THE ROLE OF THE MIGRATION PROCESS IN THE CULTURAL-ECONOMIC CHANGES OF THE LIFE OF KYRGYZ COMMUNITY IN VAN, TURKEY

Zarina Urmanbetova MA Student of Hacettepe University

About 30 years ago a Kyrgyz community from Pakistan came as refugees to eastern Turkey. They were from Afghanistan and were already refugees in Pakistan at this time. Before coming to Turkey, this community was living in the Central Asian steppes as a nomadic community. Their motherland was in the Pamir valleys of Afghanistan before their exodus to the Pakistan after the Saur Revolution in 1979 in Kabul. Nowadays according to the Statistical Committee of TR they are about 1720 people living in the village of Ulupamir relating to the Erjish district, Van region of Turkish Republic . This paper aims to explain the cultural and economic changes in their life after the end of main migration process.

Key Words: Forced Migration, Ethnicity, Culture, Cultural - Economic Change

IINTRODUCTION

The paper aims to provide information about the Kyrgyz community, currently living in Van, Turkey and their migration journey from Afghanistan to Turkey. How and why the last station of their migration was Turkey and how their nomadic life ended? Last but not least, how the migration process has influenced their cultural and economic life?

This community is united under the Kyrgyz ethnicity. According to the social scientists that studied this term, ethnicity is based on common ancestry and cultural differences from other ethnic group. Cultural differences are defined by very different aspects such as language, costumes, customs etc (Fenton, 2003:62-63; Banton, 2007:19-35). Another main tool of the ethnicity is a collective name of the group. This is distinguishing aspect for the ethnic group, because ethnic groups recognize each other with the name of ethnicity. The establishment of the ethnicity must be based on the common memory, which is occurring through historical process. The understanding of common history, which defines common memory of ethnicity, provides the unity among the members of the group. Ethnicity is always associated with a certain place/territory. This association could be linked with certain places or strong memory of the ethnic group. At the same time there are other strong aspects of ethnicity, these are the sense of belonging and solidarity of member to the group (Smith, 2002: 47-56). Kyrgyz community which we are considering here in this context has all those aspects quoted above in their ethnic identity. Common history, memory, language, cultural features, ethnically associated place are the main aspects. Another important term in the context of the paper is forced migration. Kyrgyz community was forced to leave their place due to the political circumstances of the country. Migration is the movement which is made by individuals or collectively. The common point of definitions of migration is the movement from one location to the residential point of movement. That change of the locatıon could be permanent or semi-permanent. It depends on the purpose of the people who take this decision. Migration is an event in which people make a geographical movement from one place to another to spend their whole life or part of it. Migration could be on a short-distance as a neighborhood relocation. On the other hand it could be on a long-distance as a shift to another country. According to another definition of migration, it is not only a changing of geographical place, but can also be considered as changing a society. Geographical displacement for the people is a changing of the social, cultural, economical and political environment. At the same time it affects both sides migrants and host society (Yalçın, 2004:11-13; Jackson, 2010:1-2 [1969]).

Migration of people takes place for different reasons, according to Peterson there are 4 different kind of migrations. One of these forms is forced migration. In case of forced migration, people often take the decision to migrate suddenly when their lives are in danger, in case of emerging threats such as natural disasters, political, economic and social reasons. Natural disasters like floods, earthquakes; food shortages, famines, droughts are considered as the reasons of first category for forced migration. The causes of forced migration in the second category are the situations when the migration is imposed from outside. In that case there is a kind of conflict situation or the possibility of conflict, which does not let them live there in a peace (Hugo, 2005:5-6; Peterson, 1958). Kyrgyz from Afghan Pamirs were forced to leave their homeland because of political situation of the Afghanistan. The new regime, which was established after Saur Revolution in 1978, was dangerous for their life as they explain. After four years of a refugee life in border country Pakistan, they managed to come Turkey.

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