Adeeb Khalid. The Politics of Muslim Cultural Reform: Jadidism in . Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999. xx + 335 pp. $60.00, cloth, ISBN 978-0-520-21355-5.

Reviewed by Shoshana Keller

Published on H-Russia (May, 1999)

Some thirty years ago, there was a burst of cited the imaginations of Western scholars, who scholarship on the history of what was then Sovi‐ saw in them fellow intellectuals, modernizing lib‐ et Central Asia, which yielded a number of works erals, proto-Communists--in short, men from a on the Russian conquest, imperial administration, very foreign culture who were nonetheless famil‐ and Soviet development of the region that are still iar, who could be pointed to as a model for Cen‐ widely-used classics.[1] Since then, it seems that tral Asia's potential development. Khalid does not the bulk of publication on Central Asia has con‐ entirely dismiss this image, but he very frmly sit‐ cerned contemporary politics and economics, uates the Jadids (who generally called themselves leaving these books increasingly dated as subal‐ ziyalilar, intellectuals, or taraqqiparwarlar, pro‐ tern and post-colonial theories and new archival gressives) in the context of their own culture, not discoveries sweep the discipline. Fortunately, we as the great Western liberal hope. are in the midst of a new burst of scholarship, Understanding the signifcance of the new which not only utilizes new tools but, thanks to method of education is impossible without under‐ the fall of Cold War barriers, approaches Central standing the old method, so Khalid begins with Asia from perspectives other than that of Russian the clearest explanation yet in English of tradi‐ administrators. Adeeb Khalid's book is a welcome tional education and the reproduction of Islamic addition to this growing literature.[2] culture. The maktab (primary school) and The Jadids, or "New-Method" men, fourished (roughly equivalent to a seminary for in in the last decades of the tsarist clergy) did not teach phonetic literacy in the West‐ regime. They advocated renewing Islamic culture ern sense, which was the main reason the Jadids through Western educational methods and adapt‐ and European observers criticized them so harsh‐ ed Western forms of "print capitalism," such as ly. Instead, they conveyed proper morals, conduct, newspapers and theater, to carry out what Khalid and sacred knowledge, the authority of which was calls "the politics of admonition."[3] The Jadids ex‐ assured through a recognized chain of transmis‐ H-Net Reviews sion from master to pupil. If a person (there were form, not a political response to the Russians--in also maktabs for girls, if not ) knew the fact they were politically weak except for a brief proper texts to recite at the proper times, she or period after 1917. He also points out that Jadidism he was considered educated. Trade skills were was not necessarily "the natural" response to colo‐ largely oral well into the nineteenth century, and nial occupation. Other groups of Turkestanis em‐ only a few men needed to know how to write. braced an ever-stricter observance of ("val‐ Craft guilds transmitted technical knowledge orized" the tradition, in post-modern jargon) or within their closed memberships. advocated greater russifcation. These points are An educational system founded on personal well taken, but I think Khalid overstrains to make bonds was also refected in the political order, his case. As he himself says, the Russian conquest which was based more on personal chains of au‐ set profound changes in motion for Turkestanis, thority than a fxed bureaucratic hierarchy. and Jadidism "is to be located at the intersection" Khalid's discussion of the political relations of these changes, Russian cultural policies, and among clergy, rulers, and "notable" families is the traditional order (p. 81). Without the con‐ clear and quite interesting. He is arguing against quest, there would have been no space in which earlier models of Turkestani political structure as the Jadids could develop. a theocracy or as a simple autocracy, yet he still Khalid's greatest contribution is in his discus‐ relies heavily on Russian and other foreign travel‐ sion of Jadid activities and thought, since he er sources for his exposition (a major exception makes much more extensive and sophisticated being Sadriddin Ayni's memoirs).[4] The current use of Jadid writings in Turkic and Persian than constraints on monograph publication may have previous scholars. Some of these writings, particu‐ prevented this, but some discussion of the nature larly the state-sponsored newspaper Turkistan of available sources and the problems they wilayatining gazeti and the journals Taraqqi, present would have been most helpful in assess‐ Ulugh Turkistan, and Sada-yi Turkistan (among ing the accuracy of Khalid's proposed model. others), have not been discussed in English be‐ This educational system was perfectly ade‐ fore. He also provides more detailed biographical quate until the Russian conquest of the 1860s information than has been previously available. forced Turkestan to join the Western capitalist or‐ The Jadids, most of whom were themselves prod‐ der. The Russian presence was actually quite ucts of traditional educations, spent much of their light, since they were more interested in military time excoriating the old schools and the blinkered control and economic exploitation than full ab‐ ways of thought they produced. This was "the pol‐ sorption, and in any case did not have the re‐ itics of admonition" (Chapter Four) that fxed the sources to govern Turkestan closely even if they blame for their current predicament squarely on had wanted to. The shock of foreign conquest and Turkestanis themselves. The Jadids' solution cen‐ the subsequent economic degradation caused a tered on phonetically-based education that taught profound re-thinking of traditional ways, al‐ true literacy. When students could read and un‐ though Khalid strongly argues that Jadidism can‐ derstand texts, they could gain access to the West‐ not be viewed as simply a response to Russian im‐ ern scientifc worldview and apply that knowl‐ perialism. edge to the beneft of their own culture. One may well object that had the Russians not While superfcially a simple concept, the new been in Turkestan, neither would the Jadids. But method of education contained profound chal‐ Khalid maintains that the Jadids were primarily lenges to the old order and the groups that bene‐ concerned with internal social and cultural re‐ fted from it. Jadid schools were modeled on Rus‐

