The article is devoted to the topical issues of the language policy in the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic in 1920–1940. In the article we give consideration to one of the most favorable period of case history of national language system in Kazakhstan. We carry out a review of problematic situations occurred before the war time. Language situation and language development in the state are the most complicated and problematic issues of inter-ethnic relation regulation. To find reasonable ways to solve them means stability for society. To solve issues regarding state and legal regulation of language process is a quite difficult and ambiguous thing to do in the Constitution development both in the Former Kazakh SSR and in foreign countries. Everything depends on certain conditions and demands of society for use and development of a certain language, on combination of different languages.
Language situation and language development in the state are the most complicated and problematic issues of inter-ethnic relation regulation. To find reasonable ways to solve them means stability for society.
To solve issues regarding state and legal regulation of language process is a quite difficult and ambiguous thing to do in the Constitution development both in the Former Kazakh SSR and in foreign countries. Everything depends on certain conditions and demands of society for use and development of a certain language, on combination of different languages.
As a natural result a question arose what way to choose for the sovereign Republic of Kazakhstan. It is commonly known that the multinational population structure in Kazakhstan was formed during the process of economic, political, and cultural relation development. General negative directions in language processes of course had a bad influence on the language for Kazakh people as well as on the rest. Therefore we can understand lofty ambitions of representatives of the Kazakh nation to guarantee the development of their native language, and it seemed to be clear to have a wish for Kazakh-born residents for to make their language official in the Legislation and Constitution.
As the heart of state and nation disunity of people in Central Asia and Kazakhstan in 1920 this language criterion of the nation was taken. Thus in 1924 the Kazakh SSR was given the regions in Central Asia where the most part of the population spoke the Kazakh language. Today the language that was given consideration during creation of national statehood of Kazakh people needs to be taken charge of on the part of the state.
According to the date of population census by Konovalov A.P. in USSR in 1926 194 nationalities were registered, and in 1989 there were 128 nationalities. We can guess where the rest of the nationalities disappeared if we mention the fact that by that time children at school were taught only in 55 national languages. According to the census in 1989 in Kazakhstan about 120 representatives of different nations and ethnic groups, the number of population in each of 55 nations was above 10,0 thousand [1; 54]. Such situation in language policy was for a long period of time that began at the early days of Soviet government.
The period between 1917 and 1927 is the most favorable period in history of Kazakh national language system development what can be proved by the following facts in history:
On the 2nd of November in 1917 the «Declaration of Rights of Russian peoples» was adopted, it declared the following statements:
- equality and sovereignty of nations;
- right of nations to self-determination including cases of their separation and formation of a new independent state;
- abolishment of all national and national and regional privileges and restrictions;
- on the 26th of August, 1920 the Kazakh ASSR (Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic) was recognized by the decree of Russian-wide Central Executive Committee;
- the decree of Central Executive Committee of the Kazakh SSR dated the 22nd of November, 1923 «Regarding the conduct of record management in the Kazakh language» ratified the regulation of Founding Convention Union as well as the decrees in regard to «Adoption of the Russian and Kazakh languages as official languages in the Republic region» performed by Central Executive Committee and Council of People's Commissars of the Kazakh SSR.
- if before the revolution time in modern Kazakhstan there were only 569 schools where children were taught in Kazakh (1600 students), then between 1926 and 1927 there were 1527 schools (61567 students) [2; 13,14]. At this time the special resolution regarding non-discrimination based on a language was en-
In this resolution it was mentioned that the state is obliged to hold in respect for all languages of absolutely all nations that are desirous to live in the modern Soviet Republic. Of course the role of this resolution initiated from the principles of «proletarian internationalism» was a quite ostentatious.
However the first steps for foundation of language equality for the future were taken. Indeed this period of time could be considered to be successful if we mention that the Bolsheviks offered oppressed nations new conditions for national development and use of the native language. M.Z.Hasanaev defines the peculiarities of this period in the following way, «Formation period of the autonomy as part of RSFSR (the Russian Soviet Federated Socialist Republic) raised big hopes in the Kazakh clerisy for strengthening the Kazakh language as the official language. This period between 1921 and 1926 can be called «romantic». The documents of that time reported specific steps of the state bodies for strengthening of the Kazakh language status, authoring and publication of the first text-books under active involvement of A.Baitursynov, as well as for implementing of the Kazakh language in workflow management, training of domestic labour, its wide involvement in the state machine work [3; 6]. At this time the special resolution regarding non-discrimination based on a language was enforced. In this resolution it was mentioned that the state is obliged to hold in respect for all languages of absolutely all nations that are desirous to live in the modern Soviet Republic. Of course the role of this resolution initiated from the principles of «proletarian internationalism» was a quite ostentatious.
