyghurs”), Abdusem atov saw
his people as not only the Taranchis o f Semirech’e, but as the M uslims o f all o f Xinjiang,
and the m ajority o f his writings at this time focused on this region and its larger M uslim
population.7
Uyghur Balisi’ s identification with the general M uslim population o f Xinjiang was
also reflected in his interest in the Jadid discourse on group consciousness that had various
trends from pan-Islamism to parochial nationalism. Uyghur Balisi appeared to see m erit in
viewing his people as members o f a variety o f these ./at//t/-inspired imagined communities,
and his early writings demonstrate this in their inconsistent use o f the overlapping
ethnonyms o f Chinese Turkestan Sorts, Taranchi Turks, Taranchis, and Uyghurs [cf.
Abdusem atov (191 la) 1991:117; Abdusematov (1914) 1991:99-108; Abdusem atov (1911b)
1991:121-124; Abdusematov (1913) 1991:126-129]. After taking a trip to Xinjiang in 1914,
however, Abdusematov became more concerned about the inconsistent ways in which
Uyghurs portrayed themselves. This is evident in a 1915 article about his trip that was
entitled Bizning Turmush and was published in the journal Shura. In this article,
Abdusem atov expressed his exasperation with his people’ s lack o f a unified identity:
If you ask the locals who they are, they say Kashgarlik or Khotanlik. If you
say “isn’t that the name o f where you live?,” they say “I am a M uslim .” If
you say no, I did not ask your religion, they say “I am a Chantou.” Those who
6 Abdusematov, who is best known by his pen name Uyghur Balisi, was born in 1887 in the Taranchi village o f
Ghaljat a few years after his parents had left Kuldja under the terms o f the Treaty o f St. Petersburg
(Abdurakhmanov 1989:103). Although Abdusematov studied in a regular religious maktap, he became interested
in the new Jadid educational and social movement o f the Muslims o f the Russian Empire as a young man
(Abdurakhmanov 1989:103).
7 Abdusematov’s father had fought against the Qing in the 1864 rebellion in Kuldja, and this obviously
influenced the writer’s deep interest in the fate o f his compatriots in Xinjiang (Abdurakhmanov 1989:103).
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136
live amongst Kazakhs and Kyrgyz say “we are Sarts.” Essentially, we do not
know who we are. That is ignorance! [Abdusematov (1915) 1991:96].
W hile Abdusematov did not call for the recognition of a single ethnonym for his
people in this 1915 article, the essay had evident nationalist overtones and at least indirectly
suggested that a unified national consciousness was needed among the Sarts and Taranchis
o f Eastern Turkestan if they were to be politically recognized in the twentieth century.
Furthermore, having taken the pen-name Uyghur Balisi, Abdusematov obviously believed
that he and his people were the direct descendants o f the rulers o f the ancient Uyghur
Empire, and he had begun using the Uyghur ethnonym to describe his people in articles as
early as 1913 [ see Abdusematov (1913) 1991], W hile various scholars have suggested that
the Soviet authorities persuaded the settled people o f Semirech’e and later Xinjiang to adopt
the Uyghur ethnonym only in the 1920s and 1930s (cf. Gladney 1990; Allworth 1990;
Rudelson 1997), Abdusematov was already promoting this idea in the 1910s. Although it
would be deceptive to assert that a Uyghur national consciousness held wide appeal in the
Uyghur society o f the Ili valley at this time, it certainly was a part o f Uyghur social and
political discourse that would only become more important in the near future. Uyghur Balisi
would also continue to be an important contributor to this discourse.
Beyond engaging the increasingly popular Jadidist discourse on nationalism, the
Uyghur Jadids in Sem irech’e were also concerned with modernizing their local
communities. These activities greatly disrupted the traditional practices o f zhutdarchilik and
further com plicated the contentious competition within Uyghur localities for the symbolic
capital needed to define these communities. M any communities found them selves divided
between different camps that promoted different political, social, and cultural agendas
ranging from m aintaining the status quo to the radical alteration o f society. If the trading
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137
corporations, or shirkats, were one o f the main indigenous vehicles for prom oting the
Jadidist agenda in the local communities o f the Kuldja area (Bogoiavlenskii 1906:130), in
Sem irech’e the mashrap became one o f the most important propaganda tools for Jadid
reformers. The successor Jadid organization to the Kalta Chapanlar, Taraqqiyparvarlar
(“The Supporters o f Progress”), began organizing a new form o f mashrdps in the 1910s
throughout Sem irech’e. In these mashrdps, the participants would read Jadid newspapers
and journals instead o f religious manuscripts, and they would discuss issues o f concern
locally and globally (AOGAK, f. 94, op. 1, d. 42, sv. 6:419). In addition to serving as a
propaganda tool for Uyghur Jadids, therefore, these new mashrdps were an important arena
for local Uyghur com m unities’ negotiation o f the various modernist ideas they were
encountering whether through the Jadid movement or through contacts with Russian
reformists.
If the 1905 revolution in Russia fostered a stronger Jadid movem ent am ong the
Uyghurs o f Sem irech’e, the 1911 revolution in China initially would have the opposite effect
upon the Uyghurs o f the Kuldja area. In the chaos o f the 1911 revolution, the Han Chinese
living in Xinjiang who belonged to secret societies opposed to Qing rule attempted to
establish their own local governments in the Q ing’s western frontier (cf. Chen 1977:107;
Forbes 1986:11-12; Lattimore 1950:52). Once these small revolts, the most extensive o f
which was in Kuldja, were put down, a Han warlord named Yang Zengzin took over rule o f
the region.8 Yang ruled with an iron fist, and he was extremely wary o f any foreign
influences, including Jadidism (see Forbes 1986:17). As a result, he strictly regulated
8 In Kuldja, the rebels held the city for several months and set up their own provisional government in the wake
o f the revolution (cf. Chen 1977:107; Forbes 1986:11-12; Lattimore 1950:52). W hile Jack Chen has suggested
that this revolt had gained the support o f local M uslims (see Chen 1977:170), neither he nor any other scholar has
provided substantial evidence o f this.
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138
foreign publications and prohibited the printing o f newspapers in the Uyghur and Kazakh
languages (Lattimore 1950:53). In addition, Yang attempted to bring all schools under the
state’s control, greatly limiting the experimentation o f the new method schools [Bughra
(1940) 1989:358-359],
W hile these policies slowed down the activities o f Jadids in Xinjiang, they did not
destroy the reform movem ent which had gained in popularity during the decades prior to
1911. Jadid schools continued to operate in Xinjiang, and the M usabaev family opened
several new ones in the years following 1911, including two in the Kuldja area opened in
1913— the Turaniya Maktap and the Sayramiya Maktap (Qadiri 1995:3).9 In addition to the
M usabaevs, other Uyghur merchants continued to support Jar& /-inspired reforms through
their shirkat trading associations which advocated for change in local communities.
Furthermore, despite government attempts to ban foreign publications, Uyghurs in Xinjiang
inevitably retained access to Jadid publications printed in Russian Central A sia through their
cross-border contacts, especially in the Ili valley. M ost importantly, however, the Chinese
revolution o f 1911 increased expectations that these ideas could actually effect change in
Xinjiang, and there was consequently an increase in the political aspirations o f the region’s
Jadids.
W hile the revolutions o f 1905 and 1911 had different effects on Uyghurs living on
opposing sides o f the border in the Ili valley, in both cases the removal o f absolute
monarchism initiated an atmosphere o f change that, coupled with the engagem ent o f
modernist ideas, raised expectations for the future that were not always met. Am ong the
Uyghurs, or Taranchis, in both Russian and Chinese controlled areas o f the Ili valley, this
9 T he u se o f the nam e Turaniya for one o f these schools reflects the M usabaevs’ interest in the pan-Turkist
understanding o f Central Asia as the homeland o f the Turkish people, which has often been called Turan.
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139
situation only fostered increased frustration with colonial rule. W hile the Uyghur Jadids
tried to channel this frustration towards reforming local Uyghur society by establishing new
schools and discussing issues o f national identity and the politics o f colonialism, the Jadid
movement, like most urban intellectual movements in history, had only limited effect upon
local rural populations. Instead o f participating in the changes promoted by Jadids,
therefore, many o f the Uyghurs in the rural areas o f the borderland had more guttural
reactions to their plight and responded to their introduction to the unm et expectations o f
modernism with outbreaks o f violent unrest that would foreshadow the upheaval o f future
revolutions in the decades to come. W hile these socio-political disruptions were somewhat
more organized on the Chinese side o f the border, they were equally widespread on the
Russian side.
Illustrations 6: Uyghur Jadid Reformers at the Turn of the Century
Illustration 6.1: Hiisan-bay (right) and Bahavudun-
bay (left), the Musabaev brothers who had been
instrumental in spreading Jadidism in Kuldja
(Khushtar 1993:2).
Illustration 6.2: Nazarghoja
Abdusematov or Uyghur Balisi,
Uyghur Jadidist in Semirech’e
(Abdusematov 1991).
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4.2 Muslim Resistance and Rebellion: The Violent Response to Modernism
Following the first Russian Revolution o f 1905, Uyghurs in the villages o f
Sem irech’e often exhibited violent and unplanned acts o f resistance to Russian rule and the
corruption o f the Uyghur colonial administrators. As more Russian settlers entered the area,
such violence was especially apparent among the increasingly dispossessed M uslim
population that was landless and forced to work on the land o f the settlers. M any o f these
dispossessed M uslims turned to thievery, attacking primarily Russian settlements. Some o f
these bandits had significant moral support from other local Muslims, and their acts,
therefore, have been characterized as a popular, albeit a highly disorganized, form o f
resistance to Russian colonialism [see Galuzo (1929) 1986:197], In this vein, Soviet
historiography would later hail these bandits as early Central Asian revolutionaries who,
unlike most Jadidist M uslim intellectual reformists, were economically oppressed and, thus,
allegedly more proletarian in their consciousness (cf. Vorontsov 1937; Kabirov 1975;
Ruziev 1982).
Am ong the Taranchis, one particular bandit/revolutionary by the name o f Anyat
Kurban gained acclaim in Taranchi songs and folklore as a champion o f the dispossessed
and later earned the status o f a Taranchi revolutionary hero in official Soviet
historiography.1 0 Given that Anyat Kurban had been exiled to Siberia, it has been argued
that he was influenced by the Russian revolutionary m ovem ent.1 1 W hether this was the case
or not and whether or not Kurban saw him self as a champion o f the Taranchi oppressed,
1 0 For an early Soviet justification o f Anyat Kurban as a pre-Bolshevik revolutionary see Vorontsov (1937).
1 1 As early as 1898, Kurban had been sent to Siberia to a work camp as punishment for his murder o f a wealthy
Taranchi for which he worked (TsGIAK f. 76, op. 1, d. 1189, sv, 56, p. 3). While there exists no information
about his experiences in exile in Siberia, Soviet Uyghur historians have suggested that while there Kurban fell
under the influence o f Russian revolutionaries also in exile (see Ruziev 1982:82; Kabirov 1975:91-92).
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141
many Taranchis did see him as a Robin Hood-like symbol o f resistance. After Kurban fled
his exile in Siberia, he returned to Sem irech’e and led a band o f thieves who, between 1905
and 1911, concentrated their raids on Russian settlers and the less popular o f the Taranchi
local colonial administrators and district elders. W hile the colonial adm inistration sought his
arrest, he continually evaded them with the assistance o f other Taranchis. As a police report
to the Vernyi prosecutor from October 1910 attested, “he has many supporters in the city
[i.e. Vernyi] and uezd who at every moment inform Kurban about police attempts to detain
him ” (TsGIAK f. 76, op. 1, d. 1189, sv. 56, p. 6). K urban’s evasion o f the Sem irech’e
police, however, ended in early 1911 when he was finally detained and later executed for the
m urder o f the Karasu volostnoi upravitel ’ (Ruziev 1982:85).
At the same time, and especially immediately after the 1911 revolution, local
disturbances in Xinjiang had also become commonplace. The tenuous order in Xinjiang
immediately following the 1911 revolution even prompted Russian troops to enter the region
in order to prevent this disorder from spreading across the border (see Skrine and
Nightingale 1973:188-194). Initially, as was the case with Anyat K urban’s band o f thieves,
these disturbances were not overtly political in nature. In 1912 and 1913, however, the
Xinjiang M uslim s’ dissatisfaction with Qing rule was politicized in two Uyghur-led revolts
in Komul (Hami) and Turpan respectively [Bughra (1940) 1989:387-388]. W hile these
revolts were put down quite violently by the new Chinese government, they were only the
beginning o f many organized rebellions to come in Xinjiang in the following decades. In
com parison with Semirech’e at this time, the Uyghur community in Xinjiang already
included a critical mass o f sophisticated opponents to colonial rule who had been influenced
by Jadidism, and these people would continue to organize rebellions against the Chinese
state throughout the first half o f the twentieth century.
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The largest socio-political disturbance in the Ili valley during the first two decades
o f the twentieth century, however, did not take place in Xinjiang, but in Sem irech’e. This
was the so-called 1916 revolt that spread amongst virtually all o f the M uslims o f Russian
Central Asia, the Taranchis o f Semirech’e included. The event that spawned this revolt was
a 25 June 1916 decree by the Tsar stating that all M uslims in Central Asia must register for
m ilitary service to assist the Russians in W orld W ar I. Once authorities on the ground in
Central Asia began carrying out this policy and registering potential recruits in July o f 1916,
they encountered sharp resistance.
On 4 July 1916, the volostnoi upraviteV o f the Jarkent-Taranchi volost’ informed
uezd authorities in Jarkent that the Taranchi villagers from Tyshkan and Kazanchi flatly
refused to offer a list o f their potential recruits (TsGIAK f. 44, op.2, d. 16922, sv. 266, p.
149). As a result, authorities asked that representatives from these villages come to Jarkent
and explain themselves. On July 7, representatives from the villages came to Jarkent to
reiterate that they would not offer a list o f potential recruits, and they were immediately
arrested (TsGIAK f. 44, op.2, d. 16922, sv. 266, p. 157). Later that day, about 500 Taranchis
from various neighboring villages gathered in the square near the administration building in
Jarkent and demanded an explanation o f the new policy and the arrests o f those voicing
opposition to it (TsGIAK f. 44, op.2, d. 16922, sv. 266, p. 161). W hile the crowd eventually
dispersed without violence, social disorder would ensue in many Taranchi villages in the
weeks following.
In Taranchi villages throughout Sem irech’e, villagers stormed the volost’
chancelleries and looted them. In the village o f Qoram, where the local population had long
had disputes with the volostnoi upravitel ’ , the villagers destroyed his home and murdered
him (TsGIAK f. 76, o p .l, d. 204, sv. 21, p. 3). W hile not very organized, the protest to the
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143
enlistment o f local M uslims into the Russian army had turned into a general revolt against
Russian rule and the local M uslims who facilitated this rule. As similar events were
occurring throughout Central Asia among different M uslim subjects for the next several
weeks, m any Taranchis, Dungans, and Kazakhs decided to flee Russian territory altogether
for the Kuldja region. While the number o f Uyghurs who left the Russian Ili valley for the
Kuldja region at this time is unknown, it was certainly the largest single cross-border transfer
o f Taranchis since the 1880s.
M ore generally, the events o f 1916 in Semirech’e demonstrated how disgruntled the
Taranchis had become with Russian rule at a time when a changing world appeared to
promise a better future. Although the unrest had been caused by a specific policy o f Russian
rule, it led to acts o f violence that targeted the very symbols o f colonial society.1 2 In the
Kuldja area, the strict rule o f Yang was fostering similar tension among those Taranchis who
remained Chinese subjects. Taken together with the Jadidist ideas about self-reliance in the
modern world and notions o f Muslim, Turkish, and national consciousness, this tension had
the potential o f being mobilized in a more organized form o f anti-colonial resistance in the
borderland. Before this would happen, however, the Russian Empire would be turned on its
head by yet more revolution. Unlike the events o f 1905, however, the revolutions o f
February and October 1917 would drastically change the lives o f the Taranchis in
Sem irech’e, and their influence would cross the border into the K uldja region where the
Soviets would have increasing presence and power.
1 2 This was indicative o f the revolts that broke out throughout Central Asia in the summer o f 1916. This violence
ended in the deaths o f 55 Central Asian native colonial administrators, 24 Russian officials, and som e 3,000
Russian settlers (Allworth 1994: 212). In all these cases, the victims were representative o f colonial rule and
Russian colonization.
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4.3 The 1917 Revolutions and the Civil War: The Politicization o f Modernism
among the Taranchis
In the years immediately prior to 1917, Taranchi society in Sem irech’e was already
divided into different ideological camps that were in competition for the symbolic capital
required to define their local communities. Uyghurs in the region had engaged the recent
influx o f m odern ideas, whether from Russia or from the Jadid movement, quite differently,
and a growing elite class with varied viewpoints was now entrenched in a contentious
discourse on the future o f the world, Islam, and the Uyghur people. The contributors to this
discourse were on an ideological continuum that ranged from devoted M uslim believers to
nascent socialists and M arxists.1 3
W hen the February 1917 Revolution in Russia promised even more change for the
Em pire’s subjects, these ideological divisions were influenced by forces pulling them in
opposite directions. On one hand, the political differences within the Taranchi com m unity in
Sem irech’e were amplified by the com m unity’s engagement with the many political parties
vying for power in the aftermath o f the February Revolution. On the other hand, these
differences were also tem pered by the simultaneous development o f a political m ovem ent
that sought to unify the diverse M uslim population o f Russia.
This unified political movement o f M uslims built on the legacy o f the Ittihad-al-
Muslimin Party that had sought to provide a single political voice for the M uslims o f the
Russian Empire following 1905, and it gained in power following the first All-Russian
Muslim Congress that was held in M oscow in M ay o f 1917 and included representatives o f
1 3 The different ideological positions o f the Taranchis in Semirech’e mirrored larger trends in the All-Russian
Muslim Congress. Various scholars have portrayed these positions as belonging to three distinct groups: the
conservative Muslim faction, the liberal faction (an outgrowth o f a part o f the Jadid movement), and the radical
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M uslim organizations from Central Asia, the Caucasus, the Volga region, and Russia proper.
W hile this congress’ participants had heated debates about various aspects o f their proposed
unified platform (see Pipes 1964:76-77), they overcame these differences in order to
coalesce around their primary goal— becoming more independent from Russian-dom inated
rule (see Allworth 1994: 216). In order to achieve this goal, the Congress voted to create a
united political organization named the Milli Shura (“National Council”) to represent all o f
the M uslims o f Russia, and it adopted as the central plank o f its platform the establishm ent
o f M uslim autonom y within the Russian Empire.
With the creation o f this Central Milli Shura, M uslims throughout Russia
subsequently established their own local branches o f Milli Shura to represent the interests o f
M uslims in specific locations. In Sem irech’e, Uyghurs played a prom inent role in the local
Milli Shura, and they were led in this participation by the prominent Uyghur Jadid and molla
M aruf M as’ud (see Rozibaqiev 1934a:4). W hile this organization sought to unite the various
M uslims o f Sem irech’e, it remained ideologically divided over numerous questions from the
interpretation o f Islam to the appropriate approach to socio-political change.1 4 In this sense,
the Milli Shura was as ideologically ambiguous as the Jadid movement that had helped to
establish it, but it also shared Jadidism ’ s common goal o f empowering the M uslim s o f the
Russian Empire to m eet the challenges o f a new age. This new unified political organization
faction (an outgrowth o f another part o f thz Jadid movement) [cf. Pipes 1964:75-76; Safarov (1921) 1996:106-
113],
1 4 In his unpublished memoirs from this time, for example, the Uyghur communist Abdulla Rozibaqiev recounts
an instance in June o f 1917 when a large protest march organized by the M illi Shura was almost halted due to
arguments over whose banners should be carried first (Rozibaqiev 1934a:4-5). Rozibaqiev notes that a group o f
Dungans carrying a banner reading “Allah Aqbar” (God is great), got into a serious quarrel with the liberals in the
parade over being delegated to the back. The organizers o f the parade, who were more interested in displaying
their signs demanding specific reforms than the religious banner o f the Dungans, resolved this dispute and had
this group o f Dungans lead the parade with their religious message prominently displayed. W hile this is a
humorous example o f the factionalism within the Semirech’e M illi Shura, it is symptomatic o f more serious
divisions over what and whom this organization should represent.
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o f Muslims, however, also inherited the contentious discourse on group consciousness that
had characterized Jadidism ’ s various ideological divisions. In addition to proponents o f a
Pan-Muslim or Pan-Turkish political consciousness, the organization also included many
nascent nationalists who maintained that their particular ethnic groups had their own set o f
issues that needed to be addressed within the framework o f the All-Russian Muslim
m ovem ent.1 5
Due to these ethnic differences and their divergent interests, the Sem irech’e Milli
Shura established national committees within its organizational structure. As had been the
case during the Kuldja rebellion o f the 1860s, the Taranchis and Dungans formed an ethno-
political alliance based on their shared experiences as refugees from Xinjiang, and in April
o f 1917 a Taranchi-Dungan Committee was formed within the Sem irech’e Milli Shura
(Rozibaqiev 1934a:9).1 6 For the Taranchis and Dungans, this organization became the
prim ary forum for negotiating the different interests within both o f these com m unities.1 7
The Committee, therefore, included as members a variety o f different Uyghurs and Dungans
ranging from conservative clerics to nascent communists, and their interactions reflected a
new arena in the competition for symbolic capital. The Secretary o f the Committee was one
1 5 It should be noted that ethnic identities remained fluid at this time. Nonetheless, there was already a w ell-
developed consciousness o f a Tatar nation, and the Kazakhs’ nomadic lifestyle set them apart from other
M uslims in Semirech’e. The Taranchis and Dungans, in turn, were consciously separated from others as
immigrants from Xinjiang, and they clearly distinguished between each other through a variety o f ethnic markers
such as dress, clothing, etc.
1 6 According to Rozibaqiev, this organization was initially merely named the Taranchi Committee, but in the
middle o f the year (presumably in June or July), it was renamed the Taranchi-Dungan Com mittee (Rozibaqiev
1934a:9).
1 7 The analogous organization among the Kazakhs was Alash-O rda, a group that would initially provide a serious
challenge to Bolshevik power in the area (see Sabol 1998).
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o f the nascent communists among its ranks, and he would soon emerge as the champion o f
the Bolshevik cause among the Ili valley Uyghurs. His name was Abdulla R ozibaqiev.1 8
W hen the Bolsheviks took over control o f the Russian Em pire in October o f 1917,
the situation in Sem irech’e quickly changed. The Taranchis, along with other M uslims in
Central Asia, reacted to the events by preparing to establish their own local governments to
fill the void left by the breakdown o f the former Russian imperial government. The second
All-Muslim conference o f Central Asia held in September o f 1917 had already taken serious
steps towards outlining what an independent Turkestan would look like [see Safarov (1921)
1996:102], and in January o f 1918, the Sem irech’e Taranchi-Dungan Committee held an
important congress where it established a national foundation that more or less represented
an autonomous Taranchi-Dungan self-regulating government (TsGIAK f. 44, op. 11, sv. 6,
pp. 1-2).1 9 This foundation, however, barely began to operate before it was superseded by
the arrival o f Bolshevik power in Vernyi in M arch o f 1918.
The Bolsheviks’ seizure o f power in Vernyi made it clear to all other political parties
that one needed to be either on the side o f the Soviets or against them .2 0 Am ong the
1 8 Born in 1897, Abdullah Rozibaqiev was the son o f a teacher and m olla who had been greatly influenced by the
Jadid movement. Having studied in a small Jadidist school run by his uncle and studying Russian from a
Bolshevik agitator, Rozibaqiev was attracted at an early age to modernist ideas both emanating from Russia and
from the Jadid movement (Khasanov 1974:6-8).
1 9 This foundation did not represent territorial autonomy for the Taranchis and Dungans, but it did provide a
mechanism for the self-regulation o f these respective societies. It was funded by the local Taranchi and Dungan
populations, getting its funds from fees on life cycle ritual celebrations (e.g. a percentage o f each kalym, a fee for
each new child named, etc.), land taxes, and money from the w a q f connected to local mosques and shrines
(TsGIAK f. 44, op. 11, sv. 6, pp. 1-2). With this money, it was to support local schools, the maintenance o f
irrigation canals, the settlement o f disputes, and the publication o f a new newspaper entitled Saday Taranchi
(TsGIAK f. 44, op. 11, d. 81, sv. 6, pp. 3-5). The foundation, in many respects, was the Taranchi and Dungan
counterpart to the Kazakh nationalist group o f the same period— Alash Orda (see Sabol 1998).
20 As the Tatar Muslim communist Sultan Galiev characterized the situation in the M uslim areas o f the Russian
Empire during the period immediately following the October Revolution, “whether you want to or not, you must
take part in it, and consciously or unconsciously become either Red or White” (Bennigsen and Wimbush
1979:24).
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Uyghurs, this led to a breakdown in the coalition o f different ideologies that had co-existed
in the Taranchi-Dungan Committee, and individuals were forced to ally them selves with one
side or the other o f the emergent civil war. W hile Abdulla Rozibaqiev and other radical
young Uyghurs began organizing workers and local communities for the cause o f Soviet
power, others among the Taranchis opposed the new Soviet government, not believing that it
was serious about granting the M uslims o f Central Asia autonomy.2 1 When the Red Army
arrived in Vernyi in March, the leaders o f the Taranchi-Dungan Committee who opposed
Soviet rule fled the city to points further east, settling either in the Uyghur villages on the
road to Kuldja or in the city o f Jarkent (Rozibaqiev 1934b:4). In contrast, Rozibaqiev and
his allies remained in Vernyi to help further the Bolshevik cause.
W hile the political leaders in the Taranchi community o f Sem irech’e were forced to
take immediate sides in the civil war, it is likely that most o f the local Taranchi zhuts in the
region were indifferent to this emerging contest for political supremacy. Subsequent events
in 1918, however, would soon change that. The initial Soviet intervention in Central Asia
demonstrated much o f the same colonial mentality o f superiority that had characterized past
Russian regimes [see Safarov (1921) 1996:122-123]. One event in particular during 1918,
however, highlighted the Bolsheviks’ neo-colonial attitude towards the Taranchis and
weakened the cause o f Uyghur Bolshevik sympathizers like Rozibaqiev.
After Vernyi came under Bolshevik control in M arch 1918, the W hite troops
fighting against the Red Arm y mostly fled to the Kuldja area from where they pledged to
launch raids into Russian territory. As a result, Sem irech’e became a m ajor front o f the Civil
2 1 Rozibaqiev was part o f a small group o f nascent Bolsheviks in the Semirech’e M illi Shura that had been
influenced by Bolshevik agitators in Vernyi. They actually began organizing before October. In May o f 1917,
this group, with the assistance o f the editor o f the Bolshevik newsletter Sotsialist, organized a Union o f Muslim
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149
W ar in Central Asia. In M ay o f 1918, an overzealous officer of the new Red Arm y by the
name o f M uraev was sent to liquidate the W hite troops and any M uslims in Sem irech’e who
were aiding them. In seeking M uslims with pro-White sympathies M uraev im mediately
focused on the Taranchis, a tactic that resulted in a large-scale massacre o f Uyghurs living
near the town o f Qoram. As an eyewitness explains the events, M uraev’s troops went door
to door summoning the adult men o f the villages in and around Qoram (Sadiriy 1998:5).
Gathering them at the tow n’s well-known medresse, the troops began firing on those
suspected o f fighting against Soviet power, and chaos followed. In the disruption that
ensued, more shots were fired, and more Taranchis died. In the following days, similar
events transpired in other Taranchi villages on the road from Vernyi to the Chinese border,
and even more Taranchis were killed (cf. Hasamdinov 1998:8-9; M angsurov 1998:8-9).2 2
Hearing o f the events that had transpired in Qoram and elsewhere, many Uyghurs in villages
further east began fleeing across the border to the K uldja area before M uraev and his troops
could reach them.
Once the dust had settled from M uraev’s campaign, approximately 20,000 Taranchis
had crossed the border (AOGAK f. 489, op. 1, d. 27, sv. 3, p. 20), and most o f them now had
good reason to mistrust the Bolsheviks. This mass exodus along with the migration
associated with the events o f 1916 greatly depopulated the Taranchi society o f Sem irech’e
and significantly added to that in the Kuldja area. It also likely drove m any Uyghurs who
had been affected by these events to join the ranks o f the Basmachi rebels who would
Workers (Rozibaqiev 1934:11-13). Between October 1917 and March 1918, they would help promote the
Bolshevik cause within the Taranchi-Dungan Committee.
2 2 Official Soviet documents would describe these events somewhat differently, noting simply that in route to
Jarkent Comrade Muraev “defeated bands o f rebels who are now fleeing in panic and confiscated weapons and
ammunitions” (AOGAK f. 489, op. 1, d.20, sv. 2, p. 40).
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150
continue to resist Soviet rule from along the external borders of Soviet Turkestan into the
1920s.2 3
A t the same time that these events had weakened the Bolshevik cause am ong many
Taranchis in Semirech’e, and by extension in the Kuldja area, the group o f young Uyghur
intellectuals supporting the Bolsheviks was becoming more organized. In addition to
Abdulla Rozibaqiev who helped spearhead this movement, its members included m any
Uyghur Jadids who had come under the sway o f socialist ideas. Among this group o f Jadids
turned Bolsheviks was one o f the most influential Taranchi intellectuals o f Sem irech’e—
Nazarghoja Abdusematov or Uyghur Balisi.
W hile it is difficult to present a singular ideological characterization o f this group o f
early Uyghur Bolsheviks, they all were initially motivated by Uyghur nationalist aspirations,
making them representatives o f a larger group o f pro-Soviet M uslims o f this period that
Alexandre Bennigsen and S. Enders W imbush have called Muslim national communists (see
Bennigsen and W imbush 1979).2 4 W hile many o f the Uyghur Muslim national communists
had been members o f Milli Shura before the Bolsheviks had taken Vernyi, they now all saw
the Com munist Party as the only means towards establishing either M uslim or Taranchi
political empowerment. Largely due to the efforts o f these early Uyghur com m unists, the
Communist Party in Turkestan almost immediately began courting the Uyghurs who had
fled to the Kuldja area in the summer o f 1918, offering them full am nesty if they were to
return to Sem irech’e regardless o f their prior activities against the Bolsheviks (TK OGAK f.
2 3 For more on the Basm achi movement, particularly as it was characterized in the border areas around the
Ferghana valley, see Ginzburg (1925).
24 The Muslim national communists were not a formalized political movement, but an ideological grouping
among the non-Russian Bolsheviks. According to Bennigsen and Wimbush, these national communists “were
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151
208, op. 1, d. 33, sv. 2, p. 2). Between 1918 and 1925, nearly 15,000 o f those who had fled
to Kuldja during M uraev’s massacres in 1918 returned to Sem irech’e and joined the new
Soviet society [Rozibaqiev (1926) 1997:82].
These young and active Uyghur supporters o f the Bolsheviks had earned enough
recognition from the Communist Party by 1919 to be given resources and an organizational
framework to assist them in their efforts. Under the auspices of the Communist Party’s
Musbiuro (“M uslim Bureau”), various national-based organizations or Revsoiuz
(“Revolutionary Unions”) were formed in early 1919 in order to conduct propaganda
campaigns among the local population (see figure 6.3). In Sem irech’e, the Kazakh
organization was entitled Saule, the Uzbek organization— Turan, the Tatar organization—
Tokay, and the Taranchi and Dungan organization was named Uyghur (Rozibaqiev
1934b:25). The use o f the Uyghur name for the Taranchi-Dungan organization evoked the
idea o f the lost Uyghur nation that Uyghur Balisi had earlier propagated, but it did not yet
promote this label as a replacement for the Taranchi ethnonym. The organization initially
was more concerned with filling the void left by the dissolution o f the Milli Shura ’ $
Taranchi-Dungan Committee. In particular, the Uyghur Revsoiuz undertook propaganda and
educational work, supporting the development o f new schools and literacy classes for adults
(Rozibaqiev 1934b:26). The organization and its name, however, would soon become
important vehicles for promoting the larger agenda o f the Uyghur Muslim national
communists in Sem irech’e. This agenda included establishing the idea o f a single unified
Uyghur nation and promoting Uyghur national liberation.
rigidly dedicated to working within the framework o f Marxism-Leninism as they understood it,” but “they sought
to adapt its tenets to their specific national conditions” (Bennigsen and Wimbush 19179:39).
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4.4 Imagining Uyghurstan: The Rise o f the Uyghur Muslim National Communists.
1921-1923
The M uslim intellectuals in Central Asia supporting the Bolsheviks during the first
years o f the Soviet Union continued to engage in the contentious political discourse on group
identity that spawned the Pan-Turkist, Pan-Muslim, and parochial, nationalist camps within
the Jadid movement. The prim ary difference after the arrival o f the Bolsheviks in the region
was that the pro-Soviet intellectuals now discussed these different imagined communities to
which they belonged in terms o f their relationship to M arxist ideas about group
consciousness and revolutionary mobilization. Among the Bolsheviks, there were already
proponents o f the idea that colonized people occupied a special role in the M arxist
dichotom y o f oppressed and oppressor. According to this perspective, m ost colonized
people were not proletarian in the sense o f their economic class, but the oppression they
experienced at the hands o f colonial regimes gave them a certain revolutionary
consciousness that made them akin to the proletariat,2 5
In this context, the Taranchis o f Sem irech’e and others who had come to Russia
from Xinjiang represented a vanguard proletarian nation in the world revolution as it faced
east towards China. Taranchi communists, therefore, were encouraged to approach their
work as missionaries o f the Soviet cause not only among the Taranchis o f Sem irech’e, but
also among the Uyghurs o f Xinjiang and to engage in the ideology o f anti-colonial national
liberation as a rallying point for world revolution. One o f the initial steps in this w ork was
25 This idea was already pregnant in one o f Lenin’s most well-known essays, Imperialism : The H ighest Stage o f
Capitalism , but Bolsheviks such as Mirsaid Sultangaliev would take it further noting that “all M uslim colonized
peoples are proletarian peoples and as almost all classes in Muslim society have been oppressed by the colonists,
all classes have the right to be called proletarian s” (Bennigsen and Wimbush 1979:42).
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to unite all the M uslims from Xinjiang living in the Soviet Union under a single um brella
organization that could promote revolution in their homeland.
Shortly after the Turkestan Soviet Socialist Republic was formed in April o f 1921, a
m eeting o f the various local national organizations under the auspices o f the Musbiuro was
held in Tashkent in June o f the same year. Parallel to this meeting, a separate congress was
also held among the various M uslims in Soviet Turkestan who had come from Xinjiang at
different times over the last two centuries. It is unknown from where the initiative for this
congress came, but the idea was eagerly embraced by the Xinjiang immigrants who
attended.2 6 At the congress (The First Congress o f the Poor and the Workers ofKashgar-
Junggariya), representatives o f the Uyghur Revsoiuz o f Sem irech’e gathered with Uyghurs
from the Ferghana valley who had long ago fled Kashgar and with Dungans who had come
from various locations in Xinjiang.2 7 The three groups decided to form a single national
section within the Communist Party o f Turkestan (CPT) and to advocate for revolution in
Xinjiang [Rozibaqiev (1921) 1997:23-26],2 8
Following the lead o f the Uyghur Revsoiuz from Sem irech’e, this new unified Party
section o f Xinjiang immigrants in Turkestan called itself the Uyghur Komsektsiia (“Uyghur
Communist Party Section”). W hile this name once again evoked a common glorious past
26 It has been maintained that this congress represented a concerted effort by the Soviet Communist Party to
create a Uyghur nation (see Allworth 1990). W hile one can only speculate, it is more likely that the idea o f a
new unified Uyghur nation came out o f the combined interests o f the Soviet Communist Party and the Uyghur
Bolsheviks who had already been exposed to the ideology o f nationalism. In both cases, unifying the Uyghurs
under a single group consciousness and potential political entity helped to m obilize Uyghurs against Chinese rule
in Xinjiang and to justify the idea o f Xinjiang as the historical and rightful homeland o f the Uyghur nation.
27 According to one source, the Congress attracted 117 attendees o f whom 99 were either Kashgarliks or
Taranchis, ten were Dungan, three were Han Chinese, two were Kyrgyz, two were Tatar, and one was a Turk
(Rozibaqiev 1987:31).
2 8 Once this Communist Party section was established, branches were founded in Tashkent, Andijan, Kokand,
Bukhara, Bishkek, Jambul, Tokmak, and Alma-Ata (Rozibaqiev 1987:28).
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that was linked to the ancient Uyghur Empire, there initially remained am biguity as to
whether or not this organizational name reflected a new ethnonym intended to represent
these different groups’ shared identity. On the one hand, the separate ethnonyms o f
Taranchi, Dungan, and Kashgarlik (sometimes referred to as Altishaharlik) continued to be
used to define separate peoples within this organization throughout the early 1920s. On the
other hand, this Komsektsiia also began to refer to a Uyghur nationality/people (narodnost ’ )
in m any o f its official documents (TKOGAK f. 304, op. 1, d. 215, sv. 9, p.5) and describing
it as including “the Taranchis, the Altishaharliks/Kashgarliks, and the Dungans” (m y italics)
(cf. Birinchi 1924:120; TKOGAK f. 304, op. 1, d. 215, sv. 9, p.5).2 9 These docum ents also
openly pronounced one o f the central goals o f this organization and its new narodnost’ to be
“the liberation o f the Altishdhdr and Junngariya peasants and workers from the century-old
repressive rule o f China” (TKOGAK f. 304, op. 1, d. 215, sv. 9, p.6).
By 1921, therefore, a distinct framework for the ideas o f a united Uyghur nation and
a Uyghur national liberation movement was taking form through the vehicle o f a separate
section o f the CPT. For the Soviet Communist Party (CPSU), this organization provided a
potentially powerful vehicle for extending the world revolution into Xinjiang. In June o f
1921, the Central Committee o f the Communist Party had already discussed the idea of
helping to establish a socialist Republic o f Kashgaria and Junggariya akin to the one being
formed in M ongolia (Barmin 1998:85-86). W hile the Central Committee apparently decided
to shelve the idea, interest in the potential for revolution in Xinjiang did not disappear, and
29 In the source from 1922, the name Kashgarlik is used, and in the 1924 source, it reads Altishaharlik. Both
names basically refer to the Uyghurs o f the Tarim Basin.
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155
the Uyghur Komsektsiia provided a proxy instrument for the new Soviet government to
promote this idea among X injiang’s M uslims.3 0
Illustrations 7: Uyghur Muslim National Communism
Illustration 7.1: The families of Abdulla Rozibaqiev, Qurvan
Tokhtimatov, and Musa Roziev, late 1920s (left to right)
(Kazakhstan State Archives, Arkhiv Kino-Foto Dokumentev)
4 1 * *-
Illustration 7.2: Members of the Uyghur
Revsoiuz, 1920s. Abdulla Rozibaqiev is
first from the right (Kazakhstan State
Archives, Arkhiv Kino-Foto Dokumentov)
Illustration 7.3: Front page of
Kambagallar Avazi, 1926 (Erzin 1988:57).
30 One o f the reasons for the reluctance o f the Central Committee to take any significant steps towards agitating
for revolution in Xinjiang was a belief that the very religious Muslims o f Xinjiang would be unlikely to rally
around Marxist ideas o f revolution. A s one Soviet secret police (NK VD ) report from 1921 stated, “as easy as it
would be to initiate a disruption in Kashgaria, it would be difficult to channel it into an appropriate socio-political
movement” (Barmin 1998:87).
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W hile promoting revolution in Xinjiang was an important part o f this Party section’ s
work, the organization would also focus much o f its attention on changing the situation o f
the Uyghurs living on Soviet territory. Over the next decade, the Uyghur Komsektsiia would
undertake work that simultaneously promoted the Sovietization and the nationalization o f the
Soviet Uyghurs.3 1 This work was done on two interacting levels that defined the
consciousness o f a nascent Uyghur nation: the daily life o f practice in local zhuts and the
ideological realm o f mediated culture.
The work conducted by the Uyghur section o f the CPT in the local Uyghur zhuts o f
Sem irech’e was coordinated with that o f another multi-national organization known as
Koshchi. Koshchi was established in 1920 to promote land reform in the areas o f present-
day Kazakhstan. Its primary duty was to wage a two-pronged struggle “against the
exploiters and their economic domination o f the impoverished and the landless farm hands”
and “against the remnants o f old colonial and patriarchal-clan relations” (TK OGAK f. 185,
op. 1, d. 198, sv. 10, p. 64). Forming its own branch o f Koshchi, the Uyghur section o f the
CPT worked to open new Soviet schools in Uyghur zhuts, to organize adult classes to
eradicate illiteracy, to combat backward traditions, and to oversee the confiscation and
redistribution o f the property o f wealthy farmers or kulaks (TKOGAK f. 304, op. 1, d. 215,
sv. 9, pp. 5-6).
W hile the Uyghur branch o f Koshchi sought to accomplish the same goals as the rest
o f the organization, it approached these goals in a way that was in concert with the U yghurs’
own national particularities. Like their Jadid predecessors, therefore, the Uyghur section o f
the CPT extensively utilized the Uyghur tradition o f the mashrap to prom ote their own
3 1 In Semirech’e, this organization was spearheaded by Abdullah Rozibaqiev among the Taranchis and by Ma
San Chi, a Dungan military official in the Red Army, among the Dungans.
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agenda in the local zhuts o f Sem irech’e. As early as 1920, Uyghur communists began
organizing their own mashrdps in the local Taranchi communities throughout Sem irech’e.
At these mashrdps, they developed plans for assisting local Uyghur schools, held group
readings o f various newspapers, and conducted political discussions (Roziqulov 1923).
After the formation o f the Uyghur Komsektsiia in 1921, this work intensified, and Uyghur
communists began using these mashrdps as the basis for their local organizational structure,
requiring each mashrap to establish its own workplan (Roziqulov 1923).3 2
Simultaneous with this work in local zhuts, the Uyghur com m unists o f Sem irech’e
were also busy establishing the framework for a new Uyghur mediated culture. Shortly after
the congress o f Xinjiang immigrants was held in Tashkent in 1921, the Uyghur Komsektsiia
established its own newspaper— Kdmbagdllar Avazi (“The Voice o f the Poor”) (see figure
6.6). Into the mid-1920s, this newspaper was to be the primary mediated vehicle o f
propaganda for Uyghur communists in Sem irech’e.3 3 At the same time, however, the
newspaper, both in its form and its content, was playing an important role in helping to
develop the consciousness o f a unified Uyghur nation.
Initially, not all those people who were considered members o f the new Uyghur
narodnost’ agreed with its salience. W hen the Uyghur communists o f Sem irech’e held their
first viliyat congress in 1922, for example, numerous speakers questioned the union o f
Taranchis, Dungans, and Kashgarliks under the um brella o f one narodnost’. On the pages o f
32 In an interview I conducted with Rozibaqiev’s nephew, Abdumejit, he noted that Abdulla Rozibaqiev even
wrote a guide to using the mashrap for progressive educational purposes. While Abdumejit did not have a copy
o f this guidebook, he said that one o f his uncle’s colleagues had shown him the book in the early 1940s.
3 3 There were other Uyghur newspapers and journals at this time that were published in Tashkent (see Erzin
1988:33-53), but Kdm bagdllar A vazi was the only one that was printed in Semirech’e. Before the appearance o f
this newspaper, Uyghur communists often contributed to other local newspapers such as Kom ak and Jedi Su
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Kdmbagdllar Avazi, however, the supporters o f the united Uyghur nation answered that the
Taranchis had in fact come by forced migration to the Ili valley from the south o f Xinjiang
(home o f the Kashgarliks) and that the Dungans m ostly spoke the Uyghur language as their
primary mode o f communication and were in fact the descendents o f the ancient Uyghurs as
well (K-A, 17 Aug. 1922).
Beyond directly advocating for the concept o f a unified Uyghur nationality through
such polemics, the newspaper also became a forum for writing about the history, literature,
and culture o f the Uyghurs that framed this new nation’s narrative. A central them e in this
new narrative o f the Uyghur nation, in the past, present, and future, was the long-standing
struggle with the Chinese (and Qing) over the occupation o f the nation’s hom eland o f
Uyghurstan (cf. Abdusematov 1923; K-A, 21 June 1923).3 4 The centrality o f this struggle to
the Uyghur com m unists’ new mediated culture is apparent in the large banner headline
inside the 1923 issue o f Kdmbagdllar Avazi that announced Lenin’s death. This banner
headline read: “Freedom for Uyghurstan! The Uyghur poor will follow the road established
by Lenin!” (K-A, 21 Jan. 1923).
The independence struggle o f the M uslims o f Uyghurstan also became a central
theme in the developing Soviet Uyghur literature o f the early 1920s. On the pages o f
Kdmbagdllar Avazi, for example, a new genre o f poetry lauded the successes o f the Soviet
revolution and propagated its continuance in Uyghurstan (cf. Abdusematov 1922a;
M uhammadii 1922; Tilish 1923). In addition to this new national genre o f poetry, a new
genre o f Uyghur prose was emerging that took on similar themes. In 1921, U yghur Balisi
Ishchi Mukhbiri, which were published in a Turkic vernacular understandable to most Central Asians [cf.
Rozibaqiev (1918) 1997:5-7; Rozibaqiev (1919) 1997:10-13],
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159
published a novel about Nazugum, the nineteenth century Uyghur heroine who had defied
the Qing [Abdusematov (1921) 1991], and in 1922 he published a non-fictional history
entitled Taranchi Turklarning Tarikhi (“The History o f the Taranchi Turks”), an account o f
the Taranchis’ struggle with Qing rule in the Kuldja area [Abdusematov (1922b) 1991],
W hile Uyghur Balisi’ s new works o ffictional and non-fictional prose were both set in
Xinjiang and both entailed stories o f resistance to Chinese rule, however, the continuance o f
the Taranchi ethnonym in them suggested that the united Uyghur nation rem ained an
ambiguous concept.
Nonetheless, through the printing o f modest but substantial runs o f Kambagallar
Avazi and the publication o f Abdusem atov’s books, a definite Uyghur m ediated culture was
emerging that was consumed by the Taranchis o f Sem irech’e, the Kashgarliks o f the
Ferghana valley, and the Dungans living on Soviet territory. W hile this mediated culture
continued to refer to each o f these groups separately, it also referred to them together as
Uyghurs, and their shared consumption o f m edia helped to raise a consciousness o f this
newly unified narodnost At the same time that this emergent Uyghur mediated culture was
helping to define a new unified Uyghur nation, however, it was also bringing to light the
problems inherent in this concept by exposing this new nation’s lack o f linguistic unity.
W hile the D ungans’ inclusion in the Uyghur narodnost’ was obviously problematic
from a linguistic point o f view given that their native language was not even from the
Turkish family, there also remained questions about the degree to which the Taranchis and
Kashgarliks shared a common tongue. Newspapers published in Tashkent and Alm a-A ta
(the new name o f Vernyi after 1921), for example, used completely different orthographies
34 It is significant that Uyghur communists o f this period freely used the name Uyghurstan for their homeland.
The use o f this name, as opposed to Eastern Turkestan, reflected a certain ideology o f nationalism that differed,
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(see M alov 1930), and references to Taranchi, Kashgarlik, and Uyghur languages were all
common.3 5 If these were two different languages, were they not also two different nations'?
As a young revolutionary interested in M arxist interpretations o f the nation, Joseph
Stalin had noted the importance o f a shared language to the definition o f any nation [Stalin
(1913) 1942:10-11], and as the Commissar for Nationalities after the revolution he was at the
forefront o f enforcing this rule for the m any competing imagined communities under Soviet
rule during the early 1920s.3 6 Aware o f the importance attached to language by Stalin and
others in the CPSU who were involved in the nationality question [see Stalin (1920)
1942:83], the Uyghur Bolsheviks knew that they needed to demonstrate their new nation’s
linguistic unity if they ever hoped to get Party support for the development o f their national
culture and national autonomy.
