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Abstract

This paper examines how ethnic Kazak migrants from China’s Xinjiang region navigate social marginalization in Kazakhstan, challenging dominant frameworks that interpret return migration primarily through transnationalism and dual place attachment. Drawing on 30 months of ethnographic fieldwork in Astana (2023–2026), including participant observation and in-depth interviews, the study analyzes the everyday practices, identity constructions, and adaptive strategies of Xinjiang-origin migrants within the broader context of Kazakhstan’s post-Soviet repatriation policy.

The paper argues that, unlike Kazak migrants from Mongolia—whose adaptation is often characterized by strong transnational networks and dual homeland attachment—Xinjiang migrants exhibit a distinct pattern: many of them treat migration to Kazakhstan as a final destination rather than part of an ongoing transnational lifecycle. While they experience similar forms of marginalization (e.g., exclusion from Russian-speaking labor markets and stigmatization as culturally “backward”), their primary adaptive strategy is not the maintenance of cross-border ties. Instead, they mobilize what this paper conceptualizes as “Chinese modernity”—a repertoire of linguistic skills, technological familiarity (e.g., WeChat usage), and market-oriented practices acquired in China—as a cultural resource.

Empirically, the study demonstrates that these “Chinese” cultural practices serve both practical and symbolic functions: they facilitate everyday communication and economic activity, while simultaneously enabling migrants to construct an alternative identity that combines “authentic” Kazak tradition with a competing form of modernity distinct from the Russian-influenced norms of local society. This dual positioning allows Xinjiang migrants to counter local hierarchies that label them as inferior, even as it paradoxically reinforces their othering.

By foregrounding intra-ethnic heterogeneity and the role of non-territorial cultural resources, this paper contributes to broader debates in migration studies, in particular, territorially bounded notions of identity and nationalism. It suggests that return migration cannot be fully understood through transnationalism alone and calls for greater attention to how migrants selectively appropriate multiple modernities in negotiating belonging within “homelands” that are themselves culturally fragmented.