Crimean Tatar Gasprinskiy Library

Gasprinsky Library to become accessible to the visually impaired

2012-01-24T04:39:00.000-08:00

Recently, I and my counterpart, Nadjie Yagya, finished writing a draft proposal for a Peace Corps sponsored grant that would open up the Gasprinsky Library to visually impaired people. It has long been a dream of the Library to increase its accessibility to disabled and visually impaired people. Though changing the physical structure of the library entrances to make them wheelchair accessible is beyond the scope of this grant, we were able to write a project that would add resources to the library for visually impaired people and also to work with librarians across Crimea to increase access in their libraries for visually impaired people.

In developing this grant, we partnered with two local NGO’s (non-governmental organizations): UTOS, who provides vocational rehabilitation for visually impaired people; and KrimTIZ, who functions as an advocate for the rights of visually impaired and disabled people. We are especially excited about the partnership with KrimTIZ, as they are located nearby which more easily gives us the potential for future collaborations.

The Gasprinsky Library and the NGO’s will conduct a one-day training in Simferopol for representatives from the twenty-five central rayon libraries in Crimea and UTOS branches located in seven Crimean cities. In the training, we will present seminars on working with visually impaired people, the resources that are available for making libraries accessible, and also training in the adaptive technology that is now available to enable visually impaired people to access the internet and “read” computer screens.

Also, as part of the project, we will help KrimTIZ set up an internet information center in their organization building which will have adaptive software. We will also add a work station with adaptive software to the Internet Center at our library. This will allow visually impaired patrons of the Gasprinsky Library to not only access the internet, but also to access the information on the library websites.

This grant won’t be funded until early summer, so it will be some time before these new resources become available in our library and at KrimTIZ. I will be sure to post the information about our grand openings.

Nadjie and I working on writing a grant.

Nuriye Jeter, Crimean Tatar actress and dancer

2012-01-11T07:07:00.000-08:00

In the front right corner of the Reading Hall in the Gasprinsky Library, there is a revolving display of information about different Crimean Tatar artists, writers, poets, intellectuals, and political leaders. With documents taken from the library’s collections, the displays highlight the achievements of prominent Crimean Tatars and the vast creative and intellectual wealth of the Crimean Tatar people.

Susanna Rezaevna, head of the Readers department, stands in front of a display about Nuriye Jeter, who was a famous Crimean Tatar actress and dancer in the 20th century. Born in Bakhchiseray, Crimea in 1912, Jeter studied at a theater school in Simferopol. In 1925 when she was only 13, she began to perform at the Crimean Tatar theater in Simferopol. She soon became one of the prominent artists in the company, playing leading roles is such classic plays as The Last by M. Gorky (the role of Anastasia) and Shakespeare’s Hamlet (the role of Ophelia), and also Crimea Tatar plays such as The Fountain of Bakchiseray, in which she played the role of Zarema, written specifically for her.
Jeter performed at the Crimean Tatar theater for sixteen years until 1941. She also became part of a trio that included vocalist S. Eredzhepovoy and violinist A. Parikova in which she performed traditional Crimean Tatar dances. The trio became well known beyond Crimea and planned an overseas tour, but their plan, like so many others, was interrupted by the war.
In1944, Nuriye Jeter was swept up in the deportation of the Crimean Tatars and ended up in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. After the war, she continued to perform in drama theaters in Uzbekistan. She died in Tashkent in 1991.

In honor of Asanin Idris, 1927 - 2007

2011-12-22T06:22:00.000-08:00

Today at the library there was an event celebrating the memory of the Crimean Tatar poet, essayist, and leader of the national movement, Asanin Idris (1927-2007). The Reading Hall was packed to overflowing with people coming to honor this important figure in Crimean Tatar culture.

Asanin Idris was born in 1927 in the village of Sala-Foti (Golubinka) in the district of Bakhchisaray. In 1944 the family was deported to the Samarkand region of Uzbekistan. All of his family with the exception of one sister perished during the deportation and in the refugee camps afterwards. Even as a young person in Crimea, Asanin rebelled against the sufferings and injustices of his people. The poetry be began to write in his youth became, after deportation, poetry of the feelings of his people, exiled from their native lands.