In this context, a commission o f Uyghur communists was convened in 1923 in order
to establish a standardized orthography for their national language, which, according to one
article on the subject, the Uyghurs “needed like they need the air they breathe” (K-A, 16
Nov. 1923). A s a result o f the work o f the commission, the first official Uyghur alphabet
prim er was published in Tashkent in 1924, and it was released in a run o f 3,000 books to
accommodate Uyghur school children throughout Sem irech’e and the Ferghana valley
(Ansari 1924). That same year, an almanac was released by the Uyghur section o f the Party
in Sem irech’e that used this new standardized writing system in its collection o f poetry and
at least in form, to pan-Turkism.
35 The heading to K am bagdllar A vazi even announced that the newspaper was written in different languages at
different times throughout the early 1920s. According to these headings, until August 1922 K am bagdllar A vazi
was published in the Taranchi language, from August 1922 until June 1923 it was published in the Taranchi-
K ashgarlik language, after that in the Uyghur-Taranchi language, and only a month later would it appear simply
in the Uyghur language.
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political essays about the Uyghur nation’s role in the Soviet and world revolutions (Birinchi
1924).
By 1924, therefore, the Uyghur communists had established the mediated basis for a
Uyghur nation through the development o f a national history, a national literature, and a
national language. They were also still being given substantial freedom by the Soviet Party
to discuss the possibilities o f a future Uyghur socialist nation-state in Xinjiang. W ithin this
group, therefore, expectations for the future were great and included an anticipated freedom
that the Uyghurs had never experienced before. At the same time, however, the political tide
in the Soviet Communist Party was beginning to turn against small numbered nationalities in
Central A sia and against the Muslim national communists o f the Soviet Union in general.
This transform ation started almost immediately after Lenin’s death in 1923, and it would
intensify into the late 1930s.
4.5 F acing M arginalization and Repression in the Soviet Union: The F all o f the
Uyghur M uslim N ational Communists, 1923-1937
The first signs o f the changing political atmosphere were apparent in 1923, when the
most vocal o f the Soviet U nion’s Muslim national communists, the Tatar M irsaid
Sultangaliev, was arrested for nationalist deviations (Rorlich 1986:150-151). Soon
afterward, in October o f 1924, the Republic o f Turkestan was dismantled, and the borders of
the new Soviet Central Asia were redrawn to account for two new Union Republics
(Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan), two new Autonomous Republics (Tajikistan and
Kazakhstan), and two new Autonomous Regions (Kyrgyzstan and Karakalpakistan) (cf.
36 In 1917, Stalin had been named to direct the People’s Commissariat on Nationality Affairs (Narodnyi
K om m isariyat p o delam Natsional ’ nostei or Narkomnats).
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162
Allworth 1994:256-257; Khodorv 1924).3 7 For the Pan-Turkists and Pan-Muslims am ong
the Muslim national communists, this event marked the end of a dream o f establishing a
large and powerful autonomous socialist state that would be based on either Turkic or
Muslim solidarity. For the Uyghurs, however, the new borders o f Central Asia also created a
different set o f problems.
Among significant M uslim populations in Central Asia, the Uyghurs were
conspicuously left without any form o f territorial autonomy. This problem was already
addressed in September o f 1924, a month before the new borders had been officially
announced, in an article published in Kambagdllar Avazi. The article announced that the
Com munist Party o f Turkestan was now determining new borders for the region based on
the Soviet nationalities o f Central Asia, but unfortunately the Uyghurs did not qualify for
any form o f territorial autonomy under these plans. The author reasoned that, while the
Uyghurs had a large population in the region, they were scattered in different locations,
making the development o f a Uyghur autonomous region impossible (Qasimi 1924). W hile
the tone o f this article had obvious disappointment in it, its author reassured the Uyghurs o f
the new Soviet Central Asia that their rights would be protected and that they could now
focus on establishing their own socialist state across the border in Uyghurstan.
Such hope m ust have seemed justified since, for the time being, the aim o f
prom oting a Uyghur revolutionary movem ent in Xinjiang was tacitly supported by the
Soviet Com munist Party. As part o f planning for this future Uyghur nation-state, Uyghur
communists also continued to develop an infrastructure for the Uyghur nation. In this
respect, the Uyghur communists were able to retain a strong nationalist movem ent at a tim e
37 Over the course o f the next several years, the Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan would also become
national republics.
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when m any other Soviet nationalities could not. The tolerance for such a nationalist
movement, however, was to be short lived given that the arrest o f Sultangaliev was only a
first step in the gradual liquidation o f national communists throughout the Soviet Union.3 8
Despite the disappointment o f not achieving territorial autonomy, this continued
hope for a revolution in Xinjiang fueled the Uyghur com m unists’ support for the Party and
its policies. Given the new configuration o f the political entities o f Central Asia, however,
the Uyghur communists o f Sem irech’e now necessarily engaged Party policies and their
implementation as part o f a Natsmen (“national m inority”) Party section (see figure 6.5). In
the Sem irech’e Natsmen organization, the Uyghurs took the leading role and represented the
largest constituency (K-A, 29 Sept. 1925). In this capacity, Uyghurs were particularly active
in the implementation o f the 1925 Party campaigns against the backward remnants o f the
pre-Soviet past that were a critical part o f the initiation o f the collectivization o f agricultural
communities.
The Uyghur communists o f Sem irech’e sought to implement these policies by
launching numerous campaigns against the common practices o f zhutdarchilik and the
religious institutions that supported these practices. These campaigns were described
extensively on the pages o f Kambagdllar Avazi throughout 1925 in a special section entitled
Zhut Arisida (“In the middle o f the z h u f). This section o f the newspaper described
campaigns against arranged marriages and the local election o f akhuns as neighborhood
zhigit beshi (cf. Ayghaqchi 1925a; Ayghaqchi 1925b) and levied character attacks on those
3 8 It should be noted that despite declining involvement by Uyghur communists in the Soviet Union, the Soviet
Communist Party was to remain interested in propaganda efforts in Xinjiang for many years to come. Party
cadres, for example, were heavily involved in ensuring that the some 10,000 migrant workers from Kashgar who
came to the Ferghana valley each year to pick cotton left with a positive opinion about Soviet society (see Karpov
1929). Likewise, as will be discussed in the follow ing chapter, the U.S.S.R. was to invest significant resources in
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164
holding on to old ways through accusations o f alcohol abuse and hashish smoking (cf. K-A,
21 June 1925; Ayghaqchi 1925c; K-A 8 Oct. 1925). In addition, the section recounted
Uyghur com m unists’ successes in the reinvention o f local zhuts through the transform ation
o f form er religious institutions into new Soviet schools and clubs (e.g. K-A, 8 M arch 1925,
21 June 1925).
W hile the Uyghur communists embraced this work with zeal, they did so in a way
that also celebrated the U yghurs’ national particularities. They continued, for example, to
promote Soviet styled mashraps that taught both basic and political literacy and that could be
mobilized to implement locally the policies o f the new Soviet government (see Sheripay-
Oghli 1925). Furthermore, they attacked the Uyghurs’ attachments to the old practices o f
zhutdarchilik by introducing Soviet ideas o f collectivism and atheism as a new zhutdarchilik
(see K-A, 15 Feb. 1926). This indigenous approach to their work likely accounted for m any
o f the successes that the Uyghur communists encountered in transform ing their local zhuts,
but it was obviously not accepted by all Uyghurs in Sem irech’e. M ost Uyghurs continued to
worship Islam, and the local ulema, despite its shrinking numbers, still provided an
alternative to the full-fledged adoption o f M arxist-Leninist ideas (see K-A, 10 April 1925).
In this context, the struggle to define daily practices in Uyghur zhuts was inevitably
becoming increasingly contested.
W hile the Uyghur communists o f Sem irech’e were avidly engaged in Party work in
their local zhuts, the idea o f a united Uyghur nation and a Uyghur independence m ovem ent
in Xinjiang were becoming contentious issues within non-Uyghur Party circles due to
changes in the Soviet U nion’s domestic and foreign policies. In the realm o f foreign policy,
educating Xinjiang Uyghurs both in China and as foreign students in the U.S.S.R. throughout the second half o f
the 1930s (see Chapter Five).
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the U.S.S.R. was establishing close contacts with the Chinese communists. As a result,
Soviet support for a Uyghur revolutionary movement became less focused on national
liberation and instead stressed the need for the Uyghurs to establish contacts with the larger
com m unist m ovem ent in China. Demonstrative o f this tendency, Kambagdllar Avazi began
publishing a series o f articles lauding the accomplishments o f the Chinese Com m unist Party
(CCP) and encouraging the Uyghurs o f China to support the CCP (cf. K-A, 21 M arch 1925;
Qutluq 1925). These articles, however, stood in stark contrast to the continued references to
the eventual establishment o f an independent Uyghurstan in the Uyghur poetry that appeared
in Kambagdllar Avazi at this time (cf. M uhammadi 1925; Abdusematov 1925). Such mixed
messages in the newspaper reflected an emerging rift between the Uyghur national
communists and the goals o f the central organs o f the Soviet Communist Party.
This rift also related to the Party’s domestic policies. Given the new borders in
Central Asia, the promotion o f a united Uyghur Soviet nationality was now at odds with the
Soviet policy o f recognizing the independence o f the new National Republics and
Autonom ous Regions. As a result, the Party was less forthcoming with resources for the
developm ent o f Uyghur national institutions. The effects o f these dwindling resources were
most im mediately felt in the field o f education. If there were almost sixty Uyghur schools
with 5,880 students in Semirech’e in 1924, by the next year there were only 32 schools with
1,624 students {K-A, 22 Oct. 1927). Outside Sem irech’e, the situation was even worse, and
by 1927 there were only fifteen Uyghur schools with 680 students in Uzbekistan,
Kyrgyzstan, and Turkmenistan combined (K-A, 22 Oct. 1927).
These developments, however, did not prevent Semirech’e ’s Uyghur com m unists
from continuing to advocate for the idea o f a united Uyghur nation. In fact, the partition o f
Central A sia appears to have led them to more consciously follow the activities o f Uyghurs
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in different Republics. Throughout 1925, for example, Kambagdllar Avazi published
numerous articles about the shared and particular problems of different Uyghur com m unities
in Central Asia from the Ferghana valley to the Issiq Kul region (cf. Quchqarov 1925; K-A, 3
April 1925; K-A, 22 M ay 1925). The conscious development o f a unified Uyghur national
literature also continued during this period, and 1925 marked the publication o f the first
Uyghur-compiled collection o f the new nation’s traditional folk literature (Ansari, et. al.
1925).
If the Uyghur communists continued to maintain their nationalist m ovem ent despite
the changing political climate in 1925, this would become increasingly difficult to do in
1926. In M arch o f 1926, the Communist Party o f Kazakhstan adopted a resolution calling
for the Uyghur communists to cease using the mashrap as a vehicle for their Party work.
This resolution complained that these mashraps were dominated by the merchant
bourgeoisie and improperly made decisions that should be left to official organizations under
the jurisdiction o f the Party (AOGAK f. 94, op. 1, d. 42, sv. 6, p. 415). In addition to
forbidding Party and Komsomol members from participating in mashraps, the resolution also
requested that Uyghur communists actively seek to establish Komsomol (“Com munist
youth”) gatherings on the nights that mashraps were held and to encourage youth from
outside the Party to participate in these events in lieu o f local mahsrdps (AOGAK f. 94, op.
1, d. 42, sv. 6, p. 415). The forced dissolution o f these mashraps demonstrated an increasing
intolerance for any expressions o f Uyghur national particularities, and it greatly detracted
from the independence o f the Uyghur communists in the region.
In retrospect, this policy was likely part o f a larger cultural offensive in Central Asia
to com bat remnants o f the past, religion, and nationalist tendencies that would intensify over
the next decade as Soviet power became solidified in the region (see M artin 2001:154-170).
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Over the next several years, for example, official Party documents (cf. AOG AK f. 448, op.
2, d. 266, sv. 33; AOGAK f. 489, op. 1, d. 713, sv. 56) and articles in Kambagdllar Avazi
(cf. Datman 1928; K-A, 17 M arch 1928; Sabirjan 1930) frequently attacked religion and
advocated for the dismantling o f religious institutions in Taranchi communities. In addition,
the newspaper also published numerous articles attacking mashraps and toys (life cycle
ritual celebrations) and encouraging young Uyghurs to study in Soviet schools as an
alternative to the backward socialization practices o f these rituals (cf. Roziqulov 1926;
Khavarchi 1928; Khaji Oghli 1928; K-A, 30 April 1928). This intensification o f the cultural
front o f the revolution would serve to further polarize the Uyghurs o f Sem irech’e, and m any
religious leaders were forced to flee to the Kuldja area in the midst o f accusations that they
had formed a religious movement with the intent o f resisting Soviet rule (Haqiqatchi 1925).
A t the same time that Uyghur cultural practices and religious leaders were under
attack, Uyghur communists who were engaged in the production o f national literature were
also becoming subject to intense criticism. These attacks on nationalist writers began in
1927 when Abdullah Rozibaqiev, then a student at the Sverdlov Communist University in
M oscow, began to openly question the ideological aims o f the work o f Uyghur Balisi. In a
three part article on Uyghur national culture published on the pages o f Kambagdllar Avazi,
Rozibaqiev, the highest ranking Party m ember among the Uyghurs, criticized m any o f
A bdusem atov’s literary works from both before and after the revolution (Rozibaqiev 1927).
He attacked Abdusematov for fostering an idealist vision o f revolution that was more
socially oriented than economic, and he accused him o f promoting the idea o f a Taranchi
nationality and o f subverting the construction o f a unified Uyghur nationality (Rozibaqiev
1927).
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Uyghur Balisi wrote a reply to Rozibaqiev’s attacks where he stood by his beliefs in
the importance o f social revolution and refuted both being a nationalist and prom oting the
idea o f a Taranchi nationality (Abdusematov 1928). Among other things, Abdusem atov
reminded readers that he had been at the forefront o f promoting the idea o f a unified Uyghur
nationality, and he had taken the pen name Uyghur Balisi long before 1917 (Abdusem atov
1928). Rozibaqiev answered back with several articles over the next two years in w hich he
further outlined the nationalist tendencies o f Uyghur Balisi and others (cf. Rozibaqiev 1929,
1930). In these articles, Rozibaqiev’s arguments increasingly reflected a developing Soviet
orthodox M arxism that did not tolerate deviation, particularly if it was in the form o f
nationalism. Evidently foreseeing the consequences o f falling out o f favor in Party ranks as
a result o f these attacks and anticipating the eventual consequences o f the changing political
climate, Abdusem atov fled to K uldja in the early 1930s. One o f the earliest o f the
Sem irech’e U yghurs’ modernists, therefore, had given up on the Soviet Party’s vision o f the
future.
In hindsight, it seems likely that these various articles by Rozibaqiev were part o f a
larger effort in the Com munist Party to consolidate, control, and Proletarianize the
production o f the national cultures o f all the Soviet Central Asian nationalities in the later
1920s (see Allworth 1994:380-381). In this context, the Party was also anxious to once and
for all determine the exact ethnic boundaries o f the different Soviet nationalities. The
Uyghur nation was problematic in this regard since there remained serious disputes and
ambiguities concerning who was and was not a Uyghur. At some point after 1924, the
Dungans had already conspicuously disappeared from discussions about the Uyghur
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nationality, and it now remained strictly a union o f Taranchis and Kashgarliks.3 9
Nonetheless, there still existed differing opinions about whether or not these two groups
should have their own separate nationalities within the Soviet Union. The 1926 Soviet
census, for example, had entries for Kashgarliks, Taranchis, and Uyghurs, and there
continued to be separate schools for both o f the different Uyghur peoples (Grande 1936:85;
AOGAK f. 177, o p .l, d. 549, sv. 51). Furthermore, despite earlier efforts to standardize
Uyghur orthography and lexicon, Uyghur publications did not reflect linguistic uniform ity
and instead often used either the Taranchi or Kashgarlik dialects as the basis for written
language (Shakirjan 1926).
An exchange o f articles in Kambagdllar Avazi had brought this question into public
discourse already in 1926. This public debate began over a 1926 review o f the collection of
traditional Uyghur folklore that had been published in 1925. In this review, the author
complained that the book lacked linguistic uniformity and often printed the same word in
different spellings (Shakirjan 1926). He further noted that these inconsistencies were
dem onstrative o f the fact that one Uyghur language did not exist. Instead, he argued, both
Taranchi and Kashgarlik languages should be recognized as separate.4 0 These statem ents in
the review were immediately met with a response that refuted the division o f the Uyghur
nationality into two different groups and criticized the review ’s author for partaking in
39 A Dungan in Almaty who had lived through this period told me that the Dungans left the fold o f the Uyghur
nation after a concert where Taranchis had sung a song about the Dungans’ alliance with the Qing Empire. This
popular conception o f the Dungans’ secession from the Uyghurs obviously does not tell the whole story, but it
does confirm that there was significant tension between the Dungans and Taranchis in the later 1920s.
Regardless o f the wishes o f Dungans and Taranchis, however, it would have been unlikely that the Dungans
would have remained a part o f a Uyghur nationality for more practical reasons. The Dungans’ culture and native
language differed markedly from those o f the Taranchis, and the communities o f the two groups had only
minimal interaction.
40 Since the author o f this article was a Bashkir Party cadre and not a Uyghur, he may have also been acting on
Party directives aimed at breaking down the Uyghur nation. By the later 1920s, there appeared to be a concerted
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170
divisive politics (Abdughupur Rozibaqiev 1926). At the same time, however, this reply
agreed that work still needed to be done in order to standardize the Uyghur language.
W hen Rozibaqiev began attacking Uyghur Balisi and other nationalists in 1927, this
issue was further highlighted. Rozibaqiev insisted that a single Uyghur nationality existed
that was in concert with the new life o f the Soviet Union, and he criticized those opposed to
this concept as bourgeois nationalists who wanted to maintain old habits (cf. Rozibaqiev
1927, 1929, 1930). Furthermore, Rozibaqiev argued that standardizing the Uyghur language
was the most important step towards resolving this question once and for all.4 1
The resolution o f this question was to come in 1930 when a second Uyghur
Orthographic Conference was held in Alma-Ata to determine the appropriate base dialect for
the new Uyghur language. To oversee this process, the Communist Party appointed S.E.
Malov, a Turkologist who had helped in the language planning for various Soviet
nationalities and who had done research on the Uyghur language in Eastern Turkestan. In
his address to the conference, M alov outlined scientific reasons that justified the
establishm ent o f a standardized and unified Uyghur language based prim arily upon the
Taranchi dialect (M alov 1930). The conference, o f course, adopted M alov’s
recommendations as well as a four-year program to implement the new orthography in a new
Latin script through the training o f teachers at a new Pedagogical Institute to be established
in Jarkent (K-A, 9 June 1930). By 1935, the linguistic unification o f the Uyghur nation was
officially recognized by the Institute o f Nationalities o f the Central Committee o f the Soviet
effort underway aimed at removing the Kashgarliks o f the Ferghana valley from the Uyghur nation, and, in
retrospect, these articles could have been part o f an early propaganda effort towards this goal.
4 1 The central organs o f the Communist Party in M oscow were also likely also concerned about this issue for
other reasons. Throughout the 1920s, there had been debates about how to internationalize the languages o f the
Soviet nationalities. By 1927, plans were already being outlined as to how to create new Latin-based alphabets
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Union in their List o f Peoples o f the U.S.S.R. which recognized Uyghurs, but not Taranchis
or Kashgarliks. As an article introducing this List noted, “we have not included the
Taranchis and Kashgarliks in this list; they are parts o f the Uyghur people, formed as its own
separate nationality with its own written language” (Grande 1935:85).
If a unified Soviet Uyghur nationality was once and for all officially consolidated
with these actions in 1930, the role o f this minority nationality in Soviet life was rapidly
decreasing. W hile a Uyghur journal in the Latin script entitled Qizil Tang (“Red Daw n”)
was established in 1931, it only survived four issues (see figure 6.7). In early 1932, both
Qizil Tang and Kambagdllar Avazi were discontinued (Erzin 1988:104-108). This action
corresponded roughly with the intensification o f mass collectivization campaigns in
Kazakhstan, and the two periodicals were replaced with a new local new spaper to be
distributed only in Sem irech’e that was appropriately entitled Kolkhozchilar Amgigi
(“Collective Farm ers’ Labor”). In addition to bringing the collectivization campaigns to the
forefront o f Party work among Uyghurs, the creation o f this newspaper was also part o f a
larger effort to further isolate the Sem irech’e Uyghurs from Uyghurs elsewhere in Central
Asia.
Ironically, therefore, the Party was purposely dividing the Soviet Uyghur nationality
just as this nationality had finally been consolidated. The reasons for this policy were likely
multiple. First, minority nationalities like the Uyghurs were finding them selves in an
increasingly marginal position generally in the Soviet Union as the Party increasingly
downplayed expressions o f national culture in favor o f the promotion o f Soviet culture.
Second, the Party’s energy in Central Asia was focused on the construction o f new National
for the majority o f the Soviet nationalities (see Allworth 1994:384). In order to create a new Latin alphabet for
Uyghur, there needed to be a consensus on what this language was and who spoke it.
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Republics and Autonomous Regions, and an active and unified Uyghur national com m unist
m ovem ent that crossed the new borders o f the region was becoming increasingly
problematic. Third, and perhaps most decisively, the Soviet Union was changing its policy
with regards to the promotion o f revolution in Xinjiang.
In 1931, unrest had broken out in Xinjiang once again as both Uyghurs and Dungans
forged separate rebellions against Chinese rule. While some in the Komintern (“Com munist
International”) believed that this unrest presented the worldwide com m unist m ovem ent with
an opportunity to spread its influence eastward, more practically oriented m ilitary officials in
the U.S.S.R. believed that the revolt presented potential for unrest in Soviet Central A sia
(Barmin 1998:107-109). Beyond the fact that the rebels were not particularly pro-Soviet in
their orientation, thousands o f Uyghurs, Kazakhs, and Kyrgyz had recently fled the U.S.S.R.
for Xinjiang as a response to collectivization polices, and these refugees, if mobilized in
these revolts, could be expected to be particularly anti-Soviet (Barmin 1998:115).4 2 Given
this situation, the Soviet Union not only gave up, for the time being, on its form er interest in
the potential for revolution in Xinjiang, but it even assisted the local Chinese government in
the region to put down the rebellion.4 3 In light o f this change in Soviet policy towards
Xinjiang, the unification o f the Uyghurs o f the Soviet Union under the um brella o f a single
nationality with revolutionary ambitions had largely lost its utility.
42 An article about the revolt in the Uyghur journal Qizil Tang epitomized the official Soviet view o f the
developments. Referring to the unrest in Turpan and Hami as a “peasants’ revolt” that was a response to
oppression, the article notes that it would be unlikely to lead to any true progress in Xinjiang by virtue o f its
leaders’ religious leanings and the lack o f proletarian consciousness among the rebels (Q izil Tang 1931, no. 2-3).
4 3 In 1931, the Soviet Union signed a secret treaty with Chin Shujen, who was then the Governor o f Xinjiang, and
as a part o f this treaty Soviet military aircraft were almost immediately transferred to the region in 1931 to assist
in squelching local revolts (Forbes 1986:98).
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Over the next several years, therefore, the Soviet Communist Party began actively
dismantling the Uyghur national communist movement in the U.S.S.R. At the same time
that the Taranchi Uyghurs were being isolated in Semirech’e, the Kashgarlik Uyghurs o f the
Ferghana valley were being forced to declare themselves as Uzbeks in their official
documents, and those who refused were subjected to arrest (see Talipov 1998). W ith the
Kashgarliks becoming Uzbeks, the extent o f the Uyghur nation in the early 1930s had been
relegated to the collective farms o f Sem irech’e, where local Uyghur zhuts were becoming
essentially colonized by Soviet cadres who brought their own form o f Soviet zhutdarchilik
with them. The Uyghur national communists o f Sem irech’e were increasingly left out o f
this process, and many o f them were relegated to Party work that did not involve Uyghurs.
Rozibaqiev, for example, was sent to Pavlodar in Kazakhstan’s north in 1932 to work as the
Secretary o f the Raikom (“Raion Committee o f the Communist party”) (Rozibaqiev 1937).
W hile the Uyghur communist cadres were being integrated into a Soviet Com munist
Party that increasingly downplayed national differences, the rural Uyghur farmers o f
Sem irech’e were being integrated into a new more uniform Soviet life style through the
collectivization o f agriculture. Part o f bringing the Uyghur farmers into the world o f Soviet
collectivism was a more violent repudiation o f the ways o f the past. If such campaigns
against the pre-Soviet past had been omnipresent in the Uyghur zhuts o f Sem irech’e since
the mid-1920s, they now took on a more personal manifestation that focused on individuals’
class allegiances. For almost a decade beginning in the late 1920s, the Party intensively
targeted bays (wealthy individuals) and kulaks (middle-class farmers) as the scapegoats for
the continuance o f pre-Soviet remnants in daily life. In 1929 and 1930 as part o f a campaign
to increase local grain production in Sem irech’e, a large-scale repression began that attacked
those who had been born in wealthy families regardless o f their present occupation
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174
(AOGAK f. 69, op. 1, d. 47, sv. 5, pp. 25-39). As a result, many local Uyghur Party activists
were relieved o f their positions, and the power structure within local Uyghur com m unities
was realigned.
Illustrations 8: The Dismantling of Uyghur Muslim National Communism
f
: ft P 9 « 1 ,1
Illustration 8.1: The former Tatar mosque that became the Nats-Men (“national
minority”) club in Alma-Ata after 1924 when the Uyghurs were relegated to Nats-Men
status (Kazakhstan State Archives, Arkhiv Kino-Foto Dokumentev)
(i 30(169>
Mcrkfic Komlletlifhi Pfcnimifda 1937-
S T A L IN J o !d B ;i!iit q i lq a n M l a d i
Illustration 8.2: Front cover
of the short lived journal Qizil
Tang, 1931 (Erzin 1988:103)
Illustration 8.3: Front page of the Uyghur
rayon newspaper Stalinchi featuring the
full text of a speech by Stalin condemning
Trotskyites (Stalinchi Sept. 29, 1937)
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175
This new class struggle in the Uyghur zhuts was to remain an important part o f the
construction o f collective farms and other Soviet institutions, and its importance was
highlighted by the re-printing o f one o f Stalin’s speeches in Kambagdllar Avazi in April o f
1930 where the great leader noted that the proletariat could never co-exist with kulaks {K-A,
29 April 1930). As Stalin was moving the country away from M arxist internationalism
towards his conception o f socialism in one country, this struggle with class enemies also
began to encompass foreign influence, all the more so among borderland populations such as
the Uyghurs o f Sem irech’e. In 1930, for example, an article in Kambagdllar Avazi warned
o f the dangers o f associating with and taking books from Uyghurs in K uldja (Ansari 1930).
The article suggested that the Uyghurs o f the Kuldja area were no longer to be seen as the
oppressed subjects o f the colonialism, but as part o f an international anti-Soviet conspiracy
controlled by religious leaders and capitalists. As the 1930s progressed, this xenophobia
would increase, and the Ili Uyghurs’ cross-border relations became more and more
problematic in the eyes o f the Party.
In this increasingly oppressive political climate, the Soviet Com munist Party was
also making strides in developing a system o f controlling the Uyghur nation and its culture
on the local level. Already in 1929, the capital o f the Kazakh Autonomous Republic had
been moved from Kyzyl Orda to Alma-Ata in the heart o f Semirech’e, and in 1935 plans
were being drawn to transform this Autonomous Republic into a National Republic. In
preparation for this change, the areas where Uyghurs lived in Sem irech’e were also being
reconfigured in the context o f an emerging bureaucracy o f control. The Jarkent Uezd was
divided into two new raions (Jarkentskii and Uigurskii), and each o f these new raions was
further divided into multiple sel ’ soviets that served as the primary administrative unit on the
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176
village level (AOGAK f. 448, op. 1, d. 108, sv. 26a, pp. 67-69). As a result, yet one more
administrative system was laid over the system o f self-regulation practiced by Uyghurs in
their zhuts, and this new system ensured a direct line o f power to the central organs o f the
Com munist Party through a hierarchy o f Party committees in Kazakhstan that went from the
Republic level to the Oblast level on to the Raion level and finally down to the seVsoviet.
Demonstrative o f the importance attached to the new administrative divisions, the Uyghurs
o f the new Uigurskii raion were even given their own newspaper, entitled Stalinchi
(“Stalinist”) (see figure 6.8).
This administrative structure sought to inscribe a new habitus for the Sem irech’e
Uyghurs that would once and for all rid them o f religion, class differences, and backward
cultural practices and offer them instead scientific-atheism, a common proletarian
consciousness, and Soviet culture. Both children and adults were subject to ideological
training and were offered organized forms o f recreation that supported Soviet ideals such as
theatre, films, clubs, and reading rooms (see AOGAK f. 138, op. 1, d. 20, sv. 1, pp. 3-4). In
the process, they were subject to a new form o f modernism that depicted technology as the
savior o f humanity, especially in the m echanization o f agriculture.
W hile this intense Sovietization o f the Semirech’e Uyghurs drastically altered the
daily life o f local zhuts, it could not transform Uyghur zhutdarchilik into the epitome o f
Soviet life overnight through persuasion alone. By the later 1930s, however, persuasion was
being supplemented with the brutality and violence o f the Stalinist repression, and this
combination o f force, fear, and control would effectively transform Uyghur society in
Sem irech’e and virtually destroy the long-practiced activities of zhutdarchilik that had
formerly defined this community.
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As was the case elsewhere in the Soviet Union, the repression was carried out in
Uyghur communities under the guise o f protecting the Soviet Union from foreign spies and
conspirators. The repression had begun in 1936 with the show trial against Zinoviev and
Kamenev, who were convicted o f a terrorist plot to undermine the Soviet Union. It was the
show trial o f Piiatakov and Radek in 1937, however, that would frame all future conspiracies
as being jointly planned with foreign agents. Piiatakov and Radek were convicted o f
conspiring with Germany and Japan to overthrow the U.S.S.R., and soon after com m unists
from M oscow to the Uyghur villages o f Sem irech’e would be accused o f sim ilar deeds
(W estwood 1987:314).4 4
Am ong the Uyghurs, o f course, accusations o f possible ties to foreign influences
were easy to make, but conspiring with Germany and Japan seemed less than likely.4 5
Nonetheless, in 1937, virtually all o f the best known Uyghur national communists who had
not earlier fled to Xinjiang were arrested as enemies o f the people, and most o f them were
executed under charges o f conspiring with Germany and Japan to overthrow Soviet power.
Even Abdulla Rozibaqiev, who had been the most loyal and highest-ranking Uyghur
communist, was arrested. His daughter Ninel (Lenin spelled backwards) recounted to me the
day he was taken away. She said that the Secret Police arrived at their house on 29 June
1937 and told the family that they were taking Abdulla away for questioning. Although he
44 The focus on ties with Germany and Japan in Stalin’s repression was part o f the Soviet reaction to the Anti-
Comintern P act concluded between the Japanese and German governments in Novem ber o f 1936.
4 5 It should be mentioned that the Japanese and German governments were seeking influence in Xinjiang during
the 1930s, and the Soviets feared that these states might m obilize Muslims in the region against the U.S.S.R. (cf.
Nyman 1977:117-125; Hasiotis 1987:83-102). Reportedly, the group o f Pan-M uslim/Pan-Turkic Uyghurs in
Xinjiang who had established the Islamic Republic o f Eastern Turkestan in the Khotan and Kashgar areas o f
Xinjiang in 1931 and had fled to Kabul, Afghanistan after the short-lived state was liquidated in 1933 had even
discussed possible military assistance for a revolt in Xinjiang with the Japanese Ambassador in Japan (Forbes
1986:139-140). Nonetheless, the German and Japanese infiltration into Xinjiang was minimal, and it is unlikely
that these states would have entered into a conspiracy with Soviet Uyghurs who were devoted communists as
well as nationalists.
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was aware o f what had happened to others, Abdulla told his daughter that he would be gone
for awhile, but that everything would be fine and he would come back (see figure 6.4). He,
however, never did return. In September o f 1937, an article in the newspaper o f the
Uyghurskii raion, Stalinchi (“The Stalinist”), revealed to the Semirech’e Uyghurs that
Rozibaqiev had worked with other Kazakh and Uyghur counter-revolutionaries to form a
nationalist-fascist party that was conspiring with Germany and Japan to overthrow the
U.S.S.R. {Stalinchi, 1 Sept. 1937). It was only revealed decades later that he had been
executed on 3 M arch 1938 along with another prom inent Uyghur communist Ismail Tairov
and the Dungan Bolshevik M a San Chi (Rozybaqiev 1994:16). Other prom inent Uyghurs
Party cadres and writers who had been at the forefront o f the Bolshevik cause in Sem irech’e
suffered similar fates, and between 1937 and 1938 virtually the entire Uyghur intelligentsia
was liquidated.4 6 Only a handful o f the names that had once graced the by-lines o f
Kambagdllar Avazi survived past 1938.
The repression, however, did not stop with the intelligentsia. It continued to be
waged in Uyghur villages throughout Semirech’e where enemies o f the people were
uncovered everywhere. As a Uyghur newspaper article from 1937 warned its readers,
“while the party o f nationalist-fascists has m ostly been destroyed, its supporters still walk
amongst us” {Stalinchi, 1 Sept. 1937). Already in the summer o f 1937, Party cadres in
Sem irech’e were preparing Uyghur farmers on collective farms to weed out the enemies o f
the people that were walking amongst them. In study groups, the collective farmers read the
pamphlet About Some o f the Carnivorous Ploys and Methods o f Foreign Spies and were
instructed to seek out any potential spies on their farms (Ibragimov 1937). In October o f
46 To see more about the most prominent Uyghurs to have been arrested as enemies o f the people during the
repression, see Gheniev (1998).
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1937, some o f these supporters o f the nationalist-fascists were uncovered on a collective
farm in the village o f Akhtam where the head o f the seVsoviet, the collective farm ’s
brigadier, and its accountant were all arrested for contributing to the conspiracy against the
Soviet Union. As the newspaper reporting this event characterized the evidence o f these
conspirators’ guilt, “Tokhtakhunov is him self wealthy and has two brothers in China,
Nazm atov is a kulak and has two brothers in China, and Qadyrov’s father is wealthy and fled
to China in 1931 to escape being targeted as a kulak” (,Stalinchi, 8 Oct. 1937). Given these
m en’s evident class allegiances and ties with China, it was evidently decided that they were
receiving arms from Japanese sources in China in order to commit acts o f terrorism against
the state. Such witch hunts were undertaken on virtually all o f the Uyghur collective farms
in Sem irech’e (cf. Stalinchi, 8 Oct. 1937, 27 Oct. 1937, 22 Dec. 1937, 9 Jan. 1938, 12 Jan.
1938). The toll o f these events on the Uyghurs o f Sem irech’e, and all o f the people o f the
U.S.S.R., in terms o f lives lost and lives wasted in labor camps was enormous, and today it is
difficult to find a Uyghur family in the region that did not have a m ember who was labeled
as an enemy o f the people during the late 1930s.
Given the extremely close relations that the Soviet Union had established earlier in
the decade with Sheng Shicai, the Governor o f Xinjiang, the 1937 repression even stretched
across the border into Xinjiang where Uyghur intellectuals were also jailed. As one Xinjiang
Uyghur who was jailed at this time has recounted, the Soviet NKYD Secret Police even
came to the Urumchi jail during 1937 to question him and others about their connections
with Abdulla Rozibaqiev (Erzin 1997:4-5). W hile the intellectuals jailed in Xinjiang were
freed from prison a few years later, the impact o f the repression on the Uyghurs o f
Sem irech’e was more devastating. The community had lost its leaders, and an atm osphere
o f acute fear made many scared o f even expressing the slightest indication o f disagreem ent
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with Party policies. In effect, the repression had subdued the Uyghur com m unity o f
Sem irech’e and dashed any hopes it had entertained that modernism or revolution would
bring them liberation. In the Kuldja area, however, Uyghurs remained susceptible to the
promises o f a better future, and they too would soon experiment with the Soviet versions o f
modernism and revolution with similar results.
W hile ultimately a disappointment, the Ili U yghurs’ initial engagement with
modernism had significantly changed the ways in which this community would interact with
the world system in the future. It had socialized them into an ideology o f nationalism that
offered justification for their desires to resist external rule o f their perceived homeland. As
members o f a unified Uyghur nation, the former Taranchis o f the Ili valley now could
articulate their struggle with external rule in a discourse o f historical destiny and indigenous
rights. Initially, however, the ideology o f Uyghur nationalism would be tightly controlled
and guided by the Soviet and Chinese communist states, which promoted their own
particular notions o f what it means to be a nation.
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C H A P T E R FIVE: Revolution Reprise and Socialist Entrenchment in the
Borderland: Sheng Shicai, The Eastern Turkestan Republic, the M aoist
Revolution, and the Sino-Soviet Split (1937-1979)
If the first three decades o f the twentieth century marked the Ili U yghurs’ introduction
to the prom ises and disappointments o f modernism, the next four decades would reaffirm
these experiences. In general, many o f the processes that had transpired in the Soviet Union
between 1917 and 1937 repeated themselves in slightly different ways on the Chinese side o f
the border between 1937 and 1957. As in Sem irech’e, hopes o f a better future in the Kuldja
area were raised through the ideologies o f revolution and socialism only to be crushed once
the utility o f local Muslim nationalist communism had run its course. Likewise, as
collectivization had largely destroyed Uyghur zhutdarchilik practices on the Soviet side o f the
border, it now proved debilitating for the Uyghurs in China as well. Once this repeat
performance o f revolution and repression had run its course in the K uldja area, the Ili valley
Uyghurs found them selves divided between competing socialist states and isolated from the
rest o f the world in the context o f the Sino-Soviet split. This chapter outlines this period o f
history during which the Ili Uyghurs were betrayed by modernism for a second time and
became socialized into two separate Uyghur nations, one Soviet and one Chinese, that were
isolated from each other, their own past, and the rest o f the world by a closed border.
5.1 The Sovietization ofXinjiang: Stalin and Sheng Shicai, 1933-1942
After the Bolshevik revolution, the Soviet government sought num erous means to
increase its involvement in Xinjiang. Despite efforts to encourage the Soviet Uyghur Muslim
national communists to promote revolution in Uyghurstan during the early 1920s, Soviet
influence would initially make its way into the region prim arily through state to state relations
rather than through a popular revolutionary movement. As already noted, the U.S.S.R. gained
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extensive influence in Xinjiang during the early 1930s by entering into a partnership with the
Governor o f the region, Chin Shujen, who was besieged by local revolts. Chin, however,
remained a reluctant partner with the Soviet Union, and he even tried to keep his treaty with
the Soviets a secret from the people o f Xinjiang (Hasiotis 1987:74). Soviet assistance to the
Xinjiang government in its suppression o f local revolts in the first years o f the 1930s,
however, ensured that the U.S.S.R. would maintain a position o f privileged influence in the
region regardless o f Chin’s reluctance.1
Soviet influence reached its apex under Chin’s successor, Sheng Shicai (see figure
7.1). Sheng had originally come to Xinjiang in 1929 as a military commander, and he was in
charge o f the Chinese suppression o f successive M uslim revolts between 1931 and 1933
(Hasiotis 1987:83-84). This experience brought him into close contact with the Soviet state,
without the help o f which Sheng m ay not have suppressed the revolts and destroyed the short
lived Islamic Republic o f Eastern Turkestan (TIRET) o f 1933-1934 (see Barmin 1998:130-
133) (see figure 1.2)? From a m ilitary perspective, therefore, Sheng knew that he would
continue to require Soviet help if he was to maintain order in Xinjiang, and he sought an
alliance with the U.S.S.R. immediately after taking over the Governorship o f the region in
1933. Given the lack o f oversight and resources that the weak Chinese nationalist government
in Nanjing could offer Sheng, his alliance with the U.S.S.R. was at least tolerated by the
1 The Soviet U nion’s assistance to the Chinese administration during the 1930s reflected a repeat o f the Russian
Empire’s willingness to return Kuldja to the Qing Empire in the nineteenth century, bringing into question how
much the ideologies o f socialism and revolution had really changed Russia’s policies towards Xinjiang.
2 The Soviets were particularly concerned about the Islamic Republic o f Eastern Turkestan (TIRET). TIRET had
been established primarily by local Uyghur Jadids who retained distaste for the Soviet Union, and the Soviets
worried that this newly independent neighboring state could lead to potential unrest in Soviet Central A sia (see
Nyman 1977:111-119). For this reason, the Soviets assisted Sheng and the Xinjiang government in destroying the
Republic, even bringing in a troop o f Soviet soldiers who became known as the A ltay Volunteer A rm y (Barmin
1998:130). Given that this study concentrates on the Ili valley, however, the characteristics and short history o f the
TIRET, which was located in the south o f the Tarim Basin, will not be described in detail.
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Chinese Kuomintang (KMT), which all but lost control o f Xinjiang during most o f Sheng’s
rule.
Under Sheng, Xinjiang was to become virtually a protectorate o f the Soviet Union.3
In early 1934, Stalin sent his son-in-law, Alesha Svanidze, to assist Sheng’s governm ent in
formulating a plan for the region’s reconstruction and sent the Red Arm y General Pogodin to
help organize X injiang’s security organs on the model o f the Soviet KGB (Hasiotis 1987:95).
Soon, Soviet advisors and technical workers were to be found throughout Sheng’s
government, and Sheng’s policies became increasingly based on the Soviet model.4
Demonstrative o f the degree to which the U.S.S.R. influenced Sheng’s policies, the pam phlet
outlining his 1935 political program o f the Six Great Policies was even published in Alm a-Ata
(W hiting 1958:33).5 Furthermore, the first two o f Sheng’s Six Great Policies were anti
imperialism and kinship to Soviet Russia, both o f which were obviously influenced by his
Soviet advisors (Sheng 1958:165).6
Beyond the rhetoric o f friendship with the U.S.S.R. and an anti-im perialist stance in
foreign relations, Sheng’s government also instituted numerous social and political reforms
that were based on Soviet ideals regarding society, government, and modernization. For the
3 It should be noted that after the Islamic Republic o f Eastern Turkestan was crushed there remained a portion o f
the southern Tarim Basin under the control o f Dungan warlords who were loyal to the KMT. This area o f Xinjiang
has been called Tunganistan by European observers, and it was independent o f Sheng’s Xinjiang and o f Soviet
influence until it was liquidated in 1937 (see Forbes 1986:128-135)
4 One example o f the work o f Soviet technical workers in Xinjiang during the 1930s was recounted to me by a
Uyghur who had assisted two Russian women who were placed in Turpan to run a weather station (and perhaps
also a listening station). The women carried out their work rather inconspicuously in their weather station, and my
informant would do all o f their shopping and help them with any other daily necessities they required.
5 Around the same time, the Soviets were also distributing their own propaganda in the Uyghur language
throughout Xinjiang. One Uyghur who had lived in Urumchi at this time, for example, told me that there were
leaflets given out throughout the city with Stalin’s portrait, the caption o f which read “Comrade Stalin— The Great
Friend o f the Uyghur and M ongol Peoples.”
6 In addition to supplying Sheng with advisors, the U.S.S.R. gave the Xinjiang government a large monetary loan
and significant military support that included everything from arms to uniforms, all without the knowledge o f the
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M uslims o f Xinjiang, Sheng’s early ethnic politics in this regard were particularly important.
Sheng opened government-run schools and newspapers in the local M uslim languages o f the
region, and he made an effort to recruit Uyghurs, Kazakhs, Dungans, and other local M uslims
to positions within his government, mimicking many o f the affirmative action policies o f the
early Soviet state (see Lattimore 1950:73).7 For the local population, these policies were a
great improvement on previous regimes, and m any local M uslims became more actively
involved in the political life o f the region as a result. Nowhere was this more the case than in
the Kuldja area where Soviet influence was particularly strong and where m any o f the urban
and educated Uyghurs who were qualified to become government workers in Sheng’s
modernizing state lived.
At the same time, many Uyghurs in the Kuldja area were gaining an appreciation for
Soviet socialism and the particular notions o f modernist progress associated with this system.
In 1934, the Soviet Union adopted a resolution to sponsor the education o f students from
Xinjiang in Soviet institutions, and within a decade nearly 30,000 students from Xinjiang, a
high percentage o f whom were from Kuldja, had received a Soviet education, m ostly in
Central Asia (Barmin 1998:144). Those who studied in the U.S.S.R. returned with an
enthusiasm for the Soviet system ’s accomplishments, and they spread this enthusiasm
throughout their local communities where they became increasingly respected as a new
educated and modernized local elite.8 This group o f highly educated pro-Soviet youth,
therefore, represented a new force in the competition for symbolic capital in Uyghur
KMT central government in Nanjing. In return, the Soviet Union gained not only political influence, but also
exploratory and drilling rights to oil reserves in Xinjiang (see Forbes 1986:136).
7 The number o f non-Han students studying at non-religious schools in Xinjiang increased from 3,000 in 1933 to
150,000 in 1936! (Lattimore 1950:73).
8 The returning students also tended to publicly display their new ideological leanings by trying to appear more
m odem or more European in their clothing. In addition to adopting western styles o f dress, it was also popular
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com m unities in and around Kuldja, and many others who had not studied in the U.S.S.R.
followed their example and sought to copy their westernized/Sovietized style and ideas.
Illustrations 9: Sheng Shicai and Resistance to his Rule
Illustration 9.1:
Sheng Shicai, leader of
Xinjiang 1933-1944
(Hedin 1936:180).
Illustration 9.2: Leaders of The Islamic Republic of Eastern
Turkestan in the south of Xinjiang, 1933-34 (Dikbash 1994).
Soviet influence, however, was not limited to the students who studied in the U.S.S.R.
and those who admired them. M any o f m y informants who lived in the Kuldja area at this
time gained an appreciation for the Soviet Union and its influence in Xinjiang locally while
under the tutelage o f visiting Soviet instructors in Sheng’s new schools.9 Others recall having
become interested in the U.S.S.R. and its socialist system through Soviet publications and
films that lauded the successes o f the revolution in the U.S.S.R.1 0 Local Uyghurs gained
access to these products o f Soviet mediated culture at Soviet social clubs in K uldja and
among them to marry local Tatar wom en who, in comparison with Uyghur women, both appeared more European
in their features and tended to have more liberal ideas about the role o f women in society.
9 According to one interviewee who had studied under Soviet teachers in grammar school, these teachers were
primarily Russian wom en who had no knowledge o f the local languages o f Xinjiang. Consequently, they would
teach in Russian, and an interpreter would translate for them.
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Urumchi, which also sponsored western-style parties and dances as an alternative to the
mashrap (Forbes 1986:137).1 1 W hile not all residents o f the Kuldja area were influenced
positively by these various forms o f Soviet public diplomacy, the propaganda efforts o f the
Soviet government were certainly establishing a core group o f educated urban Uyghurs with
pro-Soviet leanings, and this group was in turn influencing others.
One consequence o f this steady Sovietization o f the Kuldja area was that the concept
o f the united Uyghur nation, now well developed on the Soviet side o f the border, began to
find currency in the Chinese-controlled portion o f the Ili valley. The increasing salience o f the
concept o f the Uyghur nation was promoted both by the returning Soviet-educated Uyghur
students, who had learned about their national history and literature while studying in
Tashkent or Alma-Ata, and by Sheng’s government, which began referring to the Uyghur
nation in its official documents and promoting the concept in local Uyghur newspapers and
schools (Barmin 1998:145). By the mid-1930s, therefore, the Uyghur ethnonym, while still
not recognized by all M uslims in Xinjiang, was replacing the local Taranchi m oniker in the
Kuldja area and serving as symbolic o f a Soviet-inspired vision o f m odern nationhood.
