Aidana Sultan

Lately a new wave on how to be a Kazakh woman has come from different resources:

both governmental and societal. Book on how to be a proud Kazakh woman can still be

found on the shelves of the book shops. “Uyatmen” is a common word that describes men

who shame women for “not (enough) kazakh” behaviour, would it be to raise your voice,

know your rights or dress as you as an individual person choose to. Schools aimed to raise

“proper wives” still function1; students in classes of hand work (“truda”) are still separated

based on their sex: girls cook, boys repair stuff. Is it normal that there are only two roles – to

be an obeying wife or a providing husband – in our country? Is it normal that this is not even

a decision that a person makes, but rather is put on you once a doctor sees your genitals?

I went to four schools, two of them were Kazakh governmental gymnasiums. As a

girl, I could not enter if I did not have my hair braided, no make up, of course, no earrings, no

piercings, god forbid a tattoo. Does it sound like a place where kids can be happy? Such

rules were not explained, they were taken as normal. I did not understand, neither did I

question them, I would just be anxious to be yelled at or pointed at, so I obeyed. We could

question how such atmosphere in a school, where students spend more than six hours a day,

can be related to the suicide statistics, but not in this paper. For the sake of clarity of this

research, I want to focus on the postcolonial nationalism that forms the societal norms of

women behaviour and existence.

This research is focused on exploring the construction of re-traditionalized discourse

of hegemonic femininity as an attempt and part of nation building in the age of populism.

The second part focuses on how such revitalization of the “lost traditions” are aligned with

the decolonization process in Central Asia. Finally, it describes the impact of populism

trends and parallels on rising hegemonic femininity definitions in the USA, Poland, Russia.
1 https://vlast.kz/obsshestvo/v_astane_otkryli_institut_blagorodnyh_devic-7479.html
 For my research I am mostly using qualitative research on gender, nationalism and

populism conducted by both Central Asian and outside feminist scholars. To understand all

the topics included, we should first define such phenomenons as postcolonial feminism,

nationalism, features of Central Asian feminism and nationalism, and retraditionalization as a

part of nation building.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, all former communist countries experienced a

rapid urge for transformations in all spheres: socio-economic, political, cultural and

ideological. Communism used to be the only ideology and basis of identity for several

decades. Previous value system oppressed any other “self-fulfillment” that would question

its top position. In his work John Plamenatz describes Ideology: “a set of closely-related

beliefs or ideas, or even attitudes, characteristic of a group or community”2. Eventually,

ideology has grown to statehood formation, as Karl Manneheim writes, “ideology refers to

the particular ideologies which are used by nations for securing the goals of their national

interests''3.

Famous theory of Benedict Anderson is that communities, nations and nationalism

are imagined, such concepts as sovereignty and comradeship, patriotism are also imagined, as

they do not exist, “It is imagined because the members of even the smallest nation will never

know most of their fellow-members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of

each lives the image of their communion”, – Anderson.4 The construction of such ideas is

what helped to keep people at relative peace during the last decades, forming a nation, where

“regardless of the actual inequality and exploitation that may prevail in each, the nation is

2 John Plamenatz, Ideology (London, 1970), p. 15.

3 Shtromas, Aleksandras. “IDEOLOGY AND CONFLICT: DOES WARFARE BETWEEN ‘ISMS’

BELONG TO PAST HISTORY?” International Journal on World Peace, vol. 14, no. 2, 1997, pp. 31–
76.
4 Anderson, B. (2006) Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism
(revised edition). London:
Verso.
always conceived as a deep, horizontal comradeship”.5 In this sense, it is important which

imagination is collectively formed and pushed as a part of nation-state formation. Looking

and constantly scrutinizing situations from different perspectives – an attempt to always be

aware that there are silenced who need to be addressed. It helps us to scrutinize how gender

based roles form norms that can be restricting and harmful.

It is very often that in patriarchal societies women’s voices are muted the most.