As a result of his writings, Asanin was arrested in 1950 while in his third year of study at the History Teachers' Training Institute, and was sentenced to 25 years of hard labor. After Stalin's death his sentence was reduced and in 1956, he was released. After returning from the camps, Asanin continued his studies at the Institute and completed his course in 1961. He worked in various construction jobs in Samarkand and then received a diploma in civil engineering through the correspondence department of the Tashkent Polytechnic Institute.

Asanin became very active in the national movement to return to Crimea and later wrote a three-volume work about the movement titled “In the Ranks of the Struggle for Justice.”
A collection of his poetry, titled “A Handful of Earth,” was published in 1997 in honor of his 50 years of creative work.
Idris Asanin also worked tirelessly to preserve the historic monuments of national culture of the Crimean Tatars and created and managed the company “Shrine."

In 2009, the widow of Idris Asanin, donated all of his papers to the Gasprinsky Library for study and use by researchers and readers. Among the materials donated were many books of different Crimean Tatar authors, personal correspondence, rare photos, and many materials concerning the Crimean Tatar national movement.

Great news! We have reached our fundraising goal!

2011-12-13T00:26:00.000-08:00

Thanks to the generosity of so many of you, we have reached the fundraising goal of our Peace Corps Partnership Project, Crimean Tatar Language and Cultural Preservation Project. In just one month, over thirty individuals and organizations donated $4000.00 to our project. This means the Gasprinsky Library will be able to purchase digital scans of their microfilm collection, particularly the microfilms of Ismail Gasprinky's newspaper, Terdjman, and also will be able to purchase a high speed office scanner to scan the many paper documents in the archives.
On behalf of the Library, thanks so much to all of you.

The Scanner arrives!

2011-12-12T01:12:00.000-08:00

An exciting event occurred last week at the library. The book scanner that we had purchased with a grant from the EMC Cultural Heritage Fund arrived! (See June 7th blog post “Library Receives Cultural Heritage Grant” for information about this grant.) Two large boxes came by train from Kyiv, and then two days later, the technician from the company arrived to set up the scanner and train library workers on how to use it.

Because of the EMC grant, the library was able to purchase an Atiz BookDrive DIY scanner capable of scanning books and newspapers to a digital format. The scanner uses two cameras to produce high quality images which are then transferred to a computer. Having this specialized piece of equipment will allow the library to begin the long process of scanning their document collection and converting them to a digital format which will then be made available to the public via the Library website. This is particularly important for the library’s collection of rare books and newspapers which are in danger of deteriorating to the point of being unreadable and are no longer available to library patrons. Some of these documents are the only copy in existence and the loss of them would mean one more piece of Crimean Tatar history would be gone forever. It is vital to the mission of the Gasprinsky Library as “the keeper of the memory of the Crimean Tatar people” that these rare documents are transferred to a digital format, not only to preserve that memory, but also to make Crimean Tatar history available to people worldwide.

Two big boxes containing the scanner arrive on the train from Kyiv.
The technician arrives two days later and begins to assemble the scanner.
He begins to train library staff how to use the scanner.

The technician shows how to adjust the cameras to get the highest quality images.
The scanner is ready to start the work of digitizing the library's collections.

Yunus Kandym

2011-11-29T05:37:00.001-08:00

PLEASE HELP SUPPORT THE GASPRINSKY LIBRARY. EVERY DONATION HELPS! CLICK HERE TO DONATE.

Yunus Kandym 1959-2005

Today in the Reading Hall of the Library, a newly published edition of a book translated from Ukrainian into Crimean Tatar was presented to the Library and the media. The translation was the work of Crimean Tatar poet Yunus Kandym, who died in 2005.

Yunus Kandym was born in Tashkent, Uzbekistan in 1959. From 1976 to 1981, he studied Crimean Tatar language at the Tashkent State Pedagogical Institute. In 1981, he went to work for the Crimean Tatar newspaper, Lenin Banner, first as a reporter, and later as a department head. In 1989 his family moved to Crimea, where he began work on the newspaper Crimean. He became a member of the Journalist Union in 1986 and the Writers’ Union in 1990 and also worked as a translator.