Despite the effectiveness o f these early efforts to Sovietize Xinjiang, Sheng’s
government faced increasing local resistance in the later 1930s, particularly in the south where
the memory o f the TIRET state had not disappeared and where the population’s strongly
religious values were not conducive to Soviet-style reform s.1 2 The tension between local
1 0 Between 1935 and 1938, the Soviet Union imported to Xinjiang over 400 copies o f Soviet films (Barmin
1998:146).
1 1 One account o f these clubs notes that “the smoking o f hashish and opium was forbidden but drinking araq and
vodka was encouraged, probably in order to undermine Muslim traditions” (Forbes 1986:137). My informants who
had frequented these clubs, however, mostly recount that they enjoyed free access to new reading materials from
the U.S.S.R. as well as to Soviet popular music and Soviet films from Central Asia.
1 2 One aspect o f the Sovietization o f Xinjiang that particularly concerned M uslims in the south o f Xinjiang was
education. These M uslims were offended by the teachings o f Soviet instructors in their local schools, particularly
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M uslims in the south o f Xinjiang and Sheng’s government was further aggravated in 1936 by
policies aimed at weakening the power o f Islam in the region.1 3 Sheng, for example, instituted
new educational reforms, which forced M uslims to send their daughters, as well as sons, to
school, instituted European Arabic numerals as an alternative to the traditional Arabic
numbering system, and drastically cut Q ur’anic studies from the curriculum (Forbes
1986:139). In addition, local mosques in some areas were transformed into clubs as had been
done in Sem irech’e, and Sheng’s representative in Kashgar even ordered that a portrait o f Sun
Yat-sen be hung in the city’s largest mosque, the Heytgah (Forbes 1986:139).
These policies led to widespread M uslim dissatisfaction with Sheng’s rule in
Xinjiang, particularly in the south. As a result, another revolt broke out in the Kashgar area in
1937, reportedly with the aim o f once again establishing an independent Eastern Turkestan
Republic (cf. Barmin 1998:161-162; Forbes 1986:141-143). Almost immediately, however,
the Soviet Union came to Sheng’s assistance and sent military planes across the border to
attack the rebels (Barmin 1998:162). In return, Sheng pledged to assist the U.S.S.R. in its
anti-Trotskyite witch hunt, and he immediately named the chief Soviet consul in Xinjiang,
Gagerin Apresov, as the head o f a conspiracy to divide Xinjiang and the U.S.S.R., even
implicating Apresov in the Kashgar revolt o f that year (Sheng 1958:177-178).
Sheng’s anti-Trotskyite campaign, however, did not only assist Stalin’s governm ent to
identify enemies o f the people among the Soviet citizens working and living in Xinjiang. In
1937, Sheng’s government arrested 435 local citizens for their alleged participation in a
Germ an-Japanese plot to take over Xinjiang and eventually to destroy the Soviet Union
because many o f them were women whose dress did not conform to local concepts o f proper M uslim attire (Forbes
1986:139).
1 3 This more aggressive anti-religion campaign was likely an outgrowth o f increased Soviet influence in Xinjiang
starting from 1936, when a secret agreement was signed between Sheng and the Soviet Union that called for broad
cooperation between the two governments including a pledge o f Soviet support if Xinjiang was to cede from China
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1 8 8
(Sheng 1958:179). W hile only 35 o f those arrested were executed for their alleged ties to the
conspiracy, many others remained in prison for several years. In his memoirs written in the
early 1950s, Sheng echoed the Soviet explanations o f the Stalinist purges in order to justify his
own campaign o f repression:
In their never-ending quest for power and their desperate search for means to
overthrow Stalin, the Trotskyites joined with the German and Japanese fascists
in a plot to seize Sinkiang (sic) as a base for operations against the Soviet Union
(Sheng 1958:176).
Allen W hiting, however, provides a more cynical explanation of the repression, noting that
“the purg e... served Sheng, as it did Stalin, to destroy rival centers o f potential pow er” and
was “an extension o f Stalinism into Sinkiang (sic), with Sheng acting as the willing
executioner o f both policy and people” (W hiting 1958:53). Sheng’s utilitarian goals of
elim inating competing power bases were further apparent in his simultaneous attacks on
religious institutions throughout Xinjiang.1 4
As a result o f these measures, Sheng Shicai increasingly lost his support am ong the
Uyghurs in the Kuldja area, but the reputation o f the U.S.S.R. in the region remained m ostly
untarnished. W hile the repression o f 1937 in Sem irech’e had left Uyghurs there feeling
betrayed by modernism and socialism in general, in the Kuldja area this repression was m ostly
seen solely as a misguided abuse o f power by Sheng. Soviet influence was still appreciated by
the local population, which continued to consume Soviet mediated culture and attend the local
Soviet social clubs. As evidence o f the continued pro-Soviet stance o f the population in the
Kuldja area at this time, many o f those local Uyghurs who were jailed in 1937 would emerge
(Hasiotis 1987:100). In this context, Sheng may have launched these new campaigns in order to demonstrate his
allegiance to the ideology o f his patrons.
1 4 Simultaneously with the m ti-T rotskyite purges o f 1937, Sheng banned religion as a discipline in local schools
and ordered a further crackdown on local religious schools.
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as key personalities in the Soviet-supported revolution in the Ili valley during the early 1940s.
In their opinions, it was Sheng, not Stalin, who had betrayed them.
If m any Uyghurs o f the Kuldja area continued to hold pro-Soviet leanings, it would be
m isleading to suggest that these allegiances superceded other ideologies within the
community. M ost Uyghurs in the Kuldja area remained religious, and Islam played an
important role in defining their identity. Likewise, the remnants o f the Jadid m ovem ent
continued to promote a form o f modernism that was inextricably linked to Islam and that
served as a counterbalance to the Soviet socialist and atheist ideas o f progress. In addition,
the Jadid movem ent in Kuldja was greatly influenced by Pan-Islamic and Pan-Turkist ideas
that competed for popular allegiances with the Soviet ideal o f the separate Uyghur nation. For
the most part, however, these different ideological currents in the K uldja area were not
creating discord in the community, which appeared to be feeling its way through a multitude
o f visions associated with modern progress while being united around the simple shared hope
for a better future.
Over the next several years, Soviet influence in Xinjiang would continue to be strong,
particularly in the Kuldja area. Soviet infiltration into the region, however, was also
tempered, at least publicly, by a new era o f friendship between the U.S.S.R. and the KM T
Party that ruled China.1 5 As a result, the U.S.S.R. became more careful o f openly by-passing
Nanjing in order to make direct agreements with Sheng concerning activities in Xinjiang, but
this did not mark an end to the special relationship between Sheng and the Soviet U nion as
practiced in secret negotiations. In 1938, for example, Sheng and his family traveled to
M oscow, meeting with Stalin several times about political issues and attending a private party
with the Soviet dictator’s inner circle at M olotov’s dacha (“vacation hom e”) (Sheng
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1958:203-205). This trip not only served to bring Sheng closer to the Soviet leadership, but
before departing Sheng had even been admitted to the Soviet Communist Party despite being a
Chinese citizen (Sheng 1958:205-207). According to Andrew Forbes, following this trip
Sheng’s foreign policies became almost a carbon copy o f those of the U.S.S.R., and by 1939
Xinjiang “had become a virtual dependency o f the Soviet Union, differing scarcely at all from
the neighboring M ongolian People’s Republic” (Forbes 1986:152). W hile M oscow was
entering into a closer friendship with Nanjing, therefore, it was also quietly pulling Xinjiang
further towards Soviet control.
As part o f this increased Soviet influence, members o f the Chinese Com m unist Party
(CCP), including M ao Zedong’s brother Mao Zemin, were brought into positions o f power
within Sheng’s administration in 1938-39 (Barmin 1999:10).1 6 The strongest indication o f
M oscow ’s increased power in Xinjiang at this time, however, was the Soviet U nion’s new
economic role in the region. In Novem ber o f 1940, Sheng signed a treaty with the Soviet
leadership, often referred to as the Tin Mines Agreement, which gave the U.S.S.R. exclusive
rights to the mining o f tin and other related metals in Xinjiang for the next fifty years (W hiting
1958:66-67). In addition, the U.S.S.R. was to build and control “all power lines,
transportation media, and communications networks necessary to the project, without
interference from outside authorities,” a stipulation that, according to Allen W hiting, virtually
created “a state within a state immune from control by Urumchi or the central governm ent”
(W hiting 1958:67). The authority o f this treaty, however, was not to last much more than two
years, let alone fifty.
1 5 In 1937, the Soviet Union signed a treaty with the KMT declaring a United Front against Japanese imperialism
(W hiting 1958:48-49).
1 6 W hile in Xinjiang, these CCP cadres were involved in considerable propaganda and organizational efforts aimed
at gaining local support for their struggle with the KMT. One such effort was a large conference held in 1942 in
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Despite reportedly having suggested to Stalin in 1941 that the U.S.S.R. incorporate
Xinjiang into the Soviet Union (Forbes 1986:157-158), Sheng began a drastic change in his
policy towards his Soviet patrons a year later that would seek to reverse the Soviet infiltration
into Xinjiang. It is not known with certainty why this about-face took place, but a
combination o f fear o f M oscow’s ultimate intensions in Xinjiang, doubts about the course o f
World W ar II, and Sheng’s own political ambitions likely all contributed to his course o f
action.1 7 Having apparently already met secretly with the KM T central government in order to
ensure support for his policy change, in 1942 Sheng ordered the arrest o f some one hundred of
the most prom inent communists and Soviet sympathizers in Xinjiang for having harbored a
conspiracy to take over the region and incorporate it into the U.S.S.R. (Forbes 1986:158-159).
M any o f those who were arrested, including M ao Zedong’s brother M ao Zemin, were
subsequently executed (Barmin 1999:21). Simultaneously, Soviet cultural societies and
institutions in Xinjiang were closed, and thousands o f Xinjiang residents who had worked
with Soviet advisors and workers or who had studied in the U.S.S.R. were arrested for their
links to the alleged conspiracy (Barmin 1999:20-23). Following these moves, Sheng sent a
letter to Stalin, M olotov, and Voroshilov in M oscow accusing the Soviet Union o f organizing
the conspiracy against him and his family (Barmin 1999:25-26).
Somewhat later, Sheng also sent a letter to the Soviet Consulate dem anding the
withdrawal o f all Soviet m ilitary and technical personnel from Xinjiang, effectively revoking
the rights o f the U.S.S.R. to prospect for oil and metals in the region (Forbes 1986:159-160).
order to attract Xinjiang’s women to the CCP (The F irst Annual X injiang Women's Congress), the center stage o f
which was shared between Mao Zedong and Sheng Shicai (Shinjang 1942).
1 7 Forbes notes that Sheng, who was vehemently anti-Japanese, must have been greatly disappointed by the signing
o f the Soviet-Japanese Non-Aggression Pact in 1941, but he also notes, as does Whiting, that Hitler’s invasion o f
the U.S.S.R. in 1941 was the deciding factor that led Sheng to re-consider the political horse he was betting on for
future global domination (Forbes 1986:157-158; Whiting 1958:74-75). In his own memoirs, however, Sheng
justified his actions by outlining what he believed to a long on-going conspiracy by Soviet and Chinese
communists to render his rule obsolete and to take over Xinjiang (Sheng 1958:209-269).
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By 1943, the Soviet leadership had reluctantly fulfilled Sheng’s request, and it withdrew all
Soviet citizens with the exception o f official diplomats from the region. Using political tactics
reminiscent o f M arshall Stalin himself, therefore, Sheng had made a perm anent break with his
former Soviet patrons, but the upper echelons o f the Soviet Communist Party were not about
to accept such indignation without retaliating.
5.2 Soviet-Supported Revolution in Kuldja: The Rise and Fall o f the Eastern
Turkestan Republic. 1942-1949
M ost Uyghurs and other M uslims in the Kuldja area did not share Sheng’s enthusiasm
for the removal o f Soviet advisors and workers. During the years o f the partnership between
Sheng and the Soviets, the U.S.S.R. had been more successful than Sheng in appealing to the
local M uslims o f the Kuldja region. The Soviet Union free o f cost had offered the Uyghurs
and other M uslims in Kuldja opportunities for advanced education abroad as well as
considerable access to books, films, and cultural events. W hile Sheng had been respected
among m any M uslims during the early years o f his rule, following the repression o f 1937 he
was increasingly identified with brute force and terror. Between 1937 and 1943, thousands o f
M uslims had been arrested on political charges, and the vast numbers arrested after Sheng’s
break with M oscow even included many minors who had worked with Soviet technical
workers in various capacities. One o f my informants in Almaty, for example, had been
arrested at the age o f 16 merely for having worked at a Soviet weather station in Turpan.
Furtherm ore, Sheng’s military had gained a reputation am ong the local M uslims for abusing
its power and carrying out frequent acts o f needless violence against the local population
(Benson 1990:38). In this context, it is not surprising that many Uyghurs and other M uslims
in the Kuldja area and elsewhere in Xinjiang identified with the U.S.S.R. more than with
Sheng’s administration in the political battle between the two. As one o f the people who
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organized the 1944 rebellion in Kuldja told me quite plainly, “we disliked the Chinese much
more than w e did the Russians.”
This sentiment was further reinforced by Sheng’s policies after the Soviet withdrawal.
Along with continued political arrests o f pro-Soviet conspirators, Sheng’s adm inistration also
began to crackdown on M uslim religious observation once again following 1942. The
pilgrimage to M ecca was forbidden, and the government allegedly destroyed num erous older
copies o f the Q u’ran (Barmin 1998:51). These acts had provoked a Uyghur religious leader in
Kashgar, Tair Khan Maksum, in early 1943 to publicly accuse Sheng to his face o f not
honoring his policy o f religious freedom, an act that led the Soviet Consul in Kashgar to report
back to an obviously interested M oscow that religious leaders were at the forefront o f any
potential National liberation movement in the region (Barmin 1999:51-52).
The deteriorating economic situation following the departure o f significant Soviet
support also increased the local M uslim s’ distaste for Sheng, especially in Kuldja. As the
main entry point from the U.S.S.R. into Xinjiang, K uldja was a booming border city
throughout the 1930s where highly valued Soviet goods were in abundance and w here local
traders could sell their wares to the Soviet state import agency created specifically for
Xinjiang, Sovsintorg (cf. Benson 1990:36; Barmin 1999:33-36; Forbes 1986:173). The
withdrawal o f Soviet citizens from the region and the virtual closing o f the border, therefore,
was an economic shock for the people o f Kuldja, and it had far-reaching consequences for the
economy o f the entire region o f Xinjiang as well.
Given these factors, in conjunction with the recognition that the withdrawal o f Soviet
military assistance had left Sheng’s troops vulnerable, many local M uslims in Xinjiang must
have seen the time as ripe to renew resistance against Chinese rule. Likewise, the Soviet
leadership apparently was ready to support such a popular resistance movement in order to
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destabilize Sheng’s rule as retribution for his about-face in policy, and a 1943 m eeting o f the
Soviet Politburo even discussed the option o f creating a cross-border Uyghur resistance
m ovem ent for this purpose (Barmin 1999:71).1 8
The first local resistance group to allegedly receive direct Soviet assistance was a
band o f Kazakhs in the Altay region north o f K uldja under the leadership o f Osm an Batyr.
Osman initially led a small group o f Kazakh nomads in carrying out raids on Chinese m ilitary
and security posts in the Altay region, and his supporters quickly grew from 16 in 1942 to
over 300 by N ovem ber 1943 (Barmin 1999:55). According to V. Barmin, who has had
unprecedented access to Russian archives regarding Soviet activities in Xinjiang at this time,
Osman initially had no Soviet support, but he likely received arms from the U.S.S.R. shortly
after an extensive report about him was sent to M oscow in April 1944 by the Soviet Consul in
the Altay, F. M ikhailov (Barmin 1999:54-55).1 9 Having apparently received arms from the
Soviet Union by the sum m er o f 1944, Osman increased his activities and attempted, albeit
unsuccessfully, to take over the capital o f the Altay region, Shara-Suma, in Septem ber 1944.
At around the same time, the KM T had ordered the transfer o f Sheng Shicai from Xinjiang to
a position in China proper, and most o f Sheng’s political prisoners were released from prison
(Forbes 1986:163). The political situation in Xinjiang was in flux, and continued unrest could
seriously de-stabilize the region.
Evidence suggests that the Soviet assistance to Osman Batyr was not an isolated
event, but instead was part o f a larger plan to foment revolution throughout Xinjiang.
Although retribution for Sheng Shicai’s betrayal was likely the initial impetus for supporting
1 8 There is also further evidence that Soviet agents were sent to Xinjiang to seek out such local resistance groups to
support. In 1946, several Soviet agents o f the M VD and KGB were given awards for “fulfilling the m ission o f the
Central Committee o f the Soviet Communist Party in Xinjiang since May 4, 1943” (Barmin 1999:75).
1 9 This claim is all the more likely considering that Osman and his band o f rebels had periodically taken refuge in
the M ongolian People’s Republic, where they would have been able to easily meet with Soviet government
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such resistance, news o f Sheng’s removal from power appears to have only expedited this plan
in order to take advantage o f the political transition.2 0 According to several sources, a group
o f Uyghur and other M uslim intellectuals and religious figures in Kuldja led by Elikhantora
Saghuniy had already formed a secret organization in April o f 1944 in order to plot resistance
against Chinese rule (Forbes 1986:173; Barmin 1999:56; Uyghuriy 2000:18). Likely under
instructions to seek out viable resistance groups, the Soviet Consul in Kuldja, Dubashin, was
im mediately interested in this group, and he invited its members to m eet with him during the
summer o f 1944.
According to Abduraup M akhsum Ibrahimiy, one o f the original members o f this
small group whom I interviewed in 1997 in Almaty, the group’s twelve leaders met with
Consul Dubashin at the Soviet Consulate in Kuldja.2 1 At this meeting, Dubashin told them
that if they organized a revolt against the Chinese government, the Soviet Union would assist
them with arms and would help them to establish an independent government like that which
existed in M ongolia.2 2 Also present was a Uyghur Soviet citizen by the name o f Fatikh
M uslimov who lived in Nilka north o f Kuldja. According to my informant, the Soviet
C onsul’s plan was to have Muslimov organize an initial revolt in Nilka, and the rem ainder o f
representatives. Andrew Forbes, however, claims that Soviet support reached Osman through M ongolia even
earlier, in mid-1943 (Forbes 1986:171).
20 W hile virtually all independent scholars agree that the U.S.S.R. was involved in fomenting revolution in Xinjiang
at this time, the extent o f Soviet involvement has long been debated (cf. Benson 1990:138-144; Forbes 1986:177-
195; Chen 1977:195-241). Research in the Soviet archives since the fall o f the U.S.S.R., primarily by V. Barmin
(1998; 1999), however, has once and for all established the central role o f the Soviet Union in helping to organize
this rebellion.
2 1 A recent memoir published in Kazakhstan names the twelve in attendance as: Elikhantora Saghuniy, Rahimjan
Sabirhajiev, Zunnun Teyipov, Jani Yuldashev, Abdukerim Abbasov, Qasimjan Qambiriy, Abduraup Makhsum,
Mahammatjan Makhsum, Salijanbay Babajanov, Muhiddin Akhmat, Nurdunbag Ilakhun, and Omarjan
Pirmuhammat (Uyghuriy 2000:18).
22 One recent source states that Elikhantora Saghuniy initially distrusted the Soviets and did not want to take part in
the plan, but after subsequent discussions with Dubashin he agreed to the idea (Uyghuriy 2000:18).
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the group m eanwhile would recruit members in Kuldja, particularly amongst those who had
recently been released from prison.
M uslimov and a Uyghur who had just been released from prison by the name o f Gheni
Batyr (see figure 7.4) led a group o f over 200 rebels armed with Soviet weapons in an attack
on N ilka in October 1944, and the revolt ended in a surprising victory over KM T forces (cf.
Barmin 1998:56; Uyghuriy 2000:21). Simultaneously, in Kuldja the remainder o f the group
began organizing a follow-up revolt there. The group allegedly met with 30 armed Russian
soldiers at the Khorgus border-crossing on Novem ber 1, 1944, and this rag-tag Russian
m ilitary force, joined by reinforcements from the N ilka revolt, helped the M uslim rebels
organized in K uldja to attack Chinese government institutions in the city on the seventh o f
November, the 27th anniversary o f the Bolshevik Revolution. A few days later on N ovem ber
12, an independent government called the Eastern Turkestan Republic (ETR) was established
for the three viliyats (“counties”) around Kuldja, and the leader o f the twelve men who had
met with Dubashin to plan the revolt, an Uzbek religious figure in K uldja named Elikhantora
Saghuniy, was named its interim president (Uyghuriy 2000:22) (see figure 7.3).2 3
After the rebels had taken K uldja and formed their interim government, the U.S.S.R.
sent higher ranking military leaders as well as Soviet Communist Party cadres to advise
further military campaigns in the region and to assist in the construction o f the ETR.2 4
Bolstered by this assistance from the U.S.S.R., the rebels continued to take one city after
another, taking control o f the entire Chinese side o f the Ili valley by February 1945 (Benson
1990:46-47). Stalin, Beriya and M olotov all personally followed these developm ents in
2 3 Forbes has placed the date o f this event at November 15 (Forbes 1986:176).
24 One o f my Uyghur informants who had participated in these events names a certain Russian General Vladimir
Stepanovich K ozlov as having played a particular important role in the ETR’s military and political affairs. A s my
informant stated, “he (K ozlov) was our Stalin; we had to follow his orders and do whatever he said.”
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Xinjiang closely, and Beriya him self approved sending demobilized soldiers and officers from
the Red Army to Xinjiang in order to assist the ET R ’s troops (Barmin 1999:80).2 5 The
fighting continued throughout the majority o f 1945, and by September the rebels had virtually
encircled Urumchi, the capital o f Xinjiang, as Han Chinese refugees fled the city for points
further east (Benson 1990:52). Just as it seemed that the rebels from the Ili valley were about
to push the Chinese out o f Xinjiang entirely for the first time since the 1880s, fighting
suddenly ceased and peace talks were held.
The sudden end to the rebels’ attacks once again suggested that the Soviet Union had
extensive power over the Kuldja revolution. The KM T had never recognized the rebels and
went directly to the U.S.S.R. to appeal for an end to the revolt. W hile the Soviet government
never adm itted to its implication in the Ili rebellion, it did agree to broker a peace treaty and
brought the rebels to the negotiating table far quicker than a neutral party would have been
able to do (Benson 1990:54; Barmin 1999:93).2 6 According to archival docum ents that have
recently come to light, Beriya had even ordered the cessation of rebel attacks as early as June
1945, but the rebels did not stop their forward march entirely until September o f that year
when peace talks were initiated (Barmin 1999:91). W hile the treaty that was signed
recognized the autonomy o f the ETR, it also called for a coalition government that would
oversee the Xinjiang province as a whole. Instead o f achieving the status o f an independent
Soviet-supported state akin to M ongolia, therefore, from 1946-1949 Xinjiang was to be run by
a coalition government that was characterized by a continually unstable alliance between the
leaders o f the ETR and the KMT.
2 5 Barmin (1999) cites numerous documents about the revolt and the ETR from the Russian archives that are direct
correspondences between these critical members o f Stalin’s inner circle.
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By the time this coalition government was formed, however, the ETR was also
developing a fairly sophisticated independent state that was both assisted and overseen by the
U.S.S.R. In term s o f high-level policy decisions, the U.S.S.R. evidently continued to have far-
reaching control over the ETR. As V. Barmin has concluded from Soviet archival documents,
“it is com pletely apparent that, without the agreem ent o f the Soviet diplomats and
representatives working with the ETR government, neither members o f that government nor
the actual president Alikhan-Tore (sic) could take any serious (independent) steps either
militarily or in state construction” (Barmin 1999:79).2 7
If the Soviet Union evidently had far-reaching influence in the decision-m aking o f the
ETR, the ideological domain o f the state initially remained more contested. The ETR ’s
President, Elikhantora Saghuniy, was him self a religious leader, and he represented one end o f
the state’s ideological spectrum that was religious in its orientation, focused on the eventual
liberation o f all o f Xinjiang from Chinese rule, and more defined by pan-Turkism and pan-
Islamism than by parochial nationalism. On the other end o f the spectrum was Akhm atjan
Qasimi (see figure 7.5), a Uyghur who had spent most o f his life in the U.S.S.R. and had
returned to Xinjiang in the early 1940s only to be jailed during Sheng’s anti-Soviet purges o f
1943 (Benson 1992:29-30) (see figure 7.5). Qasimi is a very complicated figure whose
allegiances were obviously pro-Soviet and pro-communist but at the same time appear to have
been pro-independence and Uyghur nationalist, thus resembling the ideological orientation of
the Uyghur national communists in Semirech’e (cf. Benson 1992; Uyghuriy 2000; Vakhidiy
1994b).
26 M ost scholars who have researched this question share in the opinion that the U.S.S.R. took this action due to the
increasing importance o f their relationship with China in the context o f the war with Japan (cf. Benson 1990:54-56;
Forbes 1986:190-193; Barmin 1999:90-91).
27 According to a recent compilation o f memoirs about the ETR, the U.S.S.R. had sent their own advisors to assist
each section o f the government including the President (Uyghuriy 2000:23).
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W hen the Soviet Union agreed to broker the peace treaty between the ETR and the
KM T in 1945, the ideological differences in the new state began to clash. Elikhantora
disagreed vehemently with his Soviet advisors over the question o f stopping military action
(Ibrahimiy 1994b). For Elikhantora and his followers, the goal of the revolution had always
been the liberation o f the entire region of Xinjiang from Chinese rule and the establishm ent o f
an independent Eastern Turkestan, and he did not intend to halt the military offensive when
this goal seemed to be in reach. Akhmatjan Qasimi, by contrast, followed Soviet directives
and served as the leader o f the ETR delegation at the peace talks in Urumchi.2 8 In Decem ber
1945, even as Qasimi was in Urumchi conducting talks with the KM T, however, Elikhantora
was proclaiming “if the Chinese state does not give us freedom, we will fight for it and spread
our national revolution through the entirety o f Eastern Turkestan” (Barmin 1999:111).
W hen the peace treaty was finally signed by Qasimi and his delegation, this
ideological division, at least as it was manifested in the upper echelons o f the ETR leadership,
was resolved rather heavy handedly by the Soviet Union. On July 17, 1946, Elikhantora was
removed from the ETR ’s presidency and brought by Soviet agents to Tashkent, Uzbekistan
where he would die years later as a reluctant Soviet citizen, and Akhmatjan Qasimi
subsequently was put in his place as the leader o f the ETR (Barmin 1999:117). The Soviet
Union had hi-jacked the revolution from Elikhantora and his followers, who harbored various
ideas that must have seemed dangerous to the Soviet leadership, including self-determination,
pan-Turkism, and religiosity.2 9
28 The ETR delegation sent to the talks was not even chosen by Elikhantora, but by Beriya from his office in
M oscow (Barmin 1999:110).
29 Interestingly, the same day that Elikhantora was taken to the U.S.S.R., one o f the Soviet KGB officers who had
helped to organize the Kuldja revolt attempted suicide, an act that Barmin suggests may have been related to the
officer’s guilty conscience from having lied to the rebels about the true intentions o f Soviet assistance (Barmin
1999:117).
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Although Elikhantora had been taken out o f power and the struggle for X injiang’s
independence had been cut short, most o f the ETR supporters in the Kuldja area continued to
believe that the future would bring them their own state. This was also reinforced by the
mediated culture consumed by Uyghurs and others in the ETR. Following the example o f the
Bolshevik revolution, the U.S.S.R. ensured that the ETR had no shortage o f books, journals,
and newspapers with which the battle for the hearts and minds of the local population could
be waged. Furthermore, as had been the case in Soviet Central Asia during the early 1920s,
much o f this mediated culture focused on fostering an anti-colonial nationalist consciousness
that, despite the ETR ’s pan-Turkish and pan-Muslim coalition of nationalities, was prim arily
Uyghur nationalist in character.
M uch o f the ETR ’s mediated culture emanated from two Soviet publishing houses in
Tashkent and Alma-Ata, entitled Sharq Haqiqiti and Qazaq Eli respectively. For these two
publishing houses, which began operations immediately in 1944 and were devoted exclusively
to the printing o f materials for Xinjiang, the U.S.S.R. employed those few Soviet Uyghur
intellectuals who remained alive and out o f prison following Stalin’s purges.3 0 The publishing
houses immediately translated scores o f books, including the classics o f M arxism -Leninism
and the fictional works o f Russian revolutionary writers, into Uyghur using the Arabic script.
Likewise, each o f the publishing houses produced their own journal, also entitled Sharq
Haqiqiti (“The Truth o f the East”) and Qazaq Eli (“The Land of the Kazakhs”) respectively.3 1
The articles in these journals addressed various themes from the success o f the Soviet Union
in its developm ent o f communism to the history o f the Uyghurs and their struggle for
30 The editor o f Sharq H aqiqiti was the nephew o f Abdullah Rozibaqiev, Abdumejit Rozibaqiev. Other Uyghurs,
som e o f whom were simultaneously receiving an education in the new Uyghur section o f the Central Asian State
University (SA G U ) in Tashkent, worked as translators, editors, and writers for the publisher.
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independence from China (cf. Shakirjan 1945; Qadiri 1946; Shami-qizi 1946; Uyghur-Ughli
1947; Vatan-Ughli 1947; Hidayatov 1978).3 2
Similarly, the ETR ’s own internal publications, which likely received extensive
assistance from the Soviet Union, also printed numerous articles about the U yghurs’ history o f
resistance to Chinese rule [cf.Kurash 1946(2-3): 12-24; 1946(4-5): 1-10, 15-26; 1947(4): 13-
19; 1947(6-7):22-29] and continued to talk about the ETR ’s revolution as a national liberation
struggle, at least indirectly suggesting that this struggle would not end with the establishm ent
o f a small semi-independent state in the three counties around Kuldja [.Kurash 1947(4): 1-5]
(see figure 7.7). In addition to providing a particularly militant historical narrative o f the
Uyghur nation, the ET R ’s journals and newspapers also promoted other aspects o f the Soviet
version o f the Uyghur nation and its culture. In particular, they published articles about the
history o f Uyghur literature and folklore and advocated for the standardization and expanded
use o f a Uyghur written language [cf. Kurash 1946(10-11):20-26; 1947(l):23-33; 1947(2-
3): 12-23; 1947(4): 13-19].
In the Kuldja area, however, this emerging narrative o f the Uyghur nation appears to
have been received with mixed results. According to m y informants from A lm aty who had
lived in Kudlja during the ETR, the consciousness o f being a Uyghur had superceded the
consciousness o f being a Taranchi, but national identity still remained somewhat secondary to
being m embers o f the Turkic peoples upon which the ideology of the Eastern Turkestan
Republic had been at least partially built. W hile Elikhantora and his pan-Turkish vision for an
independent Xinjiang were no longer forces in the official state ideology o f the ETR, there
remained m any aspects o f this semi-autonomous republic that fostered a feeling o f pan-
3 1 Later, Q azaq Eli was published in two different forms. The version in the Kazakh language was called Q azaq
Eli, and the version in the Uyghur language was named Yengi H ayat (“new life”).
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Turkish unity in the region. The leaders o f the ETR remained multi-national, and the most
popular state figures among the local people were from the Turkish peoples— Kazakh,
Uyghur, and Tatar. Furthermore, even the name o f the state evoked the concept o f a greater
Turkestan o f which Xinjiang was only the eastern half. W hile these factors did not mean that
the different Turkish speaking people in the K uldja area did not recognize the differences
between themselves, it does suggest that parallel to any notion o f national consciousness was a
strong common identification with being Turkish peoples.
It is likely that these continued pan-Turkish sentiments within the ETR and its socio
political institutions worried the nascent state’s Soviet patrons. Stalin and his associates had
worked hard to rid Soviet Central Asia o fpan-Turkism as a political ideology and had
succeeded in liquidating m ost of the local intellectuals who harbored pan-Turkish sentiments
during the 1930s. If the ETR became an overtly pan-Turkish state bordering Soviet Central
Asia, this ideology could easily become a political force in the U.S.S.R. once again. This may
explain why in 1947 there was a project being discussed within Kazakhstan to establish a
Uyghur Autonomous Oblast’ that, as stated in official documents concerning the proposed
territorial unit, could elicit “a positive response from the side o f the 3 million Uyghurs in
Xinjiang and activate their national-independence movement, orienting it even m ore towards
the Soviet U nion” (Khlyupin 1999:228). It is unknown what happened to this proposed
project within Kazakhstan, but no Uyghur Autonomous O blast’ was ever formed, and the
Soviet Union would find other ways to repress the pan-Turkism latent in the ETR.
Although the ETR remained beholden to the U.S.S.R. throughout its existence, there
are reasons to believe that the coalition government formed as a result o f the ETR-KM T peace
treaty o f late 1945 gradually helped to bolster the ETR ’s leaders’ independence from the
32 Similarly, the schools in Kuldja during the ETR adopted a Soviet program that taught both the history o f the
Soviet Union and a Soviet-produced course on Uyghur history.
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Soviet Union. When a coalition government for Xinjiang was formed in 1946, the KM T
placed several anti-Soviet Uyghurs in positions o f power, evidently to tem per the appeal o f the
ETR to M uslims outside the Ili valley in Xinjiang. These anti-Soviet Uyghurs included
M uhammad Imin Bughra, one o f the leaders o f the 1933 Islamic Republic o f Eastern
Turkestan, and two ./a<7/c/-educated Uyghurs who subsequently studied in China proper— Aysa
Yusup Alptekin and M asud Sabri (Benson 1990:70; Benson 1991). W hile vehem ently anti-
Soviet, these three Uyghur politicians were not puppets o f the KMT. They were strong
nationalists with pan-Turkish sentiments who believed that the best resolution to X injiang’s
problems would be the creation o f a truly autonomous region within the Chinese state (Benson
1991:88-89).
W orking in the coalition government side by side with Akhmatjan Qasimi and other
representatives o f the ETR, there is little doubt that these anti-Soviet Uyghur nationalists
discussed issues o f common concern with the pro-Soviet representatives o f the ETR (see
figure 7.6). This significant representation o f Uyghur and pan-Turkish nationalists in the
coalition government was also celebrated by the local population o f Xinjiang. A ccording to
Linda Benson, it created a “new sense o f Turkic power” in the region that increasingly
m anifested itself in large protests against both Chinese rule and Soviet influence in Xinjiang
(Benson 1990:88). W hile there is no significant evidence that the ET R ’s leadership ever
openly defied their Soviet patrons as a result o f this popular support for both camps o f Uyghur
nationalists, this “sense o f Turkic pow er” among the population may have at least made the
pro-independence elements within the ETR think about the possibilities o f eventually gaining
independence from both Chinese rule and the control o f the U.S.S.R.
W hen both Aysa Yusup Alptekin and Akhmatjan Qasimi participated in the National
Assembly o f the KM T in late 1946, for example, it is significant that the two supposed
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ideological foes each spoke forcefully on behalf o f Xinjiang’s autonomy within the Chinese
state (Benson 1990:98). Furthermore, in 1948 the radical Sharqi Turkistan Inqilabi Yashlar
Tashkilati (“Eastern Turkestan Revolutionary Youth Organization”) was dismantled in the
Kuldja area, and a new organization named the Tinchliq va Khalqchilliq Itifaq (“Union o f
Peace and Democracy”) was formed in its place (Benson 1990:151). W hile both Benson and
Barmin suggest that this new Itifaq was necessarily formed with the approval o f the E T R ’s
Soviet advisors (cf. Benson 1990; Barmin 1999:168-169), it also brought the ETR leadership
closer to the Uyghur nationalists in the KM T who took part in this Union as well.
The journal o f the Union, which was also entitled Itifaq, provided a very different
version o f Uyghur nationalism than had emerged from the Kuldja area previously. From its
inception, the journal promoted autonomy for Xinjiang within the Chinese state, but it also
insisted that such autonomy should be wide-reaching and include extensive local decision
making (cf. Itifaq 1948(1):7-14; 1948(1): 14-19; Flajiov 1948). Furthermore, in the spheres o f
culture and history, a variety o f viewpoints were represented in the journal, not all o f which
reflected support for the U.S.S.R. In 1948, for example, the journal published articles about
the U yghurs’ history o f struggles with Chinese rule [.Itifaq 1948(2):98-101], a regular section
on the proper observance and interpretation o f Islam [.Itifaq 1948(l):75-90; 1948(2): 102-111;
1948(3):95-106], and essays on the successes o f the Soviet communist, Chinese nationalist,
and ETR anti-colonial revolutions [cf. Askhanov 1948; Uyghur Sayrani 1948; Itifaq
1948(2): 15-23; Isaq Bek 1948], W hether approved by the Soviet advisors to the ETR or not,
therefore, the Itifaq and its journal were providing a new field of discourse in which to discuss
the common goals and different viewpoints o f various groups o f Uyghur nationalists and pan-
Turkists in Xinjiang.
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Illustrations 10: The Eastern Turkestan Republic and its Aftermath
Illustration 10.1: ETR government
representatives in 1945. President
Elikhantora is seated in middle, and
, Abduraup Makhsum, who now
lives in Almaty, is first from the left
standing (Shinjang 1994:27).
Illustration 10.2: Gheni
Batyr, one of the leaders of
the 1944 Nilka rebellion who
later emigrated to Kazakhstan
in 1962 (from 1995 calendar
printed in Urumchi).
Illustration 10.3:
Akhmatjan Qasimi, pro-
Soviet leader of ETR
after 1946 who allegedly
died in a plane crash in
1949 (Shinjang 1994:11)
Illustration 10.4: Members of Coalition
government, 1948: Masud Sabri (far left), Zhang
Zhizhong (in uniform), and Akhmatjan Qasimi
(far right) (Shinjang 1994:61).
Illustration 10.5: An illustration of a
Uyghur student studying a map of his
homeland from an ETR journal [Kurash
1946(8-9)].
As Uyghur nationalists o f various ideological leanings were becoming more
em powered throughout Xinjiang, however, the Soviet Union was already planning its next
move in the region. It had decided that the days o f KM T rule in China were numbered, and its
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206
entire focus in China should serve to assist the Chinese Com munists’ rise to power. The KM T
was obviously also well aware o f this situation, and in 1948 the coalition governm ent in
Xinjiang, now led by M asud Sabri, began a purge o f Soviet sympathizers in Urum chi (Barmin
1999:160-161). In the meantime, the Soviet Union was laying the path for the Chinese
Communists to enter Xinjiang and take it over as part o f a new Communist Chinese state.
The m any and com plex machinations that brought the Chinese com m unists to power
in Xinjiang are both unclear and beyond the scope o f this study. W hat is important to this
study, however, is that the Soviet Union played a critical role in these machinations and did
not appear to have ever considered helping the Uyghur national communists in the K uldja area
to establish an independent socialist state like that in M ongolia. In fact, there is evidence that
a Soviet representative had advised M ao Zedong in January o f 1949 that it w ould be unwise to
offer the national minorities in Xinjiang any form o f territorial independence and that the
U.S.S.R. w ould support the Chinese communists in this policy (Barmin 1999:178).3 3
Once the Chinese Communists had taken Beijing in January o f 1949, the Xinjiang
coalition government knew it would be necessary to enter into an alliance with the new
occupants o f Tiananmen Square. The leader o f the Xinjiang coalition government in 1949, a
Tatar by the name o f Burhan Shahidi, apparently already had made contact with Chinese
com m unist representatives and had indicated a willingness to cooperate with them (Shahidi
1986:702-729). A t the same time, the Soviet Union was assisting the Chinese com m unists to
establish a foothold in the ETR leadership. After meeting with Soviet officials in M oscow, a
Chinese com m unist delegation traveled to Xinjiang to conduct talks with the ETR leadership
in Kuldja on August 15, 1949 (Barmin 1999:180). At this meeting, it was decided that the
ETR would help facilitate the Chinese com m unists’ entry into Xinjiang, and a group o f five
3 3 This would seem to contradict the assertions o f Andrew Forbes that the Soviet Union had discussed the idea o f
establishing an independent state in Xinjiang with KMT officials in May o f 1949 (Forbes 1986:220).
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representatives from the Kuldja government were invited to attend the First Plenary Session of
the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference in Beijing (Barmin 1999:180). At
some point in the next few days, Akhmatjan Qasimi, Abdukerim Abbasov (one o f the original
organizers o f the K uldja revolt), the Kyrgyz and Kazakh military leaders Iskhaq Bek and
Deilihan, and a Han Chinese representative named Lo Zu apparently left Kuldja for Alm a-A ta
to board a plane that would take them to the Conference in Beijing (Benson 1990:175; Forbes
1986:222).
It is unclear what happened to these representatives o f the ETR after they left Kuldja,
but it is known that they never returned. Burhan Shahidi was privately informed by the Soviet
Consul in Urumchi on August 28, 1949 that the plane carrying the delegation to Beijing had
crashed a day earlier around the Siberian city o f Irkutsk (Benson 1990:175-176; Barmin
1999:180). Furthermore, the Soviet Consul reportedly suggested that it would be unwise to
publicly announce the tragedy given the already unstable situation in China, and an official
announcem ent was apparently not made for several months (Benson 1990:176). In place o f
the ETR representatives who were initially supposed to fly to Beijing, a new delegation was
formed with a lesser known Uyghur from the ETR, Saypidin Aziz, as its leader (Barmin
1999:180). Saypidin Aziz would soon become the most vocal support o f the Chinese
Com munist Party in Xinjiang.
For obvious reasons, many Uyghurs to this day do not believe the official version o f
the death o f the ET R ’s leaders. M ost Uyghurs believe that the ETR leaders must have
harbored intentions o f advocating for an independent Xinjiang in the wake o f the Chinese
com m unists’ victory, and they were, for this reason, killed or jailed either by the Chinese or by
the Soviets.3 4 Regardless o f what actually happened, the deaths o f the ETR leaders served the
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aims o f the Chinese Communist Party in Xinjiang. W hile evidently believing in Communism,
the leadership o f the ETR was also nationalist and perhaps even nominally pan-Turkish in
orientation. With the most prom inent of these leaders now gone, the CCP would encounter
little resistance as it moved in to control Xinjiang.
Illustrations 11: The Fall of the Eastern Turkestan Republic
Illustration 11.1: Saypidin Aziz greets a Soviet government delegation in Kuldja,
circa 1949 (Kazakhstan State Archives, Arkhiv Kino-Foto Dokumentov).
Illustration 11.2: Saypidin Aziz fits Mao
Zedong with a traditional Uyghur coat and
hat in 1949 (Shinjang 1994:99).
Illustration 11.3: Former Uyghur
supporters of the ETR as CCP cadres in early
1950s. (Abbas Aliev personal photos).
3 4 A popular version o f what happened that is heard throughout the Ili valley today is that the delegation never
boarded the plane for Beijing and was instead brought to M oscow where its members were imprisoned and
eventually died. Numerous Uyghurs in Kazakhstan claim to have substantiated this version with a Uyghur KGB
agent who, while on his deathbed, allegedly told people the true story o f what occurred. To this day, however, the
incident remains a mystery.
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209
Around the same time, the anti-Soviet Uyghur nationalists also fled the country via
India, and Aysa Yusup Alptekin would later become the leader of the Uyghur nationalist
movem ent in Turkey.3 5 By the time that Burhan had completely severed ties with the KM T
and had officially pledged allegiance to the Chinese communists on Septem ber 25, 1949,
therefore, the most active and brightest Uyghur nationalists o f Xinjiang were either deceased
or outside the country (Benson 1990:176). The results o f these events were very sim ilar to
what had happened in Semirech’e following the Stalinist purges. The field o f socio-political
discourse in the Kuldja area narrowed significantly, and the work o f implementing a
centralized version o f socialist statism was put into motion.
The change in political discourse was already visible in the last issue o f the journal
Itifaq, published in N ovem ber 1949. In addition to a series o f tributes to Akhm atjan Qasimi
that portrayed him as a m artyr for the Chinese communist revolution [ .Itifaq 1949(11-12): 1-
23], this issue o f the journal contained numerous articles lauding the great achievem ents o f
socialism ranging from an essay on the life o f Lenin [.Itifaq 1949(11-12):25] to a review o f the
Soviet literature about the Bolshevik Party [Itifaq 1949(11-12): 113-122], Even m ore telling
o f the changing political climate, however, the journal re-published an article from the Soviet
published Qazaq Eli that attackedpan-Islamism andpan-Turkism as ideologies exploited by
im perialist states (M uradov 1949) and a speech by Saypidin Aziz com m em orating the fifth
anniversary o f the ETR which ended with wishes for the long life o f the People’ s Republic o f
China and its great leader M ao Zedong [Itifaq 1949(11-12): 15-22]. Conspicuously m issing
35 A s these KMT aligned Uyghur nationalists were fleeing the country, they were attacked in the Soviet published
journal printed for Xinjiang, Q azaq Eli. In a two-part article that had significant resonance among Uyghur
intellectuals who remained in Xinjiang, the Soviet Uyghur Vatan Ughli (a.k.a. Mansur Apendi, a.k.a Mashur
Ruziev) attacked pan-Islam ism and pan-Turkism as tools used by imperialist powers to destroy socialism (Vatan
Ughli 1949). In this article, the author both targets the pan-Turkists and pan-Islam ists from the early days o f Soviet
rule and the KMT Uyghurs as lackeys o f imperialists powers intent on preventing the socialist liberation o f Central
Asia.
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from the issue is the section on Islamic practice and any mention o f the ET R ’s goals of
independence and/or autonomy.
In this context, the 1944 rebellion that brought the ETR to power was also reinterpreted
in the Party’s media and in speeches by Saypidin Aziz and Burhan Shahidi as being a critical
part o f the Chinese communist revolution. In 1952, for example, Burhan characterized the
1944 revolution in K uldja along the following lines:
.. .the national liberation movements o f 1932-33 and that of 1948-49 [Osman
B atyr’s revolt against emerging communist power] were both reactionary in that
they were lackeys o f the various imperialists, but the Yilli (sic) movem ent o f
1944 was a genuine revolutionary struggle, and formed part o f the general
m ovem ent o f revolution by the whole Chinese people and socialism (M cM illen
1979:42).
The 1944 rebellion and the ETR, therefore, had not only lost its leaders in 1949; they had also
lost their original ideological purpose o f freeing Xinjiang from Chinese rule. Nonetheless,
during the first years o f the C CP’s rule in Xinjiang, m any Uyghurs who had taken part in the
ETR were willing to engage this reinterpretation o f their original revolt and serve the Chinese
Communist Party in the hopes that it would deliver the liberation it promised to the people o f
Xinjiang.
5.3 Socialist Entrenchment in Semirech ’ e, 1937-1949
During the time that the Kuldja area o f Xinjiang had become home to a sem i
independent Soviet-backed state, very few Uyghurs in the U.S.S.R. were aware o f w hat was
happening across the border. Although a significant number o f Soviet Uyghurs had taken part
in the Soviet U nion’s backing o f the ETR either as clandestine agents stationed in X injiang or
as producers o f mediated culture, their work was secret, and almost no mention o f the ETR
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appeared in the Soviet press, let alone in Kazakhstan’s Uyghur newspapers.3 6 Instead, the
Soviet Uyghurs were barraged with information about the Great Patriotic War (i.e. W orld
W ar II) and the requirements o f the simultaneous endeavors o f supporting the war effort and
establishing collective agriculture (cf. Stalinchi, 17 Jan 1945, 4 July 1945; Kol-Am, 5 Feb.
