Poets of the People: Learning to Make Culture in Kazakhstan

Abstract

This chapter presents an ethnography of the performance tradition of aitys (oral improvisational poetry) as it is realized in Kazakhstan today. Together with other narrative and musical cultural forms, aitys was nationalized as Kazakh culture in the socialist republican model of the Soviet system, and has transitioned to become a major symbol of ethnicized identity and heritage, promoted by a nationalist state. However, such promotion proves somewhat superficial, as the legacy of Russian cultural and linguistic hegemony continues to compete with efforts to valorize a more specifically Kazakh identity today. Despite the rhetoric of Kazakh nation-branding, there are many institutional and ideological obstacles, to the promotion of cultural forms which may now be considered ‘folkloric’ or non-contemporary. Centering on the perspectives of aitys teachers and poets, as well as rural villagers, regional offices of cultural affairs, and elite patrons alike, this chapter outlines the practical efforts and challenges facing the broad community of people in Kazakhstan who actively work to maintain aitys poetry (and by extension, Kazakh language) as a living tradition, rather than a cultural legacy of the past.