Yunus Kandym’s first poem was published in Tashkent in 1979. Nine years later his first book of poetry was published. He went on to publish several books of poetry and his poems are found in numerous collections in Russian, Ukrainian, and Crimean Tatar languages. He received the award of Honored Culture Worker of Ukraine and is often quoted in Turkish writings. Yunus Kandym died in 2005 at the age of 45.

Display of Yunus Kandym's work in the Reading Hall of the Library.
Publisher of the Crimean Tatar translation of Mikael Kotsubinsky.
Yunus Kandym's wife talks about the poet's life.

Crimean Tatar: A "severely endangered" language

2011-11-22T04:38:00.000-08:00

The Crimean Tatar language is listed as “severely endangered” in the UNESCO Atlas of the World’s Disappearing Languages. They estimate that, if nothing is done, half of the 6000 plus languages spoken today will disappear by the end of this century.
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Why should we care? This is what UNESCO says:
“Every language reflects a unique world-view with its own value systems, philosophy and particular cultural features. The extinction of a language results in the irrecoverable loss of unique cultural knowledge embodied in it for centuries, including historical, spiritual and ecological knowledge that may be essential for the survival of not only its speakers, but also countless others.”

Please consider donating to the Crimean Tatar Cultural and Language Preservation project and help at least one of those endangered languages survive. Click here to donate.

And if you haven’t taken the opportunity to check out the Gasprinsky Library’s website, please do—you can click on it under Websites of Interest. The website is in Crimean Tatar and Russian, but with the aid of Google Translate, you can read much of the site in English. The Library just started a children’s section on their website with games, fairy tales, and coloring books, all in Crimean Tatar, along with the Crimean Tatar Cyrillic alphabet. It is estimated only 5% of Crimean Tatar children speak their native language. This is just one more effort on the part of the Library to fulfill its mission to preserve and revitalize the Crimean Tatar language and culture.

Children at the Gasprinsky Library learn about the children's books in Crimean Tatar.
The Crimean Tatar television station, ATR, interviews one young reader.

Help support the work of the Gasprinsky Crimean Tatar Library!

2011-11-15T01:54:00.000-08:00

Now you have an opportunity to support the work of the Gasprinsky Library by making a tax exempt donation through the Peace Corps website. Just click on the link on the right, and it will take you directly to the listing of our project on the Peace Corps website.

Your donation will help fund a project of the Library to digitize their archival documents and make them available on their website. More on this project:

Since its founding twenty years, the Gasprinsky Crimean Tatar Library has become the central repository of documents by and about the Crimean Tatar people. It now has a collection of over 40,000 documents, including more than 8000 in the Crimean Tatar language. The Library has an archival department to which well-known Crimean Tatar political leaders, intellectuals, artists, writers and poets have donated their personal papers. However, as an institution of the Ukrainian government, the Library suffers from a severe lack of funds to do anything beyond pay salaries and maintain the building. Many of the documents of the Library are in urgent need of preservation, particularly in a digital form that would give them a much wider audience. With this project, we hope to raise $3000 which would allow the Library to purchase a small flatbed paper scanner for the numerous archival paper documents—letters, writings, notes, etc—and also to purchase digital scans of some of the Library’s microfilms. The Library is particularly interested in purchasing scans of the microfilms of the newspaper Terdzhman, published from 1883 to 1918 by the Muslim educator and reformer Ismail Gasprinsky, whom the Library is named after. The digital copies then would be made available to Library patrons through the Library’s computers and to readers and researchers worldwide via the Library’s website.

Please consider making a small donation to support this vital work in the continuing mission of the Library to preserve the Crimean Tatar language and culture. Thank you.

Ramiz Netovkin, 1960-2011

2011-11-08T01:55:00.000-08:00

In the long hallway of the Library that connects the different offices, a space has been made for exhibits of the work of local Crimean Tatar artists. The current exhibit shows the work of a well-known graphic artist, Ramiz Netovkin, who died recently at the age of 51. Netovkin was born in Tashkent on June 21, 1960. In 1975, he came to Simferopol. He studied painting at the Simferopol College of Art in the name of H.C. Samokisha and graduated in 1980. Since 1983 his work has been included in numerous regional, national, and international exhibits, including solo exhibits in New York, Russia, Germany, Turkey, Poland, and Estonia. Ramiz Netovkin worked as a graphic artist, and in 1989 he became a member of the Union of Ukrainian Artists. He was awarded the designation of Honored Artist of Crimea.
Ramiz Netovkin lived in the nearby small city of Belagorsk. He died July 16, 2011, after suffering a heart attack in the earlier part of the year. Currently there is a retrospective exhibit of his work at the Crimean Tatar Museum of Art in Simferopol.