1946, 24 M ay 1947, 8 June 1947, 21 Nov. 1948).
If the Soviet Uyghurs were kept in the dark concerning their relatives’ revolutionary
efforts in Xinjiang during the 1940s, their own revolutionary spirit was sim ultaneously broken
by increasingly repressive socio-economic policies in the U.S.S.R. The collectivization
campaign had effectively destroyed the zhuts in which the Uyghurs o f Sem irech’e had once
lived, replacing them with Party-controlled docile agricultural work camps.3 7 As part o f this
program, the joint practices o f community life {zhutdarchilik) were replaced with an
artificially imposed structure o f collective work based on brigades (brigada) and work units
(zveno) rather than on mahallas and villages. This situation was exacerbated by the removal
o f the mosques that once served as the nerve center o f Uyghur communities and the cessation
o f mdshrdps that had once been the social fabric and socialization vehicle o f the community.
In place o f these institutions, the Soviet government installed Reading Rooms and Clubs on
the new collective farms where the Party line o f the CPSU was promoted (see AOGAK f. 448,
op. 2, d. 341, sv. 40).
36 One wom en who studied in Jarkent at this time, however, did tell me that those living near the border were aware
o f what was happening in Kuldja since Soviet military vehicles were continually m oving back and forth over the
border.
37 A s had been the case during the Russian colonial regime’s attempts to reconfigure Uyghur rural social space by
decree in Semirech’e, however, the new groupings o f workers on Uyghur collective farms were not successful in
m obilizing or organizing the Uyghur rural population in its work. Am ong the archival documents from the late
1930s and early 1940s, one finds scores o f reports by Russian Soviet cadres that express frustration with the “poor
organizational work” and lackluster farming on the Uyghur collective farms (see AOGAK f. 448, op. 2, d. 614, sv.
71). While the Soviet government ensured obedience through the construction o f collective farms, therefore, they
simultaneously lost a considerable amount o f the productive energy that the Uyghurs’ zhut social structure had once
facilitated.
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Sim ilar processes were also underway in the Uyghur urban neighborhoods o f Alma-
Ata, which were increasingly dismantled to make way for new apartment buildings, the
occupancy o f which would be based on place o f employment. In this context, there were no
possibilities o f practicing zhutdarchilik among neighbors since even the actual physical space
o f the mdhdlld had been destroyed. The only choice for the urban Uyghur wishing to live in a
zhut, therefore, became moving to a collective farm.
At the same time, the m em ory o f Stalin’s purges was fresh in the minds o f Soviet
Uyghurs, and they, therefore, were careful to avoid any activity or statements that could be
construed as nationalist and/or anti-Soviet. In addition to complacency in the collectivization
o f agriculture and the Sovietization o f Alma-Ata, this self-censorship included a concerted
effort by the Uyghurs in Sem irech’e to disavow their connections to their homeland and
relatives in China.3 8 One means o f showing one’s undying loyalty to the U.S.S.R. was to
name one’s children using Soviet rather than Uyghur names, and there exist today m any
Uyghurs in Kazakhstan who, having been born in the 1940s, were given such names as G egel’
(“Hegel”), Mels (“Marx, Engles, Lenin, Stalin”), Oktyabr ’ (“October”), Kommunar
(“Com misar”), etc.
W ith their connections to Xinjiang severed, Soviet Uyghurs were also fed a new
Soviet socialist national culture that was focused exclusively on their participation in Soviet
society. Alm ost immediately after the 1937 arrests o f the majority o f Uyghur intellectuals
from the revolutionary period, for example, the Communist Party began promoting the
38 The erasure o f the Soviet Uyghurs’ memory o f their ties to Xinjiang was also assisted by the controlled nature o f
the Soviet-Xinjiang trade. W hile this trade remained extensive in the later 1930s, it was entirely handled by the
Soviet trade agency for Xinjiang, Sovsintorg, and all transactions took place at specified Soviet state-run trading
posts on or near the border (see Fesenko 1936:387-397). According to a Uyghur from Kuldja who had assisted his
father in trading with the Soviets in the 1930s, these state-run Soviet trading posts would buy goods directly from
Xinjiang traders, and there was no longer any interaction between Uyghur merchants on opposing sides o f the
border. Furthermore, illicit private trading was strictly forbidden on Uyghur kolkhozes in Semirech’e where it was
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213
developm ent o f a new Uyghur literature that was devoted to the promotion o f Soviet power
and the construction o f socialism.3 9 At the forefront o f this new literature were a handful o f
younger Uyghur poets and Party loyalists who had survived the purges including Ismail
Sattarov, Hezim Iskandarov, and Qadir Hasanov (Karataev 1939; Sattarov 1939). In contrast
to the poems o f earlier Soviet Uyghur communists which emphasized the anti-colonial
struggle on both sides o f the border in the Ili valley, the works o f these new poets were m ostly
love poem s that expressed their devotion to Stalin, the U.S.S.R., agricultural m echanization,
and the Com munist Party (cf. Abdurakhmanov, et. al. 1987:53-148; Karataev 1939; Sattarov
1939). O f particular importance to the aim o f separating Soviet Uyghur society from its
relatives in China, the new poems o f the late 1930s and 1940s had also conspicuously replaced
their references to the homeland o f Uyghurstan in China with the greater homeland o f the
Soviet Union (cf. Aziyev 1939; Saliyev 1941; Alimqul-Ughli 1947).
W ith a new national culture promoting Party loyalty, the Sovietization o f Uyghur
rural zhuts destroying social cohesiveness, and the cessation o f private participation in the
cross-border trade effectively isolating the Soviet Uyghurs from their homeland, the arrival o f
W orld W ar II was only one more debilitating blow for this struggling community. W hen war
was declared, m ost able bodied men were called to military service, and the farms were left to
the women, children, and elders. In this context, all remaining residents on the collective
farms who were at least able to carry out some form o f work were forced to keep the fields
producing (AOGAK f. 448, op. 2, d. 775, sv. 95, p. 47). Uyghurs who were children on the
collective farms o f Sem irech’e at this time recall great hardship. Food was rationed, homes
treated as an economic crime, and, thus, no Soviet Uyghur traders even existed (cf. Ghapparov 1939; Avutova
1941; Chynishbayev 1947).
39 A long serialized article by Ismail Sattarov that was published in 1939 in the Uyghur newspaper Stalinchi
provides the guidelines for this literature, at least as it pertained to poetry. In the article, Sattarov stresses the
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214
were left without heat, and children often did not have shoes, being forced to walk barefoot
even in the dead o f winter. M ost schools only taught limited classes, and some farms were not
even able to support their own school. W hile the Uyghurs in the Kuldja area were being fed
propaganda about the great achievements o f Soviet socialism, therefore, their relatives across
the border in Sem irech’e were experiencing the harsh realities of a struggling and controlling
Soviet system strained by an incredibly demanding war effort.
Given these great difficulties that the Uyghurs and all Soviet citizens experienced
during W orld W ar II, the declaration o f the allied forces’ victory brought great relief to the
Uyghur com m unity in Sem irech’e. Furthermore, with the U.S.S.R. heavily involved in
supporting the ETR during the later 1940s, the Soviet Communist Party expressed a new
interest in the developm ent o f the Semirech’e Uyghur community during the early post-W ar
years. In 1945, a conference o f teachers working in Uyghur areas o f Kazakhstan was held in
order to discuss the problems o f schools in the m ostly Uyghur rural areas o f the Republic, and
this meeting resulted in significant improvements for education on Uyghur collective farms
(Rokhm utulla 1945). Likewise, in 1946, a new sector o f the Kazakh Academ y o f Sciences
was created for the study o f Uyghur history, language, and literature (Hasanov 1947). Finally,
as already noted earlier, in 1947 the Soviet Communist Party even discussed a project for the
establishm ent o f a Uyghur Autonomous Oblast’ within Kazakhstan (Khliupin 1999:228).
W hile these actions demonstrated a new interest in the promotion o f Uyghur national culture,
the Party’s vision for this national culture remained that o f a Soviet m inority nationality and
did not entail promoting cross-border links. In fact, in 1947 the Uyghur language became one
o f the last official languages in Central Asia to begin the process o f changing its alphabet to
the Russian-based Cyrillic, thus linking the language and its readers inextricably to the Soviet
importance o f p o litica l correctness, noting that poems with p o litica l mistakes would not be published (Sattarov
1939).
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Union and isolating them from the Uyghur language o f Xinjiang (Lukyanets and
Nurm aqam betov 1947).
By the time that the Chinese Communists took over power in Xinjiang, therefore, the
Uyghurs o f Sem irech’e had undergone many transformations that had greatly changed their
daily practices, worldview, and capacity to resist external rule. In short, within a relatively
brief time period, a Soviet Uyghur nation had been constructed in which the aspects o f
zhutdarchilik and religious observance that still characterized the Uyghurs o f Xinjiang and the
anti-colonial revolutionary spirit that had characterized the Uyghur national communists o f the
1920s were both absent. W hile Stalin’s government had accomplished this transform ation o f
the Uyghur Soviet nationality through brute force and terror, after the death o f Stalin in 1953
the principles o f this new Soviet Uyghur nation were reinforced under the ever-present
guidance o f the Party. W hile Soviet Uyghur institutions, such as schools, newspapers, and
theatres were rehabilitated under N ikita Khrushchev, these institutions lacked the vitality that
they had possessed during the 1920s. Furthermore, as this new Soviet socialist Uyghur
national culture emerged in the 1950s, it would also serve as an example for the nascent
Chinese socialist Uyghur national culture developing in Xinjiang in the spirit o f Sino-Soviet
friendship.
5.4 Socialist Entrenchment in the Kuldja Area and the Re-unification o f the Uyghur
Nation Under the Banner o f Sino-Soviet Friendship. 1949-1963
This union between two great states will not only help the development o f the
Soviet Union and China, but will have a great influence on the future o f
humanity and is undoubtedly the beginning o f the victory ofjustice and peace.
-A. Sterbalova (article about Sino-Soviet friendship reprinted in the Uyghur
new spaper Stalinchi. 1953)
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Initially, the Chinese Communist Party, like the Bolsheviks before it, instituted a
liberal approach to the establishment o f a socialist society in Xinjiang that appealed to the
local population.4 0 As in Soviet Central Asia, for example, the issue o f regional and national
autonom y was a central part o f early communist policy in Xinjiang. W orking closely with the
Soviet Union in the construction o f their new state, the Chinese communists used a variation
o f the Soviet model o f autonomy in determining the People’s Republic’s territorial and
administrative divisions. This system o f autonomy for Xinjiang was instituted gradually from
1952 to 1955, and it resulted in the creation o f the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonom ous Region as
well as sm aller Autonomous Zhou representing high concentrations o f the Kazakh, Kyrgyz,
Hui (Dungan), and M ongol nationalities respectively (M cMillen 1979:43-47). Am ong other
things, the establishment o f these national territorial units also served to solidify the idea o f
the unified Uyghur nation in Xinjiang and to detract from the concepts o f pan-Turkish and
pan-Islamic unity that had served resistance movements against Chinese rule in the past.
Unlike in the Soviet Union where National Republics retained the right to cede from the
Union, however, it was established that Xinjiang would remain an inseparable part o f China
(M cM illen 1979:44).
Another policy aimed at gaining local support for the new People’ s Republic was the
recruitm ent o f cadres from the local nationalities. During the early 1950s, the CCP recruited
extensively among Uyghurs and other local M uslims, drawing substantially from the ranks o f
the ETR government, and m any began to work with enthusiasm in hopes that the prom ises o f
the communists for real autonomy were indeed sincere (see figure 9.2). As one Uyghur in
Almaty who had served as a CCP cadre in the early 1950s explained the appeal o f joining the
40 The liberal approach to constructing a socialist society in Xinjiang was especially pronounced in the Kuldja area.
Until m id-1950, the ETR remained a semi-autonomous region within the province, and afterwards it continued to
enjoy more freedoms than other regions due to its special relationship with the U.S.S.R. (M cM illen 1979:42).
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217
CCP with an evident feeling o f betrayal, “I believed in Communism at that time and genuinely
thought that it would liberate us.”
Am ong the primary duties o f these new native Party cadres was the responsibility for
propagating socialism and collective agriculture among the local M uslim population. Given
the large rural population o f China, collectivization was a high priority for the CCP in its
initial efforts to construct socialism throughout the country, and this was no different in
Xinjiang. The first stage o f the collectivization campaign began as early as late 1950 when the
rural population o f various regions o f Xinjiang was mobilized in a “universal class struggle
against criminal landlord elem ents” (M cMillen 1979:131). This campaign, which was largely
facilitated by native cadres, involved both the re-distribution o f large tracts o f land owned by
wealthy landowners and the public condemnation o f landlords as class enemies. A woman
who lived in a village near K uldja at the time recounted to me one such public condemnation
that she and her fellow sixth grade students were let out o f class to witness. It involved a
wealthy Kazakh who owned numerous livestock and had several wives. During the public
meeting, both his workers and his wives were brought forth to condemn his actions before the
entire village.4 1 In the end, he was paraded through the village with a placard identifying him
as a class enemy.
This campaign was followed by a series o f subsequent programs to gradually form
collective agricultural work units. These subsequent campaigns, however, were more
moderate politically than the anti-landlord campaign, and they even left m odest land holdings
to mosques (M cM illen 1979:132). M y inform ants’ accounts o f life in K uldja throughout the
early 1950s indicate that these early programs aimed at establishing collective agriculture also
4 1 Interestingly, the woman who told me this story was most struck by the public condemnation o f the landlord by
one o f his wives. As she told me, a wife may say anything she likes to her husband in private, but only an evil
woman would condemn her husband in public.
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did not yet effect practices o f zhutdarchilik, and Uyghurs continued to live in their local zhuts,
observe life cycle rituals, and even participate in mashraps as had been done before.
Furthermore, given that most o f the early collectivization campaigns only served to
redistribute land from the wealthy landlords to the rural farmers, most rural Uyghurs in the
region enthusiastically supported the programs.
By 1953, therefore, this moderate approach o f the CCP in the construction o f
socialism in Xinjiang had been at least partially successful in gaining support am ongst the
local population o f Xinjiang. The Chinese communists had empowered native cadres,
deferring to them on m any issues, and initial campaigns to collectivize agriculture had neither
tram pled on religious practices nor attacked cultural traditions (M cM illen 1979:114).
Furthermore, the continued publication o f the journals that the Soviet Union had established in
1944 for the people o f Xinjiang reinforced through concrete examples the belief that the future
o f socialism would be bright. The very favorable picture o f the quality o f life created by the
modernization o f the Soviet Union that was found in these journals offered a snapshot o f a
future where the state helped to support the development o f local nationalities and w here a
mixture o f modern technology and democracy had given these local nationalities
unprecedented control over their destiny (cf. Tajibaev 1951; Rijapbaev 1951; M amatov 1954).
In the mid-1950s, this Soviet example o f socialist development was also prom oted for
Xinjiang through significant Soviet involvement in the region. In the spirit o f Sino-Soviet
friendship, num erous cross-border cultural and educational exchanges took place between
Uyghurs. Uyghurs from Xinjiang continued to study in the U.S.S.R., and delegations o f
Uyghurs from both sides o f the border were able to visit the other side for research,
performances, and conferences (see Jumaghazi Ughli 1951) (see illustrations 8). These
exchanges increased after the death o f Stalin, as the Soviet Union began to gradually open up
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219
its border regions [see S-A-S (1955)11(49):63-64; U-A, 1 M arch 1997; Slide-Karklins
1975:353], and, like during the height o f Sheng’s rule, Xinjiang was soon once again hosting a
significant num ber o f Soviet advisors, workers, and teachers (Slide-Karklins 1975:354). In
addition to creating an atmosphere o f goodwill, these exchanges o f scholars, students, writers,
artists, advisors, and teachers had a significant effect on the development o f a Uyghur
socialist/national culture in Xinjiang, which would take its lead from the post-1937 Soviet
socialist Uyghur culture.
Throughout the early 1950s, the Chinese Communist Party was busy developing the
institutions to support the development o f this new Uyghur socialist nation’s culture. The
Xinjiang University, Xinjiang branch o f China’s Academ y o f Sciences, numerous publishing
houses, and a W riters’ Union were all established in Urumchi at this time, and a M inistry o f
Culture was developed to oversee cultural production in the region.4 2 As part o f this state-
sponsored intellectual development, numerous journals were also published in the Uyghur
language such as Tarim (“Tarim ”), Khalq (“The People”), Shinjang Khotun-Kizliri (“Xinjiang
W om en”), Shinjang Adabiyat-San ’ iti (“Xinjiang Literature and Arts”), Shinjang Azatliq
Armiyasi (“Xinjiang Liberation Army”), etc. If these institutions and journals helped to create
an infrastructure for the production o f a mediated culture that would facilitate the imagining o f
the Uyghur socialist nation in China, the narrative for this new national consciousness was
m ostly imported from the Soviet Union. W hile Soviet published journals for Xinjiang had
already been promoting a well-developed historical narrative for the Uyghur nation since
1944, now they provided more detailed instruction on the correct means to standardize the
Uyghur literary language (Ruziev and Hasanov 1951; Shamiev 1951; Jalilova 1953;
42 Xinjiang University was established in 1955 on the foundations o f an Institute that had already been established
in the city during Sheng Shicai’s rule. The first Minister o f Culture in Xinjiang was a young Uyghur writer from
the ETR who had been born in the U.S.S.R. by the name o f Zia Samedi.
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220
Sadivaqqasov 1953) and the proper expressions and interpretations o f national consciousness
in the context o f international socialism (Samiran 1951; Vatan-Ughli 1953a, 1953b).
This ideological guidance provided by the Soviet-produced journals was also
supplem ented by the CCP’s own relatively strict guidelines for the production o f the new
Uyghur national culture. Already in 1952, the journal Shinjang Adabiyat-San ’ iti outlined the
proper characteristics o f socialist literature on the basis o f the teachings o f M ao (Naziri 1952).
The them atic shift to this new Uyghur national literature from the literary work associated
with the ETR was similar to that seen in Soviet Uyghur literature following the Stalinist
purges. Instead o f evoking the struggle for independence and freedom, Uyghur literature
under the CCP was to hail the accomplishments o f the Chinese communists and support their
new policies. In 1951, Saypidin Aziz would explain this shift quite clearly in the context of
the C C P’s nationality policy.
.. .from now on, China’s nationality problems enter a new historical stage... the
m inority race problems are no longer concerned with the struggle for freedom
and equality from the pan-racialists, .. .but rather how to safeguard the
fatherland and how to shake o ff the yoke o f feudal exploitation (M cM illen
1979:114).
This hard line approach to the content o f Uyghur literature was to foreshadow more
conservative Party policies with regards to other aspects o f life during the second h alf o f the
1950s as the political climate in the region became decidedly colder.
The m ost significant changes in the general political climate o f Xinjiang began in
1956. The campaign to collectivize agriculture intensified, the Party began to attack religion
and its observation, and a plan was drafted, with Soviet help, to change the Uyghur alphabet to
the Cyrillic form used in Kazakhstan (M cM illen 1979:116). These more conservative
policies, in turn, resulted in incidents o f popular unrest, especially in X injiang’s south where
anti-religious campaigns were met with sharp resistance (M cMillen 1979:117). The Party’s
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221
reaction to these disturbances, however, was to clamp down even more, and in 1956-1957, the
consecutive execution of the Hundred Flowers and Anti-Rightist Campaigns began a period o f
repression that would set the tone for the future o f the C CP’s relations with the Uyghurs o f
Xinjiang.
As was the case elsewhere in China, the Hundred Flowers Campaign in Xinjiang
(referred to in Uyghur as Echilip Sayrash or “Open up and sing”) was m eant to elicit criticism
about com m unist rule in order to better formulate policy, but it resulted during the ensuing
Anti-Rightist Campaign in the political repression o f those who openly criticized the
government. For those Uyghur cadres who had believed in the new regime and its potential,
this obvious betrayal o f trust was devastating. One such cadre who was subsequently accused
as a rightist in 1957 characterized the events to me in the following manner:
In 1956, a new political movement appeared (in China) called “sing openly.”
... we openly sang, said everything. In the end, we were condemned as
opponents o f Maoism, as nationalists, and as enemies o f the state. We spent a
year being condemned. Each morning, they’d start again— what did you say?
Who are you against? The politics o f China are like that—through w hat they
call education, they eventually repress everybody (Roberts 1996:82).
In Xinjiang, the Anti-Rightist Campaign was prim arily directed against local nationalists, and
it targeted a wide range o f local cadres, including relatively high ranking Party members. In
1958, for example, the Uyghur M inister o f Culture Zia Samadi and the well known Uyghur
writer and Party cadre Ibrahim Turdi were subjected to intensive and w idely publicized
criticism labeling them as local nationalists and rightists and accusing them o f being against
Party unity and the friendship o f peoples [see Tarim 1958(5):9-22], According to Zia Samadi,
with whom I conducted an interview in 2000, he had been targeted as a local nationalist
because he had spoken against the Party’s nationality politics during the Hundred Flowers
Campaign, saying that the CCP was not fulfilling Lenin’s true vision o f national autonomy.
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222
Illustrations 12: Sino-Soviet Socialist Brotherhood, 1949-1962
• * '•'L r'J
:
" :- ; W ■/§
s e r
Illustration 12.1: Workers brigade in Xinjiang
greets Soviet delegation of artists, 1951
(Kazakhstan State Archives, Arkhiv Kino-Foto
Dokumentov).
Illustrations 12.2 & 12.3: Delegations from Xinjiang meeting with Soviet colleagues in Alma-
Ata, Kazakhstan, mid-1950s (Kazakhstan State Archives, Arkhiv Kino-Foto Dokumentov).
Illustration 12.4: Han Chinese and Uyghur
female students studying in Alma-Ata,
Kazakhstan, 1950s (Kazakhstan State Archives,
Arkhiv Kino-Foto Dokumentov)
Illustration 12.5: The Great Friendship, a
portrait of Stalin and Mao from a Soviet
history book on China, 1951 (Efimov
1951).
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223
The Anti-Rightist Campaign also introduced the Muslims o f Xinjiang to the kurash
(“struggle”), or self-criticism session, which would soon be a central part o f life during the
Cultural Revolution. Those who had been accused o f Rightism or local nationalism were held
in custody and subjected to public criticism sessions where their friends and colleagues were
called upon to condemn them, and they were subsequently sent to labor on People’ s
Communes for re-educational purposes. Zia Samadi, for example, was subjected to criticism
sessions for almost five months, during which time he was accused o f various conspiracies
and crimes against the Party by his own colleagues in the Party, including Saypidin Aziz. For
rehabilitation, Samadi was sent to Korla where he was forced to labor on one o f the new
People’s Commune collective farms. Almost all o f the Uyghur intellectuals and Party cadres
in Xinjiang suffered a similar fate at this time, and the purge again effectively served a similar
role for Xinjiang that Stalin’s purges had done in the U.S.S.R. exactly twenty years earlier. It
virtually eliminated the native intellectuals who had initially supported the regime, and it
ensured that the Party Line would not be questioned.
Furthermore, as had also been the case following Stalin’s purges o f 1937, the Anti-
Rightist Campaign in Xinjiang was followed by an immediate intensification in the
collectivization o f agriculture that resulted in the expansion o f People’ s Communes where
land, living space, and work were shared. As in Sem irech’e, in the Kuldja area these new
collective farms also strictly forbade religious practice and attacked the practices o f
zhutdarchilik as remnants o f the feudal past. Furthermore, the Great Leap Forward, which
began soon after in 1958, demanded that these agricultural collectives somehow also help
construct an industrial sector that could support the Chinese state and increase its proletarian
profile.
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224
As Chinese policies were becoming more radical, however, the Soviet Union was
experiencing a political thaw. At the 20th Party Conference in 1956, Khrushchev delivered his
famous speech in which he criticized the excesses o f Stalin’s rule. The Party’s policies
subsequently became more moderate, and there was an increased liberalism felt throughout the
Soviet Union. As part o f confronting the demons o f the Stalinist period, Abdulla Rozibaqiev
and other Uyghur national communists were soon rehabilitated along with other repressed
personalities from throughout the Soviet Union. These former enemies o f the people were
once again hailed as heroes o f the revolution, monuments o f them were built, and streets and
schools were named after them (see figure 9.4). Furthermore, given the special relationship
between the U.S.S.R. and China, the Uyghurs found themselves especially benefiting from
these new more liberal Soviet policies. In 1957, the various small Uyghur raion level
newspapers in Sem irech’e were supplemented with a Republic-wide Uyghur new spaper for
Kazakhstan called Kommunism Tughi (“The Banner o f Communism”), filling a void in Soviet
Uyghur mediated culture that had existed ever since Kdmbagalldr Avazi had been closed in
1932. A t the same time, new Uyghur schools were opened throughout Sem irech’e, and efforts
were made to bolster Uyghur literature.
The divergent courses o f the Soviet Union and China, however, were creating discord
in the friendship between the two great socialist states. W hile official m edia in both states did
not publicize it, there was an increasing competition between Khrushchev and M ao for the
leadership o f the world-wide socialist movement. Am ong other things, M ao did not agree
with K hrushchev’s condemnation o f Stalin, especially at a time when the Chinese Com munist
Party was itself becoming more authoritarian. W hile it was not reported in newspapers, the
tension between the two states was evident in other ways. Although the CCP had adopted a
plan to institute a Cyrillic alphabet for Uyghur in Xinjiang in 1956, this plan never came to
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225
fruition and in 1958 it was decided to switch to a Latin-based alphabet instead. Furthermore,
in 1957 China stopped the importation o f books and journals from the U.S.S.R. entirely
(Slide-Karklins 1975:354-355). The CCP had obviously decided that it desired significantly
less Soviet participation in its own construction o f socialism, especially in Xinjiang.
If the CCP was evidently attempting to cut o ff Soviet influence in Xinjiang, the Party
did allow m any Uyghurs and other local peoples o f Xinjiang to emigrate to the U.S.S.R. at this
time. Since 1953, former Soviet citizens in Xinjiang had been allowed to return to the
U.S.S.R. as part o f a campaign aimed at re-populating the country after W orld W ar II. W hile
significant numbers o f Uyghurs, particularly in the Kuldja area, had left for Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan in the mid-1950s, the numbers o f immigrants apparently began
increasing in 1957 and 1958. According to one o f my informants who later em igrated to the
Soviet Union in 1961, the Anti-Rightist Campaign and the intensification o f the
collectivization o f agriculture once again increased anti-Chinese sentiments am ong m any
Uyghurs, who began searching for any justification they could find to be accepted for Soviet
citizenship. According to other Uyghurs who had emigrated from the Kuldja region to
Kazakhstan at this time, there was even a market for counterfeit passports among those
Uyghurs who had no actual claim to Soviet citizenship.
The scope o f this study does not allow us to speculate on all o f the m achinations that
took place between the U.S.S.R. and the People’s Republic o f China in the last years o f the
1950s and the first years o f the 1960s. During this time, however, it is quite obvious that the
relationship between the two socialist states was rapidly deteriorating. Furthermore, as the
relationship between China and the Soviet Union worsened, the number o f Uyghurs and others
from Xinjiang claiming Soviet citizenship only increased. For most Uyghurs in the K uldja
area who could lay claim to Soviet citizenship, the choice was a clear one. In addition to
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226
being forced onto collective farms, whether one was an urban intellectual or a rural farmer,
many Uyghurs in the Kuldja area and in the rest o f Xinjiang were also suffering from
malnutrition. As had been the case in the U.S.S.R. during the 1930s and 1940s, the new
collective farms o f Xinjiang failed miserably in producing the food necessary to feed the
population o f the region. In contrast to this situation, the Soviet Union, at least according to
its propaganda, appeared to be a land o f plenty where the Uyghurs, despite being a m inority
with little to no political representation, lived well and thrived. Adding to these already
obvious motivations for becoming Soviet citizens, Uyghurs who had worked directly with the
Soviet government in one capacity or another under either Sheng or the communists, o f whom
there were many in Kuldja, were increasingly suspected by the CCP o f lacking loyalty to
mother China.
After the political disagreements between the U.S.S.R. and China became public w ith
K hrushchev’s criticism o f the People’s Communes in 1959, the number o f Uyghurs
em igrating further increased. In 1960, the Soviet Union suddenly withdrew all o f its citizens
who were providing technical assistance in Xinjiang and the rest o f China (Dreyer 1979:208).
As part o f this withdrawal, the U.S.S.R. also began inviting numerous Uyghurs who had
participated in the ETR to emigrate to Soviet territory, whether or not they could lay claim to
formerly being Soviet citizens. Among those who would emigrate in 1961 and 1962 were Zia
Samadi (former Xinjiang M inister o f Culture), Gheni Batyr (one o f the organizers o f the N ilka
revolt in 1944), Zunun Teyipov (a General in the ETR army), and many other lower-level
officials in the ETR government and military.
The race to leave the Kuldja area by 1961-62 was reminiscent o f the last months of
the Taranchis’ m igration from the Kuldja area to Sem irech’e in the 1880s. Thousands o f
Uyghurs in and around Kuldja expressed interest in becoming Soviet citizens, and one source
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227
notes that over 20,000 families o f Uyghurs emigrated from the Bay County near Kuldja alone
between 1961 and 1962 (Abdurehim Ughli 1994). Given China’s large population and its
desire to rid itself o f potential dissidents, the government initially tolerated these mass
em igrations as was the case in the south o f China in areas bordering on Hong Kong (Dryer
1979:209).
The emigration o f Uyghurs from China to the Soviet Union, however, was about to
come to a dramatic climax. In the spring o f 1962, the U.S.S.R. had virtually opened its border
with Xinjiang to those locals who wanted to leave. As a result, the local governm ent even
began providing buses to take people from Kuldja to the Soviet border at Khorgus, and several
vehicles filled with new migrants traveled the road each day (Sadirov 1994). Everyday,
people in Kuldja would wait in line at the bus station to buy tickets for the buses to Khorgus,
but on M ay 29 it was announced that the buses would not leave. It is not clear whether the
Chinese planned to close the border indefinitely, but those who had bought tickets to leave
that day feared that this was the case. Given that m ost o f them had sold their possessions in
preparation for the move, they were outraged. A protest ensued at the bus station that spread
to the local Party Committee headquarters (Abdurehim-Ughli 1994). When the protesters
stormed the building o f the Party Committee, they were met with gunshots, and chaos
followed ending in scores o f Uyghurs killed (cf. Abdurehim-Ughli 1994; Sadirov 1994;
Dreyer 1979:208-209). One eyewitness, who was thirteen years old at the time, told me that
she w atched as scores o f people were shot with machine guns and buried in outhouse pits. In
the wake o f this disturbance, some 67,000 Uyghurs apparently fled towards the border and
were allowed to leave over the course o f the next several days (Abdurehim-Ughli 1994).
According to one source, this exodus continued with the graces o f the Chinese state into
September. Those who fled China during this incident, however, were among the last o f the
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228
emigrants to the U.S.S.R. In 1963, the border was closed and would not re-open until the
1980s.
N o officially released information exists on the number o f Uyghurs who came to the
Soviet Union between 1954 and 1963, but one recent Uyghur source claims that the num ber is
in excess o f 200,000 (Abdurehim-Ughli 1994).4 3 W hile this large population o f new em igrant
Uyghurs in the form er U.S.S.R. would have a significant effect on the lives o f the Uyghurs
already living in Sem irech’e, it is interesting to note that the topic o f this migration quickly
became taboo for Soviet Uyghurs to discuss or write about publicly. If the story o f the
resettlement o f these Uyghurs in the U.S.S.R. was m ostly absent from Uyghur publications,
however, it was soon being experienced daily on Uyghur Kolkhozes throughout Kazakhstan
and Kyrgyzstan.
5.5 Nesotiatins a Re-United Uvshur Nation in Kazakhstan, 1963-1979
W hen the new migrants arrived in Kazakhstan, they were first processed at the border
where their bodies and clothes were disinfected and they were given immunizations.4 4 They
were then sent to their newly assigned places o f residence. While most Uyghurs who had
arrived in the U.S.S.R. during the 1950s were able to return to the villages and towns from
which they or their parents had previously fled in Semirech’e, the later arrivals in the early
1960s were almost all sent to far-flung regions o f Kazakhstan where other Uyghurs did not
live in order to assist in Khrushchev’s virgin lands campaign to cultivate unused land.
4 3 This estimated figure is likely inflated given that the population o f Uyghurs in the U.S.S.R. in 1989 was only
about 350,000. It is not, however, too much o f an exaggeration. My own observations, for example, have shown
that the immediate fam ilies o f at least half o f the present Uyghurs in former Soviet Central A sia came from the
Kuldja area o f Xinjiang between 1954 and 1962.
44 This process provided something o f a rite o f passage for these new arrivals into Soviet modernism and illustrated
the Soviet U nion’s general view o f the migrants as unclean and uncivilized. For images o f this process, see
Waiting f o r Uighurstan (Roberts 1996).
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229
One woman, for example, recounted to me how she had been sent to Zhekazgan in
northern Kazakhstan where her family were the only Uyghurs. Given the poor harvests o f the
early 1960s, the conditions were very difficult, and the family survived m ostly on the charity
o f local Kazakhs who were more accustomed to finding maximum use for the scant foodstuffs
that this area had to offer. Being only fourteen at the time, she was informed by the head o f
the collective farm that she should begin labor immediately given that she did not know the
Russian language and would not be able to catch up with the other students at school. After
she and her sister had worked on the farm for two years, the family found a way to m igrate to
a collective farm on the outskirts o f Alma-Ata. Another woman described to me how she had
been sent to a cotton producing collective farm in the south o f Kazakhstan near Chimkent
where her family was one o f twenty-four Uyghur families, all of whom were recent migrants.
In a strange land with no knowledge o f the Russian lingua-Jranca and no experience farming
cotton, however, all twenty-four families also found ways to leave the farm for places closer to
Alm a-A ta where other Uyghurs lived.
This pattern was fairly typical for the migrants who were sent to areas outside
Sem irech’e in 1961-63. Very few remained on their assigned collective farms for more than a
few years, and virtually all o f them found ways to migrate back towards Alm a-Ata or to the
villages and towns on the road between Alma-Ata and the Chinese border where they sought
acceptance in Uyghur zhuts. W hile many undertook these moves on their own w ithout official
acceptance, others were assisted by local Uyghur intellectuals who sent letters to Party
officials on their behalf and by local Uyghur collective farm directors who accepted them and
attained proper documentation for their new residences.
Once they had found means to live amongst their own people, however, the migrants
experienced other problems. They were resented by m ost o f the local Soviet Uyghurs who
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230
had spent the last three decades disassociating themselves from their cultural, familial, and
historical connections with Xinjiang and cultivating an identity as representatives o f the new
modern Soviet socialist peoples. In addition, the Soviet Uyghurs had largely lost their
collective m em ory o f the practices o f zhutdarchilik and Islam and had been socialized into
viewing such practices as backward and uncivilized. In this context, the new migrants
represented everything that the Soviet Uyghurs had been taught to disdain. When the migrants
attem pted to reproduce a way o f life that was still thoroughly intertwined with the ideals o f
com m unity life created by zhutdarchilik and religious practices, therefore, they were not
accepted by their Soviet relatives.
If the local Uyghurs resented the immigrants for their backwardness and dem onstrated
an air o f superiority in their interactions with these newcomers, the Uyghurs who had come
from China quickly lost respect for their Soviet relatives and their lack o f knowledge about
Uyghur and M uslim traditions. In particular, the Uyghur immigrants were outraged at the
local U yghurs’ drinking habits and their blatant disregard for the conventions o f zhutdarchilik,
which they took for granted having been socialized through mashraps on the Chinese side o f
the border. Essentially, in seeking Uyghur zhuts to join in Semirech’e, the migrants found that
nothing like w hat they believed to be zhut existed in the Soviet Union.
This conflict initially was very intense, and it was discussed passionately in virtually
all o f the life histories I recorded with Uyghurs who had emigrated to the U.S.S.R. in the
1950s and 1960s. Furthermore, the distinctions drawn between Soviet and immigrant Uyghurs
were sharp enough to warrant the creation o f new sub-ethnic identities that remain salient even
today in the Uyghur com m unity o f Kazakhstan. The local Uyghurs who had lived through the
repression and W orld W ar II in the U.S.S.R. began calling themselves Yerlik (“local”)
Uyghurs, in order to distinguish themselves from the newcomers, whom they referred to as
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231
Kitailik (“Chinese”) Uyghurs. As the animosity between the two groups increased, each
Uyghur in Kazakhstan became acutely aware o f who was a Yerlik and who was a Kitailik.
M any Kitailik Uyghurs noted that their Yerlik relatives ignored them and forbade their
children from associating with the children of the new immigrants. As a result, the Kitailik
Uyghurs initially found themselves interacting more with the internal Soviet refugees in the
area who had come from the Caucasus in the 1940s, such as the Mesketian Turks and the
Chechens, than with other Uyghurs.
Due to the conflicts between the Yerlik and Kitailik Uyghurs, many Kitailik Uyghurs
sought ways to move out o f the collective farms on the road from Alm a-A ta to Kuldja where
the majority o f Yerlik Uyghurs lived. As a result, several collective farms on the outskirts o f
Alm a-A ta became overrun with immigrants who now began to reconstruct the structure o f
zhuts and zhutdarchilik practices in which they had engaged on the other side o f the border.4 5
On these farms, the Kitailik Uyghurs were even able to find old neighbors with whom to
renew mashraps and other community practices, and in the 1970s, several o f these
neighborhoods even elected their own zhigit beshi. Another reason for the move to these
collective farms was that many o f the immigrant Uyghurs from China were not farmers, but
were from the city o f Kuldja where they had been intellectuals, artisans, or traders. In these
collective farms bordering on Alma-Ata, therefore, they were able to find means to partake in
urban life, often through illicit economic activity, while still living and working on the
collective farms.
W hile the conflict between the Yerlik and Kitailik Uyghurs in Kazakhstan created
discord in the community, this discord was gradually replaced by an increased mutual interest
in the respective knowledge and experiences o f the two groups. M any Kitailik Uyghurs, for
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232
example, described to me with pride how they helped to enlighten the Yerlik Uyghurs on
issues o f religious and cultural practices that had been suppressed in the U.S.S.R., such as
proper M uslim burial rights and the observation o f M uslim holidays. Likewise, the Yerlik
Uyghurs were able to assist Kitailik Uyghurs in their quest to better understand the Soviet
system and to ensure that their children had the best opportunities to advance in society.
W hile these exchanges of information and values led to a lessening o f tension between the two
groups by the 1970s, an awareness o f who was who remained.
In general, m ost Kitailik Uyghurs remained on the margins o f Soviet society in
Kazakhstan until the fall o f the U.S.S.R. W hile some o f the most prom inent immigrants who
had worked in the ETR, such as Zia Samadi, Gheni Batyr, Zunun Teyipov, and Yusupbeg
M ukhlisi, were given significant opportunities for themselves and their families to thrive in
the U.S.S.R. in part as a propaganda effort aimed at Xinjiang, these were the exceptions to the
rule. Other Kitailik Uyghurs in Kazakhstan were relegated to collective farms for the rest o f
their lives, and many who lacked farming experience resorted to illicit trading as a way to
support their families. W hile many o f their children were able to assimilate into Soviet
society through education and army service, those who had migrated as adults had very little
chance o f doing more than surviving in the U.S.S.R.
Despite being on the margins o f Soviet society, the Kitailik Uyghurs in Kazakhstan
did experience a significant degree o f Soviet acculturation in order to survive. M ost learned
enough Russian language to make life bearable, and all but the eldest began to view religion as
a less significant part o f their lives, if for no other reason, because it was difficult to observe a
religious lifestyle in the Soviet Union. Furthermore, while the Kitailik Uyghurs never became
as fervent supporters o f the Soviet system as did the Yerlik Uyghurs, the Soviet U nion’s anti-
45 The most frequent destinations were the collective farms o f Zaria Vostoka (“Dawn o f the East”), G ornyi G igant
(“Mountain Giant”), Druzhba (“Friendship”), and Parizhskii Kommun (“Paris Commune”), all o f which were
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M aoist politics did raise their level o f Soviet patriotism. This was also aided by the
establishm ent o f the Uyghur newspaper Yengi Hayat in the Arabic script, likely intended for
both the Kitailik immigrants and for propaganda efforts inside Xinjiang, which was first
published in 1970 and continues to publish today.
Illustrations 13: Soviet Uyghur Modernism During the Sino-Soviet Split
Illustration 13.1: Uyghurs gathered at the
unveiling of a bust of Abdulla Rozibaqiev
in his home village following his
rehabilitation, 1957 (Kazakhstan State
Archives. Arkhiv Kino-Foto Dokumentov)
Illustration 13.2: Children of Uyghur
immigrants in the Soviet Army, 1970s
(Abbas Aliev personal photos).
Illustration 12.6: Uyghurs in the U.S.S.R., an illustration from a book on the
history of the Soviet Uyghurs (Ruziev 1982:117).
virtually suburbs o f Alma-Ata.
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The Kitailik U yghurs’ connections to Xinjiang, however, also created problems for the
immigrants in the 1970s. Numerous children o f immigrants who had come to the U.S.S.R.
when still very young, for example, found that having their official birthplace labeled as the
People’s Republic o f China created a glass ceiling for their careers in the Com munist Party,
security organs, or the m ilitary regardless o f their actual assimilation into Soviet society.
Likewise, the hysteria in Kazakhstan about the potential for war with China throughout the
1960s and 1970s made others in the Republic suspicious o f the immigrants as potential spies
despite the fact that these refugees from the PRC were likely the most vehem ent anti-M aoists
in the U.S.S.R. One Yerlik Uyghur who grew up in a village near the Chinese border, for
example, said that in school she was recruited into a youth organization called the Yunii
D ruz’ ia Pogranichnikh (YuDP, “The Young Friends o f the Border Guards”), which, in
addition to staging mock battles against fictitious Chinese invaders, provided instruction on
finding Chinese spies on Soviet territory. This experience had greatly influenced her
relationship with the Kitailik Uyghurs, the loyalties o f whom she has never truly trusted.1
W hile the fear o f a war with China and the tensions between the Yerlik and Kitailik
Uyghurs in Kazakhstan had greatly subsided by the end o f the 1970s, a division remained
between them both culturally and politically. A t the same time, however, the Kitailik Uyghurs
had also been gradually acculturated into Soviet society, albeit at its margins, and life in
Xinjiang rem ained a far-off memory for the older immigrants and a nostalgic vision for those
who had come to the U.S.S.R. while still small children. The younger generation o f
immigrants and the second generation, therefore, already had developed a consciousness o f
being Soviet that would remain with them even after the U.S.S.R. had ceased to exist. A t the
same time, however, the arrival o f the Kitailik Uyghurs in Kazakhstan had served to partially
1 This particular informant also recounted to me a story o f one K itailik Uyghur who had allegedly been arrested in a
nearby village in the early 1970s for spying on the U.S.S.R. and relaying state secrets by radio to China.
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resuscitate the practices o f zhutdarchilik in local Uyghur communities throughout Sem irech’e,
setting the stage for the revival o f Uyghur zhuts in Kazakhstan after the fall o f the U.S.S.R.
5.6 The Sino-Soviet Split and the Cultural Revolution in Xinjiang. 1963-1979
W hile both Yerlik and Kitailik Uyghurs in Kazakhstan’s Sem irech’e were becoming
assimilated into Soviet society, the Chinese Communist Party in Xinjiang was busy cleansing
the area o f any traces o f Soviet influence. After the closing o f the border in 1963, a
widespread campaign to eradicate Soviet sympathizers was waged, and hundreds o f Uyghurs,
especially in the border region around Kuldja, were arrested for supporting the U.S.S.R. in the
Sino-Soviet split. One woman who was bom the same year as the closing o f the border, for
example, told me that she had never met her father because he had been arrested the year o f
her birth for listening to Soviet radio transmissions. Others told me that they even knew
people who were arrested for owning Soviet consumer goods, including one person who
apparently was convicted o f having Soviet candy. Given the extent o f Soviet influence in the
region over the last several decades, virtually everyone in the Kuldja area feared the
possibility o f being accused o f pro-Soviet sympathies.
W hile publicly the PRC suggested it was taking a more liberal attitude towards
minority nationalities in Xinjiang after 1963 in an effort to counter Soviet propaganda
(M cM illen 1979:124), the anti-Soviet purges actually served to sim ultaneously provide a veil
for attacking local nationalism and religion more generally. Between 1963 and 1966, the CCP
gradually intensified its attacks on Islam and local nationalism in the region, culm inating in
the closing o f village mosques, the securing o f the Sino-Soviet border, and the liquidation o f
more suspected nationalist leaders (M cM illen 1979:124-127). This campaign was almost
im mediately followed by an even more radical period in Xinjiang and in China as a whole
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236
known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (GPCR). W hile there are few sources
describing the actual scope o f the Cultural Revolution in Xinjiang, w hat does exist suggests
that this radical political movem ent had some specific characteristics in Xinjiang that differed
from the rest o f China.
Donald M cM illen, who provides one o f the only in-depth accounts o f the Cultural
Revolution in Xinjiang available in the English language, has suggested that the effects o f the
GPCR were felt much later and less forcefully in Xinjiang than in the rest o f China (M cM illen
1979:247). In retrospect, there are two reasons for the relatively m ild nature o f the G PCR in
Xinjiang. First, for the core o f the Red Guard from Beijing and elsewhere in China proper,
Xinjiang was both far away and relatively unknown, making it difficult for them to work
there. Secondly, the fact that the Soviet Union was continually involved in encouraging the
local M uslim population to revolt discouraged Party officials and Red Guards alike from
pushing radical campaigns too forcefully in the region in fear that it would lead to instability.
Thirdly, the ability o f the communist leader in Xinjiang, W ang Enmao, to resist attacks on his
power by the Red Guard kept the radicals’ focus on battling W ang rather than on attacking the
ideological impurity o f the region’s national minorities for most o f the GPCR. If the Cultural
Revolution in Xinjiang was milder than elsewhere in China, it did have a significant effect on
the Uyghurs living there, and the period is not without stories o f repression and suffering.
When the Red Guard had arrived in Xinjiang as a political force in the autum n o f
1966, it initially focused its energy on attacking W ang’s pow er base (M cM illen 1979:188-
195). The elimination o f the three black lines ( the bourgeois line, the local nationalist line,
and the line o f contacts with those outside China’ s borders) among the local population,
therefore, was at first o f secondary concern (Bazilbaev 1978:13). By the end o f 1966,
however, there were reports that Red Guards had waged campaigns on Uyghur Communes
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237
attacking feudal religious practices, resulting in the destruction o f mosques, the burning o f
religious manuscripts, and the public humiliation o f Mollas (M cMillen 1979:196).
Accounts o f Uyghurs who had lived through this period in X injiang’s history confirm
that the effects o f the GPCR were most forcefully felt among local M uslims on the People’ s
Communes. Those who still had private land or substantial personal possessions were forced
to hand over all they had to the collective and underwent kurash sessions before the others on
the Commune (see figure 9.3). Furthermore, in addition to working all day in the fields,
m embers o f the Communes were expected to attend evening educational sessions on the
teachings o f M ao Zedong. One Uyghur even told me that his Commune was forced to raise
pigs, and the members were told during the evening educational sessions that the M uslim
taboo on pork was merely a remnant o f the feudal past that needed to be discarded. Uyghurs
on many collective farms were also criticized for wearing traditional clothing and were forced
to adopt the Chinese uniform that has become associated with Mao Zedong. Likewise,
mdshrdps, and any gathering o f Uyghurs outside Party meetings, were forbidden, and dancing
was criticized as a bourgeois excess.2
Perhaps the most long-lasting affect o f the GPCR, however, was its effect on
education. Teachers at all levels were particularly open to attacks by the Red Guards, and
virtually all o f the teachers in the region were either purged or themselves joined the radicals.