However the first steps for foundation of language equality for the future were taken. By the said above we can prove by the facts. Let us mention a few documents passed in terms of the language during this period. They are: «The extract from the Minutes on the 22-th meeting of People's Commissariat for Education of the Kazakh SSR regarding giving reward for authorizing text-books in the Kazakh language» (the 6th of May, 1921); «The Circular Note of People’s Commissariat of Justice in of the Kazakh SSR for People’s Court and People’s interrogating officers of the Kazakh police stations concerning application of record management in the Kazakh Language in judicial and investigating authority» (the 11th of July, 1923),
«Agreement of Academic Center of People’s Commissariat for Education of the Kazakh SSR with M.Dulatov about authorizing of text-books in the Kazakh language» (the 2nd of November, 1923) and etc [4; 42]. In these documents the Russian and Kazakh languages were taken into consideration. At that period of time in history of development these two languages were equal. In «Decree of Council of People's Commissars 19 regarding the usage of the Russian and Kazakh languages in the governmental agencies of the Republic» it was mentioned that «In the governmental agencies of Semipalatinsk, Akmolinsk, OrenburgTurgai, Urals, and Bukeevsky guberniyas (one of the territorial subdivisions of Russia) and Adaevsky district that comprise the Kazakh SSR the Kirghiz and Russian languages are used on equal terms [3; 14]. We can see that the government is concerned with the issue of learning the language of the local people by considering the following document: «The extract from the Minutes of the 15 meeting of Council of People's Commissars of the Kazakh SSR regarding courses of the Kazakh language training for European workers» dated the 21-th of January, 1927. In this document the following points are mentioned:
- To support office workers of Soviet agencies desirable to learn the Kazakh language it was stated that all Soviet, economic, and cooperative organizations are obliged to start establishment of courses of the Kazakh language education for European workers there. Expenses for these courses must be undertaken by the institutions and economic bodies that are in charge for
- People's commissariat for education must take measures to provide teachers for the courses and the necessary educational guidance in the Kazakh language» [4, 46].
However the prolific climate for language policy development lasted not for a long time. From the end of the 1920’s and before the early 1950’s USSR underwent the processes which are considered now as one of the most tragic period for its nations. That was a period of expansion and bloom of totalitarianism, suppression of freedoms and democracy. This period in history is known as Stalinism. Stalinism also had its negative impact on language policy. Courtesy, wide-awareness, and flexibility in language policy as well as in national policy were replaced by suspicion, distrust, intolerance, and violence. The policy of support and development of national languages taken in the 1920’s (XI–XІІ meetings of Russian Communist Party) included not only Soviet system localization (translation of party documents, record management into national languages, and formation of national clerisy). Its main direction was written system formation for nonliterate or «monoliterate» nations. In the 1920’s the writing system reforms for Eastern nations started it was organized by means of transformation of local characters from the Arabic to the Latin alphabet. In Kazakhstan since 1926 we can notice the same tendency as in USSR in general. The idea of the shift from the Arabic to the Latin alphabet is insistently promulgated. Starting with a few suggestions for discussion about advantages of the Latin language and superiority of the alphabets considered as the based alphabet for the Kazakh language these measures lead to the direct appeal to «the burial of the Arabic alphabet»
The data from the Central Public Record Office allowed to make a point of significant changes in the language policy between 1926 and 1938, when the following documents were adopted: «The resolution of Kazakh Republic Students’ General Meeting in Moscow City, the one which was ratified according to the report by Turekulov on Latinizing of the Kazakh alphabet (the 24th of April, 1927), «The first All-Union Turkological Conference which was devoted to the New Turkic alphabet» (March 1926); «The Messages to the report of the Central Committee Chairman of the New Kazakh alphabet in Kazakhstan (the 25th of May, 1927)». They also included «The Summary Report of the Central Committee of the New Kazakh alphabet dated from the 1st of July to the 1st of October, 1927»; «The extract from Verbatim Record of All-Union Committee Presidium Meeting for the New Turkic alphabet (the 23rd of June, 1928)»; «The extract from the minutes of the 19th People's Commissariat for Education Meeting of the Kazakh SSR in terms of ways to accelerate widespread application of the new alphabet (the 6–8th of February, 1930)»; «Decree 89 of People's