Adeeb, Khalid. “The Fascination of Revolution: Central Asian Intellectuals, 1917 – 1927.” In Empire, Islam, and Politics in Central Eurasia, edited by Uyama Tomohiko, 137-152. Sapporo: Slavic Research Center, Hokkaido University, 2007.
Summary
This chapter is the quick and dirty version of Khalid’s previous two books, mostly The Politics of Muslim Cultural Reform.
It chronicles the drama of the Jadids, a group of Central Asian modernizers. They began committed to Enlightenment political ideals, arguing that achieving a “modern” society was the duty of all Muslims (138).
However, with the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in 1918, their ideals shifted dramatically (144). They no longer looked to Europe as a source of potential inspiration, but lashed out at the entire colonial order, and became committed to more radical, revolutionary ideals (145).
Consequently, when the Soviets came to power in Central Asia in the 1920s, the Jadids leapt at the opportunity, and collaborated with the Bolsheviks (148). Their ideals, however, did not envision radical class revolution, but rather a national revolution of modernization (146). Once the Bolsheviks consolidated their power, they put real control in the hands of more Russified Central Asians committed to the Soviet cause (150). Nevertheless, the Jadids remained in control of the cultural transformation of Central Asia throughout the 1920s until they were eliminated in the Stalinist purges (150).
Interesting Gems
Bishkek used to be called Pishpek (149).
Before switching to the Latin alphabet, Jadid reformers had converted to a modified Arabic alphabet that used all the vowels (151). More info about lingual transformations:
Perry, John. “Script and Scriptures: The Three Alphabets of Tajik Persian, 1927-1997.” In Journal of Central Asian Studies 2, no. 1 (1997): 2-18.
