Description
About the Author
Diana T. Kudaibergenova is research fellow in the Centre of Development Studies at the University of Cambridge and postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Sociology of Law at Lund University.
Reviews
Kudaibergenova's project is highly ambitious and covers an impressive breadth of literary history . . . This book accomplishes its primary aim, which is to provide a welcome and needed view into the lives and worlds of twentieth-century writers in Kazakhstan, and will be helpful for scholars of (post-)Soviet literature and nationalisms alike. * Central Asian Survey *
Rewriting the Nation in Modern Kazakh Literature offers a rare glimpse into the world of the 'writers of the nation' who, in pursuit of their elitist projects, shaped 'total readership' in Soviet Kazakhstan and inscribed the ideals of indigenous history and nationhood. While focused on research and mythology involved in these Soviet projects, it speaks volumes to broader issues and provides important insights to academic debates on totalitarianism, post-colonialism, and national imagination. -- Saulesh Yessenova, University of Calgary
Diana T. Kudaibergenova has written an important book that introduces modern Kazakh literature and issues of Kazakh identity to English-language audiences. She accomplishes this through a careful analysis of selected major works of Kazakh belles lettres. Her study provides a cogent analysis of the relation of works of successive generations of writers to one another and to the political context in which they worked. Readers of this book will be rewarded with an understanding of how Kazakh literati have conceived of and portrayed the history of the Kazakh people and its relevance to the eras in which they wrote. Dr. Kudaibergenova leads the reader up to the present and illustrates the complexity of Kazakhs' and Kazakhstan's identity in the post-Soviet era. -- William Fierman, Indiana University Bloomington
Impressively applying methods of cultural semiotics and the sociology of culture, Diana T. Kudaibergenova approaches the ideologies that have been accompanying the complex transformations of Kazakh national identity in a non-ideological manner, combining intimate familiarity with her subject with an objective perspective throughout. This renders her monograph a groundbreaking contribution to the study of modern Kazakh society, particularly regarding the ways in which literary texts shaped national discourses during the Soviet and post-Soviet periods. -- Peter Rollberg, George Washington University
Book Information
ISBN 9781498528313
Author Diana T. Kudaibergenova
Format Paperback
Page Count 298
Imprint Lexington Books
Publisher Lexington Books
Weight(grams) 399g
Dimensions(mm) 229mm * 152mm * 15mm