commissariat for education of the Kazakh SSR for all Regional Board of Education with respect to the enforcement of the regulation by the Central Executive Committee and Council of People's Commissars of the Kazakh SSR dated the 2nd of January, 1928, «The statement in regard to the changes in the Kazakh alphabet and orthography (the 11th of January, 1938)» [4; 91]; and etc. These documents give evidence of speedup and command methods of application of the Latinized alphabet. The struggle for the new alphabet was at the class and ideology level. There were propaganda campaigns where it was spoken about advantages and technology superiority of the new Latin alphabet over the Arabic and newly changed Arabic alphabets. It was claimed that industrial classes of the Kazakh Republic could allegedly take all advantages of the new regime only with the close cooperation with USSR and the specified direction to the Western culture. A part of the clerisy, scientific men that considered the new Kazakh alphabet as the separation from general Muslim culture and traditions as well as regarding the interests of national education were against the application of the Latin alphabet. The Kazakh public divided into two opposite groups of people: Arabists and Latinists. Akhmet Baytursinuli, the famous turcologist, writer, scientist, and the leader of The Alash Movement was in charge for the battle for the Arabic alphabet.
Nowadays it is hard to estimate the damage all the Turkic languages had as a whole. It is important to mention that morphology and syntax systems of the Arabic written Turkic languages such as Kazakh, Uyghur, Tatar, Uzbek, Kyrgyz, Azerbaijani, Turkish and etc were mutually acceptable both for reading and for writing in any of these languages. When the Latin alphabet was applied, the problem occurred in terms of presentation of some characters as well as application of new Latinized symbols for sounds corresponding to the Kazakh language.
At the same time the relation and infusion gap was forming between the Turkic languages, and the influence of the works published in Arabic drastically decreased between the 19th and the early 20th century. We think that the sayings of the Russian authors T.M.Mastyugina and L.S.Perepelkin are quite appropriate to mention here: «Regardless the number of the literate people and the level of adaptation of any language graphic system for a certain language, these peoples lost the link with the cultural heritage of their ethnical groups» [5; 237, 238]. This is the price the people had to pay due to the Soviet experiments in the language policy between the 1920‘s and the 1930’s. The experiment on the shift from the Arabic to the Latin alphabet was caused by the ideological way of the Bolsheviks’ policy in terms of «the World Revolution». They thought that the Latin graphic system would become overwhelming for nations all over the world. However by the early 1930’s the Bolsheviks took a tack to «formation of socialism in one specific country».
Therefore it was decided to change the written systems of a number of nations from the Latin into the Cyrillic script. This process was enforced by Russification. Stalin made «the scale» significantly move towards the Russian nationalism. «Socialism in one country» started to mean first of all the Russian socialism. When Stalin was the political leader, the authorities of All-Union Communist Party, the Armed Forces, and State Security were considerably russified» says G. Hosking (Great Britain) [6; 58].
The development of the country by means of forced modernization lead the Kazakh people to the social disaster and destruction of their traditional way of life. Long before the tragic campaigns on compulsory termination of nomadism, liquidation of rich landowners (bais), collectivization and famine between the 1930’s and the 1933’s Stalin’s protégé, F.Goloshekin by the order of his «master» made the intellectual elite of the Kazakh society refuse from their power authorization what means to rob the right and opportunities to have influence on political events. The destiny of the national intellectuals that used to be participants of the Alash Movement under conditions of «exacerbation of the class struggle in the country» was the main issue of that time. To eliminate them from the political and cultural arena Goloshekin saw the way of «sovietization» and acceleration of «socialistic reforms»: «For us it was not clear who take the lead over public enlightenment if it was Regional Committee or Academic Center where Baitursynov was the leader… If we consider the texts-books then we can say that until we involved in that there were no text-books, they were written by foreigners in foreign languages propagating the pernicious ideas… It is intolerable when extraneous, quite adverse elements for our ideology have a big influence on different spheres of our life» [7; 24-25]. It was said in 1926. We can see that for the first leader of Regional Committee of All-Union Communist Party the national clerisy that served for the Soviet system were just foreign people speaking in a foreign language that had pernicious ideas and adverse ideologies.