Feminist IR helps to dismantle the forms hegemonic masculinity has been rooted in IR

politics – whereas militarization and security are considered to be one of the main national

interests, securitization is viewed as the realm caused by potential risks to the state, feminist

perspective analyzes various interpretations of security, asking a question: "Who is being

secured?" ( Harel-Shalev 2017)6. The main objective of the feminist IR (Tickner, 1997)7 is to

consider in IR analysis and address gender inequality – a problem that is still concealed or

overlooked in international theory. By using various methodologies, including non-

traditional investigative methods, feminist IR scholars have contributed to the study of

international relations, through reevaluating the roles gender play in the international arena

and how it affects the notions of dominance, authority, supremacy, and security. Feminist IR

academics adopt gender perceptions that affect power relations and communication.

However, looking at particular trends of global politics through gendered lenses does not just

tell us one point, instead, it gives us an opportunity for deeper research than without such

(Sjoberg 2013, p. 285)8.

Antonio Gramsci explains the concept of cultural hegemony using marxism theory –

the norms of society are the norms that are formed by the interests of the ruling class.

5 Ibid.
6 Harel-Shalev, A. (2017). Gendering ethnic conflicts: Minority women in divided societies–the case of
Muslim women in India. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 40(12), 2115–2134.
7 Tickner, J. A. (1997). You just don’t understand: Troubled engagements between feminists and IR
theorists. International Studies Quarterly, 41(4), 611–632.
8 Sjoberg, L. (2013). Gendering global conflict: Toward a feminist theory of war. NY: Columbia
University Press.
However, people are not constrained to behave and believe in certain way, but are rather

persuaded9. Such hegemony sets norms, values, beliefs, thus, keeps people subject to the

ruling elite. Same with hegemonic masculinity and femininity. Therefore, the Kazakhstani

ruling elite – i.e the government – can impose, support or condemn any certain behavior,

including based on gender. “The concept of “emphasized femininity” focused on

compliance to patriarchy, and this is still highly relevant in contemporary mass culture”, –

Connell and Messerschmidt10.

Coming back to the times after the USSR collapsed, the formation of a nation-state

ideology had to be done quickly, an attempt to erase the influence of a colonizer on national

identity. As Leela Gandhi notes, postcolonial nations tend to forget the painful past colonial

times and rush to build themselves fresh. Which is Kazakhstan’s government is actively

doing now. It is as if we are in a hurry to become what we were prior to Russian

colonization, to reach that level of “Kazakhness”, which is not bad per se, but the form of that

new identity is ambiguous and not defined. Rather than that, characteristics of a “true

Kazakh” man and woman are selectively collected, often coinciding with hegemonic

masculinity and femininity. Nationalism is essentially gendered and discriminative as a result

of a social construction in patriarchal communities.

Postcolonialism discourse can serve as an additional instrument for feminist scholars

to point out oppression and encounter the idea that each individual can go thorugh different

experiences than the hegemonic gender norms would presume. Leela Gandhi writes, when

the two meet – feminism and postcolonialism – they “produce a more critical

and self reflexive account of cultural nationalism”.11 According to her writings, post-colonial

nation-state can be characterized as behaving in compliance with anti-colonial nationalism

9 Roger Simon and Stuart Hall, Gramsci’s Political Thought (Lawrence & Wishart, 2002), 22.
10 Connell, R. W., & Messerschmidt, J. W. (2005). Hegemonic masculinity: Rethinking the concept.
Gender
and Society, 19, 829–859.
11 Gandhi's, L. (1998). Postcolonial Theory: A Critical Introduction. Australia: Allen & Unwin.
and European imperialism. Such theory would mean that postcolonialism, as to rebell to

former colonizer, spurs nationalism, which in its turn covers all the problems that go under

the carpet, would it be high rates of domestic abuse or teenage suicide.

After three decades of being an independent, sovereign country, new questions arise

concerning how far we have gone in terms of development. If the three pillars of Kazakhstan

foreign policies are security, stability and prosperity, have we achieved all of them? maybe

some of them or even heading towards it? Has the process of nation-building been

completed? In this context, such measures as Ruhani Zhangyru (“spiritual awakening”),

“Kazakhstan 2030/2050” fit well, as well as the former president’s initiatives as Central

Asian Union and deeper Eurasian integration.

