Diana T. Kudaibergen, "What Does It Mean to Be Kazakhstani?: Power, Identity and Nation-Building" (Oxford UP, 2024)

In Conversation: An OUP Podcast · Jul 11, 2026 · 1h 1m

In early 2022, protests rocked Kazakhstan. Initially peaceful demonstrations turned violent after brutal government crackdowns, leaving at least 238 dead during "Bloody January." Many feared the unrest might fracture the country along ethno-linguistic lines—yet ethnicity played little role. It was deep socio-economic grievances and anti-regime sentiment that brought people onto the streets. In What Does It Mean to Be Kazakhstani?: Nation-Building in Post-Soviet Central Asia (Oxford University Press, 2024), Diana T. Kudaibergen asks why. Building on unpublished archival materials and hundreds…