Russian language in Kazakhstan

According to part 2 of Article 7 of the Constitution of the Republic of Kazakhstan of 1995 , “Russian is officially used in state organizations and local government bodies along with the Kazakh language”.

This rule was clarified in 1997 by a decision of the Constitutional Council : “(..). This constitutional norm is understood unequivocally that in state organizations and local self-government bodies the Kazakh and Russian languages ​​are used equally, equally, regardless of any circumstances. ”

Also, this decree established: “Establishing the list of professions, specialties, and positions that require knowledge of the state language in a certain amount and in accordance with the qualification requirements does not contradict the Constitution” ^[1] .

Russian is the native language of the Russian population of Kazakhstan (up to 67% in a number of northern regions ^[2] ), as well as for most of the European peoples of Kazakhstan (Ukrainians, Belarusians). Traditionally, it acts as a second language or, depending on the level of education and place of residence, the first foreign language for the majority of the population of the republic, primarily Kazakhs .

On July 11, 1997, the Law of the Republic of Kazakhstan No. 151-1 “On Languages ​​in the Republic of Kazakhstan” was adopted, which regulates in detail the use of languages, including Russian ^[3] .

In 2001 , the “State Program for the Functioning and Development of Languages ​​for 2001–2010” was approved, paragraph 5.1.1. which provides that the state bodies need to carry out work on a phased transition until 2010 of clerical work, maintenance of accounting, statistical, financial and technical documentation to the state language and subject to the provisions of paragraph 2 of article 7 of the Constitution to implement it.

By 2006 , according to data voiced during the round table “The Future of Kazakhstan and the state language”, in five regions (Atyrau, Zhambyl, Kyzylorda, Mangistau, South Kazakhstan) the paperwork was officially translated into Kazakh . Nevertheless, even in these areas, the Kazakhization of office work faces a number of difficulties. Therefore, in the Atyrau region, only 51% of the entire official document flow was performed in the Kazakh language, in the Dzhambul region - 50%, in Kyzylorda - 49%. In 2006, 500 million tenge was allocated from the republican budget for the introduction of the Kazakh language ^[4] .

In 2007, another resolution of the Constitutional Council explained: “The Basic Law provides for the supremacy of the status of the state language,” while recognizing the right to apply to state bodies in Russian ^[5] . In 1997, the law “On Languages ​​in the Republic of Kazakhstan” was adopted.

The Minister of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Zh. Tuimebayev, in his 2010 interview with a question about translating office work into Kazakh since 2010, answered: “All official documentation in our country is conducted in the state Kazakh and inter-ethnic Russian . No crowding is expected. This was recently announced by President Nursultan Nazarbayev . He also confirmed that Russian will retain all the functions of the language of international communication . I therefore emphasize: the rumors and assumptions about some kind of ousting the Russian language are wrong ” ^[6] .

Until 2018, the Russian language was used along with Kazakh on banknotes ^[7] .

Political parties

According to Kazakhstani law, the creation of political parties on a national and confessional basis is prohibited ^[8] .

In the Kazakhstani elections of 2007, the largest representation of Russian-speaking candidates was in the CPPK ( Communist People’s Party of Kazakhstan ) - 35%, NSDP (National Social Democratic Party) - 18.5% and the ruling Nur-Otan party - 17.46% ^{[8 ]} . On the issue of the status of the Russian language, the CPPC calls for the preservation of the former status of the Russian language, and the NSDP is in favor of creating conditions for the full use of the Russian language, which, according to the party, "played an undeniable role in creating an atmosphere of inter-ethnic harmony" ^[8] .

In 2007, at the state level , Kazakhstan adopted the “cultural project“ Trinity of Languages ​​”” - Kazakh, Russian and English ^[9] . However, this idea had both supporters and opponents.

Supporters

The chairman of the Russian community of Kazakhstan said: “We can take upon ourselves the question of learning the Kazakh language by Russian youth” ^[9] .

The dean of the philological faculty of the Kazakh National University Kanseit Abdezuly evaluated this project as one of the main priorities of state policy ^[10] .

Director of the Center for the Study of Central Asia and Kazakhstan of the University of Seattle (USA) William Fieerman on May 15, 2008 at the international scientific-theoretical conference “Multilingualism: language - consciousness - culture” opened in Almaty, assessed the idea as correct, but stressed that for Kazakh language problem lies in the fact that it, as a state language, low demand ^[11] .

Opponents

On the other hand, on November 26, 2009, prominent figures of culture, literature and chief editors of newspapers and magazines published in the republic, representatives of intelligentsia, leaders of public organizations - 124 people signed, with the support of more than 5 thousand citizens, said that thanks to the policy " the triunity of languages ​​"Kazakh language will gradually die out, and Russian and English will play a dominant and progressive role ^[12] .

