Grassroots Resource Preservation and Management in Kyrgyzstan: Ethnicity, Nationalism and Heritage on a Human Scale

Co-developed by K. Anne Pyburn (Indiana University—Bloomington), Avaz Tursunbaev (Director, Uzgben State Museum and Mausoleum and Tower, and President of the Kyrgyz Sacred Heritage Association), Momytbaev Yimadin Birnazarovich (Deputy, Kara Sas, Herdsman), Abakir Kalybekov (Physics Teacher at Chargynov, Ozgorush, Toktogul region), and Caroline Beebe (PhD, Information Specialist, USA), this case study has grown out of an earlier project.

 

Over the past four years, Anne Pyburn and Caroline Beebe have collaborated with more than 100 Kyrgyz, Canadian, Kazak, Uzbek and American stakeholders to begin to address questions around cultural heritage, and to offer useful information and timely support to Kyrgyz citizens as requested. As a result, Kyrgyz people from various backgrounds participated in the “Silk Roads” project that set the groundwork for the current research funded by IPinCH. The Kyrgyz people designed 13 small-scale sustainable, culturally-appropriate, and community-embedded projects that address the preservation and educational use of IP and cultural heritage.

 

Three projects were deemed of primary importance since they address many of the IPinCH goals, while satisfying the Kyrgyz project objective of completing demonstration projects of sufficient variety and scope to inform the design and implementation of the remaining ten projects, each of which further Kyrgyz identification and protection of important cultural heritage themes.

 

This project capitalizes on the local community’s existing engagement with an internationally-significant heritage site that is an ancient architectural masterpiece with local spiritual significance.  The site is in immediate danger because previous archaeological excavation was left unconsolidated, and faces future preservation concerns because of the several avenues of development being suggested. A public opinion survey designed and administered by Avaz Tursunbaev will discover what types of improvement and development the citizens of Uzgen will approve and support. Administering this survey will simultaneously engage the public in thinking and talking about this site, hopefully enhancing their engagement with the place, not only spiritually, but also through awareness of the practical importance of preservation.

 

This project will preserve oral traditions unknown to the younger generations of Kyrgyz by reconnecting young people to their heritage and their country’s resources, inspiring them to be better stewards of their material and spiritual heritage. Co-developer Abakir Kalybekov will record a series of traditional songs and stories and take these to visit radio stations in Bishkek, Koch Kor and elsewhere for a weekly radio show. He will design and print a companion workbook for children ages eight to twelve, presenting values of heritage preservation through traditional stories, songs and petroglyphs.

Momytbaev Yimadin Birnazarovich has begun to create a photographic and video-graphic record of the archaeological and cultural treasures in his local area. He would like to develop these onto an ethnographic map that could be used to develop tourism, by a) directing visitors to sites they would like to see; b) to people who would be willing to talk to them; and c) by offering them some information about the area and its residents. At the same time casual visitors will be tactfully discouraged from intruding at sites that local people consider sacred.