Those who were purged were subjected to kurash sessions and were usually exiled to
Communes to learn from the work o f the peasants. As a result, educational institutions
virtually did not exist for the majority o f the GPCR, and an entire generation o f Uyghurs
emerged that lacked formal education. Furthermore, those who were able to enter school after
2 Nonetheless, Uyghurs on the Communes often did hold m ashraps secretly where they were able to dance, sing,
and tell jokes about the Party and Cultural Revolution. Such mashraps, however, were held more for enjoyment
than for instructive purposes.
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238
1972, when most schools reopened were taught the Uyghur language in the Latin alphabet,
which after 1980 became obsolete. Likewise, virtually all mediated culture discussing the
Uyghur nation was suspended, and the only m edia that people encountered were found in
political posters and in radio, both o f which were dominated by the Red Guards and their
campaigns.
In the Kuldja area, another important effect o f the Cultural Revolution was its effect
on local zhuts. A significant number o f Kuldja’s residents had been purged in either the anti-
Soviet campaigns or the Cultural Revolution and were consequently sent to the south o f
Xinjiang to work on Communes. N ot surprisingly, however, most sought ways to return to the
Kuldja area as soon as they were able to do so. By the later 1960s, the battles between
warring factions o f the Red Guard provided many with the opportunity to do so. M ost
Uyghurs who returned to Kuldja at this time did so without permission or proper
docum entation and lived secretly with relatives. One such Uyghur, who was only fifteen at
the time, told me that he survived in K uldja by selling sunflower seeds secretly on the street.
Another recounted illegally selling food ration tickets to people in the city.
At the same time, the chaos o f the GPCR also allowed some Uyghurs to plot
resistance against Chinese rule in Xinjiang. During the Cultural Revolution, Soviet
propaganda aimed at the M uslims o f Xinjiang was intense. Soviet radio stations in Tashkent
and A lm a-A ta had broadcasted into Xinjiang since 1964, but they increased their signal and
broadcasting time in 1967 (Dreyer 1979:211). In addition to broadcasting programs about the
progress o f the U.S.S.R. towards socialism and about the history o f the U yghurs’ struggle for
independence from Chinese rule, these stations apparently suggested that Zunun Teyipov, the
former General from the ETR, had gathered a group o f Soviet Uyghur soldiers in the
mountains and was waiting to attack Xinjiang (M cM illen 1979:227). Believing that the
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239
U.S.S.R. would come to their assistance if they began a resistance movement, numerous
Uyghurs throughout Xinjiang allegedly established a secret Eastern Turkestan People’ s
Revolutionary Party with the aim o f exploiting the disorder o f the GPCR and establishing an
independent state.
According to one o f the members o f this Party in Kuldja, it had a broad base o f
support throughout Xinjiang and even including amongst its ranks M ehmetmin Iminov, one o f
the highest ranking Uyghur members o f the CCP Regional Committee. Likewise, in the
Kuldja area, its members were overwhelmingly former government and m ilitary officials o f
the ETR. Interestingly, m y informant who was a m ember o f the Party m entions not being
overly concerned about the Red Guard in the city. As he told me, the Red Guard did not
know who they were, and the rebels concealed their activities by blending into the poorest of
the population, wearing old clothing and staying out o f public life. Being made up m ostly o f
intellectuals with no access to arms, however, the Party did not achieve much o f note during
its existence. It apparently published an underground newspaper entitled Oyghan
(“A wakened”), and it held discussions about establishing a viable resistance m ovement, but it
never initiated these plans.
According to my informant who had worked in the Party in the K uldja area, several
m embers including Iminov were arrested in 1968, and the remainder o f the Party decided to
resort to pleading for assistance from the Soviet Union. As a result, they sent two
representatives across an unwatched mountain pass to Alma-Ata in order to establish contact
with the Soviet KGB. W hile these emissaries succeeded in meeting with the KGB, using code
via Soviet radio broadcasts to Xinjiang to confirm their arrival, they returned empty handed.
Shortly after, the Party was broken up, and most o f its members were arrested. This would be
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240
the last time that a Uyghur resistance movement in Xinjiang would depend upon Soviet
assistance.
Illustrations 14: The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution in Xinjiang
Illustration 14.1: A 1977 painting of a kurash from the Cultural Revolution in
Xinjiang where a woman condemns her husband (Amat 1989).
Illustration 14.2: A 1977 artistic depiction of Uyghurs mourning the death of
Mao, which essentially marked the end of the Cultural Revolution (Amht 1989).
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241
In general, the Great Proletariat Cultural Revolution had a lasting effect on the
Uyghurs o f Xinjiang that differed markedly from that achieved by the various Soviet cultural
revolutions in Sem irech’e since 1917. The GPCR’s demands that Uyghurs discard their
religion and traditions were fulfilled tem porarily by the use o f force, but they were not
reinforced through alternative means o f socialization. During the years o f GPCR, Uyghurs in
Xinjiang did not consume a mediated culture, were not educated in schools or universities,
and were given few positive incentives to adopt the changes that were demanded o f them.
Furthermore, the confusion associated with the warring parties o f the GPCR made it generally
unclear w hat changes were actually being demanded o f them. While some o f the tem porary
changes in behavior were irreversible such as naming children with patriotic names instead o f
M uslim names, most Uyghurs seem to have consciously forgotten about the G PCR and view it
merely as a confused time o f great difficulties.3
If one was to comment on a single influence o f the GPCR on the Uyghurs o f Xinjiang
as being the most important, ironically it would likely be the destruction o f most o f the
advances made by the CCP prior to 1966 in socializing Uyghurs into a socialist system. W hen
M ao died in 1976 and the Cultural Revolution had officially ended, the Uyghurs o f Xinjiang
were left with a large uneducated segment o f the population whose knowledge o f the early
years o f the revolution had been either wiped out or jaded by disappointments. Given this void
with which the Uyghurs o f Xinjiang were faced, it is not surprising that they returned to
religion and cultural traditions as a means o f making sense o f the world as soon as they were
allowed to do so in the 1980s. This stood in stark contrast to the Uyghurs o f the U.S.S.R. who
3 Today, one can often recognize Uyghur children who were born during the GPCR by virtue o f their names.
During this time, such names as Junggo Gul (“China Flower”), Kurash (“Struggle”), M adaniyat (“Culture”), and
Gomin (“Revolution”) were often popular among young parents who feared being labeled as disloyal to the
revolution (Bazilbaev 1978:28).
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had been socialized into a Soviet culture that offered them incentives for loyalty and which
would be remembered with fond nostalgia once the Soviet Union had fallen. These differences
were the results o f variance in the turbulent histories and encounters with modernism
experienced on opposing sides o f the same borderland. W hen the Soviet Union and the PRC
renewed diplomatic relations and reopened their border in the 1980s, therefore, Uyghurs on
respective sides o f the border would need to re-negotiate these different histories and
modernisms amongst themselves in order to establish a new common narrative o f the Uyghur
nation, and, in doing so, they would once again return to establishing unity through com m on
practices o f zhutdarchilik.
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UYGHUR NEIGHBORHOODS AND NATIONALISMS
IN THE FORMER SINO-SOVIET BORDERLAND:
AN HISTORICAL ETHNOGRAPHY OF A STATELESS NATION ON THE
MARGINS OF MODERNITY
VOLUME II
by
Sean Raymond Roberts
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(ANTHROPOLOGY)
August 2003
Copyright 2003 Sean Raymond Roberts
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PA R T II: TH E ET H N O G R A PH IC PR ESE N T
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C H A P T E R SIX— Open Borders, Open Markets, and Closed States: The Uyghurs
Encounter a N ew World Order
M y scattered years o f fieldwork among the Uyghurs of the Ili valley borderland
spanned the decade o f the 1990s— a time o f incredible change and transform ations for this
people and for the world as a w hole.1 During this time, the Soviet Union disintegrated, and
fifteen new independent countries were established in its place. Among these new states,
Kazakhstan transform ed from a renegade, m ildly nationalist republic on the periphery o f the
U.S.S.R. to an independent oil-rich autocracy run by the former First Secretary o f the
republic’s Com munist Party and receiving millions o f dollars in Am erican and European
assistance. At the same time, China changed from a gradually opening pariah state to an
economic power and m ember o f the W orld Trade Organization (W TO) com peting w ith Russia
and the U nited States for interest in the markets o f the newly independent Central A sian states.
In the process, Xinjiang has gone from an isolated communist outpost to a crucial link in
C hina’s capitalist engagem ent with the rest o f Eurasia.
For the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley, these changes brought yet one more period o f radical
transform ation bearing hopes for a better future. Like the revolutionary periods in both
Sem irech’e and the Kuldja area earlier in the century, this new era o f transform ation
represented to the Uyghurs o f this borderland a new opportunity for liberation from external
domination. Thus far, however, the impact o f the new changes in Central Asia and Xinjiang
on the Ili Uyghurs has also followed a similar historical trajectory as these past revolutionary
periods. W hile the late 1980s and early 1990s began with this community engaging new ideas
o f progress and receiving significant freedoms to pursue this progress, these freedoms have
been gradually disappearing ever since.
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Despite historical precedents and the gradual withdraw o f freedoms, however, the
Uyghurs o f the Ili valley show no signs o f giving up on their goals. The Ili valley borderland
has once again become the central site for the production o f Uyghur nationalism, and the
borderland com m unity in the region is busily engaged in re-constructing zhuts and
zhutdarchilik practices that offer their nationalist movement both organizational structure and
social cohesion. Furthermore, with the socialist promises that betrayed this com m unity in the
past supplemented by a neo-liberal vision for the future, the Ili valley Uyghurs still hold out
hope that this time things will be different. Only time will tell, however, whether their hopes
will finally be realized.
In the remainder o f this study, these latest efforts by the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley to
m aintain their stateless nation and agitate for territorial sovereignty are described. As opposed
to the first half o f the study, however, the following chapters concentrate prim arily upon the
Uyghur com m unity o f Almaty, Kazakhstan where the Uyghur nationalist m ovem ent has
become transnational in character and has benefited from the ability to construct local
com m unities in ways that have not been possible in this borderland for at least fifty years.
Before looking m ore closely at A lm aty’s present Uyghur community and its efforts to
construct and maintain a stateless nation, however, this chapter provides a brief
contextualization o f the changes in the Ili valley borderland over the last decade and the
impact that these transformations have had on the political situation o f the Uyghurs on
opposite sides o f the border.
1 I first came to Central Asia to study for a year in Tashkent, then capital o f the Uzbek SSR, in September 1989,
and I left my last long-term stay in the region (three years and one-half) only in October 2000.
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246
6.1 The Post-Cold War World: New “World Order. ” Same Old “WorldSystem”
Our present moment in history marks an important shift in the political and economic
order o f our world. W hile only a little more than a decade ago our world was divided into two
distinct ideological, political, and economic camps, the fall o f the Soviet Union and the
reversal o f communism in Eastern Europe have m ostly obliterated that dichotomy. Although
Cuba and N orth Korea continue to profess allegiance to the M arxism-Leninism that
characterized the socialist camp o f the Cold War, these countries are isolated anom alies in our
present world order. The People’s Republic o f China, by contrast, calls itself a com m unist
state while acting internationally more like a capitalist power. The shape o f the world has
changed significantly, but how can these changes be characterized in the context o f the history
o f the world system? W hile recent scholarship has provided some insight into this question, I
argue that most o f it fails to provide links between the ideological change inherent in the end
o f the Cold War, the continuity in the global hierarchy o f our world system, and recent
m aterial and technological innovations.
W estern liberal and conservative arguments about the changes reflected in the end o f
the Cold W ar have been overwhelmingly idealist in perspective, stressing the developm ent o f
a new world order founded on shifts in ideological allegiances. The basic liberal argum ent is
articulated m ost forcefully by Francis Fukiyama, who has seen in the end o f the Cold W ar the
end o f history, or at least the end o f the class struggle and its opposing ideological positions
(Fukiyam a 1989, 1992). According to Fukiyama, the end o f the Cold W ar marks a new phase
in world history that will be characterized by the dominance o f democratic liberal states and
economies due to the relative prosperity o f societies adopting these values. In contrast,
Samuel Huntington argues, in a more conservative and less optimistic vein, that, our new
historical m om ent will be characterized by a “clash o f civilizations” between the Islamic,
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247
Confucian, Christian, and Judaic populations o f the world (see Huntington 1993, 1996).
W hile recent ideological shifts towards global liberalism, ethno-nationalism, and religious
fundamentalism have created a new world order that in part supports the assertions o f both
Fukiyam a and Huntington, I argue that this new world order cannot be explained purely in
ideological terms. It must be remembered that there are also important dimensions o f power
and m aterial concerns inherent in the ideological shifts underway in the world today.
M any materialist analyses o f our present era, however, also fail to accurately explain
the changes presently taking place in the world. As already noted in this study’s introduction,
numerous scholars have framed the recent changes in the world in terms o f a new
globalization and transnationalism that is linked to recent innovations in the technologies o f
communications and transportation (cf. Hannerz 1989; Appadurai 1997; Glick-Shiller 1994,
Ong 1999). W hile the processes described in these works are certainly apparent in the world
today, the m ajority o f these authors also suggest that this emergent globalization marks the
decline o f m odernity and the end o f the nation-state. The most radical o f these works depict a
fractured world where cultures, ideologies, and the power o f capital are collapsing in the
context o f a developing post-modern cfo-order (see Jameson 1991).
I would suggest, however, that both these idealist and materialist explanations o f the
world today are too quick to forecast a revolution in the structure o f our world. W hile much
has changed in the world politically and economically in the last several decades, much also
has not changed, particularly with regards to the hierarchy o f power in the world system. The
geographer David Harvey has provided an alternative view o f recent global transform ations
that more accurately captures this dynamic o f both what has and has not changed in the world
in the last several decades. Harvey notes that modernism is still very alive in the world, and
global structures o f power have changed very little (see Harvey 1990). In H arvey’s opinion,
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the changes underway in the world are m erely symptomatic o f a new more flexible capitalism,
which, w hile appearing less ordered and hegemonic than in the past, is still structured around
the same powerful alliance o f states and capital (Harvey 1990:338-342). In other words, if
there is a new world order today, it exists in the same old world system. W riting before the
fall of the Soviet Union, however, Harvey does not suggest how the destruction o f socialism
has effected the world system in the context o f this new flexible form o f global capitalism.
Furthermore, as a neo-Marxist, Harvey does not clearly articulate how these changes have
effected non-economic modes of domination, particularly those emerging from the long
established division between colonizers and colonized in the modern/colonial world system.
As the continued struggles o f various stateless nations for sovereignty in the world
suggest, the world has not been fully de-colonized either by the fall o f classical em pires or by
the end o f the Cold War. The end o f the Cold War, however, has significantly altered the
struggles o f marginal peoples in the world, whether they be stateless nations or other
disenfranchised groups. M ore specifically, the fall o f the Soviet Union and C hina’s
withdrawal from any existing world communist revolutionary movem ent has all but destroyed
socialism and M arxism as ideologies supporting such struggles. Consequently, in the place o f
the bi-polar ideological world o f the Cold War, a powerful and global neo-liberalist ideology
has taken root that courts both the powerful and the disenfranchised in the world system. W ith
resistance to the pow er structures o f global capitalism subsumed into an ideology that is based
on the proliferation o f global capitalism, the status quo o f our world system has been greatly
strengthened, at least ideologically.
This new neo-liberal globalism is promoted by an international coalition o f sorts,
which exhibits overwhelming unity in its political and economic engagem ent with the rest o f
the world. Am ong the most important members o f this coalition are the United States, most
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249
European countries, and many international institutions including the United Nations, the
W orld Bank, and the International M onetary Fund.2 This global movement, in the most
general terms, promotes the proliferation o f market economics, free trade, and dem ocracy
around the world and bases its utopian vision for the future on the power o f new technologies
to unify the world and make it more peaceful and democratic.
In this context, the international avenues for the engagement o f the world system
offered to local disenfranchised populations such as the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley are almost
exclusively through the neo-liberal movement. W hile the Soviet Union once backed
disenfranchised groups in countries allied with the United States, and the United States
supported dissidents within socialist societies, today one unified international community
supports both oppressive states and their oppressed citizens, suggesting that both can share in
the same liberal utopia at once.3 The only other organized international alternatives available
to the disenfranchised outside the neo-liberal fold are marginal radical and conservative
m ilitant groups such as Osama Bin Laden’s Al-Qaeda Islamic extremist organization or
marginal leftist civil disobedience groups such as the worldwide anti-globalization movement.
If m arginal people in this new world order have limited ideological choice in their
international alliances, the technological innovations o f the last several decades have given
such disenfranchised groups access to new means for the propagation o f their political voice.
Inexpensive technologies for the reproduction o f m edia including video and the internet have
offered once isolated marginal peoples, such as the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley, the tools needed
2 W hile Japan also contributes to this movement, the Japanese mostly promote only econom ic liberalism abroad,
shying away from the promotion o f political liberalism.
3 The United States, for example, supports the post-Soviet government o f Kazakhstan with an array o f technical,
financial, and military assistance. At the same time, the U.S. assists the disenfranchised in Kazakhstan to develop
their own political and social movements that, in theory, can challenge the authoritarian state in which they live.
Similarly, the United States has engaged China as a m ost fa v o red nation in trade and has supported the country’s
entry into the WTO, and it has simultaneously criticized China on human rights and has given at least moral
support to many o f the disenfranchised segments o f Chinese society.
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to expose the rest o f the world to their viewpoints. The question remains, however, as to
whether such propaganda efforts can translate into tangible support from political interests
outside their community.
In general, therefore, the present moment in history should not be seen as a m ajor
break in the history o f the modern/colonial world system. Economic and political power
remains ordered primarily along the lines o f the global hierarchy that emerged from
colonialism and de-colonization. The end o f the Cold W ar and the technological revolution in
com munications and transportation taking place today, however, are part o f a new chapter in
this history that is reflected in a new world order. This new world order is characterized by a
more flexible and global orientation o f capital, an increasingly unified global ideology o f
liberalism, and a democratization o f m edia through increased access to technologies o f
communications. For disenfranchised populations, therefore, it is a mom ent in history during
which new technologies o f transportation and communication offer greater opportunities for
the engagem ent o f the world system and global processes but when the term s o f this
engagem ent have become increasingly uni-dimensional politically and ideologically. For the
Uyghurs o f the Ili valley, this situation has yet to bring concrete changes to their political
position in the world, but it has significantly changed their strategies for improving that
position.
6.2 C entral A sia and the U vshurs in the N ew W orld Order: The N ew “G reat G am e. ”
the “Uyghur Card, ” and K azakhstan-C hinese Relations
The global proliferation o f an ideology o f neo-liberalism has m eant that most
governments around the world today are at least paying lip-service to democracy, free trade,
and m arket economics as the only road to prosperous development. This, however, has not
ended international competition for influence around the world. China, and Russia to a lesser
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degree, continue to represent contentious forces in the neo-liberal world order that offer at
least some challenge to the ideals and interests promoted by the United States and Europe.
Furthermore, the Islamic world provides a continuum o f different perspectives on neo
liberalism that question the assumptions that democracy and capitalism can be implemented
everywhere in the same manner without accounting for cultural and religious differences. The
presence o f all o f these different competing political forces in Central A sia today makes this
region a global zone o f contention and has placed the Uyghurs between conflicting global
power interests once again.
W hen the Soviet Union fell, much was written about the future o f Central A sia and its
political alliances. The general premise o f most scholarship and journalism on this subject
was that a diplomatic competition in the region would emerge between the west, which
prom ised aid, Russia, which had been the Central A sians’ older brother for the entire
twentieth century, China, whose growing economy bordered it to the east, and Iran, w hich had
historical and religious ties to the area (see Banuazizi and W einer 1994; M alik 1994). The
prize in this competition, along with critical geopolitical influence, included suspected large
oil reserves, the majority o f which lie in Kazakhstan. W hile this com petition has not
demonstrated the same zeal for espionage and intrigue as the nineteenth century Great Game
between Russia and England in Central Asia, it has been ever present in the politics o f the area
since the fall o f the Soviet Union.4 Furthermore, with the incredible increase in the Am erican
presence in Central Asia following the events o f September 11, 2001, this Great Game for
control o f the region is likely to become only more heated in the near future.
4 It should be noted that Iran’s role in this G reat Game has not been as important as many people initially believed
it would be. That being said, various Islamic states have played an important role simultaneously by promoting a
stronger M uslim influence in the region.
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In the context o f this new Great Game, the Uyghurs have found them selves in a
familiar position as a marginal people caught between the interests o f geopolitical powers.
This position has given the Uyghurs a certain role in the new politics o f Central Asia, but as
Alan W hiting suggested about the Uyghurs’ homeland in the 1950s (see W hiting 1958), this
role m ay be more akin to a pawn than to a pivot. W hile Uyghurs have garnished some support
from all o f the power interests in the area, with the exception of the Chinese, this support has
been limited. At times, the west, Russia, and the M uslim world have all come to the side o f
the Uyghurs in criticizing Chinese human rights abuses in Xinjiang.5 For the most part,
however, all o f these incidents o f external support for the Uyghur cause could be subsumed
into what Uyghurs in Almaty refer to as the Uyghur card, a diplomatic ploy that is used only
interm ittently when advantageous as leverage in dealings with the PRC (Khliupin 1999:76-
89). These international statements about China’s oppression of the Uyghurs have never been
backed by any tangible support for the Uyghur cause, and the important economic relations
between China and those who levy these criticisms have always tem pered the seriousness o f
the statements.
W hile this largely empty international support for the Uyghurs has not significantly
furthered this stateless nation’s cause, it has kept the Uyghurs on both sides o f the border in
Central Asia in the discourse o f international politics. The Uyghurs’ presence in the discourse
o f international politics has been no where more pronounced than in the relationship between
Kazakhstan and China today. W hile Kazakhstan has never directly criticized Chinese rule in
Xinjiang, the Uyghur question has still played a critical role in the tenuous love/hate
relationship that the Kazakhstan government has with China.
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Illustrations 15: China-Kazakhstan Trade in the 1990s
Illustration 15.1: Chinese truck at border in
the Ili valley bringing goods to Kazakhstan
(Author's photo).
Illustration 15.2: Chinese goods being sold
at Almaty’s Barakholka Bazaar (Author’s
photo).
Illustration 15.3: Cartoon from a
Kazakh newspaper satirizing counterfeit
Chinese goods (Bazilevskaya 1995)
5 In the case o f Russia, this has never been manifested in official diplomatic statements, but it is noticeable in
official Russian journalistic accounts when Russia has felt itself in competition for Eurasian dominance with China.
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254
In line with the new neo-liberal world order, the defining factors in Kazakhstan-
Chinese relations after the fall o f the Soviet Union were free trade and economic cooperation.
W ith the PRC seeking new markets for its booming production industries and Kazakhstan
seeking any form o f economic stimulus, both countries embraced their new-found commercial
friendship with zeal. Beginning with the July 1991 visit o f Kazakhstan president Nursultan
Nazerbaev to Beijing, there were a series o f diplomatic exchanges between China and
Kazakhstan in the first years after the fall o f the U.S.S.R. resulting in numerous agreem ents
about political and economic relations (see Zhao 1993:196-198).
Given K azakhstan’s weak position in the global economy vis a vis China, however,
the economic and political partnership formed by these agreements has been anything but
equal. The large cross-border petty trade in consumer goods between China and Kazakhstan
that quickly developed after 1991 soon became almost exclusively a trade in Chinese made
products (see figures 10.2 and 10.3). In return, a steady stream o f raw m aterials began
flowing from Kazakhstan into China. W hile in the local markets o f Kazakhstan scrap metal
and animal (primarily sheep) pelts were the most visible indication o f this trend, its most
important m anifestation was oil.6 As early as 1993, China had expressed interest in
K azakhstan’s oil production and had initiated the idea o f a pipeline that could bring oil from
Kazakhstan's west to China through Xinjiang (Khliupin 1999:116).7 W hile this pipeline has
not come to fruition as o f yet, in 1997 the Chinese National Petroleum Com pany won two
important tenders for the right to drill oil in the Kazakh fields o f U zen’ and M unai (Khliupin
6 Throughout the city o f Almaty, one can see hand painted cities advertising the private purchase o f animal pelts
and scrap metal. Those undertaking this business, in turn, re-sell their purchased goods to Chinese dealers in bulk.
7 James Dorian, Brett Wigdortz, and Dru Gladney have noted in a jointly authored article that the Chinese interest
in Kazakhstan’s oil stems from a recognition o f China’s limited energy reserves in the context o f their vastly
expanding econom y (Dorian, Wigdortz, and Gladney 1997:467-472).
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255
1999:118). Furthermore, in 2001, the Chinese National Petroleum Com pany cem ented a deal
with the Royal Dutch/Shell Oil Group to bring this multi-national petroleum com pany into a
consortium that will construct a pipeline from Xinjiang to China’s east coast {AFP, 15 Jan.
2002). By all accounts, China appears intent upon remaining in the competition for Central
Asian oil, the primary battleground o f the new Great Game.
The shape o f the Kazakhstan-Chinese trade is telling about the two countries’ uneven
economic power and evolving political relationship. The present exchange o f Chinese
produced manufactured goods for Kazakh raw materials represents a reversal o f historical
trends in the Ili valley trade, which in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century was
characterized by Russian and Soviet manufactured goods being exchanged for Xinjiang's raw
materials. M ore generally, it indicates that into the future, the relationship between the two
countries could evolve into a situation where Kazakhstan is increasingly dependent upon
China economically and politically ju st as Xinjiang was once dependent upon Russia and the
Soviet Union.
This possibility has not escaped the notice o f the population o f Kazakhstan, which
remains overwhelmingly anti-Chinese. Kazakhstan had been at the forefront o f the Soviet
U nion’s ideological battles with China during the Sino-Soviet split, and neither its security
organs nor its population have forgotten what they were taught about the Chinese threat. As
Kazakhstani scholar Vitalii Khliupin has noted bluntly, “in the mentality o f Kazakhstanis,
both Russians and Kazakhs not even to mention Uyghurs and Dungans, is deeply em bedded a
negative stereotype o f the Chinese— sly and cheap traders as numerous as locusts” (Khliupin
1999:116). Due to this stereotype and the history o f China’s relations with Central Asia, there
is a strong fear among the people o f Kazakhstan that China eventually will seek to expand its
territory into their land. Exemplifying this fear, Khliupin has characterized the arrival o f the
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256
first Chinese traders in Kazakhstan as “reminiscent o f the eastern tradition o f the conquest o f
cities— in the avantguard is a mass o f peaceful inhabitants, who are used to fill the moats
[before the advance o f the army]” (Khliupin 1999:116).
The fear o f Chinese domination in Kazakhstan is understandable. W hile Kazakhstan
is a fledging new state with an economy looted by corruption, China is a global political and
m ilitary power with the fastest growing economy in the world. Although Xinjiang remains
one o f the least developed areas o f China, this has also begun to change in recent years. W hen
I visited X injiang’s capital city o f Urumchi in January 1990, it was generally less developed
than Alma-Ata. In returning to this city several times since, I have seen that it now surpasses
post-Soviet Alm aty by leaps and bounds as more and more high-rise buildings are constructed
each year. Even the city o f Kuldja, which was a grey and quiet border town in 1990, is now a
growing urban center under constant construction. W ith the cities o f Xinjiang growing and
becoming increasingly Han Chinese in style and population, Kazakhstan’s population must
wonder how far Chinese expansion to the west will progress in the future. This question is all
the more pertinent given that the Chinese government has continually asserted that its borders
with Kazakhstan were established in “unfair treaties” and must be re-drawn to allow for the
cession o f significant land masses to the Chinese side. Furthermore, in an attem pt to win
favor with China and to dispense with this issue, Kazakhstan has several times during the
1990s ceded territory to China along the border (see Khliupin 1999:38-75) (see figure 10.5).
In this context, K azakhstan’s government is certainly aware o f the Uyghur card as one
o f the few bargaining chips it holds in its diplomatic discussions with China. Officially, for
example, Kazakhstan has always pledged to help China fight Uyghur separatism. Tom ur
Davam at o f the Xinjiang government even notes in his memoirs from a 1993 trip to Central
Asia that Kazakhstan’s president Nazerbaev said with authority at that time, “if China stands
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against separatist movements, we in Kazakhstan will also stand against [these same] separatist
m ovem ents” (Davam at 1996:198) (see figure 10.1). In reality, however, the Kazakhstan
government has demonstrated restraint in its dealings with local Uyghur nationalist groups,
allowing them to operate, publish newsletters, and hold press conferences despite Chinese
demands. W hile the Kazakhstan government also closely monitors Uyghur nationalist activity
in its country to ensure that it does not become involved in a militant armed conflict with
China, the freedom o f expression allowed Uyghurs in Kazakhstan is enough to concern the
Chinese government.
This situation has led the Chinese to develop a series o f security treaties with
Kazakhstan and other Central Asian states with which it shares a border. These treaties have
evolved into a regional body for mutual security in Central Asia that was initially referred to
as the Shanghai Five. The Shanghai Five at its inception was a loose alliance between China,
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Russia that formed out o f a m eeting between officials
from each country in Shanghai in 1996 that addressed the question o f security along C hina’s
borders with former Soviet states (Vidaillet 2002). For the Chinese side, the question o f
Uyghur separatists using Central Asia as a base for their activities was among the most
important issues on this m eeting’s agenda. Central Asian leaders, by contrast, sought a
counter-balance to American and European dominance in their region and an ally in their
disregard for western demands that Central Asian governments become more democratic.
Initially, mutual suspicions between its members limited the power o f the Shanghai
Five and its vows to fight Uyghur separatism. This changed significantly in 1999 when
several bomb blasts in U zbekistan’s capital o f Tashkent, that were apparently targeting Uzbek
president Islam Karimov, awoke the Central Asian leaders to the potential o f M uslim
resistance to their authoritarian control o f power. In 2000, Uzbekistan joined this regional
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258
security alliance as an observer, and in 2001 this state became its sixth member. At the same
time, this loose alliance became further solidified and was renamed the Shanghai Cooperation
Organization (SCO).8 The group’s adoption o f a more official status and new m oniker
appears to have been, in part, a conscious effort to counter-balance the power o f the OSCE
(Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe), which has continually levied criticism
on its Central Asian members for their lack o f democracy. In addition to a more powerful
counter-balance to western influence in the region, however, this reorganization o f the alliance
demonstrates a real fear on the part o f Central Asian leaders o f M uslim militants threatening
their authoritarian rule. This fear has also increased since the September 11, 2001 terrorist
attacks on the United States after which the SCO began meeting more regularly and
establishing clearer plans for combating terrorism and separatism (see Yom 2001; V idaillet
2002; Sands 2002).
The Central Asian leaders’ increased involvement in the SCO suggests that they are
playing their Uyghur card in exchange for increased security from external threats and a
counter-balance to their critics in the west. Consequently, Central Asian cooperation with
Chinese authorities in countering Uyghur separatism has increased since 1999. Already in
1999, for example, Kazakhstan extradited two Uyghurs with Chinese citizenship who were
under threat o f being sentenced to the death penalty for “separatist activity.” Ignoring pleas
from the United States, European diplomatic missions, and the United Nations High
Com missioner for Refugees, all o f whom asked it not to send these accused “separatists” to
their deaths, the Kazakhstan government returned them to Chinese authorities without much
ceremony. Likewise, more recently, K yrgyzstan’s government sentenced a Uyghur with
Chinese citizenship to death for “terrorist activity” under suspect circumstances and despite
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international protest (see RFE/RL, 29 Nov. 2001). These clear examples o f Central Asian
states yielding to China on the Uyghur question are also likely to be replicated in coming
years as the SCO plans to open a Counter-Terrorism Center in the Kyrgyzstan city o f Bishkek
(see Pom fret 2001).
Illustrations 16: Kazakhstan-China Diplomatic Relations in the 1990s
Illustration 16.1: Kazakhstan
President Nazerbaev meeting Xinjiang
official Tomur Davamat, 1993
(Davamat 1996).
Illustration 16.2- Kazakh and Chinese border
officials meeting in 1997 to mark the passing of
territory from Kazakhstan to China (Khliupin
1999:39)
In general, China’s position in the Great Game for Central Asian influence is
becoming increasingly strong, and at least one American scholar has asserted that, in the end,
it will be China that wins the game (see Rudelson 1994). As a counter-balance to the political
and economic dominance o f the west, a huge and neighboring military power, and a critical
economic trading partner, China is a necessary ally to the present authoritarian leaders o f
former Soviet Central Asia. This is even recognized by many Kazakhstan citizens who are
deeply distrusting o f the Chinese but feel that this big neighbor must be m aintained as a
8 Uzbekistan’s inclusion in the alliance in 2001 was also significant in that it represented a re-orientation o f the
group’s joint interests to address the issues o f Muslim fundamentalism and terrorist activity in Central Asia.
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friend. For the Uyghurs on both sides o f the border in the Ili valley, however, C hina’s
increasing power in Central Asia diminishes their hopes o f establishing local support for the
establishm ent o f a sovereign state in their homeland. That being said, the new Great Game
for Central Asia is far from over and may actually only be intensifying given the United
States’ increased presence in the region since September 11, 2001.
Regardless o f what the future m ay hold, the New World Order and the Great Game
for Central A sia have thus far left the Uyghurs once again on the margins o f new political
configurations. While, as at other previous critical moments in history, the Uyghurs had
increased hope o f political empowerment with the opening up o f China and the fall o f the
Soviet Union, the results have once again been disappointing. These rising expectations and
dashed hopes have framed the production o f the stateless Uyghur nation on both sides o f the
border in the 1980s and 1990s. Before addressing how Uyghurs in the Ili valley construct
their nation without a state today, therefore, it is helpful to briefly describe in more detail how
the political situation o f the Uyghurs has evolved on both sides o f the border during the past
tw o decades.
6.3 The Political Position o f the Uvshurs in Xinjiang D urim the 1980s and the 1990s
If the 1980s were a time o f liberation for the Uyghurs and all peoples in China, the
1990s have been a period o f increasing political suppression and surveillance in Xinjiang.
W hile China continues to pursue its own road to reform, the Uyghurs have reaped limited
benefits from the changes in the country. In fact, despite increased contact with the rest o f the
world and the re-emergence o f a free market, Uyghurs in Xinjiang today m ay face more
intense political suppression relative to other peoples in China than at any point in the
twentieth century.
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intense political suppression relative to other peoples in China than at any point in the
twentieth century.
W ith the end o f the Cultural Revolution in China, the Uyghurs experienced incredible
cultural, political, and economic liberation throughout the 1980s. M osques, medresses, and
Uyghur language schools were re-opened, academic and popular presses returned to operation
and once again printed in Uyghur, the Arabic script was re-introduced for the Uyghur literary
language, and study abroad in the countries o f C hina’s M uslim allies was encouraged among
Uyghurs (see Gladney 1992).9 In addition, Uyghurs in Xinjiang were encouraged to partake
in private enterprise, and they responded by developing trade networks and opening scores o f
restaurants and small stores. In visiting Xinjiang in January 1990, for example, I noticed that
the economic and religious freedom o f Uyghurs in China was far more pronounced than
among the M uslims o f Soviet Central Asia. At the same time, I noticed that the history o f
underdevelopm ent in Xinjiang had left the Uyghurs on the Chinese side o f the border as a
whole far poorer and less educated than their Soviet relatives.
The rising expectations o f new found freedom and exposure to the outside world
coupled with the continued poverty o f the majority o f Uyghurs in Xinjiang also reawakened
this com m unity’s political aims o f increased independence and/or sovereignty. As early as
1985, Uyghur students in Urumchi held a mass protest against the Chinese governm ent’s
testing o f nuclear weapons in Xinjiang, setting out several demands for reform that touched
upon num erous other policies affecting minorities (Syroezhkin 1997:209). This was followed
by more Uyghur protests in the spring o f 1989 on the heels o f the large Chinese student
9 According to official statistics, there were 665 boarding religious schools, 7081 religious teachers (Talip), and
17,540 mosques in southern Xinjiang alone in 1989 [Zhang (1994) 1998:12]. In addition, while the PRC was
interested in using more eastern Muslim areas such as Gansu and N ingxia in the promotion o f their ties with
M uslim countries in the m id-1980s, the Saudis, Pakistan, and other Muslim countries have shown more interest in
Xinjiang, inviting many Xinjiang students to study in their countries (Dillon 1995:13).
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demonstrations in Tiananmen Square, which also had a Uyghur among its organizers.1 0 In
Spring o f 1989, Uyghurs and Hui (Dungans) organized demonstrations in both Urum chi and
Beijing to protest the publication in China o f a book called Sexual Customs, which M uslims
felt denigrated their religion (see Gladney 1991:1-7; Am nesty 1992:2; Syroezhkin 1997:209).
While both in 1985 and in 1989, these demonstrations were apparently dispersed without
violence, authorities in Beijing and Urumchi evidently were concerned about the continuation
o f such public displays o f dissent.1 1
As a result, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) began gradually m onitoring the
growth o f freedom in Xinjiang. In 1988, authorities arrested a Xinjiang Kazakh w riter and
poet named Kajikhum ar Shabdan for alleged “links to a nationalist political group” in what
was then the Kazakhstan Soviet Socialist Republic (Amnesty 1992:7). Likewise, in the fall
and winter o f 1989, the PRC began a general crackdown on religious and nationalist activity
in Xinjiang. This campaign appears to have been most forcefully carried out in the border
regions o f the XUAR, the Ili valley included. In Kuldja, several students who took part in a
religious festival were reportedly denied entrance to university for this reason in 1989, and
num erous Uyghurs from the city were arrested in December o f that year as alleged “spies
scheming to help Xinjiang residents to flee abroad” (Amnesty 1992:2).
In the K ashgar area, near Xinjiang’s southern borders with the Soviet Union, Pakistan,
and Afghanistan, this crackdown on religious freedom was as strongly adm inistered as in the
Kudja area, but in this case it met with sharp and public resistance. In Baren county south o f
Kashgar in April 1990, the closing o f a local mosque before a religious holiday led to
1 0 One o f the main student organizers o f the Tiananmen Square protests was a Uyghur named Kurash, or Wuer
Kaixi (his more well-known Chinese name). Kurash has since fled China for the U.S. and is among those student
leaders o f the protest who periodically make statements for the movement.
1 1 According to Amnesty International, however, a number o f Uyghurs were detained after the 1989 demonstrations
in Urumchi, and their whereabouts are not known (Am nesty 1992:2).
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demonstrations organized in rural mosques that demanded more religious freedom from the
CCP (Amnesty 1992:3). W hile local sources have stated that this was m erely a peaceful
popular protest concerning religion that turned violent when security forces tried to shut it
down, Chinese authorities called it a “counter-revolutionary rebellion” {Amnesty 1992:3).
According to one official government source, the Baren incident was initiated by an Eastern
Turkestan Islamic Party, which “incited religious m ania and, under the flag o f ‘Islamic Jihad,’
encouraged, deceived, and coerced masses to join the riot” [Zhang (1994) 1998:8], Given the
limited access o f foreigners to Xinjiang at this time, however, the details o f what happened in
Baren both during and after the riot are unknown.1 2 Regardless o f the facts surrounding the
actual incident, it was to have a lasting affect on freedoms in Xinjiang more generally in the
immediate future.
In Septem ber 1990, Xinjiang authorities instituted new regulations for M uslim clergy
in the region as a result o f the events in Baren, stipulating that they m ust “support the
leadership o f the CCP and oppose national separatism” and that they must receive licenses
from state-sponsored religious organs in order to work in mosques {Amnesty 1992:5).1 3 This
act was vital to the C C P’s control over religion in Xinjiang, and it led to the designation o f
legal and illegal religious activity, an official discourse on religious observance in Xinjiang
that continues to this day. Almost immediately following the adoption o f these new
regulations, the government in Xinjiang began investigating all religious institutions and
1 2 Official Chinese government sources state that a total o f 22 people were killed, including 7 security officers, but
unofficial sources have said that as many as 50 protesters had been killed {Amnesty 1992:3). Likewise, while
official Chinese sources state that slightly over 200 local people were detained for suspicion o f involvem ent in the
demonstrations, unofficial sources say that hundreds were detained in Baren alone and over a thousand more from
elsewhere in Xinjiang (Am nesty 1992:4).
1 3 In addition, all Muslim clergy must undergo a yearly review by the local Religious Affairs Department in order
to renew their credentials (Am nesty 1992:5).
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clergy in the XUAR. As a result, a large number o f Xinjiang’s M uslim clerics were censured,
and many mosques, maktaps, and medresses were closed.
At the same time, the authorities in Xinjiang began looking more closely at official
Uyghur secular publications to determine if these were also contributing to a rise in Uyghur
nationalism. In doing so, the Party in Xinjiang targeted one book in particular for severe
criticism— The Uyghurs (Uyghurlar) by Turgun Almas, a professor at Xinjiang U niversity
(see figure 11.4). The Uyghurs, which Almas published in 1989, was a popular history o f
Eastern Turkestan that portrays the Uyghurs as the region’s indigenous population. W hile the
book can legitimately be criticized for its poor documentation and tendency to ignore the
diversity o f the region’s population historically, it was attacked as something m uch greater— a
political tool for an organized Uyghur nationalist movement intent upon splitting Xinjiang o ff
from the rest o f China. As a result, the book was banned and severely criticized in academic
and popular publications throughout 1991 (see Amnesty 1992:10). According to one professor
from Xinjiang University with whom I spoke, several study meetings were also held in which,
sim ilar to the kurash o f the Cultural Revolution, academics in Xinjiang were asked to publicly
condemn the book and its author. After the banning o f the book, Turgun Almas was held
under house arrest in Urumchi until his death last year (see Amnesty 1992:10, 1999:9).
If the CCP began to m onitor and restrict the freedoms being offered to Xinjiang
Uyghurs in 1989, its desire to control these freedoms has dominated official Chinese policy in
Xinjiang for the entire 1990s and into the present. A 1994 essay published in a source
available only to PRC Party cadres outlines the Party’s great fear o f the Uyghur separatist
movement, which it views as highly organized and behind all local dissatisfaction with
Chinese rule in the region. As the author o f this essay restates the governm ent’s aggressive
strategy to eradicate this alleged separatist movement in the 1990s, “prom pt military
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suppression and political dissolution measures must be taken to quickly destroy it” [Zhang
(1994) 1998:24], As a result o f this strategy, China’s nation-wide strike hard campaign to
attack crime that began in 1996 has taken on political characteristics in Xinjiang where it has
been used extensively to arrest and punish alleged Uyghur nationalists.
In general, therefore, the first half o f the 1990s have spawned a continual increase in
government oversight o f local Uyghur institutions and publications, a massive increase in the
arrest, imprisonment, and execution o f alleged Uyghur nationalists, and extensive governm ent
m onitoring o f Uyghur religious behavior. These harsh measures undertaken by the CCP to
suppress local nationalist movements in Xinjiang, however, have also served to further fuel
Uyghur resistance to Chinese domination. Throughout the 1990s, there were reported cases o f
Uyghur nationalists challenging Chinese rule in the region by both peaceful and violent
means, m ostly in response to government efforts to restrict Uyghurs’ freedom. In the south o f
Xinjiang, the most notable o f these incidents ended in violence: the bombing o f a hotel in
Kashgar in 1991 (see Syroezhkin 1997:209) and a mass violent disturbance in Khotan in 1995
(sq q Amnesty 1999:9-12).1 4 In the Kuldja area, however, resistance was more subtle, at least
until the violent clashes between Uyghurs and government security forces in February 1997.
One o f the most important factors in the rise o f resistance to Chinese rule in Kuldja
has been the cross-border trade with Kazakhstan. As anthropologist Jay Dautcher points out
in his dissertation, which is a comprehensive ethnographic study o f Uyghur com m unities in
Kuldja, the cross-border trade brought an important source o f wealth to the Uyghurs o f the
city (Dautcher 1999:22-29). W ith this wealth, many traders attempted to raise their esteem in
the community by contributing to the construction o f local mosques and other neighborhood
1 4 The disturbance in Khotan reportedly began as a peaceful protest against the removal o f the Imam o f the city’s
largest mosque. After local authorities ignored the demands o f the protesters, several o f the protesting Uyghurs
apparently occupied parts o f the local administration building. When security forces arrived, the protest turned into
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266
improvements as well as by promoting Uyghur cultural events in the city. W hile these
projects were not themselves acts o f resistance to Chinese rule, they served to raise Uyghur
national consciousness in Kuldja, and this consciousness was to be instrumental in the local
population’s defiance o f Chinese authorities.
In addition to the wealth gathered through the trade, cross-border merchants in Kuldja
gained access to the outside world. N ot only did they travel to Kazakhstan, but in the late
1980s and early 1990s many also went to Russia, Eastern Europe, and Turkey to trade. One
trader from Kuldja, for example, recounted to me that he had traded in Romania, Bulgaria, and
Turkey in 1989 and had witnessed the collapse o f communism in Eastern Europe first hand
while also living in a mostly M uslim non-socialist state for the first time. These experiences
left a lasting impression on him about the possibilities for change in Xinjiang.
W hile not all traders had such dramatic experiences abroad, they all did experience
life under different conditions than they had previously, raising their expectations o f the
potential to change their own world. In one popular essay written by a Uyghur trader from
Xinjiang, the author portrays areas outside Xinjiang, and Turkey in particular, as clean and
civilized in contrast to the poor and unclean conditions o f his homeland. He ends his essay
with obvious self-deprecation by calling for the Uyghurs to improve them selves and their
hom eland so as to be on par with the rest o f the world:
At the beginning o f the 90s, we were welcomed warmly with open arms,
hugged, kissed, and praised highly by the people o f the Commonwealth o f
Independent States..., and in two years we spread our bad smells, forcing them
to run away from us in boredom. It is clear that with those qualities o f ours we
will rot away everywhere in the world in the near future. L et’s not do that, and
let’s cleanse ourselves.... [and] become real human beings fit for the era [in
which we live] (Omar 1993:40).
a violent conflict, and several people died. See Amnesty International’s report on this incident for a more detailed
account (Amnesty 1999:12-14).
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267
W hile this essay avoids making any controversial political statements, it is evident that the
author’s understanding o f clean and civilized is largely reflected in a discourse about wealth
and poverty, suggesting that a more prosperous and empowered Uyghur com m unity in
Xinjiang would be cleaner and more civilized. W ith sentiments like this widespread, it is not
surprising that the new merchant middle class o f Uyghurs in Kuldja became more politically
engaged in the late 1980s. This was even more the case after 1991, when Uyghurs witnessed
the fall o f the Soviet Union and the declarations o f independence by the former Soviet Central
Asian states. As numerous Uyghurs told me when I visited Kuldja in 1994, “there is a
Kazakhstan, a Kyrgystan, a Turkmenistan, and a Tajikistan, why should there not be a
Uyghurstan?”
W hile not true across the board, many Uyghurs from Kuldja found their path towards
self-improvement and resistance to Chinese rule in the rediscovery o f their own religion. This
rediscovery was largely facilitated by their peers who had studied in m edresses in M uslim
states during the 1980s and early 1990s. As one trader from Kuldja told me, Islam provided
them the discipline to improve themselves and their community while also offering the
Uyghurs as a people a means o f unity in opposition to Han Chinese encroachment into their
region. It was these factors coupled with an increasing alcohol and drug abuse problem
among young men in Kuldja that led to the mashrap youth movement in the city during the
mid-1990s.