Between 1928 and 1929 the struggle against the national movement «Pan-Turkism», «the Sadvakasov movement» and other versions of «bourgeois nationalism» started. The proponents of reforms in the Arabic alphabet in Kazakhstan as well as in other republics were subjected to repression. The target to give the shift from the native writing systems to the Latin alphabet was set. This target was declared to be «a tool of Lenin’s national policy, «the beginning of cultural revolution for Turkic peoples». More than 20 million people that were mainly representatives of Turkic and Muslim Culture were involved in Latinizing of the alphabet [8; 46]. To end the discussions and condemn the opponents of the application of the Latin script at the 6th Meeting of Regional Committee (on the 15th–23rd of November, 1927) F.Goloshekin also accused the Kazakh communists, the intellectuals, and the public force that «they do not understand that in this issue 3 % of the literate prevent the further development of 97% of the illiterate that they can be taught the Latin script which is less complicated written system , but these 3% of people who know the Arabic script prevent the further development of the cultural groups» [9; 130]. Thereafter the new alphabet was applied at high speed, and the cultural campaign for latinizing in 1928 involved a large number of the public.
The beginning of latinizing synchronized with the repressive actions against the Kazakh intellectuals. During 1929–1930 about 80 prominent representative of the Kazakh culture were arrested. Many of them were sentenced to a long term prison, many of them were sent into exile from Kazakhstan, and then were arrested again and during the period of «The Big Terror» were shot dead. In the 1930’s People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (NKVD) «tore open» 183 different counterrevolutionary organizations. Only due to the trumped-up «Alash case» 4297 were arrested, and 2062 of them were shot dead.
One more event that was held under the motto «Rebuild your Life» was Regional Committee’s decree dated the 21st of November, 1929 «About the Pioneer movement in Kazakhstan» in which the Party and the Komsomol (Young Communist League) redoubled their attention to solve «the complicated target to reeducate children in the Communistic way under the patriarchal and patrimonial mode» [9; 303].
The elimination of the large scale illiteracy and development of all stages of education became one of the priorities in cultural policy between the end 1920’s and the early 1930’s. The factors of cultural policy were included in five-year term plans for development of the national economy, many important party and state decisions were taken which were aimed to fulfill them. The main targets of the first five-year plan in cultural development were elimination of illiteracy, the compulsory basic education and training. The Kazakh Regional Committee of All-Union Communist Party resolved to ensure 100% children involvement in the towns and 80% in the countryside. The elimination of illiteracy must have been reached in the town for three years and in the countryside for five years [9; 17]. For the public education the vast material and financial resources were transferred. Between 1928 and 1940 the expenditure for the public education development increased from 21 to 682 mln Rub as well as during the second five-year plan (1933–1937) they also rose from 113,1 to 648,3 mln Rub. Since The 1st of September, 1935 Schools began studies according to the new curriculum which was drawn up on the basis of the decisions taken by Central Committee of All-Union Communist Party and Council of People's Commissars in 1934 in terms of schooling [10; 333]. The amount of all types of schools increased from 3944 to 7827, the number of students rose from 274038 to 1145993 people, the number of teachers enlarged from 7900 to 44,5 thousand people [10, 348]. This notable increase took place in the mid and the second half of 1930’s. The famine in Kazakhstan during 1930-1933 became a widespread social disaster. The devastating consequences of this disaster also had influence on the public education. Temirbek Zhurgene that became the head of Center of People’s Commissariat for Education in the Kazakh Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in 1934 wrote: «in the regions of nomadism school buildings and other cultural and educational institutions were destroyed… Up to that time there were no High School and the most widespread type was a two-year type school» [7; 29]. Hereafter he mentioned that in spite of the fact that the law regarding general basic education was enforced for three years, more and more children at school age annually were not involved in education process, and that in appropriate for schools buildings only 30% of them were in service. The quality of education was also criticized a lot, so the new leaders of the Kazakh Regional Committee of All-Union Communist Party started activity work on strengthening of the public education system from reorganization of local departments of the public education. Due to the nomadisms made under the circumstances in 1931–1932 the number of students at schools was drastically decreased while the number of orphans sharply increased. In 1932 68 thousand children were at the orphanages, and in early 1933 45 thousand children increased that number. Moreover between 1934 and 1935 the number of boarding schools increased from 127 to 221. In 1935 the situation of school buildings was quite complicated.
