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Entitlement through numbers: nationality and language categories in the first post‐Soviet census of Kazakhstan *
Author(s) -
Dave Bhavna
Publication year - 2004
Publication title -
nations and nationalism
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.655
H-Index - 44
eISSN - 1469-8129
pISSN - 1354-5078
DOI - 10.1111/j.1354-5078.2004.00176.x
Subject(s) - census , entitlement (fair division) , nationality , ethnic group , state (computer science) , politics , independence (probability theory) , population , identity (music) , political science , sociology , law , geography , immigration , demography , economics , statistics , physics , mathematics , mathematical economics , algorithm , computer science , acoustics
. The post‐independence censuses in virtually all post‐Soviet states have become contested tools of nation‐building and ethnic entitlements. No state was politically more determined and psychologically more anxious to conduct its population census than Kazakhstan, in which the eponymous Kazakhs did not constitute a majority. The article points at political and identity pressures that made it inevitable that the first post‐Soviet census produce the ‘right’ numbers and officialise the anticipated majority status of Kazakhs in the multiethnic state. By analysing the census data on language, it shows how the state has constructed a politically desirable form of linguistic reality by altering the established category ‘native language’ in the census. This not only offers a compelling rationale for ethnic and linguistic entitlements, but also seeks to demonstrate the ‘success’ of the state's language policy.