Territorial Belonging and Homeland Disjuncture: Uneven Territorialisations in Kazakhstan

Abstract

This article evaluates the relationships among state-framed and alternatively-territorialized narratives of identity and belonging in Kazakhstan. Using survey data from 2017 and 2018 we argue that collective identity among Kazakhstan’s citizens is negotiated not just in terms of ethnic versus civic forms of state-centric national belonging, but also through varied forms and scales of attachment to place. Our analyses show how collective identity in Kazakhstan draws on both traditional state-framed models of territorialisation and vernacular conceptions of homeland. We find significant variation in attachment among different ethnic and social groups within Kazakhstan.

Keywords: Kazakhstan, nationality, collective identity, homeland