Developing Volunteerism mini-seminars in Crimea

2011-10-25T05:07:00.000-07:00

In the week of October 17th, my counterpart at the library, Nadjie Yagya, and I traveled to three central libraries in Crimea and two branch libraries to present mini-seminars on the topic of volunteerism in libraries and communities. As part of our Peace Corps sponsored Small Projects Assistance (SPA) grant, these mini seminars were a follow-up from the two-day seminar/training we held in Simferopol on May 24th and 25th (see the May 30th blog post for a description of that seminar). Accompanied by library staff who provided information about the work of the Gasprinsky Library, Nadjie and I presented information about the concept of volunteerism and the opportunities it can provide for a library. Included in the seminar was a presentation on American libraries and how volunteer organizations—called “Friends of the Library”—assist libraries in America, from fundraising to providing an extra helping hand with library tasks.

Volunteerism, an accepted practice in America where a large percentage of the population do some kind of volunteer work, is slowly taking hold in post-Soviet countries. The goal of our SPA grant was to promote volunteerism in Crimea through developing volunteerism in Crimean libraries. As I listened to Nadjie discussing various volunteer ideas and watched the seminar participants avidly listen, take notes, and ask many questions, I felt hopeful that at least the idea of volunteerism, and what it can do for their libraries, was planted in the minds of many librarians.

At the branch library in the Crimean Tatar village of Ismail Bey, Nadjie and I and Susanna from Gasprinsky Library pose for a photo with the director of this small library (middle) and librarian from the Evpatoria library (far left).
Participants at the Bakchiseray Central Library.
At the Evpatoria Central Library, Nadjie and I present a slide show on volunteerism in American libraries (that's a young Barack Obama in the Harvard University Library).
At the regional library and Crimean Tatar Cultural Center in the town of Cuvorovckoe, Nadjie and I discuss library volunteerism with the director over tea.
At the Saki Central Library, participants avidly take notes.

Inci Bowman comes to the Gasprinsky Library

2011-10-18T06:53:00.000-07:00

Inci Bowman with Crimea Rada Deputy Cafure Kadzhametova and Gulnara Yayaeva, Library Director.

On the afternoon of October 13th, the Gasprinsky Library was honored with a visit from Inci Bowman from the United States. Inci Bowman is past president of the International Committee on Crimea (ICC). Through her writings on the ICC website and the ICC list serve, Inci Bowman has for me become the voice of the Crimean Tatar diaspora in the United States. I attribute much of what I know about the Crimean Tatar people to her informative and elegant writing. I had looked forward to meeting her and was disappointed we did not have more time together, but I was happy to put a face with the writings that have so enriched my life these past two years.
Dr. Bowman was in Simferopol as a guest speaker at an international conference on the history of women in Crimea dedicated to the 125th anniversary of the birth of Sefiki Gasprinsky, the daughter of Ismail Gasprinsky. Dr. Bowman was born in Istanbul and speaks fluent Turkish. She is a retired professor of medical history from the University of Texas and currently lives in Washington, DC.

A word about the International Committee on Crimea taken from their website:
The International Committee for Crimea (ICC) is a group of people interested in raising awareness about the historical, cultural, and socio-political aspects of the Crimean Tatars in their native land as well as in Diaspora. They are descendants of Crimean Tatars living in diaspora, Tatars who have returned to Crimea after almost forty-seven years of forced exile, and friends and allies of Crimean Tatars. Our members live in the U.S.A, Turkey, Germany, Holland, and Ukraine.
The ICC provides a platform where dedicated and active Crimean Tatars and friends of Tatars can meet and share information, ideas, and experiences. Through Crimea-L, an Internet discussion group, and this Web site, the ICC aims to create and maintain a network of Crimean Tatars and friends of Tatars in different parts of the world.
We believe that Crimean Tatars, who were unjustly deported en masse from their homeland by Soviet authorities on 18 May 1944, have the right to live in their homeland in peace, free of social and economic prejudices against them. We look forward to the day when Crimean Tatars are recognized as people with a history and culture who inhabited the Crimean peninsula for centuries.

