Paper abstract:

Turkestani emigres who had to leave their homelands after being labeled as “class enemies” or “traitors” by the Soviet regime continued to fight for the independence of their homelands in their new settlements in Europe, Middle East, and the United States until the collapse of the Soviet Union. This paper focuses on the processes of nation-making abroad by Turkestani emigres on three different continents during the Cold War. It argues that the political dynamics in the post-WWII period provided a feasible atmosphere for Turkestani emigres to flourish their nationalism and disseminate the national knowledge among the new generation of Turkestanians who were born outside of Turkestan and could not visit their ancestors’ homelands. Through transnational publications, establishing Turkestani associations, and working at Radio Liberty and the Voice of America, Turkestani emigres established a complex social network that enabled them to disperse their national discourse and endure Turkestani nationalism among the Turkestani diaspora. The national struggle of Turkestanians and their efforts to preserve their national identity provides a new perspective to understand the failures of Soviet nation-making in Central Asia and the agency of emigres in producing and controlling the discourses of nationalism.