The evidence of that we can see from the telegram of the Chairman of USSR Council of People's Commissars, V.M.Molotov, which was sent to Alma-Ata for Mirzoyan and Isaev. It emphasized «anything but satisfactory arrangements for the new school year, especially in terms of primary schools in the countryside. The most imperfect situations were in Western, Aktubinsk, and Southern regions of Kazakhstan [7; 27]. By the 26th of August, 1935 according to the telegram the governance of Kazakhstan was obliged in short order to finish the school building in the towns and the countryside, ensure them with the necessary teaching staff, finish repairs of the school buildings, properly fix up the school equipment and supply them with the fuel. Moreover the extreme underdevelopment of the Kazakh schools was underlined there. Besides these obligations Moscow provided the well established illiteracy abolition centers and school text-books. If in 1934 the publishing house KazOGIZ published 150 thousand ABC-books in Kazakh, then in 1935 it published 15 text-books up to 1,5 mln issues. At the first conference in 1935 the workers of the cultural sphere were called for teaching 35 illiterate people. The 3rd Meeting of the Kazakh Regional Committee (1935) obliged People's commissariat for education of the Republic to eliminate illiteracy for 2–3 year period. The people who could read in Arabic had to be given a special consideration and reeducation [10; 333]. All-Union population census in 1939 documented the literacy of 54, 5% of Kazakh people, 70, 4% of Russian people, 56, 5% of the rest. The total number of literate people in the Republic was 61,4% [7; 28]. However the official statistics of stated 76,3% of literate people, i.e. 14,9% were added. Therefore not 3/4 of the population were educated, but 2/3 of the population were educated at that time. Nevertheless literacy of the population for 12 years of census period rose from 17,8 to 61,4%.
If the progress in elimination of the illiteracy was not as significant as it was propagated at that time, then in training of professional personnel it was really significant. The data of All-Union population census in 1939 also prove that. In Kazakhstan it recorded a quite a quickly rising number of the Kazakh involved in all spheres of industry, management, and culture. Thus among the leaders of party organizations, state, cooperative, and public institutions the number of the Kazakh was 36,3%. Among chairmen of Rural Council and their vice assistants, judges, and public prosecutor they correspondingly amounted to 61% and 51 %. In the group of executive heads of education institutions and scientific-research institutes they amounted to 35,3%. The increase of proportion of the Kazak leaders among chairmen of collective farms was equal to 63,9%, and of the chiefs of industrial artels (communities for collective farming) and industrial-agricultural cooperatives was up to 37,0%. In culture, politics, and education spheres there were 42,1% of Kazakh workers, and there were 25,4% of Kazakh art workers. The small percentage of the Kazakh that is equal to 6,8% was among the directors of medical institutions, the percentage of the leaders of industrial and rural institutions was 19,9%, the number of scientific and academic workers was equal to 16,0% and in terms of operators was up to 6,9%.
Moreover we can notice growth of the Kazakh population involved in industry. According to All-Union Population Census in 1939 there were 38,7% of mineral exploration and mining workers, 18,7% of metal workers, 22,6% of typographers, 19,1% of construction workers, 21,9% of power plant and crane workers. The percentage of textilemen was small, it was 15,6%, for woodmen it was 7,8%. The number of Kazakh workers that were involved in railroad transportation was 38,5%, with water transportation it was 34,9%, and 12,2% of Kazakh people were involved in car transport .
Thus we should ascertain that before the war time period we can notice the wide scale growth of general literacy of not only the Kazakh, but also the whole population of Kazakhstan including inconsiderable in number ethnic groups. Thus, for example, the number of Dungans and Uyghurs that lived in the 3rd districts of Alma-Ata region and in the 3rd districts of Dzhambul (now Zhambul) region amounted correspondingly to 20 thousand and 8 thousand people. In 1938–1939 school year there were 6553 Uyghur and 596 Dungan children in schools of Kazakhstan. To abolish illiteracy among adult population 32 schools were opened where 2468 illiterate and semiliterate people studied. Along with the wide-scale growth of general literacy we can notice also the growth of education level of the Kazakh and other ethnic groups that inhabited there. According to All-Union Population Census in 1939 among the Kazakh 49852 people had specialized secondary education (in-equivalent 1000 people — 21.4), 1952 people had Higher education (0,8 per 1000).