In the 1999/2000 school year, out of 3.5 million pupils in the republic’s schools, 1.6 million were taught in Kazakh (50.6%), 1.5 million in Russian (45%), 80,000 in Uzbek (2, 3%), 23 thousand - in Uigur (0.6%), 2.5 thousand - in Tajik (0.07%) and more than a thousand - in other languages ^[13] . The number of schools with the Kazakh language of instruction is gradually increasing ^[13] .

The number of children's pre-school organizations with instruction in the Kazakh language by the year 2000 did not exceed 25% (1158) of the total number of similar organizations in the whole country.

The number of students in the departments with the Kazakh language of instruction by 2000 was about 32% (85,300) (the number of students in the Russian departments was about 68% (181,000)) ^[13] .

From 2001/2002 to 2005/2006, the number of schools with Russian as the language of instruction fell by 303, mixed Russian-Kazakh schools by five, and schools with Kazakh as the language of instruction increased by 46. The proportion of university students enrolled in the Kazakh language over the same period increased from 31.5 to 42.6% ^[4] .

In his interview in 2010 , the Minister of Education and Science of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Zh. Tuimebayev , commented on the reference to the data on the closure of Russian schools as follows: “Only parents choose whether to send a child to a Russian or Kazakh school. The state does not specifically close the school. There are about 30 percent of Russian schools in Russia, that is, where all the subjects are in Russian. Agree, not so little ” ^[6] .

On July 26, 2010, the Minister of Culture of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Mukhtar Kul-Mukhammed, reported that the “History of Kazakhstan” in the country's universities would be taught only in the Kazakh language ^[14] .

At the beginning of the 2015/2016 school year in the Republic of Kazakhstan, the total number of students is 459,369, the proportion of students enrolled in the Kazakh language is 62.7%, in Russian - 34.3% and in English - 3.0% ^[15] .

The Russian language began to receive wide distribution in the territory of modern Kazakhstan in the 20th century, after the establishment of Soviet power and the relocation and deportation of various ethnic groups and Russification policies, with the result that Russian actually became the language of interethnic communication.

For a long time, Kazakhstan was part of the Russian Empire, and then the USSR . Then the Russian language was fundamental throughout the Union and was established as “the language of interethnic communication” ^[16] . By the time of the collapse of the USSR, the aggregate number of Russian speakers in Kazakhstan exceeded the number of the titular population ^[17] .

After 1989, lost state status , but retained the status of language of international communication , the vertical of education in Russian is preserved.

The administrative sphere of the use of language after gaining sovereignty ( 1991 ) was somewhat reduced in the framework of the policy of gradual Kazakhization of office work in a number of oblasts of the republic. At the same time, the Russian language has retained its position in the economic and social life of the country, in which it remains the most widely used, especially in the media . The peculiarity of Russian-speaking Kazakhstan is that the majority of people speaking Russian in the modern republic are not ethnic Russians. Most often these are Kazakhs themselves, who often speak only Russian (the so-called “ Shala-Kazakhs ”) or bilingual Kazakhs who speak Russian as a second language , as well as Ukrainians , Koreans , Belarusians , Uzbeks , Uigurs, and so on. Recently, the Kazakh version of the Russian language has been developing due to the borrowing of words from the Kazakh language.

On July 26, 2010, the Minister of Culture of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Mukhtar Kul-Mukhammed ^[18], said: “The implementation of the tasks will allow to achieve confident results by 2020: the share of Kazakhstanis who speak the state language will increase from 60% to 95%”, “the share of Kazakhstanis who speak Russian, will be at least 90%, now it is 89%. The share of Kazakhs who speak English will be about 20% " ^{[19] [20]} .

According to the 2009 census, 84.8% of Kazakhs were fluently written and read in Russian (62% in Kazakh, 7.7% in English), 94.4% understood oral Russian (74% in Kazakh, English). 15.4%) ^[21] .

• Russian language in Kyrgyzstan
• Kazakhization
• Russification
• Russians in Kazakhstan
• Language Policy in Kazakhstan

Zhuravleva E. A. The Russian language in Kazakhstan: status, scope of use and features of the lexical system // Russian language, literature, culture in schools and universities. 11/2008. № 6. P. 48–54

• Russian speaking is not only common where Russians live
• Language Legislation of EurAsEC Member States: Legal Status of the Russian Language in the Central Asian Republics
• Altynbekova O. B. Migration in Kazakhstan: the new status of the Russian language Demoscope Weekly
• Umurzakova A. Zh. The Russian Language and Modern Language Policy in the Western Regions of Kazakhstan // Russian Language and Literature in the World Culture Space: Proceedings of the 13th Congress of MAPRYAL (Granada, Spain, September 13–20, 2015) / Ed. Col .: L.A. Verbitskaya, K.A. Rogova, T.I. Popova, etc. - In 15 t. - T. 2. - SPb .: MAPRYAL, 2015. - 201 p. - p. 161-165