Gasprinsky Library Departments and what they do: Scientific-Methodology Department

2011-10-06T05:14:00.000-07:00

There are six different departments in the Gasprinsky Library—Scientific and Methodology, Bibliography, Archives, Collections, Reading Hall, and Computer/Technology Center. In the next few blogs, I thought I would write a bit about each department, highlighting what they do and the people who work in them. And, of course, it only seems natural that I would start with my department—the Scientific-Methodology Department.
The Scientific-Methodology Department is responsible for a number of functions related to working with the libraries across Crimea to better serve the Crimean Tatar population. In a recent presentation for the library staff, our department listed some of our most important functions:
1. Provide guidance and advice to the libraries of Crimea in the fields of information service for the Crimean Tatar population, including acquisition and promotion of their Crimean Tatar literature collections.
2. Monitor and analysis for the Ministry of Culture of AR Crimea the library and information services for the Crimean Tatar population.
3. Coordinate with other Crimean libraries in the introduction of innovative methods in the development of Crimean Tatar Library structures.
4. Organize trainings for librarians.
5. Prepare and produce teaching aides to assist the Ministry of Culture of AR Crimea
6. Implement relations with international libraries through the use of modern information technology.
7. Organize paid services in the library.

Here are the staff in the Scientific-Methodology Department:
Refika Feticlyamova who is responsible for preparing the plans and reports for the Ministry of Culture of AR Crimea.
Nadjie Yagya is the head methodologist of the library. She is also my counterpart.
Elmas Emirova is responsible for content of the library's website.
And here I am with Refika and Nadjie, welcoming visitors to our department.

New book from Germany; Cengiz Dagci dies at the age of 92

2011-09-29T04:27:00.000-07:00

On September 27th, the Gasprinsky Library hosted the authors of a new study of German occupation in Crimea called Reemtsma auf der Krim or Reemtsma in the Crimea: Tobacco production and forced labor under German occupation 1941-1944. The authors of the book, Karl Heinz Roth and Jan-Peter Abraham, were here to present their work. Dr. Karl Heinz Roth, is the co-founder of the Hamburg Foundation for the Social History of the 20th Century and is the author of numerous books and magazine articles on the social, economic, medical and scientific history of the 20th Century. Jan-Peter Abraham is a lecturer of Slavonic studies in Ukraine and Moldova and has translated numerous books from Russian and Czech.
Reemtsma in the Crimea documents the activities of the Hamburg tobacco company, Reemtsma, during the German occupation in Crimea in which approximately 20,000 people were forced to work in the tobacco fields and processing plants. The book contains many interviews of present day survivors of the occupation period.
Reemstsma in the Crimea is of particular interest to the Gasprinsky Library because tobacco farming existed mainly in the mountainous region of southern Crimea which at that time was mostly inhabited by Crimean Tatars. Its documentation of the ruthless exploitation of the population in the Reemstsma tobacco operation adds an important piece to the history of Crimea during the Nazi occupation.
For more information, please see the publisher website www.edition-nautilus.de.

On September 22nd, we received the sad news that Crimean Tatar novelist Cengiz Dagci had died in London at the age of 92. He is best known for his novels describing the tragic conditions of Crimean Tatar life between 1932 and 1945, as people struggled to survive between the Russian and German occupiers. Dagci wrote his novels in Turkish and they have never been translated into English. However, his novels were widely read in Turkey and are attributed to keeping alive the Crimean Tatar cause in that country.
As I did in my blog post of August 19, 2010, when the Gasprinsky Library celebrated Cengiz Dagci’s 90th birthday, I will again print his poem about the Crimean Tatar people and their ability to survive:
Aren't Crimean Tatars
a tree which is
supposed to die,
not to get greener
and not to give
new branches?
Since the day that they
lost their independence,
there wasn't any day
passed without
chopping the branches
of this tree, but
again new branches
came out of its body.
These branches were
not allowed to grow
and were chopped
again. But branches
came out again.
At the end,
this tree is chopped
at its root,
and thrown away
on a lonely, desert land.
But again new branches
come out of this body
and get longer and
longer, and they reach
to the land where
this tree was planted
one thousand years ago.