This movement began in 1994 when a group o f young Uyghur intellectuals, traders,
and students o f Islam m et in Kuldja to discuss “the fate o f their people and nation” (Om ar
1997:6). The primary focus o f their concern was the recent rise in drug and alcohol abuse in
the city’s Uyghur neighborhoods. In response to this problem, the merchants in the group
began sponsoring mashraps, which were based on the descriptions o f elders and promoted
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268
M uslim values but also took on their own form to address the problems o f drug addiction and
alcoholism .1 5 The movement soon gained extensive public support in the Ili valley as it spread
from K uldja’s Dong mahallisi to other neighborhoods and even local villages.
W ith some 10,000 Uyghur youth participating in the mashraps at the peak o f the
movement, their merchant sponsors also began funding youth soccer games between different
mashrap groups in K uldja’s neighborhoods as a means to promote healthy recreation (Om ar
1997:6). In August o f 1995, the organizers and sponsors o f this movem ent planned the First
Annual Football Tournament o f Mashrap Youth to be held at K uldja’s central stadium, but
they were refused permission to hold the tournament by the local administration. As a result,
supporters o f the mashrap movem ent held a small protest, which was in turn forcibly
dispersed by security forces. Soon after, the local administration called an end to all
mashraps, stating that they had been used to incite nationalist activity.
The suppression o f the peaceful and constructive mashrap movement, in turn, led to
further tension between Uyghurs and Han Chinese in Kuldja, which exploded in February
1997. On February 5, 1997, many o f the same Uyghur youth that had participated in the
mashraps two years earlier staged a large protest in the streets of K uldja calling for religious
freedom and equal treatment for Uyghurs. According to Amnesty International, the protest
itself appears to have taken place without violence, but riots erupted throughout the city after
300-500 protesters and bystanders were arrested (Amnesty 1999:14) (see figures 11.1 and
11.2). W hile several people were killed in these clashes, the significance o f the Kuldja events
o f 1997 has mostly been reflected in even more restrictive government policies that have been
enacted since throughout Xinjiang. Among other things, a review o f international new spaper
1 5 According to one participant, the general structure was four hours long and included an hour o f eating and
informal chatting, an hour o f “religious and scientific” information sharing on the dangers o f alcohol and narcotics,
an hour o f jokes and music, and an hour devoted to the game giilchay where the members o f the m ashrap,
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269
articles between 1997 and 2000 indicate that the Chinese government executed at least 114
Uyghurs and sentenced to prison scores more during these three years, prim arily for separatist
activities linked to the Kuldja riot and its afterm ath.1 6
The Chinese government’s extreme response to the events in Kuldja was, in part, due
to the death o f Deng Xiaopeng and several small explosions in Urumchi and Beijing, all o f
which transpired in the weeks following the Kuldja riot. Fearing that an actual organized
resistance movem ent might be emerging in Xinjiang, the Chinese government instituted even
stricter control o f religious activity and actively sought out the roots o f the Uyghur nationalist
movement. In visiting Xinjiang in the summer o f 1997,1 found the Uyghurs living there to be
a people under siege. Party slogans were written in Uyghur on the walls o f mahallas in all
urban areas, proclaiming “Destroy the splittists o f the m otherland!” and “Crush illegal
religious organizations!” (see figures 11.5 and 11.6). As a traveler who spoke Uyghur, I was
also under constant surveillance and was questioned by security officials in three separate
Illustrations 17: The Kuldja “Riots” in February of 1994
Illustration 17.1: Uyghur protesters
in Kuldja February 5, 1997 (from
video of demonstrations).
Illustration 17.2: Uyghur protesters
showdown with Chinese security forces in
Kuldja February 5, 1997 (from same video).
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270
cities.1 7 W hile several Uyghurs did approach me to voice their concerns about the political
situation, they did so with great fear and in the strictest secrecy.
Illustrations 18: Chinese Communist Party’s Propaganda Campaign Against Uyghur
“Separatists” and for the Unity of the Peoples in the Late 1990s
\rv
\ \
V
\
\
"V
1 h
Illustration 18.1: Uyghurs stand by an anti
nationalist slogan stating "Expose once and for
all the reactionary supporters of the nationalist
splittists!” Uyghur neighborhood in Kucha,
Xinjiang, 1997 (author's photo)
Illustration 18.2: A Billboard in Khotan
promoting harmony between nationalities
and portraying Mao Zedong, Deng
Xiaopeng, and Zhang Zeming, 2000 (author's
photo).
One o f the most visible markers o f this crackdown, with the exception o f the rise in
executions, was the arrest of a prominent Uyghur businesswoman who had once been hailed
as an exemplary model for the success o f minorities in China. Rabiya Qadir had become a
m illionaire through her early involvement in the cross-border trade between Xinjiang and the
former Soviet Union. As a result, she had built a large department store in the heart o f the
Uyghur section o f Urumchi and had been elected to the People’s Advisory Board to the
1 6 The Uyghur American Association has compiled articles on executions in Xinjiang from the international press
for these years and has re-posted them on the internet at http://www.uygur.org/enorg/reports99/990407.htm.
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271
Parliam ent o f the PRC. After appearing in a front-page column in the W all Street Journal,
Rabiya was even personally visited in Urumchi by Bill Gates and W arren Buffet, who
apparently had been inspired by her story (see illustration 19.2).
Illustrations 19: Prominent Outspoken Uyghurs Silenced in Xinjiang in the 1990s
* % r ,'
■ aiR
Illustration 19.1: Turgun Almas,
under house rest from 1989 until his
death in 2001 (from a Kazakhstan
re-print of Uyghurlar, 1992).
Illustration 19.2: Rabiya Kadr (far right) with Bill
Gates and Wife in Urumchi in 1994. She was placed
under house arrest shortly after and sentenced to 8 years
in prison in March of 2000 for giving “state secrets” to
foreigners [Tangritagh, 1997 (2)].
Due to the vocal stance o f her husband, who is a prom inent Uyghur w riter now in
exile in the United States, and her charitable support o f families in Kuldja who had lost
members during and after the 1997 riots, she was placed under house arrest in 1997 and
stripped o f her position on the People’s Advisory Board to China’s Parliam ent (see BBC, 12
M arch 1998).1 8 Furthermore, in August 1999, she was arrested in route to m eet with a
1 7 In Kashgar, one Uyghur who called him self Elvis (presumably an undercover security agent) even approached
me and told me that if I did not want to be hurt or for any local people to get in trouble, I should not speak to any
Uyghurs.
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272
Congressional research team from the United States that was examining human rights abuses
in Xinjiang. Subsequently, she was sentenced to 8 years in prison in M arch 2000 for allegedly
planning to hand over state secrets to a foreign state (U.S. Congress 2000).1 9 These events are
significant because they indicate that the Chinese government will not tolerate any dissent
from Uyghurs, even from prominent figures, who have enjoyed the praise o f the Party.
If the Uyghurs were already facing intense suppression under the governm ent’s
campaign to eradicate separatism at the beginning o f the twenty-first century, after 11
Septem ber 2001, this suppression has only intensified. Despite Am erican statements
announcing that Uyghur separatists should not be targeted as part o f the w ar on terrorism (see
Reuters, 11 Dec. 2001), the PRC government took advantage of the new global attitude
towards underground M uslim political groups to intensify its attacks on Uyghur nationalists.
Furthermore, the fact that the United States had captured a few Uyghur prisoners am ong the
soldiers fighting with the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in Afghanistan helped to substantiate the
Chinese governm ent’s case (see Reuters, 6 Dec. 2 001).2 0 As a result, in the last few months o f
2001 and the beginning o f 2002, the Chinese government has further limited religious activity
in Xinjiang, has forced M uslim clergy to once again go through re-education classes, and has
moved to further censor any cultural materials that could be contrived as supporting Uyghur
nationalism (see AFP, 12 Jan. 2002; BBC Mon., 12 Jan. 2002; Reuters, 17 Jan. 2002; AFP, 18
Jan. 2002). In addition, the Chinese state has mobilized anti-terrorism units o f its army in
Xinjiang (see Lam 2002) and has passed new legislation on terrorism that is expected to be
1 8 I met Rabiya in Urumchi in the summer o f 1997 at her department store. She told me that she was not allow ed to
leave Xinjiang and was under constant surveillance.
1 9 Reportedly, the state secrets she was going to give to the research team were locally published public newspaper
clippings.
20 Johnathan Lipman, a historian o f Islam in China, has monitored information released about these captures in the
press and estimates the total number o f Uyghurs discovered fighting with the Taliban and Al-Qaeda to be eleven
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273
used to increase the punishments given to Uyghur nationalists {AFP, 17 Dec. 2001; Reuters,
29 Dec. 2001). Although the United Nations Commissioner for Human Rights, M ary
Robinson, has warned Beijing to not use the global war on terrorism as an excuse to ignore the
human rights o f Uyghurs, no international body has taken any serious steps to prevent such
abuses (see Page 2001).
6.4 The Political Position o f the Uvshurs in Kazakhstan During the Late 1980s and
the 1990s
While the Uyghurs o f Kazakhstan have not suffered the political repression o f their
relatives in Xinjiang in recent years, they also experienced rising expectations and dashed
hopes in the late 1980s and the 1990s. For the Uyghurs o f Kazakhstan, a series o f events
raised hopes for change beginning with Perestroika and Glasnost’ and followed by the
opening o f the Sino-Soviet border and the fall o f the Soviet Union. As in Xinjiang, however,
events in the 1990s have largely proven disappointing politically for K azakhstan’s Uyghurs
who have once again found themselves to be marginal to the global processes taking place
around them and without recognition as a sovereign nation.
For the Uyghurs o f Kazakhstan, expectations o f a better life entailing more political
representation and economic power were already raised during Perestroika. During this time
o f reform in the Soviet Union, however, the hopes for the future o f the Uyghurs o f Kazakhstan
concentrated on changes within Kazakhstan itself. These rising expectations for change and
their limits are best exemplified in the work o f a prominent Uyghur historian in Kazakhstan
named M alik Kabirov, who in 1987 wrote a book entitled The Uyghurs: The Autochthonous
People of Semirech’e (Kabirov 1987). This book, which the author felt would “tell the truth
(personal communication). It should also be noted that the United States has refused to extradite these prisoners to
China despite official requests from the PRC government (see Reuters, 11 Dec. 2001).
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274
once and for all in the spirit o f Glasnost ’ ,”2 1 argued that the Uyghurs were in fact the
indigenous population o f Sem irech’e. On the basis o f this assertion, the book also argued for
the establishm ent o f a Uyghur autonomous region within Kazakhstan like that once proposed
in the 1940s.2 2 Unfortunately for Kabirov, other scholars in Kazakhstan, and particularly a
growing group o f Kazakh nationalist historians, did not agree with his point o f view.2 3 As a
result, the book was never published, and the Republic’s Party Central Com mittee censured
Kabirov for nationalist subjectivity. As one o f K abirov’s colleagues wrote in a docum ent to
the Central Committee condemning the work:
It [the manuscript] is directed not towards internationalist education, but
towards aggravating national relations— creating a distorted image o f the
interrelationship between Uyghurs and Kazakhs. The m anuscript is
characteristic o f ethnocentrism and the tendency to misuse existing sources to
only present the significance o f one’ s own nationality. In the place o f
promoting the realization o f ju st relations between Uyghurs and other peoples,
the author attempts to sow discord and distrust and to humiliate the national
dignity o f people (Romanov 1987:17).
This event is particularly important because it was a turning point in Uyghur political
aspirations in Kazakhstan that reflects the changing nature o f the Ili U yghurs’ engagem ent
with the world system in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Following the censure o f Kabirov,
the Uyghur com m unity in Kazakhstan as a whole gradually avoided making any further claims
to land that belonged to Kazakhstan and turned its political attention increasingly tow ards the
2 1 This quotation is from an nterview with author in 1994. A s an established historian since the 1950s, Kabirov had
long exem plified Soviet Uyghur scholarship and supported the pro p er Soviet interpretation o f the history o f his
people. With the advent o f perestroika and g la sn o st’ , he felt the need to make a political statement for his people.
22 Simultaneously, Kabirov sent a letter to Mikhail Gorbachev asking him to consider the idea o f establishing a
Uyghur Autonomous Oblast’ in Kazakhstan. While I have seen the text o f this letter, I do not know if the author
ever received a reply.
23 It should be noted that Kazakh nationalism was a strong force in society when Kabirov had submitted his book
for publication. Less than a year earlier in December 1986, the brutal suppression o f a Kazakh nationalist student
demonstration protesting the replacement o f Kazakh with a Russian in the position o f first secretary o f the
communist party had intensified Kazakh nationalist feelings. At this time, many Uyghurs already felt
uncomfortable about their position in Kazakhstan. A s one told me, Kazakhs at this time often said, “send the
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275
question o f sovereignty in Xinjiang.2 4 This change in direction was a product o f the particular
historical moment in which the border between Kazakhstan and China had opened up and the
Uyghurs o f the Ili valley had transformed from a separated nation into a new ly unified and
transnational one.2 5 It was also part o f a larger process o f re-negotiating the Uyghur nation in
Almaty in the 1990s as this city’s Uyghur population began to look more like a m icrocosm o f
the larger Uyghur transnational nation.
W hile some o f Kazakhstan’s Uyghurs, particularly those exiles who had come to the
Soviet Union in the 1950s and 1960s, had long advocated for political changes in Xinjiang,
their activities were largely controlled by the Soviet state. Since the Sino-Soviet split, those
Uyghurs in Kazakhstan involved in political advocacy for sovereignty in Xinjiang had been
m ostly represented by a single organization that was run by Uyghurs who had left China in the
1950s and 1960s and that was most likely supported by Soviet security organs.2 6 The M arxist-
Leninist orientation o f the organization, which was founded in the 1970s, is evident even from
its name— The United Eastern Turkestan Revolutionary Front. In the later years o f
Perestroika, however, the range o f Uyghurs involved in such political advocacy for
sovereignty in Xinjiang and the institutions available to them increased significantly.
Russians to R ’zan’, the Tatars to Kazan, and the Uyghurs to Xinjiang.” In this context, Kabirov’s book was all the
more unwelcome.
24 Various Uyghurs expressed mixed feelings about the Kabirov affair. While many noted that he was indeed right
in his arguments, most people with whom I talked about the affair also remember being ridiculed by Kazakh
friends for Kabirov’s book. In general, therefore, many Uyghurs in Kazakhstan appear to have been embarrassed
by it.
25 Already in 1990, before the fall o f the U.S.S.R., a group o f young Uyghurs who had been born in the Soviet
Union traveled from Almaty to Tashkent to meet with me. On hearing that I was studying their people, they
wanted me to pass a document from the Almaty Uyghurs to the United States government and the United Nations
condemning the treatment o f Uyghurs in China. The change in the community’s political advocacy had already
taken place.
26 While there is no “smoking gun” showing the KGB’s involvement with this organization, the evidence is fairly
clear. During the 1970s, a time when little dissent was tolerated in the U.S.S.R., this organization was printing
leaflets and distributing them both in the Soviet Union and abroad. Furthermore, the organization’s leader was not
only not harassed for his involvement in this underground organization, but he even had even received a
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276
During Perestroika, the Communist Party promoted the founding o f national cultural
centers for m inorities like the Uyghurs throughout the Soviet Union. The Uyghurs o f
Kazakhstan quickly embraced this opportunity and established the Uyghur Cultural Centers o f
Almaty, Panfdov (Jarkent), Taldikurgan, Kaskelen, and Talgar between 1989 and 1991
(Khojamberdi 2001:234). W ith the fall o f the Soviet Union, these centers and others in
Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan worked together in 1992 to establish the Inter-
Governmental Association o f Uyghurs, based in Almaty, Kazakhstan, as a means o f uniting
Uyghurs now living in different states within Central A sia (Khojamberdi 2001:235). In the
turm oil o f the fall o f the U.S.S.R., these different organizations were to become im portant to
the Uyghurs o f Central Asia as a means for political organization. At the same time, the
establishm ent o f Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Turkm enistan as
independent states began to provoke an increased interest among all Uyghurs o f Kazakhstan in
the establishm ent o f an independent Uyghur state in China.2 7
The Kazakhstan Uyghurs’ new political focus on Xinjiang is evident in the activities
o f the Inter-Governmental Association o f Uyghurs during the years im mediately following
K azakhstan’s independence. W hile the Association also undertook projects to support Uyghur
cultural institutions in Central Asia, the majority o f events it has sponsored since 1992 have
been related to re-evaluating the history o f the U yghurs’ struggle for independence in China
and advocating peacefully for sovereignty in Xinjiang (see Khojamberi 2001:239-249).
Parallel to the work o f this Association, many o f the Uyghurs who had amassed capital from
particularly good apartment and was able to send his son to journalism school in M oscow, opportunities not offered
to most Uyghurs who had com e from China in the 1950s and 1960s.
27 As early as 1990, a group o f yerlik Uyghur youth from Kazakhstan approached me in Tasheknt where I was
studying and asked me to carry a letter for them to the United Nations. The letter requested the United Nations to
recognize the human rights abuses o f the Chinese government in Xinjiang and the right o f the Uyghurs in China to
sovereignty.
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277
the cross-border trade began sponsoring the publishing o f books and the organizing o f
conferences on the history o f the Uyghurs and Xinjiang.
At the same time that the Inter-Governmental Association o f Uyghurs was established
in 1992, a group o f Uyghurs in Kazakhstan also created another, more overtly political
organization— The Uyghurs tan Freedom Organization (Uyghurstan Azatliq Tashkilati-UAT).
In all likelihood, this has been the only Uyghur nationalist organization in post-Soviet
Kazakhstan that is entirely independent o f the government. If The United Eastern Turkestan
Revolutionary Front appears to have had ties to security organs even after the fall o f the
U.S.S.R., the Inter-Governmental Association o f Uyghurs has kept tacit relations w ith the
government to ensure that it can operate without problems. In contrast, the UAT is a
grassroots organization that is adamant about its independence from the government.
Furthermore, the UAT publicly has published accounts o f its encounters with K azakhstan’s
KGB and M inistry for Internal Affairs (MVD) (see Vakhidov 1994:1). Faced with adversary
since its founding, however, the UAT has only been minimally effective in Kazakhstan.
Furthermore, in 1996, its founder, Ashir Vokhidii, was brutally beaten, likely by agents o f
K azakhstan’s security organs, and he died a year later. W hile the organization still exists to
some extent, it remains mostly a forum for political debate and lacks any substantial political
power.
The nature o f the Kazakhstan authorities’ engagement with the different Uyghur
nationalist groups in their country reflects the governm ent’s general approach to the Uyghur
problem. As already mentioned, for much o f the 1990s, the Kazakh government practiced a
large degree o f restraint with regards to Uyghur nationalists in their country. At the same
time, however, Kazakhstan authorities have always tried to keep any Uyghur nationalist
m ovem ent in their country under control. Like many trappings o f democracy in Kazakhstan,
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278
therefore, the U yghurs’ freedom to undertake political action has always been allowed only to
the degree that it does not affect Kazakhstan’s government negatively. Furtherm ore, as has
also already been mentioned, the Kazakhstan government has gradually limited its allotted
freedom for Uyghurs politically in recent years in an attempt to further court China as an ally
economically and politically. This situation has left the Uyghur com m unity in Kazakhstan
frustrated throughout the second half o f the 1990s.
6.5 Conclusions: The Limits ofUvehur Political Power in the New World Order
In general, therefore, the evolution o f a new world order in Central Asia has increased
Uyghur nationalist activity in both Xinjiang and Kazakhstan, but it has also ensured that these
activities have only limited success. China remains adamant about its stance that Xinjiang is
an integral part o f the PRC, and it has made sure through its international economic clout that
no external political interests support Uyghur claims to the contrary. Furthermore, while
Uyghurs on both sides o f the Kazakhstan-Chinese border have experienced unprecedented
freedoms o f expression in the last two decades, recent years have shown an increase in the
Kazakhstan and Chinese states’ crackdown on Uyghur separatists. Consequently, the Uyghurs
have found that in the new world order they remain politically m arginalized and stateless and
in the same position they have long occupied in the modern/colonial world system.
This being said, the new world order in Central Asia has created an environm ent
where Uyghur nationalism is not likely to be completely silenced. A certain degree o f the
freedoms o f expression given Uyghurs in the last two decades are irreversible in the context o f
our present neo-liberal world. Furthermore, the position o f Kazakhstan between the west,
China, Russia, and the M uslim world means that Uyghur nationalist political activities are
likely to continue in this country without complete state suppression for the foreseeable future.
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Given that the city o f Almaty in Kazakhstan is now also home to an increasing num ber o f
Uyghurs from Xinjiang and is located only 200 miles from the Chinese border, this city is
destined to play a central role in these nationalist politics. In fact, as the next chapter will
argue, the transnational character o f the Almaty Uyghur com m unity’s location and population
suggests that it has become one o f the most critical sites where the disparate parts o f this
stateless nation can all participate in its production. In this sense, it may be the final front in
the battle for Uyghur political representation.
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i
280
CHAPTER SEVEN— The “Tmnsnationalization”of Almaty’ s Uyghur Community:
A “Window” into and a “Doorway” out of Homeland
In the context o f the Great Game and the importance o f Chinese-Kazakhstan relations
in Central Asia, the Ili valley borderland, and the Kazakhstan city o f Alm aty in particular, has
become an important site for transnational processes that reach out to various places around
the world. One o f the many transnational processes underway in this city is the convening o f
the disparate parts o f the Uyghur stateless nation. In addition to the Uyghurs who have long
lived in Kazakhstan and those that came from China in the 1950s and 1960s, A lm aty is now
home to a growing number o f Uyghurs who have recently come to the city from China m ostly
to trade. For these Xinjiang Uyghurs, Almaty is doorway out of the turm oil in X injiang that
opens up to the rest o f the world. Furthermore, given this critical mass o f Uyghurs in the city
and the increased international access to Kazakhstan, Uyghur exiles from elsew here are in
close contact with A lm aty’s Uyghurs and often visit the city expressly to m eet with them. For
these exiles from abroad, A lm aty’s proximity to Xinjiang and its many Uyghur residents from
Xinjiang make this city a window into the hom eland from which they are exiled. As
simultaneously a window into and a doorway out o f the U yghurs’ homeland, Alm aty has
become one o f the m ost important transnational sites for the negotiation o f the Uyghur
stateless nation’s ideology, culture, and political agenda. This chapter examines the recent
importance o f Almaty to both the politics o f the new world order and the production o f a
stateless Uyghur nation. In doing so, it also provides a sketch of the different transnational
interest groups within the Uyghur nation that convene in Almaty today.
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7.1 Almaty. Kazakhstan: The Social Geography o f a Global Frontier City and Post-
Modern Social Space
In the Great Game for Central Asia, Almaty has emerged as one o f the m ost critical
sites for the interaction o f different global interest groups. First, and m ost obviously, the
Kazakhstan-China border in the Ili valley is the most traveled border between the region and
China, making the city o f Almaty in this borderland the most important location for the
Chinese engagem ent o f Central Asia and, by extension, the entire former Soviet Union.
Second, and equally important, Almaty has become the center of Am erican and European
economic and political engagement with Central Asia. The United States runs its foreign
assistance program for the entire region o f Central Asia from a central office in Almaty, and
numerous other American and European organizations and businesses have followed suit.
Third, given that Kazakhstan is the Central Asian country with the most ethnic Russians, the
Russian government and Russian businesses are active throughout the country, especially in
Almaty. Finally, M uslim countries have also shown a significant interest in the city where
they have sought not only business interests but also ideological influence through m issionary
work am ong its population, which m any foreign M uslims consider to be poorly informed
about its own religion.
In this context, while not significant in the grand scheme o f global capital, A lm aty has
become a m ultiple frontier city in the new world order. For the United States and Europe, it is
a frontier o f neo-liberalism and a testing ground for the primary assertion o f the global neo
liberal movem ent that posits that free markets will eventually spawn democracies, an
assum ption that informs these states’ engagement with both Kazakhstan and China.1 For
China, the city represents the central frontier post for the overland economic trade w ith the
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large m arket o f the former Soviet Union, where the low prices of Chinese goods appeal to an
impoverished population and where an economic advantage could translate into political
dominance throughout Eurasia. The Russians, by contrast, view Alm aty as part o f a retreating
frontier o f political control where they still desire extensive influence and fear counter
influence from abroad. Finally, among M uslims o f various countries, this city represents a
multiple cultural, ideological, and religious frontier where Islam meets the west, China, and
Russia.
In this sense, Alm aty is situated in a very different kind o f borderland today than it
was in the past. It is not only a border zone between two states, but it is also a borderland o f
the world system that reaches out for miles in different directions not only because o f its
territorial position but also due to its contentious place between various global economic,
political, and cultural interests. The many diaspora communities in the city further help to
create these long-distance transnational links between Alm aty and the rest o f the world. In
addition to the Uyghurs o f the city, who retain ties with China, there are numerous Koreans,
Turks, Kurds, Chechens, and others in Almaty who have re-established their ties with
homelands outside the region since the fall o f the Soviet Union.2 These m any different
transnational interests in Almaty make the city a site for the type o f borderland that Roger
Rouse has called a post-modern social space, and, in many ways, it effectively transcends the
nationalized spaces o f both China and Kazakhstan (see Rouse 1991).
1 Along these lines, the Ili valley borderland has become an important site for the promotion o f free trade, and both
the World Bank and the Asian Developm ent Bank (AD B) have assisted China and Kazakhstan in this border zone
to develop a regulated but free flow o f trade.
2 M ost o f these communities, including the Koreans, Kurds, Chechens, and Turks, were originally brought to
Kazakhstan by forced migration during the 1930s and 1940s. These re-settlements were part o f a political
campaign to secure the Soviet U nion’s border areas under Stalin, under which these nationalities were accused o f
harboring anti-Soviet ties with outside forces. For this reason, their transnational ties were mostly suppressed until
the fall o f the U.S.S.R.
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As a global frontier city and post-modern social space, Alm aty has become very
international. W hile Kazakhstan moved its capital to the city o f Aqmola (formerly
Tselenograd and presently Astana) in December 1997, Alm aty still remains the country’s
cultural and economic center. Furthermore, while it was originally assum ed that Tashkent in
Uzbekistan would become the center o f international presence in Central Asia, Alm aty must
now be viewed as the most important city in the entire region to the international com m unity.3
As of the year 2000, there were 43 international diplomatic missions, hundreds o f international
businesses and corporations, and dozens o f international organizations represented in Almaty.
For a city o f slightly over one million, it is now home to a staggering num ber o f foreigners.
International involvement in the economy permeates all sectors. A t one extreme, the
top five international accounting groups and several o f the top international law firms all have
offices in the city and keep busy with the large multi-national involvement in the oil sector.4
At the same time, the Korean company Samsung has opened a television factory in the city,
Coca-Cola has a bottling plant, and Phillip Morris runs the former state tobacco com pany from
Alm aty.5 In the sphere o f small business, Turkish and Chinese businessmen have opened up
restaurants and stores throughout the city. Finally, at the completely other end o f the
spectrum, the city is also home to a huge international wholesale bazaar, where m any foreign
shuttle traders, mostly from China, are among the salespeople and small businessmen from
throughout Central Asia, Russia and the Caucasus are the largest consumers.
3 This may change in the near future due to Uzbekistan’s assistance to the United States’ war in Afghanistan. To
p a y back the Uzbek government for its assistance, the United States is already m oving more presence to Tashkent.
Until the Uzbek Som is convertible, however, it is unlikely that Tashkent will becom e a center o f international
business.
4 According to Public Accounting Report, the top five accounting firms, all which have offices in Almaty, are:
Price Waterhouse, Deloite and Touche, KPMG, Ernst and Young, and Arthur Anderson
thttp://www.straffordDub.com/products/acDatlOO/). Several large international law firms also have offices in the
city including Baker and Mckenzie, White and Case, CMS Cameron McKenna, and Coudert Brothers.
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The rapid nature o f this infusion o f foreign capital, labor, and interest quickly has
altered the city from a classic example o f late Soviet modernist urban developm ent to an
outpost o f capitalist development on the extreme periphery o f a new global economy. As a
result, the landscape and social geography o f the city have changed completely. The first
floors o f old communal apartments and dormitories were gutted and m ade into storefronts
serving everything from small corner stores specializing in vodka and bread to Hugo Boss
retail boutiques. Form er Communist Party buildings were remodeled to accom m odate the
needs o f international corporations, organizations, and embassies.6 Old parks and open lots
became bustling bazaars for the re-sale o f foreign consumer products. Billboards and the
outside walls o f apartm ent buildings transformed from a forum for the propagation o f the
Party’s political aims to an advertising venue, and the giant images o f Lenin and M arx that
once graced the urban landscape were traded in for enormous portraits o f the M arlboro Man.
The privatization o f housing and the in-migration to the city from villages spawned a growing
homeless population and over-crowded the bedroom communities on the outskirts o f the city.
M any o f the other formerly undesirable neighborhoods o f private one-story homes on the
outskirts o f town were fitted with heating and plumbing and became new suburbs where the
emerging local elite and foreign business classes began building large m ulti-storied and
opulent houses. In short, it is a Soviet communist city retro-fitted to a post-Soviet capitalist
context.
In addition to these changes to the landscape and social geography o f the city,
A lm aty’s role as a global frontier city has also made it a place where rule o f law is usually
subordinate to m oney and power. The prime example o f this principle is the governm ent o f
5 A s o f January 2002, however, there was still no M cDonalds in Almaty.
6 A s example o f this phenomenon, the former office o f the city’s Communist Party is now the stockmarket, and
KPMG has its office in the philharmonic building
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Kazakhstan itself, the officials o f which have m ostly maintained their homes and M ercedes
automobiles in this former capital city. The President, Nursultan Nazerbaev, and his family
control not only the state, but also much o f the business interests and the m edia as w ell.7 This
fam ily and its associates have bankrolled their power grab with mass wealth accumulated
through documented bribe-taking from multi-national oil companies and other special interests
(see Hersh 2001). Outside governmental graft, Alm aty is also an important hub in the
international heroin trade (see M eier 1997). With Afghanistan overtaking the Golden Triangle
in opium production, Almaty serves as a critical link to drug distributors throughout Russia
and Europe. Furthermore, while little research has been done on the governm ent’s implication
in this trade, it is suspicious that most shipments o f heroin on route to points further west that
are confiscated by the country’s authorities are conspicuously small.
These extreme examples o f graft and crime are also replicated in daily street life.
Every significant business in the city requires support from organized crime, known popularly
as a krysha, or “roof.” Banks and the more affluent stores have guards armed with automatic
weapons, and many appear to serve as mere fronts for government/organized crim e money
laundering. Prostitution, drug dealing, and petty crime are rampant. Virtually any crime can
be resolved at the time o f arrest through a fine paid personally to the arresting officer. In
short, the city represents a new version o f the chaos usually associated with A m erica’s wild
west and other colonial outposts in the nineteenth century.
7.2 The E volution o f the Cross Border Trade with China, the A lm aty “Barakholka. ”
and the “Transnationalization” o f the U vshur Com m unity in A lm aty
Uyghur is an occupation, not a nationality
- Ethnic slur from Kazakhstan about Uyghurs ’propensity fo r trading
7 The daughter o f the President, Dariga Nazerbaeva, owns the most important television stations in the country and
controls the cable network.
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In the chaos of the new post-modern social space o f Almaty, the Uyghur com m unity
o f the city has also undergone a process o f intense transnationalization. The initial impetus
for this process in the Uyghur community emerged from its special relationship to the
Kazakhstan-China cross-border trade, a relationship that began as soon as the border between
China and the U.S.S.R. was opened in the mid-1980s.
W hen the border between China and the Soviet Union re-opened, Uyghurs from both
sides o f the border were allowed to travel to visit relatives. By this time, the economic
environment in China and the Soviet Union differed markedly. W hile China was already fully
in the process o f privatizing industries and fostering a free market, the U.S.S.R. was only
experim enting with the idea in the context o f Perestroika. Consequently, Uyghurs crossing
back and forth to visit relatives also found the opportunity to partake in a sem i-illict shuttle
trade in goods that profited o ff these economic differences. In the mid-1980s, there was still a
demand in Xinjiang for certain goods from the Soviet Union that were considered o f superior
quality, and there was a growing demand in the U.S.S.R. for Chinese-made electronics and
numerous other consumer products that were scarce on the Soviet side o f the border. W hile
m any o f these products that Uyghur travelers brought across the border at this time were for
personal consumption, others were intended for sale.
During Perestroika, there were a variety o f localities in the Soviet Union through
which to conduct the sale o f one’s excess belongings. In addition to state-run consignm ent
stores, or kommisionye magaziny, urban bazaars served as a central location for this nascent
commerce. In Almaty, one bazaar in particular took on this role— the Barakholka.8 The
Barakholka was located on the outskirts o f the city next to the largely Uyghur sovkhoz o f
8 The term Barakholka can roughly be translated as “flea market.” Literally, the term is derived from the Russian
word barakhlo, which means “junk.”
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Prigorodnyi. In an abandoned space adopted from a storage yard o f a neighboring truck
factory, the Barakholka was initially much like a flea market or swapmeet bazaar where, on
Saturdays and Sundays, people could buy and sell personal wares. Uyghurs, Dungans, and
others who had visited relatives in China often frequented this market at this tim e in order to
sell, w hat were at that time, scarce commercial items that they had brought from China. W hile
m any people in Alm aty got their first taste o f capitalist commercialism at the Barakholka
during Perestroika, this bazaar was destined to soon become something much larger.
Im m ediately with the fall o f the Soviet Union, the kind o f petty trade that Uyghurs
and others had conducted at the Barakholka in Almaty became fully legal. Consequently, the
Ili valley borderland quickly developed into one o f the primary thoroughfares for Chinese
consum er goods coming into Central Asia and traveling beyond to the rest o f the Soviet Union
and Eastern Europe. Initially, private citizens living on opposite sides o f the border were the
prime movers o f this trade, and due to their linguistic, cultural, and familial ties across
borders, Uyghurs became its dominant merchants. In 1991, the majority o f these Uyghur
traders were shuttled between Panfilov (Jarkent) and K uldja on one and four day tours that
handled all visa arrangements, travel, and accommodations (Zhao 1993:215). Large bazaars
were opened in both cities and a thriving border zone economy developed. In June 1992, the
opening o f rail service between Almaty and Urumchi further facilitated cross-border
movement, but it also took attention away from the border cities o f Jarkent and K uldja (Zhao
1993:210).9
9 The construction o f this railroad link was a project that had begun in the 1950s, but it had been discontinued due
to the Sino-Soviet split. A s a testimony to the suspicions that led to its discontinuance and that still remain among
people in Kazakhstan towards the Chinese, the tracks on each side o f the border are different gages. The train only
continues its trip after the border check once each wagon has been lifted and placed on new wheels. Presumably,
this drachonian measure is meant to prevent the railroad link from being used as a means o f military transport in the
event o f a conflict.
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W ith Almaty developing as the new center o f the cross-border trade, the Barakholka
was the obvious location o f choice for both wholesale and retail sales. As one Kazakhstan
scholar has noted, “the norm for the economic-trade partnership [between China and
Kazakhstan in the early 1990s] was on the level o f th e... Barakholka” (Syroezhkin
1997a: 109).1 0 N ot only had the Barakholka come to symbolize the economic relationship
between Kazakhstan and China, it soon also represented the state o f K azakhstan’s econom y in
transition. Among many former Soviet professionals, the Barakholka trade was one o f the
only available means to make a living in the new free market as they adjusted to the shock o f
the demise o f the Soviet planned economy. Indicative o f the importance o f the trade at the
Barakholka to the population o f Kazakhstan, one local official, when asked about progress in
the country’s economic reform in 1995, told an Almaty newspaper: “we do not have a m arket
economy; we have a Barakholka economy” (Bazilevskaia 1995:8).
W hile Uyghur traders from Kazakhstan would usually only spend a limited time in
China buying goods, Uyghurs from China tended to come to Kazakhstan for extended time
periods in order to set up business at the Barakholka. In most cases, they would establish their
trading business in partnership with Uyghur relatives from Kazakhstan w ith whom they
worked together to ensure both the delivery o f products from China and their sale in Almaty.
The m ost successful o f these partnerships were conducted without frequent cross-border
travel. The partner in the business who was from Xinjiang would m erely call his/her contacts
still on the Chinese side o f the border to request a certain quantity o f a particular product.
W ithin a short period o f time, a shipment o f that product would arrive at the Barakholka and
be ready for sale. The partners would then store their goods in the cargo container that served
1 0 Will Raczka notes that in 1996, the Kazakhstan-Chinese trade turnover was officially about 500 m illion U.S.
dollars, but the unofficial shuttle trade that is mostly not accounted in this figure likely doubles that figure (Raczka
1998:394-395).
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as both their storage space and their storefront at the bazaar.1 1 In m any cases, these shipments
o f goods across the border were even handled without the need to transfer capital across the
border. Instead, a contact in Xinjiang would collect money from people who were in debt to
others in Kazakhstan in order to purchase the goods, and the merchants in Kazakhstan would
pay o ff these debts to the various parties on his/her side o f the border as paym ent for the
goods.
This trade continued to expand during the early 1990s as did the Barakholka itself. As
a result, the bazaar quickly outgrew its original space in the abandoned truck stockyard and
expanded to occupy the adjacent grazing lands where the collective farm ’s cows once fed on
grass. At present, the bazaar stretches several miles on both sides o f a large thoroughfare road
that leads in and out o f the city to the north-west. W hile it is impossible to know how many
buyers and sellers frequent the bazaar each day, to say that the number is in excess o f 50,000
would not be an exaggeration.
Given the money involved in this Barakholka economy, however, it was not destined
to remain in the hands o f petty traders.1 2 W hile shuttle trade by private individuals continues
even today, by 1995 the Kazakhstan government had instituted a series o f regulations that
made it m ore difficult for small merchants to make a living on cross-border com m erce (See
Khliupin 1999:115-116; W eimer 2000).1 3 At the same time, local racketeers increasingly put
1 1 Literally thousands o f cargo containers line the rows o f the Barakholka. Traders must buy the container at a
price o f $2000-$l 5000 depending upon their location and pay a w eekly fee to the bazaar for use o f the space it
occupies. W hile there are also stalls at the bazaar where one is able to trade goods, the cargo containers are
preferred because they can be locked at night, eliminating the need to bring goods back and forth from on e’s home.
1 2 Indicative o f the money involved in the trade, by 1995, the w ife o f Kazakhstan’s president had even bought a
large sector o f the Barakholka bazaar in Almaty.
1 3 The m ost infamous o f these regulatory measures was taken with regard to Chinese beer from Xinjiang that had
com pletely taken over the local beer market in Almaty during 1994 due to its relative low price and high quality
(personal observation). Claiming that several Kazakhstan citizens had died from drinking beer brought over by
private traders, Chinese beer was first banned from import to Kazakhstan and later allowed only through official
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pressure on traders, and especially those from China, through the exacting o f protection
paym ents.1 4 As a result, since 1995 larger economic interests in both China and Kazakhstan
have gradually dominated the cross-border trade, and it has become more difficult to survive
as a private petty trader.
The Barakholka, however, remains a commercial center for Uyghurs from both sides
o f the border. Given the large number o f people visiting the bazaar daily, it has developed a
significant need for restaurants, a business that Uyghurs continue to dominate. Uyghurs,
therefore, own scores o f restaurants scattered throughout the bazaar, and m ost o f these
restaurants employ Uyghurs from Xinjiang as cooks. Furthermore, despite the com petitive
nature o f the trade at the Barakholka, Uyghurs from the XUAR have been able to lay claim to
at least one important commercial niche— the sale o f cheap polyester sweat suits, m ost o f
which are counterfeits o f Adidas, Reebok, and Nike models.
Due to the trade at the Barakholka and its related economy, therefore, literally
thousands o f Uyghurs from Xinjiang have come to live in Almaty for extended am ounts o f
time over the course o f the 1990s. A significant number o f these itinerant traders have also
found means to remain in Almaty either permanently or indefinitely. Those who have decided
to remain in the city have usually done so less for economic enrichment and more as a means
o f escaping the repressive politics o f the Chinese state in Xinjiang during the 1990s.
Furthermore, this group o f unofficial political refugees has been joined by others from
Xinjiang, including those who have stopped in Kazakhstan on route home after having studied
channels. A s a result, when it again appeared on the Almaty market, it was more expensive and no longer a threat
to companies producing beer locally.
1 4 In discussing the problem o f racketeers, one Uyghur from China told me that he could set up in a bazaar on the
former Soviet side o f the border and make money for a limited time. The protection payments, however, would
gradually increase and eventually make it impossible to make a profit. A s a result, this trader had m oved from the
barakholka in Almaty to K ashgar bazaar in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan and later to the hippodrom bazaar in Tashkent,
Uzbekistan. He eventually gave up on the cross-border trade entirely and opened a restaurant in Beijing.
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in medresses in other M uslim countries. Fearing the potential political difficulties they m ay
face in their hom eland upon return, these religious students from Xinjiang also seek to remain
in Kazakhstan as long as possible.
The cross-border trade, therefore, was the initial impetus for the developm ent o f an
entirely new group o f Uyghurs with Chinese citizenship in Almaty, but the extent o f this new
Uyghur population in the city is also related to the tenuous political situation in Xinjiang. As
noted above, therefore, for these Uyghurs Almaty represents a doorway out o f Xinjiang that
opens up to a w orld where political oppression is not a risk factor in everyday life. In
choosing to stay in Almaty as long as possible, this group has not only increased the
population o f the Alm aty Uyghur community, but it has also led to new cultural and political
negotiations within that community.
7.3 “Yerlik,” “ Kitailik,” and New “ Kitailik”: Renegotiating Uvshur Migration “Co-
Horts ” in Almaty
As noted in Chapter five, the arrival o f Xinjiang Uyghur immigrants in Kazakhstan
during the 1950s and 1960s caused significant discord in the Uyghur community. W hile this
discord had somewhat subsided when I arrived in Almaty in 1994, there rem ained a distinct
consciousness o f who was a local yerlik and who was an immigrant kitailik. At the same time,
however, the com m unity was also beginning to view this issue quite differently since there
was now a new group o f kitailik Uyghurs in the city. W hile this group was mostly made up o f
itinerant traders from Xinjiang, it also encompassed others including the religious students
mentioned above and a smaller number o f students from Xinjiang who had chosen to study in
Almaty.
W hile the experiences o f the Uyghurs o f Alm aty already varied significantly, m ost
found the newly arrived Uyghurs from China to be decidedly different from them selves. In
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general, both yerlik and immigrant Uyghurs in Almaty viewed the Uyghurs from Xinjiang as
backward, uncultured, and unclean, all those things that had originally been ascribed to the
immigrants when they came in the 1950s and 1960s. One Uyghur immigrant who had come
to Kazakhstan from China in 1961, for example, described the new kitailik from C hina to me
in the following manner:
They have a different life. W e are Soviet. We already live in the twentieth
century. They are behind us. Their ideas are only now starting to change.
They live poorly. They can’t live like us. We are behind Europe, but they are
behind us.
This statem ent was typical o f the perspective o f Uyghurs in Almaty towards the new kitailik
Uyghurs from China in the first half o f the 1990s. As in this statement, most Uyghurs in
Alm aty during this time used a modernist discourse o f civilized and uncivilized to explain the
differences between themselves and their relatives who came from China.
On the one hand, this made the yerlik and immigrant Uyghurs in Kazakhstan realize
how much they had in common with each other, leading to a reconciliation o f their
differences. On the other hand, it shifted the tension that once existed between these groups to
the dynamics between Kazakhstan’s Uyghurs and X injiang’s Uyghurs. As a sign o f this
transformation, by 1994, the former kitailik immigrants were mostly referred to as kochap
kegdn (“those who had m oved”) since the new Uyghur sojourners from Xinjiang had taken
over the label o f kitailik and many o f the stigma that had already been attached to this name.
On the other side o f the fence, so to speak, Uyghur itinerant traders from China were
shocked at much that they found in the Kazakhstan Uyghur community. W hile the Uyghurs
o f Kazakhstan became more knowledgeable o f Islam during the 1990s, the Uyghurs in
Xinjiang had been undergoing this process since the early 1980s. Furthermore, in Xinjiang,
the Uyghurs had never acculturated to Chinese culture to the same extent that the Soviet
Uyghurs, often referred to by the Xinjiang Uyghurs as sovietlik, had acculturated to Russian
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culture. In this context, the new Uyghur migrants from Xinjiang were shocked at the vodka
drinking and other incidents o f disregard for M uslim practices that were common am ong
A lm aty’s Uyghurs as well as at the poor state o f Uyghur culture and language in this
community. In private among other Uyghurs from China, these new migrants would
frequently ridicule and joke about these habits o f the Kazakhstan, or sovietlik, Uyghurs.
One popular joke among Uyghur traders from Xinjiang was about Uyghur traders
from Alm aty eating together in a restaurant in Kuldja. Sitting together, one asks the other
where he is from, using a mixture o f Uyghur and Russian languages. The answer is
Kazakhstan, and the other one says he is also from Kazakhstan. They drink a shot o f vodka
together to celebrate. One then asks the other where he lives in Kazakhstan. The answer for
both is Almaty, and they drink another shot to celebrate. This continues to the level of
neighborhood, street, and house number until the two realize that they live in the same house
and are brothers, a revelation which brings about another toast. In addition to ridiculing the
habits o f drinking among Alm aty’s Uyghurs, this joke also criticizes the Kazakhstan U yghurs’
poor understanding o f their own language and their lack o f zhut and family attachments. This
seemingly harmless joke, therefore, is a scathing indictment o f Alm aty’s Uyghur cultural
practices that reflected the feelings o f m any Uyghur sojourners from China towards their hosts
in Almaty during the early 1990s.
In general, therefore, the interaction between K azakhstan’s Uyghurs and X injiang’s
Uyghurs in Almaty during the early 1990s reflected conflicting concepts o f symbolic capital
that were the products of the two groups’ divergent backgrounds. M ost Uyghurs in
Kazakhstan had been raised on Soviet modernist ideals that identified one’s symbolic capital
in terms o f one’s education in science and rejection o f superstition. M ost Uyghurs in
Xinjiang, however, had retained a concept o f symbolic capital based in the values o f Islam,
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familial duties, and zhutdarchilik. Furthermore, while m ost Xinjiang Uyghurs allotted
symbolic capital to successful merchants who demonstrated a mastery o f trade, in Kazakhstan
the Soviet era stigma attached to trading as spekulatsiia (“speculation”) was still salient in the
early 1990s.
The tension between these two groups over differences in cultural practices and
worldview, however, has gradually been tem pered throughout the 1990s as they have come to
share more in common with each other. This process has been largely facilitated by the
waning o f Soviet ideals o f the Uyghur socialist nation and the development o f a new concept
o f the Uyghur stateless nation. As mentioned in the previous chapter, Uyghurs in Almaty
began to gradually shift their political concerns away from problems in Kazakhstan to the
issue o f sovereignty in Xinjiang throughout the 1990s. In this context, Uyghurs from X injiang
gained symbolic capital as bearers o f knowledge about the homeland. Furthermore, through
the necessity o f adapting to a free market, Soviet ideas about the am orality o f conducting trade
gradually became a part of the past for most Uyghurs in Kazakhstan, fostering a new
appreciation for the kitailik U yghurs’ propensity for trading. Finally, the growing importance
o f Islam and zhutdarchilik among Uyghurs in Kazakhstan led to an increased appreciation o f
the values o f symbolic capital held by Uyghurs from Xinjiang. At the same time, Uyghurs
from Xinjiang also gained an increased appreciation for the values o f their sovietlik relatives.
In particular, they admired the knowledge o f Uyghur history and politics that many o f
A lm aty’s Uyghurs possessed, particularly those remaining representatives o f the ETR
government.
