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Alphabet Reform in the Six Independent ex-Soviet Muslim Republics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 November 2009

JACOB M. LANDAU
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Abstract

Like other elements of culture, alphabets have both practical and ethnopolitical integrating or differentiating significance. Hence, any alphabet change has serious political implications. This article will briefly consider the process of romanisation undertaken in the six newly independent Muslim states that were part of the Soviet Union (Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Tajikistan); and then evaluate its success or failure and attempt to explain the causes for these phenomena.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 20 , Issue 1 , January 2010 , pp. 25 - 32
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 2009

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