History, Archeology and Ethnography of the Caucasus

Abstract. The article notes that linguistic construction in the 1920s. is one of the well-studied topics. However, the position of the Muslim clergy, so-called. "Arabists", remains unexplored, especially on the issue of replacing the Arabic alphabet with the Latin.

A personification of this process is needed, as well as a study of the motivation and forms of protest activity of the Muslim clergy and believers, the current practices of opposing latinizatsia.  Theoretical and practical approaches to latinizatsia were determined by conferences in Pyatigorsk (1923), Rostov-on-Don (1925) and decisions of the Turkological Congress in Baku (1926). The choice of the Latin alphabet had not so much technical as an ideological dimension: the Arabic symbolized the power of the clergy, backwardness and ignorance, and the Cyrillic alphabet - the oppression of non-Russian peoples and Orthodox missionary work among Muslims.

According to the author, the clergy could not accept the new alphabet not only because of the risks of losing their influence and resourses in education, but also for psychological reasons. The clergy and Muslims organized a Muslim congress in Adygea in 1925, at which it was proposed to preserve the Arabic script and open new madrasahs. The paper notes that at the end of the 1920s. Circassian women played an important role in protests against the introduction of the Latinized alphabet and against Soviet policy of the secularization and atheization of society and culture.