Consequently, by the time I left Kazakhstan in the year 2000, the kitailik Uyghurs had
found certain niches in the Uyghur community o f Almaty, and many even had attained
Kazakhstan citizenship by marrying local Uyghur women. One niche for young Uyghurs
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from Xinjiang in the Almaty Uyghur community has been to work as mollas. In the mid-
1990s, numerous young Uyghur students o f Islam originally from Xinjiang came to A lm aty on
their return from studying in medresses in Pakistan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. Having been
empowered by their educational experiences but fearing the consequences o f undertaking a
M uslim vocation in Xinjiang in the later 1990s, they came to Almaty with the hopes o f staying
as long as possible. Some have taught Arabic and religious courses to the youth o f the
neighborhoods, and others led prayer at the local Uyghur mosques. In the Zaria Vostoka
mosque in 1997, for example, three separate young mollas from Xinjiang led prayers on
alternating days. Another particular niche for Uyghurs from Xinjiang has been in the
restaurant field. M any Uyghur cooks from Xinjiang, for example, have found ways to stay
indefinitely in Almaty to work, and some have even opened their own restaurants.
W hile today, there remains a consciousness o f who in the Uyghur com m unity o f
Almaty is a yerlik, a kochap kegan, and a kitailik, the tension between these groups is
increasingly eclipsed by the desire to belong to a common Uyghur stateless nation.
Overcoming the differences between these groups has even become a conscious part o f
Uyghur discourse. A t a meeting o f the Uyghur Cultural Center o f Alm aty that I attended in
1997, for example, one speaker presented at length on the importance o f replacing the popular
label o f kitailik with vatandin (“from the hom eland”), pointing out that Uyghurs from
Xinjiang had not come from China, but from the homeland. The acceptance o f the Uyghurs
who have recently come from China into the Almaty Uyghur community, however, does not
reflect the developm ent o f a unified Uyghur nationalist ideology in Almaty. To the contrary,
it reflects a conscious choice on the part o f A lm aty’s Uyghurs to include Uyghurs from China
in the negotiation o f various nationalist ideologies as part o f the process o f establishing a new
transnational concept o f the stateless Uyghur nation in the city.
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7.4 Almaty Uyghurs ’ “Transnational” Ties to Uyghur Exiles from Abroad
The cross-border trade and the arrival o f Uyghurs from China have not been the only
factors in the transnationalization of A lm aty’s Uyghur community. In addition, this
com m unity has increased its communication with other Uyghur diaspora groups. Since the
fall o f the Soviet Union, Uyghurs in Almaty have established regular com m unication with
exile groups in Turkey, Europe, Australia, and the United States. For the most part these
transnational ties with Uyghurs living outside both Central Asia and Xinjiang have been
founded on the common political goal o f establishing Uyghur sovereignty in the X UA R o f
China.
In the late Soviet period, the U.S.S.R. had already allowed a small group o f Uyghur
intellectuals in Kazakhstan to interact with Uyghur political groups from Turkey, Europe, and
elsewhere, but these interactions were closely monitored by the Soviet state. W ith the fall of
the Soviet Union, however, these relations took on a completely different form. Initially,
these relations were m ostly with the Uyghur exiles o f Turkey, who sent their publications to
Almaty regularly for distribution within the city’s Uyghur community. As early as 1992,
however, a delegation o f Uyghurs from Almaty participated in the First Worldwide Kurultai
o f Eastern Turkestan where they were able to meet with Uyghurs from all over the world
(Khojamberdi 2001:240). In 1993, a similar delegation took part in the founding conference
o f the The Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO) in Holland, and
m em bers o f Uyghur exile organizations from Turkey and Germany came to Alm aty to take
part in the annual congress o f Kazakhstan’s Inter-Governmental Association o f Uyghurs
(Khojamberdi 2001:240-241).
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Since this time, these contacts have only become more regular. The week I first
arrived in Kazakhstan to conduct fieldwork in 1994, for example, I met Erkin Alptekin who is
the most recognized leader o f the Uyghur nationalist movement in Europe. Over the course o f
my fieldwork, I would encounter Alptekin in Almaty annually and sometimes twice a year. In
addition, I met numerous Uyghurs from America, Germany, and Australia in Alm aty at
various important events in the city’s Uyghur community. These leaders o f the Uyghur
nationalist movement abroad have come to Alm aty often because the city has become an
important site o f the Uyghur nation where they can m eet significant numbers o f Uyghurs who
are still citizens o f China without worrying about extensive Chinese state-sponsored
surveillance. In this sense, for the Uyghur exile com m unity abroad, Almaty is an important
window into Xinjiang where they can safely interact with their relatives from the hom eland
and speak openly about their political attitudes concerning Chinese rule in the XUAR.
For some o f the exiled Uyghurs abroad, however, Almaty was also their original
doorway out o f Xinjiang. Throughout the 1990s, the city has served as springboard for many
political refugees from Xinjiang who have managed to get to Kazakhstan first before moving
on to Europe, the United States, Turkey, or Saudi Arabia. In this sense, Alm aty is also critical
to the rest o f the Uyghur community outside o f Xinjiang as a source o f new m embers who are
fleeing China. Once having official status in a third country, such refugees also often return to
Almaty to remain in contact with the Uyghur community o f the city, further solidifying this
com m unity’s transnational ties with other exiled Uyghurs abroad.
These ties with exile communities abroad are also important in the negotiation o f the
Uyghur stateless nation that is on-going in the city o f Almaty. When these Uyghurs from
abroad visit Almaty, they spent significant time with local community leaders, religious
figures, nationalist leaders, and intellectuals in the city’s Uyghur community. They discuss
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the present and future o f their shared nation as well as strategies for political activism.
Furthermore, while usually more discretely, they also m eet with num erous Uyghurs from
Xinjiang who are living in Almaty. Through these discussions, Uyghur exiles from elsewhere
continue to influence the narrative o f the Uyghurs’ future that remains contested in Almaty.
In addition to participating in the negotiation o f the future o f the Uyghur nation, these
exiles also interact with A lm aty’s Uyghurs in the mobilization of their stateless nation. The
Uyghur nationalist movement in Almaty, for example, has increasingly coordinated advocacy
campaigns with exiled nationalist groups elsewhere. In the vignette about A lm aty’s U yghurs’
response to the riots in Kuldja in 1997 that begins the introduction to this study, I already
mentioned how Almaty served as the primary site for the gathering o f information on the riots
and the distribution o f this information to other Uyghurs abroad. Similarly, Uyghur
publications from Almaty are regularly sent to Uyghurs elsewhere, and the Uyghur
newspapers o f Almaty now have a column devoted to international press as collected on a
Uyghur web page hosted in the United States.
W hile the influence o f Uyghur exiles from abroad on the daily life o f the Uyghur
com m unity o f Alm aty is far less significant than that o f the Uyghurs from X injiang living in
the city, these disparate exile groups are included in the general negotiations o f the Uyghur
nation in the city. In this respect, their largest contribution to the Almaty Uyghur com m unity
has been to provide a more global perspective on the Uyghurs’ struggle for sovereignty in
Xinjiang. These various exiles are involved in their respective countries in lobby campaigns
for international recognition o f the U yghurs’ problems, and they have passed this experience
onto the Uyghurs living in Almaty. Consequently, the political focus o f A lm aty’s Uyghurs
has become increasingly global throughout the 1990s.
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7.5 Conclusions: Almaty as the Site for the Production o f a New Transnational
Uvshur Nation
Along with the development o f Almaty into a global frontier city in the new world
order, therefore, the Uyghurs living in this city have undergone a process o f
transnationalization. This transnationalization o f the Uyghur community in A lm aty has
occurred through its involvement in the cross-border trade, the scores o f Uyghurs from China
entering the community as a doorway out o f Xinjiang, and the use o f this com m unity by
Uyghur exiles from abroad as window into the homeland. Due to these factors, the Uyghurs o f
Alm aty today are constantly embroiled in events taking place both across the border in China
and in various regions o f the world where significant Uyghur communities exist. At the same
time, Uyghurs from China and elsewhere in the world have become increasingly involved in
the developments o f this city’s Uyghur community.
I would argue that this transnationalization o f the Uyghurs in A lm aty m akes this
com m unity a critical site in the negotiation o f a nation that is both w ithout a state o f its own
and located in the domains o f numerous states around the world. In this context, the manner
in which the Uyghur stateless nation in articulated in Alm aty today is a better com posite
reflection o f the disparate parts o f the transnational Uyghur political movem ent than
anywhere else in the world. This situation, however, also means that the Uyghur nation in
Almaty is perhaps m ore contested than anywhere else where Uyghurs live in the world.
Given the importance o f Alm aty to the production o f a new transnational Uyghur
stateless nation, the remainder of this study is grounded in this city and its Uyghur
community. In the chapters that follow, the study examines the production o f Uyghur ethnic
neighborhoods in Alm aty as the organizational structure for this stateless nation, the
production o f a narrative o f the Uyghur nation in the transnational mediated culture produced
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and consumed by Uyghurs in the city, and the negotiation o f this stateless transnational nation
in the practices and rituals o f the Uyghurs in Almaty.
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C H A P T E R EIG H T— Producing Uyghur Localities in Alm aty: Creating Social
Space and Organizational Structure fo r a Stateless Nation
In the chaos o f the fall o f the Soviet Union and the increasing transnationalization o f
the Uyghurs o f Almaty, the production o f Uyghur ethnic localities in this city have served to
unify and anchor this community and to provide an organizational structure for its stateless
nation. W hile in the Soviet Union Uyghurs had been able to create ethnic localities in the
rural setting o f the collective farm, Soviet urban planning prevented the developm ent o f ethnic
enclaves in Almaty. Today, numerous Uyghur neighborhood zhuts have emerged in the city,
and these localities have been bolstered by new institutions such as Uyghur schools and
mosques. These localities not only anchor the Uyghur people and stateless nation during this
tum ultuous time, but they also frame the practices o f daily life. This chapter reviews the
processes that contributed to the emergence o f these Uyghur urban zhuts in Alm aty and the
revival o f zhutdarchilik practices that has helped to ensure the reproduction o f these localities
as social spaces.
8.1 The E volution o fU v sh u r Ethnic Localities in A lm aty
As noted briefly in chapter five, the Soviet Union had long attem pted to curtail the
developm ent o f ethnic neighborhoods in their new socialist cities by distributing housing from
one’s workplace, serving the Party’s aims o f establishing a consciousness o f the working-class
in place o f national consciousness. Instead o f a Uyghur or Kazakh neighborhood, therefore,
one was more likely to find a m etal-workers’ or bus-drivers’ neighborhood or apartm ent
block. Such ethnic desegregation, however, was rarely adhered to in the construction o f
collective farms. To the contrary, in order to provide schooling in m inority languages,
collective farms were often made up overwhelmingly o f one nationality. Since rural people
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were viewed as low on the ladder o f socialist development, these nationality-based collective
farms were not considered a threat to the m elting away o f national consciousness and the
construction o f a common proletarian consciousness. Throughout the Soviet period, therefore,
Uyghur communities were prim arily rural and took the form o f collective farms.
As already discussed in chapter five, many Uyghur immigrants who had come from
China in the 1950s and 1960s discretely congregated in the collective farms surrounding w hat
was then the city o f Alma-Ata, both to be closer to other Uyghurs and to utilize their
proxim ity to the city as a means to gain urban employment, both legal and illegal. In doing
so, these Uyghur migrants were helping to establish nascent rurban (i.e. rural-urban) Uyghur
com m unities on the outskirts o f Soviet Kazakhstan’s capital. As the city continually grew and
expanded its borders beginning in the 1960s, these collective farms gradually reached the
edges o f the city, and many o f their fields were turned into sites for the developm ent o f new
m icro-regions with high-rise apartment buildings for the working masses (see Duisenov 1963:
151-164). W ith the development o f apartment housing between the center o f A lm a-A ta and
the Alma-Ata I train station in the north o f the city, the Uyghur collective farm Parizhskii
Kommun, known to Uyghurs as Sultan Kurghan, became a part of the city as early as the
1960s.1 By the early 1990s, three more o f the mostly Uyghur collective farms on the outskirts
o f Alm a-Ata were officially made a part o f the city’s domain— Zaria Vostoka, Druzhba, and
Gornyi Gigant (see M ap 3).
W hen Kazakhstan declared its independence from the Soviet Union and re-nam ed its
capital city in 1991, therefore, many o f the rurban Uyghur communities on the outskirts o f
Alm a-A ta were already officially recognized as urban neighborhoods in the new city o f
Almaty. Furthermore, with m any o f the Russians and other nationalities moving out o f these
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Uyghur collective farms turned urban neighborhoods and more Uyghurs, both from China and
from villages between Almaty and the Chinese border, moving to the city, it is not surprising
that the population o f these new urban ghettos became increasingly Uyghur throughout the
1990s.
A t the same time, the privatization o f apartments in the city allowed Uyghurs to
congregate in certain apartment building complexes, or micro-regions, within the city. M ore
specifically, m any Uyghurs bought apartments in several o f the micro-regions bordering on
the former Uyghur collective farms that had become urban mahallas. Some o f the best
examples o f this phenomenon are the micro-regions Aynahulak (half-way between Druzhba
and Zaria Vostoka), Aksai (directly bordering on Druzhba), and Kazakh Film (near Gornyi
Gigant) (see M ap 4). In addition, several other areas on the outskirts o f Alm aty became
important Uyghur population sites including Kok-Tiube, and Pervaia Alma-Ata. W ith many
o f the towns immediately bordering on the city’s furthest reaches also inhabited by large
number o f Uyghurs, the Uyghur community now forms a ring around the city both at its
internal edges and ju st outside its borders. The mere congregation o f Uyghurs in these
localities, however, has not made them the vital social spaces and social organizational
principle that Uyghurs refer to as zhuts. This process required the developm ent o f joint
com m unity practices and hierarchies in these localities, or as Uyghurs refer to them
collectively— zhutdarchilik.
1 A s noted in Chapter two, the name Sultan Kurghan was given to this area because it was the location where the Ili
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Map 3: Most Prominent Uyghur Neighborhoods in Almaty, 1990s
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Primary Uyghur neighborhoods transformed from Kolkhozes
1) Druzhba 3) Sultan Qurgan 5)A laTau 7)Aeroport
2) Zar’iya Vostoka 4) Gomii Gigant 6) Turk-Sib
Secondary Uyghur neighborhoods in apartment building complexes (micro-regions)
8) Aynabulak 10) Orbita
9) Aksai 11) Kazakh Film
Uyghur rural neighborhoods on the outskirts of the city
12) Iubileinoe 14) Pervomaiskii
13) Ozhet 15) Kalinin
Sultan settled in Vernyi after the Russian occupation o f Kuldja in the 1870s.
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8.2 From Uyghur Localities to Uyghur “ Zhuts”: The Development o f Social
Institutions and the “ Zhieit Beshi” in Almaty Durins the 1990s
As pointed out in chapter five, the Uyghur immigrants who had made their w ay to the
collective farms around Almaty in the 1950s and 1960s began the process o f developing these
collective farms into Uyghur social spaces, or zhuts, through the holding o f mashraps and the
election o f Zhigit Beshi long before Perestroika and Glasnost ’. As these rurban U yghur zhuts
officially became part o f the city in the last years o f the Soviet Union, however, G orbachev’s
reforms provided an opportunity for these communities to develop their localities into Uyghur
social spaces more openly. One o f the m ost important factors in the open promotion o f
Uyghur zhuts in Almaty during the last years o f the Soviet Union was the establishm ent o f a
Uyghur Cultural Center in Alma-Ata in 1989 (Khojamberdi 2000:234). During the first years
o f its existence, the Uyghur Cultural Center o f Alma-Ata was instrumental in the prom otion o f
local Uyghur schools and the opening o f Uyghur-language classes in otherwise Russian-
language schools. In addition, the Center assisted a few o f the Uyghur neighborhoods in the
city to get permission for building small local mosques even before the fall o f the U.S.S.R. As
a result, by the time that the Soviet Union fell, the larger Uyghur neighborhoods in Alm a-A ta
had at least a few institutions around which Uyghur social space could be built. They also
already had Zhigit Beshi who were prepared to coordinate the practices o f zhutdarchilik
needed to build a Uyghur social space around these institutions.
W ith the fall o f the Soviet Union, this structure for the developm ent o f local Uyghur
zhuts was put into full operational motion. Particularly in the neighborhoods that had once
been collective farms, the local neighborhood began investing its Zhigit Beshi with more and
more responsibility. In addition to the coordination o f toys, or life-cycle ritual celebrations,
these Zhigit Beshi began representing the neighborhood both in the Uyghur Cultural Center
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and in relations with the local government. Furthermore, with the dissolution o f the collective
farm structure, the Zhigit Beshi was required to take on much of the work formerly done by
farm administrators, including the resolution of local disputes and the organization o f
neighborhood improvement projects. In subsequent years, this phenom enon would spread,
and now every Uyghur neighborhood in the city, even those inside micro-regions, recognizes a
Zhigit Beshi.
At the same time, many o f the larger Uyghur neighborhoods began building additional
and/or more substantial mosques. If Zaria Vostoka built the first new (non-governm ent
supported) mosque in the city since the 1930s in 1990, after the fall o f the U.S.S.R., Sultan
Kurghan, Druzhba, and Gornyi Gigant followed this trend and built their own large mosques
(see figure 12.1). Furthermore, since all o f these neighborhoods had significant populations of
Uyghurs who had been born and educated in Xinjiang, among neighborhood elders there were
numerous men who had attended religious schools and could qualify as candidates for the
position o f local Imam. As Imams were appointed and the Uyghurs o f Alm aty became more
interested in religious practices, these neighborhoods’ new Imams emerged as important local
leader who could assist the Zhigit Beshi in promoting zhutdarchilik. Today, while not every
Uyghur neighborhood has its own mosque and Imam, each Uyghur makhalla in the city has
access to a Uyghur mosque and Imam in relatively close proximity.
W hile these first Uyghur mosques in the city since the 1930s were partly funded by
grants from M uslim foundations abroad, they were mostly financed by local inhabitants who,
despite the economic difficulties o f this time, had accumulated significant capital as prime
m overs in the cross-border trade with China. In addition, the same merchants who helped to
build the mosques contributed significantly to the further development o f Uyghur schools in
these neighborhoods as well as providing funds for other cultural projects and local
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infrastructure improvements. In this sense, the capital amassed by Uyghurs involved in the
cross-border trade with China in the early 1990s was instrumental to the transform ation o f the
emerging Uyghur ethnic neighborhoods in Almaty into distinctly Uyghur social spaces that
are self-regulating and rely little on the support o f the state.
Illustrations 20: The Development of Local Uyghur Mosques in Almaty (Early 1990s)
Illustrations 20.1 & 20.2: New Uyghur mosques built after 1992 in the Almaty zhuts of
Sultan Qurghan (left) and Zar’ia Vostoka (right) (author’s photos).
In order to better illustrate this transformation o f Uyghur collective farms and urban
networks into vibrant Uyghur social spaces, I provide below a more detailed account o f the
history o f these changes as they transpired in one o f the Uyghur localities where I lived for an
extended time— Zaria Vostoka. This neighborhood is unique for many reasons. Its Uyghur
population is almost exclusively made up o f immigrants from China who came to the area in
the 1950s and 1960s, making it a critical site for the preservation o f Uyghur culture as
practiced in Xinjiang prior to the Chinese revolution. In addition, it is located adjacent to the
large Barakholka bazaar, making it a particular important location for trans-border processes
and offering it a local means for the accumulation o f wealth. W hile these unique aspects of
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Zaria Vostoka have m eant that the recent changes in this neighborhood are also unique, the
transform ative processes taking place in this zhut in the 1990s have provided an inspiration for
the developm ent o f similar processes in other neighborhoods. In m any respects, therefore, the
changes in Zaria Vostoka have been at the forefront o f the more general reconfiguration o f
Uyghur neighborhoods in Almaty over the last decade.
8.3 The Example o f Zaria Vostoka: From Dunsan Collective Farm to Urban Uvshur
“ Zhut” and a Port on the New Silk Road
Zaria Vostoka was originally built as a collective farm on the outskirts o f the Soviet
city o f A lm a-Ata in 1930. The Dungan revolutionary M aghzi M a-san-chi helped to establish
the area as a kolkhoz for Dungans, and initially it was named after the nineteenth century
Dungan m ilitary leader Biyanhu (Jalilov 1998:11). In 1933, its name was officially changed
to Zaria Vostoka, and in the early 1950s, Zaria Vostoka joined with several other neighboring
kolkhozes to form the larger sovkhoz o f Prigorodnyi (Jalilov 1998:11). W hile the initial
inhabitants o f the collective farm only included four Uyghur families, this changed
significantly in the mid-1950s and 1960s as many Uyghur families from China settled on the
new sovkhoz. According to people who came to the farm at that time, a Uyghur kolkhoz
adm inistrator with relatives in China had invited m any immigrants who had been sent
elsewhere on arrival in the Soviet Union to move to Zaria Vostoka. W hile m any Dungan
families continued to live there, Uyghurs soon formed the largest ethnic group on the farm.
As a result o f this influx o f Uyghur immigrants, the makhalld in Zaria Vostoka expanded, and
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it was divided into a lower section inhabited mostly by Uyghur immigrants and an upper
section where most o f the Dungans and other nationalities lived.2
M ost o f the Uyghur immigrants from China who came to Zaria Vostoka in the 1950s
and 1960s were not experienced farmers. They came to the collective farm prim arily because
they were eager to find work in the adjacent city o f Alma-Ata. M y former landlord in Zaria
Vostoka, for example, recounted to me how he had supported his family by illegally selling
surplus fruits and vegetables at Alm a-Ata’s Green bazaar. For the right to unofficially trade at
the bazaar, he paid a bribe to a policeman everyday. Likewise, another im migrant from K uldja
told me that he had run an illicit business bringing fruits and vegetables to Siberia for many
years. Several others with whom I talked had worked with the Soviet railway as stewards on
the train that traveled between M oscow and Alma-Ata. Through this job, they were able to
take advantage o f the economy o f scarcity in the Soviet Union to bring goods with them in
both directions and sell them for a profit. According to others in Almaty, the area also served
as a center o f the city’s narcotics traffic in the 1970s. Between the 1950s and the 1980s,
therefore, Zaria Vostoka was already becoming a rurban area where the economy was mixed
between agriculture in the service o f the collective farm and illicit trade in the service o f the
city.
During the 1970s, the Uyghurs from China who had settled on this collective farm
apparently already began forming their own mashraps and electing Zhigit Beshi for various
age-co-horts. They even continued to observe religious holidays and would hold mass prayers
in the local graveyard for Ramadan and Qurban, a practice for which they were reprimanded
2 The designation o f upper and lower sections o f Uyghur makhdllas is related to the physical geography o f the city,
which is built on an incline. Running north to south, the city climbs towards the foothills o f the Ala-Tau
mountains, creating a natural incline.
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in the 1980s.3 These aspects o f zhutdarchilik in Zaria Vostoka during the Soviet period,
however, were usually undertaken in secrecy for fear o f reprisal from local officials.
W ith the advent o f Perestroika and Glasnost’ , the residents o f the neighborhood
began more forcefully asserting their right to cultural expression. In 1990, the residents were
able to convince the Head o f Ideological Affairs in the Oblast’ Communist Party
Adm inistration to allow them to build a mosque. In turn, local Uyghurs and Dungans pooled
their resources and built a mosque in the upper section o f the makhalla. Given the location o f
the m osque and the fact that its Imam was a Dungan, however, the Uyghurs in the lower
section o f the neighborhood decided to build their own mosque soon after. In 1991, they built
a small make-shift mosque and the foundation for a larger more perm anent one in the m ostly
Uyghur lower section o f the neighborhood. Securing $2000 (USD) from an Islamic society in
Saudi A rabia and $600 (USD) from England’s Islamic Society, they began building the larger
mosque shortly there after, and it was completed in 1994 (see figure 12.1). They selected an
elder Uyghur from the mdkhdlla to be its Imam, and sermons were conducted in the Uyghur
language.
Around the same time, the Uyghurs in this community lobbied Party officials to allow
them to open a Uyghur school. W hile the other nationalities on the farm were against this
idea, the Uyghur Cultural Center in Alma-Ata helped the residents in their negotiations with
government officials. As a result, the local Party officials gave them permission to open the
school as long as the Uyghurs in the community supported it financially. After the Uyghur
residents in Zaria Vostoka were able to raise some $10,000 (USD), the school opened in 1990
3 The fact that Soviet Muslims prayed in graveyards may account for some o f the behavior that American and
European scholars have in the past labeled as organized Sufism (see Bennignson and Wimbush). W hile this
resolution to the problem o f a lack o f local mosques may have been influenced by Sufism, all who discussed it with
me emphatically denied that it had anything to do with Sufi orders.
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(Iskandariy 1994:5). To help in the construction, the mosque even donated bricks and some
additional money.
W hile Zaria Vostoka was busy opening a Uyghur mosque and school, the area around
the collective farm was also gradually becoming a commercial center as the home to the
largest market in the city— the Barakholka. As one Dungan resident o f Zaria Vostoka told
me, this bazaar has made the neighborhood into an international port o f trade, or as he put it
more specifically, “a port on the new silk road.” The development o f the Barakholka in the
1990s also brought the residents o f Zaria Vostoka a great deal of new capital. Given the
history o f illicit trade in Zaria Vostoka during the Soviet period, its residents were quick to
join in the now legal trade that took place in this huge bazaar within walking distance from
their homes. Even those residents who did not trade at the bazaar found other means to profit
o ff o f its many daily customers and traders. Some opened their own Uyghur restaurants
(Ashkhana), others rented rooms to traders visiting from afar, and some rented space in their
homes for the storage o f goods.
W ith this new-found capital, the neighborhood was able to make significant
improvements to its infrastructure. In 1996 and 1997, the makhalla was fitted with gas lines
from the city’s central lines, after having survived for years on propane tanks and individually
fueled kerosene and coal furnaces. Later in 1997, the makhalla also pooled its resources to
pave one o f its main roads and build a youth soccer stadium. In addition, the com m unity has
put significant resources into its Uyghur school. Capital alone, however, has not facilitated
these improvements; they have been greatly assisted by the strengthened structure o f makhalla
social organization coordinated by the Zhigit Beshi and the m osque’s Imam.
W hile the Zhigit Beshi had long been an important part o f com m unity decision
making in Zaria Vostoka, the fall o f the Soviet Union changed the role o f this position
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substantially. N ot only did the dissolution o f the U.S.S.R. reduce the role o f the state as the
overseer o f people’s daily lives, but the new government o f Kazakhstan now offered little or
no support for the development o f local communities. This was all the more the case in Zaria
Vostoka, which was considered to be a marginal and mostly non-Kazakh area on the outskirts
o f Almaty. For this reason, the Zhigit Beshi o f Zaria Vostoka now fulfills not only the
responsibilities o f ritual coordination and planning; he also has taken over m any o f the roles
once occupied by the collective farm ’s administration. Fie coordinates com m unity meetings
on important issues and serves as a liaison between government organs and the
neighborhood’s population as well as between Uyghur nationalist groups and the people o f
Zaria Vostoka. In his work, the Zhigit Beshi has gained an important partner in the local
Imam, who also plays a central role in community affairs and the performance o f important
religious rites.
Due to the increased role o f the Zhigit Beshi in the neighborhood, the younger
generation o f Uyghurs in Zaria Vostoka (late 20s, early 30s) also began forming informal
mashrap groups and discussing their responsibilities to the community in the mid-1990s. This
was a significant event for several reasons. By the accounts o f both representatives o f this
generation and their elders, these chi ldren o f immigrants, most o f whom had been born in the
Soviet Union, formerly had shown little interest in the mashrap or the practices o f
zhutdarchilik. Furthermore, this increased interest in community organization and practices
was inspired by political concerns, more specifically by the riots in K uldja in February o f
1997 and by the crackdown on Xinjiang Uyghurs that followed. As my landlord’s son, who
was 32 at the time, told me, he wanted to do something for his people and he wanted to start in
his neighborhood. This new interest in zhutdarchilik among second-generation immigrants
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suggested, among other things, that this increasingly active zhut was developing a precedent
for its reproduction in future generations.
Due to their interest in helping their neighborhood after the events in Kuldja, several
o f the younger Uyghurs who had made adequate m oney as traders helped to build the soccer
field for Uyghur youth mentioned above in the spring o f 1997. Shortly thereafter, my
landlord’s son helped to organize a neighborhood-wide project, also referred to above, to pave
one o f the neighborhood’s main streets. This later project, however, was controversial since it
required each household to donate 7000 tenge (approximately $92 USD) to the construction
while not involving everybody in the project’s decision-making. In m any respects, it was the
dissatisfaction in the com m unity over the way that this project had been planned and
implemented that led this younger generation o f men to elect their own Yashliq (or “Y outh”)
Zhigit Beshi, who could negotiate community interests in the implementation o f
neighborhood-wide projects.4
On June 19, 1997,1 was in attendance as the younger male generation in Zaria
Vostoka held an election for its own Zhigit Beshi. The election itself turned out to be based on
consensus and lacked any system o f formal voting or secret ballot. In retrospect, this was
logical given that the position requires being respected by all o f the people in the
neighborhood and not ju st a majority. W hen I arrived at the elections, which were held in the
open air o f the neighborhood soccer field, I found that they were being run by the youngest o f
the elders, who were in their 40s. One o f them had a notebook where he had written down the
names o f 43 potential Zhigit Beshi who were the leaders o f separate companiia (a rough
Russian language equivalent for informal mashrap groups) representing those men in the
4 The term yashliq, or “youth,” in Uyghur is very loosely defined. It is not uncommon, as in this case, that yashliq
can refer to people in their early 30s. Here, this term is used mostly to differentiate from the aq saqols, or “white
beards,” which refers to the elders.
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neighborhood between their early 20s and their late 30s. As the meeting opened up, one o f the
elders noted that they needed to choose a Zhigit Beshi who was involved in all o f the zh u t’ s
affairs— the mosque, the school, community projects, etc. This elder then nominated his
choice, and the nominee turned down the honor in politeness. Everybody present, however,
backed this nomination, and he was chosen without anyone else being nominated. As his
assistants, four younger attendees were chosen for the under-30 age group, one for the 30-35
group, and one for the 35-40 group. Another person was nominated as treasurer. The
meeting, therefore, ended in the selection o f an entire entourage o f men in different age groups
who would work together to coordinate zhutdarchilik activities. As a result, it had solidified a
structure for the com m unity leadership into the next generation, transform ing Zaria Vostoka
into a self-regulating and self-perpetuating Uyghur zhut for the foreseeable future.
W hile these events that transpired in Zaria Vostoka as it transform ed from a collective
farm into an urban Uyghur makhalla were not replicated exactly in other Uyghur
neighborhoods in the city, they do provide a general road map that helps us understand this
process in other makhdllas. Especially in the larger Uyghur neighborhoods o f the city, a
structure o f self-regulation has likewise evolved that provides for representation o f different
generations. As in Zaria Vostoka, these other neighborhoods make communal decisions
m ostly through the elders as facilitated by the Imam and Zhigit Beshi. In turn, a younger
Yashliq Zhigit Beshi and his assistants help to mobilize the younger generations to do w ork for
the zhut and assist in its development.
In addition to mobilizing the zhut to undertake collective work, this organizational
structure in A lm aty’s Uyghur neighborhoods has led to increased emphasis on the practices o f
life-cycle rituals (child-naming, circumcisions, weddings, and funerals) and the observance o f
religious holidays. W hile life-cycle rituals were practiced during the Soviet period and were
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instrumental in continuing the production o f Uyghur localities even in the strict environm ent
o f Soviet communism, they have become a far more critical part o f Uyghur social life in
recent years. In the case o f the observance o f religious holidays, the change has been even
more dramatic since the Communist Party o f the Soviet Union actively sought to suppress
such celebrations. Today, by contrast, the Uyghurs o f Almaty are actively involved in
com m unity celebrations o f religious holidays regardless o f personal religiosity. These
transform ations have served to bring the Uyghur community in the city closer together and
more attached to their respective zhuts as well as to their nation as a whole. Given the
increased importance o f these rituals and religious holidays to Uyghur social life and their role
in the creation o f more cohesive Uyghur zhuts, they deserve our separate attention as the most
basic practices o f zhutdarchilik.
8.4 The Transform ation ofL ife-C ycle Rituals and R elisious H olidays: A Renaissance
in the M ost Basic Practices o f “Z hutdarchilik”
W hile seemingly not as political as their role in the mobilization o f neighborhoods to
undertake improvement projects, the most important contribution that the new Uyghur Zhigit
Beshi and Imams in Alm aty make to the production o f Uyghur zhuts in the city is through the
regulation o f life-cycle rituals. The Zhigit Beshi schedule various rituals in the com m unity to
prevent tim e conflicts, and together with the Imam, they oversee the correct practices o f these
rituals. The regulation o f these rituals is so important because, as is discussed in chapter one,
it is through the collective involvement in such community practices o f coordination that
Uyghurs are able to reproduce their common social space through the creation o f local
subjects.
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Due to the establishment o f a stronger network o f Zhigit Beshis that encompasses all
the Uyghur neighborhoods o f the city, there is now an indigenous institution that helps to
create com m onality in these rituals not only within specific neighborhoods but throughout the
entire city. Furthermore, with the establishment o f Uyghur mosques, Imams, and mollas
throughout the city, an infrastructure has been formed that allows for this com m onality in the
practice o f rituals to take on religious form once again after having been secularized during
the Soviet period. These phenomena, in turn, are fostering a new concept o f the Uyghur
stateless nation that is more firmly based in both what Uyghurs today consider to be their
traditional practices and the religion o f Islam.
As with the general development o f Uyghur zhuts in Almaty, the original initiative for
establishing greater commonality in zhutdarchilik practices relating to life-cycle rituals came
from the former Uyghur collective farms on the outskirts o f the city and began before the fall
o f the U.S.S.R. According to at least one source, the Zhigit Beshi o f several o f the largest
Uyghur zhuts on the city’s outskirts (Zaria Vostoka, Sultan Qurghan, Aerodromnaia, Gornyi
Gigant, and Druzhba) met as early as 1972 to draw up common rules for the toys that
celebrated various rites o f passage (Jalilov 1999:12). In doing so, however, they focused
primarily on issues o f expenditures. M ore specifically, they set neighborhood limits on how
much rice, meat, and other foods should be used in preparing banquets and gave the kalym, or
bride’s price, a set symbolic and modest monetary value. Given the political restraints o f the
Soviet Union, they apparently did not publicly condone any religious practices at these ritual
toys, but in private they m ay have developed a means for their religious blessing as well.
W ith the fall o f the Soviet Union, the Zhigit Beshi in these neighborhoods were soon
able to take greater and more public interest in the ways in which a toy was conducted in their
respective zhuts. Furthermore, they were no longer very concerned about the state becoming
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involved in such affairs o f local community practice. W ith the establishm ent o f several
Uyghur mosques in the larger zhuts o f Almaty in the early 1990s, for example, they suggested
that Imams and/or mollas should be invited and asked to bless all life-cycle rituals. Now, even
in the m ost secular homes, weddings will include the religious ceremony o f neka, and the
hosts will carefully hide the many vodka bottles reserved for the toy until the molla leaves (see
figure 15.2). At the same time, the Zhigit Beshi began suggesting that the celebration o f toys
become a more central part o f community life in their neighborhoods. Through the Zhigit
Beshi, it was assured that only one major ritual celebration be held at a time and that all in the
neighborhood were invited to attend.
As friends and relatives from outside the neighborhoods were also invited to these
toys, many Uyghurs living in neighboring apartment complexes witnessed the organization
with which these celebrations were carried out in the larger neighborhoods. This
phenomenon, more than any other transformation in the Uyghur zhuts o f the city, helped to
spread the practice o f electing local Zhigit Beshi not only in the traditional mahallds o f the
city but in the modern apartment blocks as well. By 1997, when I conducted my most
intensive fieldwork in Uyghur neighborhoods, the celebration o f a toy, whether in the city’s
more traditional makhallas or in neighboring apartment blocks, was a large and highly
organized affair coordinated on the neighborhood level by a Zhigit Beshi. In this context, the
celebration o f toys has become the primary site o f communion for both separate
neighborhoods and for the Uyghur community o f the city as a whole. For most o f the elders
o f the Uyghur neighborhoods in the city, both male and female, attendance at toys has become
a full-time job that requires keeping to a tight schedule. To the elders, this attendance at ritual
toys is more than a m atter o f enjoyment; it is an obligatory responsibility o f zhutdarchilik.
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Illustrations 21: The Re-Birth of Uyghur Zhutdarchilik Practices
in Almaty, Kazakhstan during the 1990s
Illustrations 21.1 & 21.2: A funeral in Zar ’ ia Vostoka. The men of neighborhood first meet at
the mosque for prayer and then carry the coffin to the neighborhood’s graveyard (author’s photos).
f>Jk
.. > ^ V
Illustration 21.3: An Imam, with elders,
says a prayer before the commencement of a
wedding toi in Almaty’s Druzhba
neighborhood (author’s photo).
Illustration 21.4: A woman tending the
pilau (“pilaf’) for a wedding toi at her
neighbor’s house in Almaty’s Druzhba
neighborhood (author’s photo).
Consequently, the correct performance o f ritual toys has become a critical m arker o f
belonging to the Uyghur community o f the city. One Christian missionary working with
Uyghurs in Almaty, for example, told me that several o f the small num ber o f Christian
converts in this community had approached him to ask if they would violate the traditions o f
Christianity if they circum cised their sons at the age that other Uyghurs did so. They feared
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that if they were not able to do so and hold a toy marking this rite o f passage for relatives and
friends, they would not be considered Uyghurs, but if they did, they feared they would not be
Christians. If the performance o f and attendance at ritual toys has become a com m unity
obligation, this phenomenon has also served to further unite the local Uyghur zhuts o f the city.
As a location o f communion for the neighborhood, toy celebrations have become one o f the
most important sites for the spread o f local knowledge, the exchange o f information, and the
negotiation o f local and global socio-political issues.
Given the growing importance o f ritual toys to A lm aty’s Uyghur society in recent
years, Zhigit Beshi have become increasingly concerned about the standardization o f the
practices o f these rituals throughout the city. To assist in this standardization, in 1997 and
1998 the local Uyghur television program and the local Uyghur newspapers allowed A lm aty’s
Zhigit Beshi to describe the proper ways to practice these important aspects o f zhutdarchilik
on television and in print. These programs and articles were a great success and enjoyed a
wide viewership and readership. One o f the most comprehensive articles outlined the
practices traditionally associated with weddings and wakes/funerals (U-A, 14 M arch 1998). It
provided detailed information on six separate steps appropriate for the process o f a wedding
beginning with courtship rituals and an account o f the proper celebration o f the four ndzir, or
wakes, that should take place three days, seven days, forty days, and one year following a
person’s death. The Zhigit Beshi o f the Uyghur communities viewed these articles and
television programs as essential to providing commonality in Uyghur national customs (millii
urp-adat) at a time when people had renewed their interest in the perform ance o f ritual.
Another article on the more general subject o f Uyghur customs states this opinion o f the city’s
Zhigit Beshi in the following manner:
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In some places where Uyghurs live, national customs and traditions, especially
the rituals o f the toy and the ndzir, are misunderstood, leading to confusion,
disputes, and dissatisfaction. To remedy this, various social organizations, zhut
leaders, and activists must work together in a collective to conduct the work o f
advising (on the correct practices) (Jalilov 1999:12).
This wish has more or less come to fruition through the work o f Zhigit Beshi, their assistants,
and the local Imams and mollas.
If these regulated practices o f the toy celebration and the ndzir have been instrumental
in the production o f viable self-regulating zhuts in the Almaty Uyghur community, they are
assisted in this role by a renewed interest in religious holidays. As already noted above, the
observance o f religious holidays under Soviet rule was largely curtailed if not forbidden
entirely. W ith the fall o f the Soviet Union, however, more and more Uyghurs in Almaty
began to observe the most important M uslim holidays, particularly Ramadan and Qurban. In
the early years o f Kazakhstan’s independence, the observance of these religious holidays was
scattered and limited in scope. In more recent years, however, they have taken on much more
importance in the community, even among Uyghurs who are only nom inally religious.
Furthermore, the Zhigit Beshi and local Imams have worked to coordinate this interest into
joint com m unity practices that, like life-cycle rituals, are regulated and supervised to ensure
correct practice.5
The growing importance o f religious holidays, like that o f life-cycle rituals, is largely
a product o f its role in zhutdarchilik. W hen I lived in the Uyghur neighborhood o f Zaria
Vostoka in 1997, for example, regular attendance at the mosque was m ostly limited to
neighborhood elders and a handful of Uyghur traders from China who worked at the bazaar.
On the mornings o f Ramadan and Qurban, however, hundreds o f people attended the mosque
including Uyghurs o f all ages. Furthermore, this has become a time when Uyghurs from
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neighboring apartment block zhuts tend to come to the mosques o f the larger Uyghur
makhallas to pray. To most o f these worshippers, the act o f attending the m osque on these
holidays is more than mere religious observation; it is also a part o f com m unity obligation,
and which mosque one attends has become a marker o f one’s zhut allegiances. This is even
more the case with regard to the tradition o f heytlap.
As noted in chapter one, heytlap is the practice o f visiting different friends and
families during religious holidays, Ramadan and Qurban in particular. During this time,
households keep food ready to feed unannounced guests and likewise visit others to partake in
their banquet table, or dastarkhan. If during m y first year o f fieldwork in Almaty, the practice
o f heytlap was only nom inally observed, by 1997, it had become a widespread phenomenon
not only in the larger Uyghur mdkhallds, but in the apartment block zhuts o f the city as well.
In Zaria Vostoka, I took part in heytlap with the neighborhood’s elders for Qurban Heit in
1997. During this time, the elders were required to visit every house that had sacrificed an
animal in order to sample food made with the m eat from the sacrifice. So many people
observed the rite o f sacrifice, however, that they needed to divide the houses up between two
groups o f elders. Even then, it took two full days to complete the heytlap during which tim e I
ate more lamb stew than I ever knew could fit inside me. In the case o f Zaria Vostoka, both
the sacrifice and heytlap had become a m atter o f community obligation. Those who did not
sacrifice an animal when they had the material means to do so, for example, were looked
down upon as poor practitioners o f zhutdarchilik. Those who did not have the material means
to sacrifice an animal, in turn, were given food by the other residents o f the neighborhood so
that they could provide their own dastarkhan.
5 It should be noted, for example, that the proper observance o f religious holidays was also included as a theme in
the series o f articles on Uyghur urp-adat that were written by Zhigit Beshi in 1997-1998 (see U-A, 21 March 1998).
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In general, this increased interest in the most basic practices o f zhutdarchilik has been
critical both to the production o f Uyghur localities in Almaty and to the developm ent o f a
commonality in practices across these neighborhoods. It has provided Uyghur zhuts in the
city with a variety o f practices o f coordination which help to reproduce habitus locally and
create a context for neighborhood communion. As a result, this re-birth o f zhutdarchilik has
given both structure and meaning to U yghurs’ lives in Alm aty at a tim e when the drastic
political and economic transformations o f an emergent new world order have left m any people
in Kazakhstan socially and politically confused. This structure and meaning in daily life is all
the more important to this community considering its recent transnationalization. For the
Uyghurs from China who have recently come to Almaty, for example, toys and religious
holidays provide an important mechanism through which to be accepted into the larger
Uyghur com m unity o f the city. Consequently, these newest members o f Alm aty’s Uyghur
com m unity have also contributed to the definition o f the practices o f zhutdarchilik, all the
more so because they represent a large portion o f the city’s young Uyghur mollas.
8.5 Conclusions: The Significance o f Almaty’ s Uvehur "Zhuts” to the Production o f
the Stateless Uyghur Nation
The developm ent o f Uyghur ethnic enclaves in Alm aty and their articulation as shared
social spaces for the Uyghur community are important for numerous reasons. First, the
creation o f new Uyghur social spaces provides the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley with an anchor in
a new chaotic and shifting world order. W hile it would be an exaggeration to say that these
Uyghur zhuts have allowed Uyghurs in Almaty to make the transition to a post-cold w ar world
order without difficulties, they certainly have tempered the negative impacts o f this
transformation. They have facilitated the development o f a local moral code that is largely
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based in M uslim practice promoted by local mosques and the zhigit beshi at a time when
social mores in Kazakhstan have become uncertain. Likewise, the developm ent o f mashrap
co-horts and the consciousness o f belonging to a com m on social space provide the Uyghurs in
the city with mechanisms for mutual assistance at a time when economic difficulties and the
disappearance o f social services have left many people in the city hopelessly lost.
In addition to tem pering the challenges o f a new socio-economic order, the creation o f
zhuts in Alm aty has also facilitated the U yghurs’ political empowerment in the city. As has
been suggested throughout the first half o f this study, such Uyghur localities have long served
as bases o f resistance to external domination for the Uyghurs whether that dom ination has
been in the form o f colonialism or post-colonial authoritarianism. The political role o f the
new Uyghur social spaces in Almaty today, however, is somewhat different. With the
exception o f during the periods o f brief statehood experienced by Uyghurs in Xinjiang during
the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the production o f Uyghur social space in A lm aty today
is conducted more independently o f external controls than at anytime covered in this study.
Their role in the Uyghur political engagement with external forces, therefore, has changed
from one o f subversion and resistance to one o f political organization for a new transnational
concept o f the Uyghur nation.
The new Uyghur social spaces in the city offer a territorial and social context in which
the Uyghur stateless cross-border nation in the Ili valley can be articulated in a m anner that is
chosen by Uyghurs themselves. These social spaces, therefore, are more than ethnic territorial
enclaves resisting external domination; they represent places where the consciousness and
ideology o f a stateless Uyghur nation is defined and reproduced through cohesive joint
practice. Furthermore, as in the oases o f Eastern Turkestan during the nineteenth century,
these new Uyghur zhuts in Almaty interact with each other and form a coordinated network
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324
that is connected by shared practices, mediated culture, and social interaction. This network,
in turn, can be easily mobilized when Uyghurs feel their rights threatened either in Kazakhstan
or China. In this sense, the zhuts o f Almaty provide a critical structure for political
organization in the absence o f a state.
The significance o f this political organization to the stateless Uyghur nation, however,
reaches beyond the context o f the Uyghur community in Almaty. Given the importance o f
this particular Uyghur community to production o f a stateless Uyghur nation that is inclusive
o f its m any disparate parts, the zhuts o f Almaty are a central site for the political m obilization
o f the entire transnational Uyghur movement for sovereignty. In a variety o f situations over
the last decade, these zhuts have been mobilized to address incidents in Xinjiang, such as the
1997 K uldja riots, in a manner that engages the international community through the ties that
A lm aty’s Uyghurs maintain with Uyghur exiles elsewhere in the world. The role o f the
Alm aty Uyghur zhuts in such events epitomizes this com m unity’s characteristics as a window
into and a doorway out o f the Uyghurs homeland.
This reliance o f the Uyghur stateless nation’s political structure on the organizing
principles o f local communities tells us much about the character o f the Uyghur nationalist
movem ent in Alm aty today. First, it defines this movement as populist and decentralized in
the way that Partha Chatterjee has envisioned anti-colonial nationalism as founded on a
narrative o f community. For the same reasons, however, it creates a context in which Uyghur
stateless nationalism is necessarily more contested than the nationalism o f a nation-state,
which is based in the hegemonic presence o f state power and organizational structure. The
nationalist ideologies o f the Uyghur stateless nation in Almaty, therefore, must be continually
negotiated not only in the context o f political discussions, but also in the daily practices o f
people in their local neighborhoods.