2 H-Net Reviews sian schools, with tables and chairs, books written mantic nationalism" (p. 197) led them to argue for specifcally for children, and maps. The study of a radical reconfguration of Turkestani communi‐ geography, history, and Islam together had the ef‐ ties. fect of "desacralizing" knowledge (pp. 172-75) and How "successful" the Jadids were is a compli‐ placing Islam in a space- and time-specifc con‐ cated question. They were always a small minori‐ text. The Jadids used the European media of print ty (although Khalid unfortunately does not pro‐ and theater to propagate their ideas, creating new vide a clear sense of just how many people we are spaces for public discourse beyond the control of dealing with here), and their publishing and the‐ the old elites (and contributing to the concept of ater ventures were continually hampered by poor public discourse itself). One of the younger gener‐ fnances and government censorship. The period ation of Jadids, Hamza Hakimzada Niyazi, even of their greatest activity was fairly short, from invented folksongs for school children to sing. Dis‐ 1905 to 1917, with gaps as state supervision cussing the impact of these ideas and modes of waxed and waned. On the other hand, powerful communication leads Khalid to explore the histo‐ ideas do not need a loud voice to carry them. The ry of printing, publishing, and public perfor‐ Jadids' schools, plays, and journals drew a wide mance in Turkestan. audience among the elite groups, the plays in par‐ The logical end of the Jadid argument was ticular attracting large crowds during the World that the old elites should give way to a new elite-- War I years. the Jadids, who would lead the people to an en‐ Khalid's last chapter concerns the frst years lightened and purifed Islamic culture. But who of Bolshevik rule, when many of the new were "the people"? The idea of "nation" fgured Turkestani leaders (Faizulla Khojaev, Hamza, Ab‐ prominently in Jadid discourse, and Khalid as‐ dalrauf Fitrat) were Jadids who saw the new serts convincingly that the origins of contempo‐ regime as the best chance for making their ideas rary Uzbek, Tajik, Kirghiz, and other nationhoods political reality. This was the highpoint of their in‐ lie in these pre-revolutionary debates, not in Sovi‐ fuence, since the modernizing goals of the Jadids et-imposed decrees (pp. 183-87). He discusses in ft well with parts of the Bolshevik program. As some depth the vexed question of ethnic identities the 1920s closed, however, it became clear that in Turkestan, which simply cannot be ft into neat the were in a much better position to scientifc categories. The terms "Sart," "Tajik," use and discard the Jadids than vice-versa. Khalid "Turk," and "Ozbek" were highly fuid in their use, points out that, among the Jadid leaders, only with some groups, as an example, calling them‐ Ayni died of natural causes. selves "Ozbek" while speaking exclusively Per‐ Khalid's work bring the study of recent Cen‐ sian. tral Asian history to a new level of sophistication. While the Jadids paid little attention to con‐ It deserves a wide audience among Russian and cepts of class (they mostly ignored the peasants, Middle East specialists. who made up the vast majority of Turkestan's Notes population), they spent much time in their writ‐ ings envisioning a Muslim Turkestani nation, one [1]. Edward Allworth, ed., Central Asia: A Cen‐ that was distinct from the Tatars, Armenians, and tury of Russian Rule (Durham: Duke University Jews around them. This nation was not pan-Tur‐ Press, 1967; new editions 1989, 1993), Seymour kic or even pan-Islamic in nature, as the exclusion Becker, Russia's Protectorates in Central Asia: of Tatars shows, but was bounded by both geo‐ Bukhara and Khiva, 1865-1924 (Cambridge: Har‐ graphic and religious diferences. The Jadids' "ro‐ vard University Press, 1968), Alexandre Ben‐ nigsen and Chantal Lemercier-Quelquejay, Islam

3 H-Net Reviews in the (New York: Praeger Publish‐ ers, 1967), Helene Carrere d'Encausse, Reforme et revolution chez les musulmans de russie l'empire: Bukhara, 1867-1924 (Paris: Armand Colin, 1966), published in English as Islam and the Russian Em‐ pire: Reform and Revolution in Central Asia (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988). [2]. Books using new approaches include Daniel Brower and Edward Lazzerini, eds., Rus‐ sia's Orient: Imperial Borderlands and Peoples. 1700-1917 (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1997), Andreas Kappeler, Gerhard Simon and Georg Brunner, eds., Muslim Communities Reemerge: Historical Perspectives on Nationality, Politics, and Opposition in the Former Soviet Union and Yugoslavia (Durham: Duke University Press, 1994), Michael Kemper, Anke von Kugele‐ gen, and Dmitriy Yermakov, eds., Muslim Culture in Russia and Central Asia from the 18th to the Early 20th Centuries, Vol. 1 (Berlin: Klaus Schwartz Verlag, 1996); and Anke von Kugelgen, Michael Kemper and Allen J. Frank, eds., Muslim Culture in Russia and Central Asia from the 18th to the Early 20th Centuries Vol. 2 (Berlin: Klaus Schwarz Verlag, 1998). [3]. Khalid relies fairly heavily on the work of Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Re‐ fections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, 2nd edition (London: Verso, 1991). [4]. Khalid uses a 1984 Persian edition of Ayni, Yaddashtha. There is now an English translation of Part 1 of Ayni's memoirs, The Sands of the Oxus: Boyhood Reminiscences of Sadriddin Aini (Costa Mesa, Calif.: Mazda Publishers, 1998). Copyright (c) 1999 by H-Net, all rights re‐ served. This work may be copied for non-proft educational use if proper credit is given to the au‐ thor and the list. For other permission, please con‐ tact [email protected].

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Citation: Shoshana Keller. Review of Khalid, Adeeb. The Politics of Muslim Cultural Reform: Jadidism in Central Asia. H-Russia, H-Net Reviews. May, 1999.

URL: https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=3115

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