Visitors and events

2011-09-20T02:03:00.000-07:00

The Library has a never ending schedule of events, visitors, educational forums, and various other happenings. You can go to the library website—see the link on my blog—and check out the continually updated calendar of events. The Library website is only in Russian and Crimean Tatar, but you can use Google Translate or one of the other translation websites to at least get an idea of the events.

The Library receives foreign visitors on a fairly frequent basis. For those interested in Crimean Tatar culture, the Library provides a wealth of information. Along with the Crimean Tatar Museum of Arts and the Crimean Tatar Academic Music and Drama Theater, the Gasprinsky Library serves as one of the cultural centers of the Crimean Tatar community.
Recently, a group of Estonians visited the library. The Director of the library, Gulnara Yagyaeva, showed them the work of the different departments of the library and talked about the history of the library, the famous Muslim educator Ismail Gasprinsky, and funds available to the library.

Later that same week, musicologist Lenur Asanov from the Crimean Engineering Pedagogical University came to a meeting of the staff of the library to present a project he has been working on—adapting computer keyboards to the Crimean Tatar language as written with the Latin alphabet and the Arabic alphabet.
He has developed software that can be downloaded on to Windows computers to allow the user to type in the Crimean Tatar language using either of those alphabets. The staff seemed very pleased about this development, especially the Archive Department where they frequently use the Arabic alphabet when referencing old Crimean Tatar documents (many of which are written using the Arabic alphabet).

New Internet Center opens at the Library

2011-09-08T01:18:00.000-07:00

In August, the library opened their new LEAP internet center. LEAP (Library Electronic Access Project) is a program of the Public Affairs Section of the U.S. Embassy in Ukraine. As stated on the Embassy website, the goal of the program is “to provide public libraries with free public access to the Internet and to support the free and open exchange of information that is essential for Ukraine’s integration with the world community.”
The LEAP program was initiated in 2001 and the Gasprinsky Library was one of the first Crimean libraries to receive funding to set up an internet center. This year the Library received a LEAP grant to update their internet center. The internet center moved from a small space in the bibliographic department in which there were two computers for internet access to a room solely dedicated to the internet center, conveniently located by the front door of the library. Now the Center has six computers totally dedicated to internet use and equipped with web cameras and headphones. Also, soon the Center will have Wi-Fi capability.

Lilya Emirova, administrator of the Internet Center, and Eldar Bektemirov, computer engineer for the Center

On August 3rd, the Library had a grand opening of their new LEAP Internet Center, attended by representatives of the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv—Daniel Sicek, Deputy Press Attache, and Valentyna Pashkova, Director of Information Resources.

Gulnara Yagyaeva, Director of the Gasprinsky Library, Elena Emirova, Head of Cultural Institutions and Media and Public Relations at the Ministry of Culture of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, with Daniel Sicek and Valentyna Pashkova from the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv.

Returning from America with books for the library

2011-09-06T04:21:00.000-07:00

It is the beginning of September, and I have returned to the library after my month-long trip to America. It was wonderful being in America—seeing my friends and family, stocking up on those American “necessities” that I can’t seem to get here in Ukraine, buying presents for my Crimean family and friends. But I missed Crimea and was glad to get back to my life here, and now I am especially glad to be at the library and learn of all the happenings while I was gone.
Photograph of Kemal Karpat on the front cover of his autobiography.

On behalf of the library, I had sent a request to Turkish historian Kemal Karpat to donate copies of his books to the Gasprinsky Library. It has gotten very expensive to ship books from America to Ukraine, as there is no longer any surface mail between the countries. Professor Karpat graciously agreed to donate books, but he did not want to send them to Ukraine (he lives in America now), so I arranged to receive the books while I was in America with the plan of bringing them back with me. But, of course, my suitcase got filled up with many other things, and there was no room for his books. My cousin in Chicago generously offered to pay to have them shipped, so a few days after I arrived back in Crimea, a box of Kemal Karpat’s books also arrived.
Some of the books by Kemal Karpat in Turkish language that he donated to the library.

