Post-USSR dynamics of language situation in Central Asian countries

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The language situation in Central Asian countries has drastically changed today, 20 years after the collapse of the USSR. On the basis of fieldwork conducted in those countries, this research revealed that the sphere of each official ethnic national language use has been expanding more widely in society, that the status of the Russian language has been predictably transiting from the first authoritative language to the second, and that language education policy, in which the official ethnic national language, Russian and English are in particular oriented, has been strengthening. These phenomena are closely related to several social changes : (a) a dismantling of multi-ethnic society structures in which the Russians had been playing a central role ; (b) language policy that has been promoted on the basis of core ethnic nationalism ; (c) the spread of world views in which core ethnic groups, their respective official national language, and Islam have paramount values ; and (d) Central Asian countries have been both globalizing and localizing.