As Zhanar Sekerbayeva – co-founder of the Kazakhstan feminist initiative Feminita

writes, the relationship between Central Asia and Russia is complex due to its complex

history12. To this day, this subordination exists. She connects her own experience, that many

of us (including myself) can relate to: to be ethnic Kazakh woman, speak Russian, understand

Kazakh but not to speak it, “I am never fully realised in any of these identities: I am

somewhere but only to a certain level, to a certain extent.” Historian Marina Mogil’ner

supports this theory of subordination policy based on inferiority of one towards the other, was

used by Russia at the same level as the Western colonizers13. For Zhanar, intensive

subordination started in the 19th century, when ethnographers travelled all over Central Asia

to civilise the local people, who were called “inorodtsy”14 at that time, term for non-Russian

population of Turkestan which carried negative context.

12https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/two-fields-within-lost-between-russian-and-kazakh-in-the-
eurasian-borderland/
13 Mogil'ner, M. (2013). Homo imperii: A history of physical anthropology in Russia. Lincoln: University of Nebraska
Press.
14 Slocum, J. (1998). Who, and When, Were the Inorodtsy? The Evolution of the Category of "Aliens"
in Imperial Russia. The Russian Review, 57(2), 173-190.
 Diana Kudaibergenova in her work on nationalism in Kazakh-Soviet literature

highlights that by “rewriting” Kazakh historical epics in the second half of the twentieth

century, enabled bilateral approach in formation of ethnic identities15. To encompass the

local culture, cultural and intellectual elites used pre-Russian historical elements, creating an

“imagined community”, which opposed colonialism. In her work, Diana analyzes how

modern Kazakhstan’s identity is almost fully based on that imagined community of the

Soviet time literature and culture. Although very often faced with criticism, such as “too-

nationalistic” as seen by the Soviet officials, the cultural elites were able to cover some

important issues of geographical history.

Are we, after years, decades and centuries of such relations towards us, running away

from being “inorodtsy” no more, to reach the highest level of Kazakhness, to restore as it was

prior to colonization? To this topic, many books, articles and work have been written, all

covering post-colonialism and its impact on nation formation.

In addition to that, the work on studying, scrutinizing, analysing and civilising the

indigeneous culture and traditions of Central Asian people has led us to a new mixture –

where is the truth and where there is that colonial derivative. While analysing the rise of

populism in the world and its impact on Kazakhstan, we should bear in mind this feature of

the past to influence the present.

METHODOLOGY

15 Diana T. Kudaibergenova, “The Body Global and the Body Traditional: A Digital Ethnography of
Instagram and Nationalism in Kazakhstan and Russia,” Central Asian Survey 38, no. 3 (September
2019): 363–80.
 In my work, I use qualitative research, and in order to analyze re-traditionalization

discourse of hegemonic femininity by the government during the last year, I operate with

discourse analysis. In order to track how gender hegemony is coerced by governmental

channels, I have been observing instagram accounts of a local feminist – Fariza Ospan, as

well as posts of Kazakhstani feminist organizations: Feminita and KazFem. To approach

gender policies of Kazakhstan from the perspective of discourse analysis will allow me to

find out how importance and value of hegemonic femininity is created in the social context.

As Fairclough defines critical discourse analysis, “to systematically explore often opaque

relationships of causality and determination between (a) discursive practices, events and

texts, and (b) wider social and cultural structures, relations and processes; to investigate how

such practices, events and texts arise out of and are ideologically shaped by relations of

power and struggles over power” 16. Critical discourse analysis scrutinizes the existing

dominant discourses in the society and “explores notions of resistance and appropriation of

discourses among various social actors” 17. Therefore, discourse analysis at the same time

mirrors the major phenomenons in society, how they are created, and how they can be altered

as there are other forms for them to exist.

Teun A. van Dijk defines critical discourse analysis as “primarily studies the way

social power abuse, dominance and inequality are enacted, reproduced and resisted by text

and talk in the social and political context.”18 According to Van Dijk, this type of analysis

can assess in examining the subordinate social structures. To explore the relations of power

in the discourse.