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The varied nationalist ideologies o f the Uyghur stateless nation that are under
negotiation in Almaty, however, do not emerge from the experiences and practices o f the
Uyghur com m unity in the city alone. Rather, the general shape o f these nationalist ideologies
emerges from a narrative o f the Uyghur nation that is produced through the production and
consum ption o f mediated culture in Almaty. As the next chapter will point out, the scope o f
Uyghur mediated culture has also increased in the 1990s and has been produced and
consumed with more freedom than at anytime since the 1940s in Kuldja.
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C H A PT E R N IN E—M ediated Culture and the Uyghur N ational N arrative in
Alm aty: The Production o f a Stateless N ation’ s Ideologies
National Cultures are composed not only o f cultural institutions, but o f symbols
and representations. A national culture is a “ discourse ” —a way o f
constructing meanings which influences and organizes both our actions and our
conception o f ourselves.
- Stuart Hall (1996:626).
If the establishm ent o f distinct Uyghur zhuts in Almaty and the resurrection o f
zhutdarchilik practices in these neighborhoods create the social space and organizational
structure o f the Uyghur stateless nation in this city, the nation’s contested ideologies are
produced in a different realm. This is a realm o f symbols and representations that shapes the
narrative o f the Uyghur nation and that, for the most part, emerges from the production and
consum ption o f mediated culture. W hile during m uch o f the twentieth century the
establishm ent o f a socialist Uyghur mediated culture on both sides o f the border helped to
produce a certain national narrative for the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley, the ideologies o f the
Soviet Union and the PRC strongly influenced the content o f that narrative. Today, by
contrast, Alm aty offers a cultural space where the construction o f a more independent Uyghur
mediated culture has been possible. This new mediated culture fosters a narrative o f the
Uyghur nation that defies the conventions o f the Soviet Uyghur national culture once
prevalent in this community and that is produced in direct opposition to the narrative o f the
Uyghur nation that is still promoted by the Chinese Communist Party. Furthermore, this
narrative is transnational in nature since it is produced in the shared consumption o f Uyghur
m edia products from Xinjiang, Kazakhstan, and other Uyghur exile communities.
This chapter provides a sketch o f this narrative o f the Uyghur stateless nation in
Alm aty by looking at the mediated culture being produced and consumed in the Uyghur
com m unity o f the city. In addition to describing the global processes that are allowing for the
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production and consumption o f this mediated culture, the chapter also evaluates the relevance
o f the meanings embedded in this m edia to the expression o f the nation and the different
potential interpretations these meanings may evoke from different segments o f A lm aty’s
Uyghur community.
9.1 Global Capitalism and The Revolution in Uvehur Mediated Culture durins the
1980s and 1990s
Even in my own lifetime and in my own experiences, I am amazed at the changes that
have occurred during the last thirty years in the production, consumption, and proliferation o f
m edia in the United States, not to mention around the world. W hen I was in gram m ar school,
television was four channels, video did not exist, nobody owned a personal computer, and the
self-recording o f audio cassettes was only beginning to be a popular practice am ong the
leisure class. Since that time, there has been a revolution in media around the world that has
spawned video, digital media, computers, and satellite television among other things. If this
revolution took hold initially in the wealthiest countries o f the world, the reach o f global
capitalism quickly brought it to the very margins o f our world system. As one m ight expect,
socialist countries took part in this revolution rather late, both due to their peripheral position
in global capital flows and because o f their desire to control the m edia consumed by their
citizens. By the 1980s, however, both China and the Soviet Union were opening up to global
mass media, a process that quickly changed the cultural terrain o f both countries.
M ore important than the many western fdms that came to China and the Soviet Union
during this time, however, was the proliferation o f inexpensive technologies for the production
and consumption o f media. By the late 1980s, audio cassette recorders and players as well as
television sets were almost a household fixture in Uyghur homes in both the Soviet U nion and
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China. W hile video cassette recorders (VCRs) were still a sign o f distinction in the home,
public video salons were widespread on both sides o f the border and offered a host o f films
from abroad. By the 1990s, VCRs had also become common in Uyghur homes, and by the
later 1990s it was not uncommon for the more wealthy Uyghurs on either side o f the border to
also have access to personal computers and even the internet. A m edia revolution had indeed
occurred in Central Asia, and it facilitated more flexibility in the production and consumption
o f m edia by Uyghurs on both sides o f the border.
Although the growing power o f m edia as a global commodity has often been
described as contributing to the co-optation o f expressions o f cultural resistance (see Jam eson
1991:48-49), this has not occurred among the Uyghurs. The expressions o f resistance in
Uyghur m edia have not been nullified by its commercialization prim arily because this m edia
has little or no commercial appeal beyond the Uyghur population o f the world, if for no other
reason because few people understand the language in which it is produced.1 M uch o f Uyghur
media, especially in Kazakhstan and other Uyghur diaspora communities, therefore, is
produced at a commercial loss and is subsidized by wealthy patrons within the community.
These patrons o f the m edia view the various cultural products that they are subsidizing as an
important form o f resistance to the articulation o f the Uyghur nation presented in the official
m edia o f the Chinese state. Furthermore, Uyghurs producing mediated culture in Xinjiang are
also often involved in the subtle subversion o f the Chinese Communist Party line concerning
the narrative o f the Uyghur nation through the use o f allegory and veiled political statements.
N ot only has the global commoditization o f mass m edia not muted the expressions o f
resistance in Uyghur media, therefore, it has helped to increase both the quantity and the
1 One o f the few exceptions to this rule is in the realm o f popular music. In Kazakhstan, for example, Uyghur
music groups have long had wide appeal. In Almaty today, one o f the most popular local pop music groups is a
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328
independence o f this media. This, however, has occurred quite differently in Xinjiang,
Kazakhstan, and other Uyghur diaspora locations respectively.
In Xinjiang, the changes in the freedom o f mediated expression during the 1980s were
at first dramatic. As noted in chapter five, there was virtually no Uyghur language m edia
during the Cultural Revolution with the exceptions o f Uyghur translations o f the writings o f
M ao and other Communist Party propaganda or the ideological rants o f the Red Guard on
Uyghur language radio and in street posters.2 Furthermore, most o f the best known Uyghur
writers, artists, and musicians from the 1950s and 1960s had either fled to the U.S.S.R., been
imprisoned, or spent significant time working among the masses on collective farms or work
camps during this period o f cultural repression. Once the Cultural Revolution had been
suppressed, it was as if Uyghur artists and writers were awakened from a long w inter sleep.
As one historian o f Uyghur literature has noted, “the ice gradually melted, and the real
springtime for literature began” (Akhmidi 1996:10).
This thaw was also encouraged by the Communist Party, which was beginning to
develop a radical plan for reform throughout China. The Central Institute o f M inority
Nationalities in Beijing reopened, and it immediately began work on the developm ent of
m ediated cultural products (i.e. histories, dictionaries, and standard literary languages) for all
o f China’s minorities, the Uyghurs included (see Jarring 1986:12-17). In Xinjiang itself, the
Party also helped to reopen Uyghur language schools and publish Uyghur language books,
Uyghur band by the name o f D ervishi, and one Almaty Uyghur musician who sings mostly in Russian, Murat
Nasyrov, has even become well known throughout the former Soviet Union as a pop star.
2 In addition, the imposition o f a Latin script for the Uyghur language in Xinjiang beginning in December o f 1959
made whatever written material available during the Cultural Revolution unreadable by most older adults (see
Rakhman 1996:98-107).
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journals, and newspapers.3 In addition, the Party assisted in the establishm ent o f Uyghur
television broadcasting in Xinjiang and promoted a more independent Uyghur film industry.
Uyghurs themselves also seized the opportunities o f this new liberalism to begin their
own production o f m edia privately, and in the 1980s many musicians began using privately
available cassette recorders and musical instruments to develop their own local music
recording cottage industry (see Harris 2002). This precedent was quickly followed by a
parallel video recording cottage industry that took advantage o f the new ly available VCR to
record and sell tapes o f television and films, ensuring these media products an audience long
after their initial broadcasting or release. Finally, the growing market economy in Xinjiang
fostered a growing private industry in the production and sale of decorative items, m any o f
which employed M uslim and/or Uyghur nationalist symbols in their design.
In 1989, however, the suppression o f the Tiananmen Square student protests brought a
frost that disrupted the post-Cultural Revolution spring thaw in cultural production throughout
China. In Xinjiang, the result was even more damaging than elsewhere in China due to the
CCP’s increased concerns about separatism throughout the 1990s. The arrest o f the author
Turghun Almas and the banning o f his book Uyghurlar in 1991 served as a sign o f w hat was
to be expected for the rest o f the decade. Since 1991, the Communist Party in Xinjiang has
continued to m onitor Uyghur mediated culture, and those Uyghur writers and artists who have
not followed the general Party line have generally suffered a fate similar to Almas. This being
said, state censorship and m onitoring has not prevented the Uyghurs o f Xinjiang from
producing m edia that promotes an alternative narrative o f their nation for two reasons. First,
Uyghur writers, musicians, filmmakers, and artists quickly learned to avoid making obvious
3 By 1980, even the campaign to change Uyghur literary language to a Latin Script was discarded, and the Uyghurs
o f Xinjiang returned to reading and writing in the Arabic script (see Rakhman 1996:107-117).
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330
statements on controversial issues while becoming masters at communicating such statem ents
subtly and through the use o f allegory. Second, the developing free m arket in Xinjiang
ensured that government control o f any industry, the culture industry included, was
necessarily limited.4
In the past two decades, therefore, a variety o f Uyghur mediated cultural products
have been produced in Xinjiang, and an unstoppable free market ensures that these products are
circulated and/or consumed throughout the population as well as in neighboring Kazakhstan.
Given the political situation in Xinjiang, however, such m edia products rarely directly address
the political aspirations o f Uyghurs in the region. Instead, they help to form a narrative o f the
Uyghur nation’s present and past, in which aspirations for the future are only indirectly
implied. W hen these m edia products are consumed in Almaty, however, these implications for
the nation’s future are publicly recognized and commented upon in the m edia produced by
Uyghurs in Kazakhstan.
The changes in the production o f Uyghur mediated culture in Kazakhstan were less
dramatic and slower in their arrival than was the case in Xinjiang. If the Cultural Revolution in
China marked a period o f extreme cultural suppression, especially with regards to m inorities, the
Soviet Union experienced its most extreme period o f censorship in the 1930s and early 1940s, and
the thaw in cultural expression had already long taken place by the 1980s. During the 1970s, for
example, Kazakhstan already had several Uyghur newspapers (including one printed in the Arabic
script for immigrants from China), a Uyghur musical and dramatic theatre, a publishing office for
4 The role o f the market econom y in this regard is especially apparent in the production and sale o f electronic
media. W hile a 1995 law required that all audio recordings in the Uyghur language be published either by the
Urumchi-based X injiang Recording Company or by the Beijing-based N ationalities R ecording Com pany (Harris
2002), Uyghurs often ignored these policies by follow ing the example o f China’s unofficial policy towards western
media and defying copyrights. Despite government controls, therefore, pirated audio and video tapes are produced
and sold throughout Xinjiang. This phenomenon not only allows for the illicit production o f such media outside
official structures, but, as M usicologist Rachel Harris notes, it also accounts for the continual circulation o f audio
and video cassettes that have been banned (see Harris 2002).
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U'yghur language books, a special Uyghur Studies Section within the Institute o f Linguistics at the
Kazakhstan Academy o f Sciences, and daily radio broadcasts in Uyghur. W hile Perestroika and
Glasnost ’ brought a degree o f increased cultural freedom to these institutions in the 1980s, the
changes were minimal compared to those in China at the same time. M ost importantly,
throughout the 1980s the Soviet Communist Party still controlled Uyghur mediated culture in
Kazakhstan, m eaning that Glasnost’ had merely expanded the field, but not the determ inants, o f
acceptable discourse. This is evident from the censorship o f Malik K abirov’s book on the
Uyghurs o f Sem irech’e in 1987, which had obviously overstepped the boundaries o f w hat was
acceptable (see Chapter Six).5
The most significant changes in Uyghur mediated culture on the Soviet side o f the border,
therefore, did not take place until the U.S.S.R. itself collapsed in 1991. W hile the Kazakhstan
government has continued to mildly monitor Uyghur m edia products since 1991, the developm ent
o f Uyghur media was mostly left to the free market. As a result, Uyghur m edia benefited less
from state assistance, but it also was less constricted by state controls. Due to these conflicting
forces in the transition to capitalism, state subsidized academic publishing subsided significantly,
but the publication o f memoirs, political analyses, poetry, and fictional prose by private citizens
increased substantially. Likewise, several privately funded Uyghur nationalist newsletters began
to circulate within the community. W hile the state music recording industry had disappeared,
Uyghur musicians found means, either through low-cost private studios or by using their own
recording equipment, to produce cassettes o f their work. In the midst o f this privatization of
mediated culture, some o f the state subsidized Uyghur m edia also continued to exist, bolstered by
private financial support from the Uyghur community. Uyghur radio continued to be produced
5 Another example o f this control is a project o f the Institute o f Uyghur Studies focusing on the writing and
publication o f a short history o f the Uyghurs. The Institute was not allowed to undertake this project on its own
and was required to invite specialists from M oscow and Leningrad to assist them (see Kratkaia 1992).
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with some state assistance, television programming— while constantly under threat o f closure—
continued to be broadcast on a state-run channel, and the two Republic-wide Uyghur new spapers
in Kazakhstan, Uyghur Avazi (“The Voice o f the Uyghurs”) and Yengi Hay at (“N ew Life”),
continued to publish, only being forced to completely privatize very recently.6
This privatization o f Uyghur mediated culture in Kazakhstan has had a predictable
effect on the content o f m edia that follows two o f the most basic rules o f the production o f
culture in a capitalist economy. Those who have access to financial capital have been able to
dom inate the production o f m edia and significantly influence its content, and m edia content has
begun to change to m eet the demands o f its consumers. In both cases, the result has been
Uyghur m edia’s gradual movement away from their prior role in the propagation o f state
ideology and the socialist Uyghur nation and towards a role that promotes the narrative o f a
stateless Uyghur nation seeking sovereignty. W hile not as numerous in quantity as the m edia
produced in Xinjiang, these Uyghur mediated cultural products in Kazakhstan are much more
blatantly political and nationalist in character than would ever be possible in Xinjiang. In the
context o f the cross-border consumption o f mediated culture, therefore, the Uyghur m edia
products in Kazakhstan provide a powerful supplement to that produced in Xinjiang in the
construction o f a new narrative o f the Uyghur nation.
Since the early 1990s, the quantity o f Uyghur m edia produced outside both the former
Soviet Union and the People’s Republic o f China has also increased significantly, but the
reasons for this increase in cultural production have been somewhat different. First, the
Uyghur diaspora outside China and the former Soviet Union has grown substantially over the
last twenty years. W ith the opening up o f China and the fall o f the U.S.S.R., Uyghurs from
both Xinjiang and former Soviet Central Asia have found means to emigrate elsewhere, either
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333
illegally or as political refugees. As a result, the relatively small and older emigre Uyghur
com m unities in Turkey, Europe, the Americas, and Australia have been infused with young
newcomers who have become extremely active in media production as a means o f political
expression. Second, the significant international access to Kazakhstan after the fall o f the
Soviet Union has inspired the production o f m edia by both new and old exiles expressly for
the consum ption o f Xinjiang Uyghurs living in Almaty. Finally, the growing popularity o f
internet around the world has also given exiles in wealthier countries the ability to launch a
variety o f Uyghur nationalist web sites for the consumption o f both Uyghurs and the
international community.7 Due to the limited access to internet in Central Asia, however,
most o f the m edia from these emigre communities that are consumed in Alm aty are in the
form o f books, journals, videos, and audio cassettes that are distributed in K azakhstan for both
local Uyghurs and those visiting from Xinjiang.
The majority o f these materials is overtly political in nature and tends to be polem ical
in form. In the context o f the Uyghur national narrative, these media products are an
important supplement to that which is produced in Kazakhstan and Xinjiang since they
provide political viewpoints that are founded more in global cultural and political movements.
Even if this material may differ in its nationalist ideology from that which is produced in
Kazakhstan, the Uyghurs o f Almaty play an important role in helping to distribute Uyghur
exile m edia products to those Xinjiang Uyghurs living in the city and, in the process, consume
them as well.
W hile developing in different ways and for different reasons, the increase in Uyghur
mediated culture in Xinjiang, Kazakhstan, and elsewhere has facilitated a diverse and
6 In 1999, Yengi H ayat was fully privatized and renamed Yengi Zaman, or “N ew Tim e.”
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abundant field o f m edia consumption in A lm aty’s Uyghur community. Since the media
consumed by Uyghurs in this city come from all parts o f the Uyghur stateless nation, they also
represent an important mediated realm for the negotiation o f the ideologies and narratives o f
this dispersed and transnational nation. Four genres in this transnational Uyghur mediated
culture o f Alm aty have been especially germane to the production o f these ideologies and
narratives o f the Uyghur stateless nation: history, traditional culture, social criticism, and
political statements
9.2 Recovering “Traces ” o f the Past: History in Almaty’ s Uyghur Media Today
The traces remain, the destination remains, everything remains fo r a long time,
if a storm breaks out, if the sand moves, our trace is not to be buried.
The caravan from the road is unstoppable, even though the horses are weak,
one day at least this trace will be the discovery o f our grandchildren
or our great-grandchildren.
Abdurehim Otkiir, Iz (1985:1)
This stanza from the poem that begins Abdurehim Otkiir’s now famous historical
novel Iz suggests the importance o f the recovery o f the past for the U yghurs’ future
aspirations as a nation. Indeed, the recovery o f the past has been a central them e in the
Uyghur m edia that has been consumed by A lm aty’s Uyghur community since the fall o f the
Soviet Union whether it is locally produced or imported from either Xinjiang or from Uyghur
exile communities elsewhere. This m edia has facilitated the construction o f a new historical
narrative o f the Uyghur nation that stands in opposition to the official Chinese Com munist
Party line on the history o f both Xinjiang and the Uyghur people. M ost importantly, the
historical narrative o f the Uyghurs being produced in Almaty makes two important assertions
7 There are a number o f these web pages based in the United States, Europe, and Turkey. See Nathan Light’s
homepage (www.utoledo.edu/~nlight/uyghpg.htm#diss) for links to some o f the most important ones.
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that contradict the view o f historians in the People’s Republic of China. The first is that the
Uyghurs are the indigenous population o f Xinjiang and were present in the region long before
the Chinese arrived there. The second is that the central plot line o f Uyghur history since the
Chinese arrival in Xinjiang has been the constant struggle for self-determination against the
Han Chinese, whether they represent the Qing Dynasty, the Kuomintang, or the Com m unist
Party. Both o f these assertions have obvious political connotations that support Uyghur
claims to sovereignty in Xinjiang.
The most abundant m edia products about Uyghur history that are consumed in Alm aty
are those produced in Xinjiang. Since history is highly contentious in China, and in Xinjiang
in particular, the majority o f these products promote the Chinese state’s interpretation o f the
history o f both the Uyghurs and their homeland. M ost importantly, they provide a narrative o f
the history o f Xinjiang that states forcefully that this region always has been an inseparable
part o f China.8
This them e is especially pronounced in the comprehensive histories o f Xinjiang and
the Uyghurs published by academic collectives in the early 1990s (cf. Batur and Sidiq 1991;
Uyghurlarning 1990; Shinjang 1992). All o f these works are situated clearly in the history o f
a greater China and stress the important role o f China in Xinjiang throughout the history o f
the region. W hile most Uyghurs in Kazakhstan read these works, they also actively interpret
them as propaganda and read between the lines in order to come to their own conclusions
about the questions addressed. W hile this is also done in Xinjiang, Uyghurs in Kazakhstan are
also able to use these texts to promote their own counter arguments, which are most often
8 A prime example o f the CCP’s concern about this history is the Xinjiang government’s publication o f primers on
the correct interpretation o f various historical questions about the region’s history (cf. Shinjang 1992; Shinjang
1998). These books provide short definitive answers to various controversial questions from the extent o f China’s
control o f Xinjiang in ancient times to the involvement o f Chinese Communists in the Eastern Turkestan Republic.
In all cases, the answers provided support the Chinese Communist P arty line on the history o f Xinjiang— the region
is and always has been an inseparable part o f the Middle Kingdom.
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found on the pages o f A lm aty’s Uyghur newspapers, but are also present in school textbooks
and academic articles.
N ot all history written in Xinjiang, however, supports the Chinese Party line on
Uyghur history. One o f the most obvious examples o f texts published in Xinjiang that refute
Chinese official history is Turghun Almas book Uyghurlar that has already been m entioned
in earlier chapters (see Almas 1989). W hile this book was banned for its controversial
portrayal o f the Uyghurs as the indigenous population o f Xinjiang, its republication in Almaty,
both in the Uyghur language using the Cyrillic script (see Almas 1992) and in Russian
translation (see Almas 1994), has ensured its continued influence among Uyghurs in this city.
Zainaudin Bosakov, the Almaty merchant funding the book’s republication, believed this
project to be so important that he told me, “next to the Qu 'ran, The Uyghurs is the single
most important book to the Uyghur people; all Uyghurs must read it.”
Furthermore, A lm as’ book inspired the publication in Almaty o f other sim ilar books
about the ancient Uyghurs. One example o f this phenomenon is a textbook written for use in
Uyghur schools that draws extensively from Almas and recounts the history o f the Uyghurs
and Xinjiang from the stone-age to the thirteenth century (Isiev 1996). A nother example is a
very sophisticated critique o f Chinese historical writings on the origins o f the Uyghurs that
was written by a Uyghur exile from Xinjiang who had studied in M oscow (see Tursun 1997).
Finally, another book inspired by A lm as’ work was written by an am ateur Uyghur historian in
Russian and more aptly belongs to the genre o f nationalist history that views one’s own nation
as the center o f all historical processes (M asimi 1998). Drawing from an incredible num ber o f
sources, this book not only portrays the entire history o f Central Asia and the Turkic peoples
o f the world as the history o f the Uyghurs, it also claims that Native Am erican nations are
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337
descended from the Uyghurs.9 Despite the questionable nature o f many o f the arguments
made in this book, even professional Uyghur scholars in Almaty who are better acquainted
with this history view the book as playing an important role in contradicting Chinese claims to
being the indigenous population o f Xinjiang.
Since the banning o f Alm as’ book in Xinjiang, however, most Uyghur historians in
China have used more subtle means to subvert the Chinese state’s ideological influence on
their work. One approach, that was also long popular among scholars in the Soviet Union, is
to concentrate on very specific and narrow questions from social history where the author does
not need to refer directly to larger ideological issues. Such work is particularly prevalent in
the multiple volume Shinjang Tarikh Materiyalliri (“Xinjiang Historical M aterials”), w hich is
a series o f edited collections o f articles on the region’s history that, until recently, was
published “for internal consumption only” (ichki qisimda tarqitilidu) (cf. Rakhm an 1996;
Tahir 1998).1 0 Such historical research, which generally provides little analysis o f the larger
political processes surrounding the questions addressed, serves as important factual raw
material for Uyghurs in Kazakhstan who utilize them in both interpreting and w riting their
own version o f Uyghur history.1 1
9 In addition to using literature about the land bridge theory o f the migration o f the native Americans from north
Asia, the book notes that the name Apache has a Uyghur etym ology (Apa-mother, c/h-belonging to) (Masimi
1998:312).
1 0 W hile this series began in 1960, it was discontinued during the Cultural Revolution and renewed publication only
in 1978.
1 1 Similarly, Uyghur historians in Xinjiang have also managed to re-print many older manuscripts that have
historical significance. M ost o f these re-prints have helped to establish, at least in the minds o f Uyghur readers, the
long history o f Uyghur literature and the long history o f Uyghurs in Xinjiang. They do so by covering a wide
period o f time including the eighth century [Jahannam a (Shikasta 1985)], the eleventh century [Mahmut
Qashqariy’s T urki Tillar D ivani (Qashqariy 1981-1984) and Y usuf Khas Hajib’s Q utadghu bilik (Hajib 1985)],
and the sixteenth century [O ghuznam a (Qadimqi 1980)]. In addition, several well-known historical manuscripts
concerning Eastern Turkestan from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries have been re-printed, providing a
more obvious link to historical knowledge (cf. M ojiz 1982; Haji 1988; Sayrami 1992). A third genre o f reprints is
from the much more recent past and have served to resurrect Uyghur nationalist ideologies from the early twentieth
century. These are re-prints and collections o f poems and prose by various early Uyghur nationalists who wrote
actively between the 1920s to the 1940s (cf. Uyghur 1986; Qadiriy 1992).
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338
Another device employed by Uyghurs in Xinjiang in order to allow them more
freedom in writing about their own history is to write about literary history. W hile the study
o f literature is not as overtly political as standard historical narratives, it can address the exact
same issues. An article written in Xinjiang in 1981, for example, portrays the history o f
Uyghur democratic literature as beginning with the Jadid movement o f the early twentieth
century and as being further developed by the revolutionary poet Abdukhaliq Uyghur, who
was killed by Chinese authorities in the 1930s (Zunun 1981). In doing so, the author publicly
rehabilitated these figures from the early Uyghur nationalist movement and indirectly justified
their Uyghur nationalist views as politically correct. Likewise, in a history o f Uyghur
Classical Literature that was also published in 1981, the author suggests, by his inclusion o f a
variety o f ancient literary traditions, that the Uyghur people were among the ancient
indigenous people o f the region now known as Xinjiang (Om ar 1981).1 2 In more recent years,
books have also been published which address the history o f specific Uyghur nationalist
writers who took part in the Eastern Turkestan Republic, indirectly justifying these authors’
political views on Uyghur sovereignty (see, for example, Arshidin 1994, 1998). In
Kazakhstan, this literary history has been instrumental in helping Uyghur scholars in A lm aty
to re-write Uyghur language and literature textbooks to include a wide range o f authors from
Xinjiang. In doing so, the Kazakhstan based scholars have also more directly linked these
writers to the central plot line o f Uyghur history in the modern period— the struggle against
the Chinese for independence in their homeland.
1 2 A s is evident from Gunnar Jarring’s 1978 discussions with Han Chinese historians in Xinjiang, such a theory was
contrary to the official P arty Line interpretation o f Xinjiang’s history at that time (Jarring 1986:24-33).
Furthermore, as the fate o f Turghun A lm as’ book Uyghurlar suggests, such a theory remained taboo into the
1990s. It is not surprising, therefore, that the author o f this book was later censured for this work under the claim
that it promoted nationalist history.
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339
The most popular Uyghur historical writings from Xinjiang in Almaty, however, are
undoubtedly historical novels. During the 1980s and 1990s, scores o f Uyghur historical
novels were printed in Xinjiang, and some o f these have been surprisingly bold in their
portrayal o f the past.1 3 This is particularly the case in the series o f historical fiction w ritten by
Abdurehim Otkiir about the U yghurs’ rebellions against Chinese rule that took place in the
first half o f the twentieth century (see Otkiir 1985, 1988, 1994).1 4 As in Xinjiang, the Uyghurs
o f Kazakhstan have elevated Otkiir to the status o f a national hero, and his novels are often
seen as more accurate accounts o f the history about which he writes than are non-fictional
historical narratives. Along with Otkiir’s novels, numerous other examples o f historical
fiction about Xinjiang have enjoyed wide popularity in Almaty during the 1980s and 1990s.
These books have covered an array o f periods and themes from the life o f the nineteenth
century Uyghur rebel Sadyr Pavlan to Sheng Shicai’s rule o f Xinjiang in the early twentieth
century (cf. Yasin 1997; M a 1996).1 5 W hile Uyghurs in Xinjiang also read these novels as
stories from the history o f the struggle for independence from China, in Kazakhstan this them e
from Xinjiang novels is emphasized in book reviews and literary discussions. Furthermore,
these novels have also inspired several recent works o f historical fiction written by Uyghurs in
Almaty that focus on the Eastern Turkestan Republic (cf. M usa 1995, 1996; Samadiy 1995).
1 3 In a history o f recent Uyghur literature, Azad Sultan cites the leading authors in this genre in the 1980s and
1990s as Abdurehim Otkiir, Aysham Akhmat, Abdulla Talip, Turdi Samsaq, Parhat Jilan, and Akhmat Turdi
(Sultan 1997:12).
1 4 Otkiir, like most important Uyghur authors, had been repressed during the Cultural Revolution. When the thaw
o f the 1980s began, however, he devoted the rest o f his life to writing and publishing. When Otkiir died in 1995,
the funeral was attended by hundreds o f Uyghurs, and its large procession went through the streets o f Urumchi with
his many fans chanting “Allah Akbar.” W hile the event verged on a political demonstration, authorities w isely
decided to allow it to proceed without incident.
1 5 The novel on the rule o f Sheng Shicai, Jalat Sheng Shisay (“The Executioner Sheng Shicai”) was written by the
Dungan author Tung Ma, but it has been translated into Uyghur and is praised by many Uyghurs for its accurate
portrayal o f this period.
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340
As might be expected, these historical novels are more overtly anti-Chinese than are those
published in Xinjiang.
Illustrations 22: Xinjiang Uyghur Literature Popular in Almaty
Illustration 22.1: Cover of Abdurehim Otur's novel
Iz (left), Abdurehim Otkiir (right) (Otkiir 1985, 1996).
Illustration 22.2: A Russian
translation of Turgun Almas'
book, The Uyghurs,
published in Xinjiang (Almas
1994).
In addition to helping to interpret and build upon historical work from Xinjiang in
order to support an alternative narrative o f Uyghur history, Kazakhstan writers have also
contributed extensively to the production o f Uyghur history through the recovery o f long
suppressed events from the past. In this capacity, Uyghur historians in Kazakhstan have re
evaluated several important events from Uyghur nationalist history in ways that were once
taboo in the Soviet Union and are still forbidden in China. The most significant o f these
events is the Eastern Turkestan Republic. In China, historical publications on this
controversial state have overwhelmingly supported the Chinese Communist Party line that the
ETR was an intentionally transitional state that eagerly awaited its unification with the
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341
People’s Republic o f China in 1949 (cf. Shinjang 2000; Yan 1999).1 6 In Kazakhstan in recent
years, however, numerous memoirs reprinted in pamphlets and newspaper articles have
portrayed this short-lived independent government as having a goal o f liberating Xinjiang
from the Chinese, the realization o f which is described as being foiled by the alliance between
Stalin and M ao (cf. Barat 1994; Ibrahim 1994a, 1994b; M ukhtarO ghli 1994; Vakhidiy 1994;
Yasin 1994; Vasiljan 1994; Setishev 1994; Uyghuriy 2000). W hile this has long been the
popular interpretation o f this state’s history among Uyghurs in the Ili valley, the public
recognition o f this interpretation in the realm o f mediated culture has served to officially
support this argument with facts and documentation. As a result of the increased attention
paid to the fate o f the ETR, it has in recent years become a symbol for the transnational
Uyghur nationalist movement, and its flag has emerged as the default flag o f the Uyghur
stateless nation. Consequently, the flag has also appeared as a symbol in Uyghur mediated
culture in posters, car dashboard decorations, and bumper stickers.
Another recent contribution o f Uyghur writers in Kazakhstan to the construction o f a
new historical narrative o f the Uyghur nation has been to emphasize the intertwined nature o f
Uyghur political struggles on both sides of the border in the Ili valley. This historical work
has included general examinations o f how the Uyghurs’ fate at different periods has been
manipulated by the political powers o f both China and Russia (cf. Ismailov 1998; M akhmut
1998; U-A, 22 August 1998) and more specific studies o f how cross-border migrations were
motivated by political machinations between the states o f this borderland (cf. Sadiriy 1998;
Rozi 1998; Rozibaqiev 1998; Sabitov 1998; Zulpiqar 1998; Sadirov 1994; Abdurehim Oghli
1 6 In commemoration o f the ETR’s 50th anniversary in 1994, a nation-wide project began on the history o f this
controversial semi-independent government. W hile most o f the works produced as a part o f this project held to the
P arty line, others were source books that provide chronologies, excerpts from speeches, and photos from the period
(cf. Shinjang 1994; Shinjang 1995b; Shinjang 1997). Due to the documentary nature o f this second category o f
books, they have become important resources for Uyghurs trying to re-discover this part o f their history.
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342
1994; Zaydiy 1992). Other examples o f this work have stressed that Uyghur political activists
in the Russian/Soviet portion o f the Ili valley have long been deeply concerned about the
question o f Uyghur independence from China (cf. Y-H, 25 Oct. 1997; Abdum ejit Rozibaqiev
1997; Abdusem atov 1991; Abdulla Rozibaqiev 1997). All o f these them es serve to link the
history o f the Uyghurs across borders in the last two centuries, helping to undermine the
concepts o f separate Soviet and Chinese Uyghur histories and promote a transnational
narrative o f the stateless Uyghur nation.
Uyghur mediated culture from other exile communities has also played an important
role in the development o f a more encompassing transnational Uyghur national history in
Almaty. W orks from Turkey in particular have recovered for the Uyghurs o f the Ili valley the
history o f Uyghur anti-communists in the early twentieth century, m ost o f whom fled to
Turkey when the People’s Liberation Army entered Xinjiang in 1949. The most significant
example o f this Uyghur history from Turkey is the 1989 republication o f M uhammad Imin
Bughra’s history o f Eastern Turkestan that was originally published in Kabul in 1940 (Bughra
1989). Since Bughra had been an ardent anti-communist who had been a leader o f the Islamic
Republic o f Eastern Turkestan and had served the KM T in the Xinjiang coalition government
in the 1940s, this work was banned in the Soviet Union and still is forbidden in China. Copies
o f it, however, were made available throughout the 1990s in Kazakhstan where Uyghur
citizens o f both Kazakhstan and China were able to read it for the first time.
In addition to these many examples from Alm aty o f Uyghur printed mediated culture
addressing history, non-print m edia has also supported a new interpretation o f Uyghur history
in the city. Some o f this m edia has served to bolster specific printed historical works. The
novels o f Abdurehim Otkiir, for example, inspired the production o f a dual audio cassette box
set of Otkiir’s poetry that was released in Xinjiang after his death. In addition to the recited
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poems o f Otkiir, this cassette set, called Qara Hijran (“The Dark Parting”), includes a tribute
to the author’s life and work as well as several songs based on his poetry. Likewise, the
Kuldja musician Omarjan Alim has devoted an entire cassette o f music to the historical
writings o f Otkiir and has named it Iz Qaldi (“A Trace Remains”). Similarly, the written work
o f the Uyghur politician Saypidin Aziz inspired the historical film Amaniskhan (1993) about
the life o f the Uyghur female musician and composer o f the same name who lived in the
Yarkand area during the sixteenth century. All o f these non-written forms o f m edia about the
U yghurs’ history are consumed in Almaty where they are celebrated as supporting the
U yghurs’ historical claims to a glorious past and a prolonged struggle for sovereignty in their
homeland.
Other non-literary m edia that address history, however, have drawn their inspiration
from other sources. The musician Zahir Burkhan, for example, has released a cassette, song,
and popular music video about one o f the now famous “mummies o f Urum chi,” who the
Uyghurs call Kiruran Giizal (“Beauty o f Loulan”).1 7 In the case o f the estim ated 4,000 year-
old “Beauty o f Loulan,” most Uyghurs consider her obvious Caucasian features to be proof o f
their indigenous status in Xinjiang, or at least o f the fallacy o f Han Chinese claims that the
region was always a part o f China.1 8 Burkhan’s simple tribute to this mother o f the Uyghurs,
therefore, carries with it numerous assumptions about the historical narrative o f the Uyghur
nation that contradict the Communist Party line on this history. It is only outside China and
particularly in Almaty, however, where the political connotations o f the “Beauty o f Loulan”
can be publicly addressed (see V-A, 31 M ay 1997, 18 Sept. 1997).
1 7 The “Beauty o f Loulan” is actually an international adaptation o f the Uyghur name Kiruran Giizal. Kiruran
refers to the present village where the mummy was found, and Loulan refers to the ancient city that once existed
there.
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344
Illustrations 23: The “Beauty of Loulan'
Illustration 23.1: An actual picture of
the mummy described as the “Beauty of
Loulan” from an American white
supremacy web-site
(http://www.stormfront.Org/whitehistory/h
wr6a.htm).
Illustration 23.2: Video
casette cover from compilation
of Xinjiang produced music
videos including Kiruran
Giizal, a reconstructed portrait
of the mummy is in the top
right comer of the cover.
In addition, the production o f popular posters from Uyghur paintings and prints has
helped to fuel the narrative o f the Uyghurs’ history in Almaty. M any o f the paintings o f the
Xinjiang Uyghur artist Ghazi Am at that glorify Uyghur historical figures, for example, have
become popular posters that adorn the walls o f Uyghur homes in A lm aty.1 9 A m at’s subject
matter, however, tends to deal most substantially with Uyghur cultural heroes, such as the
1 8 W hile the Uyghurs generally defy the simplified racial labels o f African, Asian, North American, and Caucasian,
they are far more Caucasian in appearance than are the Han Chinese. The actual genetic connections between these
mummies found in Xinjiang and present-day Uyghurs, however, remains unknown.
1 9 For a catalog o f Arndt’s work, see G hazi 1989.
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345
eleventh century writers M ahmud Qashqari and Yusup Khas Hajib, and it subsequently offers
little com m entary on Chinese historical assertions that are contended by Uyghurs in Almaty.
Similar works produced by Uyghur artists in Kazakhstan, however, do provide such
commentary. A prime example o f such artistic works are the illustrations o f print-m aker
Kurash Zulpiqar whose series o f prints dedicated to Uyghur historical figures features
numerous Uyghurs who fought against Chinese rule in Xinjiang at different points in history.
W hile only a few o f these prints have appeared in the form o f posters in Almaty, the artist has
prepared several full sets for Uyghur schools in the city where they help to shape the historical
narrative o f the Uyghurs consumed by school children. Another example o f Uyghur national
history being expressed in such mass-produced decorative images o f national heroes was the
printing o f a 1995 calendar in Xinjiang that was sold throughout the Uyghur section o f
Urumchi. The calendar displayed a different Uyghur historical figure for each month, all o f
whom had fought against Chinese domination and most o f whom had died a m artyr in the
process. W hile the calendar was quickly banned in Xinjiang, it remained available at
A lm aty’s Barakholka bazaar where I purchased it. Following this example, Uyghurs in
Alm aty have since also produced numerous calendars featuring Uyghur nationalists from
history, and these calendars often remain hanging in homes long after the year they feature has
expired.
All o f these examples o f the production and consumption o f Uyghur mediated culture
in Almaty, therefore, promote a certain narrative o f Uyghur history. W hile this narrative is
not without its contentious moments and disputed questions, its general plot line is clear. The
Uyghurs were the original inhabitants o f Xinjiang, and their history since the Chinese
colonization o f the region in the eighteenth century has been dominated by the struggle for
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346
independence from Chinese rule. Just as the m edia products that help form this narrative
come from a variety o f locations in the transnational Uyghur stateless nation, its consum ers in
Almaty do as well. Along with the Uyghur citizens o f Kazakhstan, Uyghur traders and self-
imposed exiles from China consume this particular historical narrative o f their nation in
Alm aty and, in m any cases, propagate it among others if and when they return to Xinjiang.
Likewise, numerous Uyghur exiles from Turkey, Germany, and elsewhere who visit A lm aty
are consumers as well as partial producers o f this history. In this sense, Alm aty has become
one o f the central locations where a Uyghur history produced by and for Uyghurs can be
engaged by this entire stateless nation, a process that is continually being negotiated by the
disparate parts o f the Uyghur nation that come together in city.
9.3 The Mediation o f “Traditional” Uvshur Culture in Almaty: Ethnoeraphy and
Folklore in the Service o f the Nation
Another genre o f Uyghur mediated culture in Almaty that has important influence on
the construction o f a new narrative o f the Uyghur stateless nation is reflected in works of
folklore and ethnography. W hile folklore and ethnography played an important role in the
construction o f a Soviet national history o f the Uyghurs in Kazakhstan, Uyghurs in A lm aty
today consume such works in a more applied fashion. Today, the Uyghurs o f A lm aty do not
consume such m edia about their traditional culture to learn about their past as much as to
inform their present practices. To most Uyghurs in Almaty, these practices are generally
viewed as markers o f their membership in the Uyghur nation and as critical to the form ation o f
the social boundaries that distinguish them from others. For this reason, their standardization
through science is particularly important.
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The m ost substantial body o f m edia on folklore available in Almaty, like that on
history, has been produced in Xinjiang. In the 1980s and early 1990s, a region-wide effort to
docum ent X injiang’s folklore resulted in the publication o f an immensely im portant and
comprehensive series o f books reflecting collections o f Uyghur proverbs, songs, jokes, short
poems, and stories (cf. Omar 1985; Ili 1986; Rakhman 1990).2 0 Given that this research has
largely involved only the documentation, and not the analysis, of Uyghur folklore, the Chinese
state has encouraged this work.2 1 In Almaty, this material has been particularly popular, and
local Uyghur scholars have used the raw materials in these volumes to produce more analytical
works linking this folklore with the Uyghurs’ struggle for independence (see M olotova 1996).
In addition, however, Uyghur scholars in Kazakhstan have tried to present this
folklore in ways that promote its reproduction in practice today. As early as 1993, for example,
Uyghurs in Alm aty had produced a teachers’ manual based on folklore that combined
collections o f proverbs and poetry with detailed descriptions o f cultural practices w here they
were used (Zulpiqar 1993). W hile this manual enjoyed limited use in schools, it did influence
Uyghur curriculum and became an important manual for Zhigit Beshi in Alm aty who were able
to use it to implement correct cultural practices in their respective neighborhoods. As a result,
much o f the descriptions o f practice and m any o f the examples of proverbs in this book have
become more conspicuous in actual Uyghur ritual and practice in Alm aty today.
O f more relevance to cultural practice in Almaty than these folklore studies from
Xinjiang, however, has been the new literature o f an emergent field o f social science in
Xinjiang known as ethnography. Like the Soviet discipline o f ethnography from the 1960s
2 0 The books cited here are only a few examples o f a much larger literature that recording oral folklore in print.
Many o f these books are regional in orientation and reflect folklore only from a specific region within Xinjiang.
2 1 It should be noted, however, that collections o f Uyghur folklore produced in Xinjiang would not include material
that is obviously critical o f Chinese rule in Xinjiang, especially during the communist period.
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until the fall o f the U.S.S.R., Uyghur ethnographic studies in Xinjiang today do not em phasize
existing cultural practices, which could create controversy in Xinjiang’s political environm ent,
but m ostly provide reconstructions o f so-called traditional cultural practices from the past.
Furthermore, like Soviet ethnography, they are far more descriptive than analytical, resem bling
the style o f salvage ethnography popular in the early twentieth century. Through their
consumption in Almaty, however, this literature from Xinjiang is directly applied to present.
The m ost substantial work o f this kind is a comprehensive compendium o f Uyghur
cultural practices and traditions written by Abdurahim Habibulla called U y g h u r E tnografiyisi
(“Uyghur Ethnography”) (Habibulla 1993). Since the publication o f this book, there has been
an increase in popular and scholarly interest in the study o f Uyghur traditional culture in
Xinjiang. This interest is especially reflected in two important Uyghur journals from Xinjiang
that publish on local history and traditional culture— Miras (“Heritage”) and Shinjiang
Tazkirichiliki (“Xinjiang Chronicles”). In addition, a more popular compendium on the full
range o f Uyghur cultural practices was published in 1996 that combines glossy color photos
with text in a coffee-table book format (see Uyghur 1996).
As has been the case in folkloric studies, these ethnographic works have influenced
Uyghur practice substantially on both sides o f the border. H abibulla’s book and other
ethnographic studies that followed it, for example, were used extensively by Zhigit Beshi in
Almaty when writing instructive articles on cultural practices in Kazakhstan’s Uyghur
newspapers in the later 1990s (cf. U-A, 14 March 1998; Jalilov 1999:12). Likewise, the
m ashrap youth movement in Kuldja began simultaneously with the 1994 publication in the
journal Miras o f an extensively descriptive article about the mashrap as it was practiced in the
Ili valley during the past (see Abdilim 1994). W hether the inspiration for this article came
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from the social movement or vice-versa, the publication o f this ethnographic study likely
furthered the mashrap’ s revival in the Kuldja area in the mid-1990s.
Furthermore, ethnographic writings have been instrumental in the Alm aty U yghurs’
recovery o f religious practices. In H abibulla’s comprehensive book on Uyghur ethnography,
for example, the religious practices that are interwoven with Uyghur rituals and traditions are
noted throughout the book, and a separate section addresses religious holidays (see H abibulla
1993). W ith the growing concern o f the Chinese government about the practice o f Islam in
Xinjiang, however, this religiously oriented aspect o f the discipline o f ethnography has been
increasingly monitored in recent years. W hen I asked a Kazakh professor o f M arxist theory at
Xinjiang University in 1997 whether the school taught religion as a subject, for example, he
answered me with obvious disapproval, “yes, they call it ethnography.” W hile presently under
fire in Xinjiang, in Kazakhstan these materials are used increasingly by the Uyghur com m unity
as they continue to resurrect religious practices that had been suppressed during the Soviet
period.
In addition to academic and popular Uyghur ethnographic studies, television and film
have also played an important role in the Alm aty U yghurs’ recovery o f traditional cultural
practices. In a series o f recent films produced by Xinjiang’s Tanghritagh Kino Istudiosi
(Tangritagh Film Studios), for example, the recreation o f rituals from traditional Uyghur rural
and urban makhalla life, such as Sufi healing rites, traditional wedding ceremonies, and other
aspects o f village zhutdarchilik, are portrayed with surprising accuracy and a beauty that
suggests admiration for Uyghur traditions (cf. Akhrqi Kul 1999; Qirliq Istakan 1999; Bu
Chush Amas 2000; Alimjan Bolumsizmu? 2000).2 2 Likewise, around the time o f the K uldja
mashrap movement, Xinjiang Television produced two variety programs that based their
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350
format on the mashrap. One program, Dolan Mashripi (“The Dolan M ashrap”), com bined
recreated practices from the mashrap as performed in the Dolan area near Yarkand with
locally produced music videos, stand-up comedy, and historical skits. The other program, Ili
Vadisida Mashrap (“A M ashrap in the Ili Valley”), follows a similar format by showing the
specific rituals associated with the mashrap in the Kuldja area historically. This second
program is also somewhat more instructive, and its narrative involves a young female student
o f ethnography who has come to see how this ritual is practiced in the Kuldja area, falling in
love with her guide in the process. Video copies o f these two programs have become very
popular in Almaty, and they likely have had some influence on the re-birth o f the mashrap in
the city’s Uyghur community.
While these various mediated representations o f Uyghur traditional culture have
undoubtedly led to some instances o f the invention o f tradition (see Hobsbawm and Ranger
1983), this is not its most important influence on Uyghur practices in Almaty. M ost
importantly, these folkloric and ethnographic materials have provided a standardization o f
practice that helps to support the claims o f U yghurs’ cultural cohesiveness and maintain the
social boundaries that separate Uyghurs from others. In this sense, one m ight say that these
various representations o f folklore and ethnography serve as a mediated mashrap through
which the Uyghur com m unity can reproduce certain cultural practices and establish a field o f
correct practice. Along with the re-birth o f actual mashraps, therefore, these m aterials have
helped to create the common ideal o f zhutdarchilik that is developing in Alm aty and was
described in the previous chapter. At the same time, however, they have also helped to
consolidate the Uyghur stateless nation around claims o f common cultural practices, which
also serve as markers o f belonging to this nation. In this sense, they have contributed to the
2 2 Indicative o f these film s’ concern for the accurate portrayal o f traditional cultural practices, several o f them
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narrative o f the Uyghur nation by helping to docum ent the cultural stuff o f that nation and the
practices