Among the Russian population 220485 people had Secondary education (89,7 per 1000), 16390 people (6,7 per 1000) had Higher education. If we consider Ukrainian people there were 69,1 people per 1000 people that had specialized secondary education, and 65,0 people that had Higher Education. To regard other nationalities we can mention the following figures: among the Uzbek –21,8 and 0,9; the Tatar — 89,0 and 4,6; the Korean— 73,3 and 3,7; the German— 42,7 and 3,7; the Polander— 63,4 and 6,1 [7; 29].
Documented data according to All-Union Population Census in 1939 in regard to the number of people that had Higher and Secondary education considering 8 the most major nationalities in Kazakhstan showed prevalence of the people that had specialized secondary education for the most part of the literate group.
To ensure schools with schoolmasters there was a priority to have training for representatives of the native nationalities. For this purpose in 1928 Teachers' Training College was founded, it was named after Abai Kunanbaev, in 1931 Uralsk and Kzyl-Orda teachers colleges were opened. Moreover in 1934 Kazakh State University, teaching institutes in Karaganda and Semipalatinsk were established. By 1940 in the 13th teaching institutes about 5 thousand people studied; in teachers colleges there were about 10 thousand students, under the vocationalism 20 thousand students took classes. More than 1800 students and 2618 graduates graduated from teachers colleges. The number of the Kazakh among the students of Higher Education was annually increasing.
In Kazakhstan on the 5th of April, 1938 Central Executive Committee and Council of People's Commissars of the Kazakh SSR enforced «the regulation in regard to the compulsory learning of the Russian language in Kazakh schools». This regulation initiated a new tendency in language policy aimed at prevalence of the Russian language in Kazakhstan. The regulation says, «Central Executive Committee and Council of
People's Commissars of the Kazakh SSR define that educational work done for the Russian language teaching in Kazakh schools all over the Republic is unsatisfactory». Therefore teaching of the Russian language as compulsory studies started to serve the purpose in all schools. Due to that fact the curricular were changed for students to have more Russian classes.
On the 13th of December, 1940 «the Law regarding the shift of the Kazakh written system from the Latinized to the new alphabet based on the Russian script» was published. It stated, «The claim of a large number of collective farm workers, workpeople, and intellectuals of the Kazakh SSR on the shift of the Kazakh written system from the Latinized to the new alphabet based on the Russian script». To disguise their command-and-control methods of work the leaders of the regime posed themselves as being watchdog for the public and declared that they took their actions by giving voice to the public. In fact from this moment the language policy was drastically changed in terms of the way and approaches for solving of language and linguistic issues towards prevalence of the Russian language what manifested itself first of all in method of force during the process of application of the Cyrillic alphabet. Moreover there was no opposition from the Kazakh intellectuals to the policy of forced Russification. Due to the large-scale political repressions between 1937 and 1938 nearly all national intellectuals were depopulated. Council of People's Commissars of the Kazakh SSR by the decree dated the14th of July, 1941 annulled the decree Central Executive Committee and Council of People's Commissars of the Kazakh SSR that was dated the 1st of September, 1933 in regard to «the benefits for specialists who have a working knowledge of the Kazakh language» [3; 180].
Soviet 'localization policy' in the early 1930’s, application of compulsory signs in Kazakh for institution, organization, and factory names, establishment of benefits for specialists who have a working knowledge of the Kazakh language, compulsory learning of the Kazakh language in all educational institutions, all these events, happened during a short period of liberal attitude to the Kazakh language. This stage of development in the 1930’s was followed by the stage of the forced Russification that lasted for all period of USSR government till its dissolution. The period between 1930 and 1940 was quite inconsistent in the language policy.