16 Fairclough, N. (1995) Critical Discourse Analysis. Longman. London.

17 Hammersley, Martyn. (2003). Conversation Analysis and Discourse Analysis: Methods or
Paradigms?. Discourse and Society. 14. 10.1177/09579265030146004.
18 Teun A. van Dijk, “Critical Discourse Analysis,” in The Handbook of Discourse Analysis (John
Wiley & Sons, Ltd, 2008), 349.
 Myra Macdonald advocates discourse analysis for studying media due to the fact that

media has become a major part of the social world and supplies ideas and values to society 19.

In this case, she suggests that discourse analysis can serve better than an ideological and

semiotic analysis by avoiding marrownes but still have enough scope of accuracy.

For my research, I have chosen to focus on Facebook and Instagram, although cases

from other public media resources as well as feminist organizations’ websites are used in this

work. I chose these channels, as most of information and work of feminist activists is

displaced there. Following feminist activists helped me to stay on top of the gender policies

in Kazakhstan. For example, because of constantly following the work of the Feminita

organization, I was informed at the time about the judiciary project of the Republic of

Kazakhstan "On amendments and additions to some legislative acts of the Republic of

Kazakhstan on family and gender policy" (“О внесении изменений и дополнений в

некоторые законодательные акты Республики Казахстан по вопросам семейной и

гендерной политики”)20, which suggests to displace the meaning of gender by sex. Another

example is Fariza Ospan’s Instagram account21, who was first in drawing attention to the

misogynistic video22 sponsored by the local officials (akimat) of Shymkent. She was as well

first to point out the objectivization of women’s image in the “Samal23” water advertisement

that was placed in Almaty.

As I base my research on the work of feminist scholars, specifically from the Central

Asia, I apply Diana T. Kudaibergenova’s work on a mobile application named Kelin24. Kelin

(“daughter-in-law” in Kazakh) is an application with a forum for kelins themselves.

19 Macdonald, Exploring Media Discourse, 2.

20https://feminita.kz//2020/06/гендер-не-равен-полу/
21 https://www.instagram.com/p/CBBJxgGjaS9/
22 https://liter.kz/korotkaya-yubka-priznak-prostituczii-chto-propagandiruet-akimat-shymkenta/
23 https://good.kz/portfolio/samal_leto_2020/
24 Kudaibergenova, Diana T. “Project Kelin. Marriage, Women, and Re-Traditionalization in Post-
Soviet Kazakhstan.” Women of Asia Globalization, Development, and Gender Equity (2018): n. pag.
Print.
Kudaibergenova uses content analysis of two feminist bloggers n Kazakhstani Instagram, as

well as the messages in the app’s chat room. Analysing the language used in the chat, she

often came across victim-blaming, female virginity and domestic violence. Using such

methods, she comes to conclusion that “The rise of kelin discourse and its commodification is

an alarming tendency that requires further study and attention from feminist scholars.

As to limitations of my research paper – I am selecting the most unpopular issues, so

the positive work done by the government for gender equality may not be represented here.

In this context, I have interpreted works of researchers in gender studies, therefore, it is also

mainly focused on what the government has done wrong. However, there is no work on the

positive progress in the academic field, at least not among regional scholars. I suppose it is

due to feminism being a “critical theory in political practice”25.

Concerning the ethics of the research, the information used is disclosed publicly,

therefore anyone is free to use it in a research. In addition to that, I will provide evidence of

every situation and news that appear in the paper.

25 Stephen Leonard, Critical Theory in Political Practice (Princeton: Princeton University Press,
1990). For a feminist defence of the claim that feminism, as a political project, speaks to and from a
left politics and, as such, embodies a form of critical theorising, see Catherine Eschle and Bice
Maiguashca, ‘Rethinking globalised resistance: Feminist activism and crit- ical theorising in IR’, British
Journal of Politics and International Relations, 9:2 (2007), pp. 284–301 and Eschle and Maiguashca,
‘Reclaiming feminist futures’.