COMMON LANGUAGE AND ALPHABET FOR THE TURKIC PEOPLE AT THE FIRST TURKOLOGY CONGRESS

Abstract

The First Baku Turkological Congress held in Baku from February 26 to March 6, 1926 and the issues discussed there (history, language, literature of the Turkic peoples, terminology, ethnography, etc.) were a serious historical event for that period. The issues discussed at the congress (common literary language, terminology, alphabet, etc.) are the most important issues facing the science of Turkology today. In this sense, the issue of a common literary language for the Turkic peoples discussed at the Congress is also relevant for our modern Turkology.

The congress was held in a very important historical period. In this regard, no matter how much we were proud of the importance of the issues discussed at the First Turkological Congress held in Baku, the events that took place after that, unfortunately, did not allow us to experience that joy from the heart. The fact that (131) Turkological scientists who participated in the congress were subjected to various persecutions and repressions after the congress, their fate is the subject of a wide study in itself. Professor Kamil Veli Narimanoghlu calls this Congress a “humanity drama” where people who are very valuable to the science of philology, especially Turkology, were killed innocently (Narimanoglu, 2006:3).