Kemal Karpat is Crimean Tatar and a Turkish historian and former professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison. He has written many books in English and Turkish. Here is an example of some of his titles from a list in Wikipedia:

The Politicization of Islam (Oxford University Press, 2001)

•The Ottoman Past and Today's Turkey (Brill, 2000)
•Political and Social Thought in the Contemporary Middle East (Praeger, 1968)
•Turkey's Politics: The Transition to a Multi-Parti System (Princeton University Press, 1959)
•Political Modernization in Japan and Turkey (Princeton University Press, 1964)
• An Inquiry into the Social Foundations of Nationalism in the Ottoman State (Princeton UP, 1973)
•Social Change and Politics in Turkey (Brill Leiden, 1973)
•Turkey's Foreign Policy in Transition (Leiden, 1975)

He sent two boxes of books, but I was only able to ship one box at this time, so I chose his Turkish language books and his most recent book in English, The Politicization of Islam.
The library did not have copies of any of his books in their collection, so they were very happy to receive the books. And I look forward to having a chance to read read his English book.

The Multiethnic society of Crimea

2011-07-13T00:39:00.000-07:00

The Gasprinskiy Library has always been interested in the diverse society of Crimea. Though Crimean Tatars consider themselves the indigenous people of Crimea, they also recognize that since ancient times, Crimea has been a multiethnic society. A notable phenomenon in recent years in the life of Crimea has been the study and revival of the traditions of peoples across national and cultural borders. For a number of years, the Gasprinskiy Library sponsored an international conference titled “The Library as a center of cross cultural dialogue in a multiethnic society.” They have also sponsored various workshops and trainings for the libraries across Crimea on working with the ethnic groups in their regions.
This month the Gasprinskiy Library has mounted an exhibition in the Reading Hall of the library called “Family Traditions of the Peoples of Crimea: Ethnicities and Cultures.” With books and photographs from the library’s collection and examples of handicrafts, the exhibition highlights the customs, traditions, festivals and rituals of the diverse people of Crimea: Ukrainians, Crimean Tatars, Armenians, Bulgarians, Hungarians, Greeks, Georgians, Jews, Azerbaijanis, and other peoples.
A note to the blog readers: This will be my last blog post for several weeks, as I will be traveling to America.

Oral History Project at the Library

2011-06-30T02:29:00.000-07:00

Brian Woods, a Master's candidate at Ohio University, began his
month-long internship at the library last week. His internship is
focused on building the library's capacity to record and archive
Crimean Tatar oral histories. Brian was a Peace Corps Volunteer for two years in Bakcheseray where he taught English.

As a student in International Affairs with a specialization in
Communication and Development Studies, Brian is excited about this
opportunity. "Helping empower under-represented minorities is at the
heart of CommDev as a discipline. Helping the library organize this
program...helping them take down people's stories about the
deportation, exile and return is so important, especially given the
implications in terms of displaced indigenous ethnicities in the
Middle East and Africa."

During his internship, he will teach simple best practices for oral
histories and help the library develop an archiving system.

2011 International Library Conference in Sudak

2011-06-16T23:46:00.000-07:00

Last week (June 6-10) was the annual International Library Conference in Sudak. Held for the last eighteen years in this beautiful town on the Black Sea coast, the International Library Conference is sponsored by the National Library of Russia and brings librarians from all over the world, including a few from the U.S. A special guest this year was the president of the International Federation of Library Associations, Ellen Tise, from the J.S. Gericke Library of the University of Stellenbosch in South Africa.

Official logo of the conference.

The Director (left) and Assistant Director (right) of the Gasprinskiy Library--Gulnara Yagyaeva and Leyla Kadyrova--are welcomed to Sudak.

