Currently, many fear that Kyrgyz language will die as a widely used language. Although, usage of the language is increasing on a daily basis, it has not "invaded" television, commercials, books, newspapers etc., which is important for its development.Best newspapers, TV channels, books, ads are in Russian. Moreover, absolute majority of organizationsincluding government prefer to use Russian, as opposed to Kyrgyz.
Partially, such a situation is dictated by market demand- usage of Russian covers more people of multi-ethnic composition of Kyrgyzstan. One can also find many resources readily available in Russian, use of which is more cost-effective.
However, on the other hand, Kyrgyz society faces such problems as contradictions within education system-while the number of Kyrgyz language high schools is increasing, most universities and institutesstick to Russian. This causes problems for many students coming from villages and small towns,some of whom don't understand even basic Russian, not counting scintific or political terms.
Increasing internal migration has contributed to social tensions as well, since urban areasstill carry the Soviet legacy of Russian representing urban and Kyrgyz-provinciality, whichhardens internal integration process.
Moreover, some of seasonal workers migrating to Russia are showing antipathy to Russian language in their homeland,after facing difficult working and living conditions in Moscow, Yekaterinburg, St. Petersburg etc.
Kyrgyz language still carries very formal role and many organizations, companies, schools use it in response to legal requirements. As a result, many materials such as books, magazines, newspapers, ads in Kyrgyz are ridiculously unprofessional, which shows negligence of Kyrgyz government to this problem.
Example: Almost all shop names in Bishkek are in two languages-Russian and Kyrgyz. Usually, they are translated directly. However, this barber shop carries two different names: in Russian- "universe of beauty", in Kyrgyz- "beaty of the universe" (or "miss universe")
3 comments:
Good for people to know.
All languages are dying, including Russian! English is taking over simply because of business and intergovernmental organizations such as the WTO, NATO, and the UN.
As you know, but for sake of argument, locals just have to teach their children Kyrgyz in order for the language to be sustained. I think it is great that each Central Asian language is moving away from Russian and the cyrillic alphabet. Language needs to be preserved to preserve culture.
Samantha, it is hard to say that Kyrgyz language is moving away from Cyrillic. But tendency of moving away from usage of Russian language is present, but still, like I mentioned, on informal level.
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