The language policy in pre-war years was a part of all policy in the cultural and national sphere. In 1917–1941 it underwent the most essential changes, and was laid the foundation for its further functioning the next years. Already in «The declaration of the rights of the people of Russia» from October 15, 1917 it was a question of equality of the nations. On October 31, 1918 there was a resolution of Narkompros «About schools of ethnic minorities», then there were national commissariats at Narkomnats, publishing literature in languages of the people of Russia. In 1919 at the 8th congress of RKP it (would) be told about creation of uniform labor school with teaching in the native language. In 1921 X-th congress of RKP (would) adopt the resolution on national policy where the problem of translation into the native language of court, administrations, and bodies of an economy, theater and etc [11; 558]. The language policy took an important place in the national policy, which purpose the people's commissar for I.V.Stalin's nationalities in 1921 formulated so: «It is impossible to be limited only one to «national equality», it is necessary to pass from «national equality» to measures of the actual equation of nationalities» [12; 86]. Such course and policy were caused by reaction to policy of the imperial government, and they corresponded to the general ideological program of the new power and coincided with mood of the democratic intellectuals of the non-Russian people of the country.
The proclaimed slogans corresponded to prevailing public consciousness and expectations of those years. For them there were those who were keen on idea of creation of new society, and the representatives of the non-Russian intellectuals hoping for national revival. Equality and free development of languages was understood as their fastest reduction in that condition in which there lived the people of the European countries. Each citizen should seize in the native language in heights of world culture. Under world culture meant European, including the Russian. Cultural local traditions, both primordial, and borrowed, but already taken roots, were considered only as a hindrance. The task was put to finish all languages of the people of the USSR to level of Russian and it received the name «language construction». During such construction the task was put to liquidate almost universal earlier illiteracy, to create the national intellectuals, to acquaint the people of the USSR with world culture. These years a lot of elementary political diploma was translated to languages of the people of the country, but Pushkin, Krylov, Shakespeare's works at the same time were translated. Objectively it was the beginning of Europeanization of the people the USSR considerably accelerated in comparison by the pre-revolutionary period. The conscious gap with former traditions, repressions concerning carriers of the old not Europeanized culture was a negative side of this policy. The first generation of the new intellectuals was suffered as well. Repressions led to a physical rupture of generations of the intellectuals, the termination of a natural course of ethno cultural development and narrowing of influence of ethno national traditions on spiritual formation of the subsequent generations.
The creative, intellectual potential, social practice of the old and new intellectuals wasn't placed in the service of the country and the people, in many respects unclaimed there were results of familiarizing of broad masses to modern forms of culture and education. Society lost many qualified and talented people. Link of generations of the intellectuals, and in many respects — link of times in culture was broken. It is impossible to estimate this damage simply. In society valuable orientations, the standards which have not been fixed in formal codes and being transferred as tradition from generation to generation have a huge role. The physical rupture of generations of the intellectuals appeared for a long time operating factor, making the negative impact on all subsequent generations. Most resistance to the state language policy was peculiar also to Muslim clergy. The same years campaign on «mass closing of churches and mosques» in Kazakhstan was carried out [3; 25].
From the middle of the 1930th in language policy slogans remained former, and the real policy changed. However, the shift occurred not only in language area — resolutions on teaching of national history were issued and great-power patriotic traditions started to be restored.
Fight against «bourgeois nationalism» more and more amplified, and fight against «great-power chauvinism» was curtailed. Transfer of writings to Cyrillic was other sign of a shift. The new language policy (would) receive final registration in the resolution of the Central Committee of VKP and Council of Peoples Commissars from March 13, 1938 «About obligatory studying of Russian at schools of the national republics and areas». Along with saving of the formulation about the native language «as to a teaching basis at national school», at all schools Russian started to be taught with the 1st class [13; 2–5]. This measure sharply changed a ratio of languages in school training. The language policy, in fact, in many respects became similar on pre-revolutionary, and compulsoriness increased in planting of Russian, even in comparison with times when «foreigners» simply ignored. This policy went I.V. Stalin. In the 1930th years, and then and later, she didn't meet resistance. The national intellectuals, which voice was especially strong in the 1920th years, it was exterminated, and escaped became silent or started talking about friendship of the people. Promotion of a cult of personality of Stalin introduced from above was conducted by all mass media and promoted conformism development in the environment of the intellectuals. At the same time, broad masses of the population understood that all people were involved in international contacts and knowledge of Russian was a necessary condition of advance up. On November 10, 1940 the V session of the Supreme Council Kazakh passed of the Soviet Socialist Republic the law «About transfer of the Kazakh writing with latinisation on the new alphabet on the basis of Russian graphics», become logic end of language policy.
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