The theme of this year’s conference was “Electronic Information, Libraries, and Society: What is to be Expected from the New Decade of the Information Century?” Despite a theme that focused on technology, there was a wide range of presentations and activities, including the Gasprinsky Library’s event. Every year at the conference the Gasprinsky Library hosts a roundtable for the librarians from the Turkic speaking countries focusing on a Crimean Tatar writer. This year the title of the roundtable was “Ashik Poetry of the Turkic World: Dedicated to the 390th anniversary of Ashik Omer, great poet of the Orient.” Ashik Omer was a Crimean Tatar poet, songwriter, and musician who lived in Evpatoria, Crimea, in the 17thcentury. He traveled worldwide and wrote over 2000 poems and songs. He is best known for his poems about love, but he also wrote about the social and philosophical issues of his day and about Sufi mysticism.

Statue of Ashik Omer in park in Evpatoria.

Elena Emirova from the Crimea Ministry of Culture and Gulnara Yagyaeva, Director of the Gasprinsky Library, opened the roundtable with a welcome to the participants and presenters.

Presentations were given by experts from the Crimean Engineering Pedagogical University in Simferopol and from several Turkic speaking countries.

Almakul Iskakova from the National Academic Library of the Republic of Kazakhstan, Astana, Kazakhstan

Zoya Mongush from the Tuvan Institute of Humanitarian Research in Kyzul, Republic of Tuva, Russia

The roundtable concluded with a performance of Ashik Omer's music and poetry by the Crimean Tatar folk ensemble Makyam.

Library Receives Cultural Heritage Grant

2011-06-07T05:08:00.000-07:00

We received exciting news at the library—we were awarded a $15,000 grant to purchase equipment capable of scanning and digitizing the library’s collection of rare books, newspapers, journals, and other documents. Purchasing such equipment has long been one of the library’s goals as it is the first necessary step in the important work of preserving and digitizing the library’s rare collections. Here is the announcement of the award:

EMC AWARDS ‘INFORMATION HERITAGE’ GRANTS TO PRESERVE AND PROTECT THE WORLD’S CULTURAL INFORMATION
Eight Organizations From Around the World Honored as Information Heritage Stewards

HOPKINTON, Mass.—May, 23, 2011—EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC) today announced that eight organizations will receive EMC Heritage Trust Project grants through the company’s Information Heritage Initiative program. The 2011 grants will support projects that digitize, protect and improve access to cultural information in communities around the world. Through the initiative, EMC has donated more than $20 million to date to help advance the preservation and accessibility of information heritage.
“Photographs, ancient writings, letters, film, music and visual art are all part of the world’s information heritage. Yet many of these historical treasures are at risk of disappearing,” said Bill Teuber, Vice Chairman, EMC Corporation. “Through the EMC Heritage Trust Project, we are dedicated to helping local community organizations worldwide preserve and protect these historic artifacts so that future generations can continue to enjoy and learn from them.”
The EMC Information Heritage Initiative program was formalized in 2007 to recognize organizations and individuals that protect and preserve invaluable cultural information from around the world through digitization, allowing readily accessible online research and education. Using the same criteria for excellence that guide this initiative and deployed in local communities, the EMC Heritage Trust Project was created to recognize and support people and projects that practice and inspire the digital stewardship of the world’s information heritage. For 2011, EMC received 95 applications from 19 countries for grant consideration.
The EMC Heritage Trust Project grant recipients were selected based on the following criteria: potential size of the audience that would benefit from access to this information; the at-risk status of the information and why it is urgent to digitize; and how significant the EMC grant would be to the overall success of the project.

The 2011 EMC Heritage Trust Project grantees are:

Canada: C.B. “Bud” Johnston Library, Western Libraries, University of Western Ontario -- The EMC grant will help digitize the entire Canadian Annual Reports Collection, the largest collection of corporate annual reports representing over 6,300 companies dating back as far as the 1920s.

Chile: Organización Comunitaria Funcional (OCF) Londres 38, Memorial House -- The EMC grant will help expand the digital archive and update the online reference catalogue of Londres 38, a memorial space, to help protect records of the memories associated with the repression and violation of human rights that took place in Chile.

Chile: General Historic Archives of Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Chile -- The EMC grant will digitize 3,000 photographs from the General Historic Archive collection making them more readily accessible online. Most of these original photographs portray a wide range of Chilean and foreign social, political and diplomatic historical episodes from 1876 to 2006.

China: The Tongji University Library -- The EMC grant will digitize unique and valuable information from the Tongji University Library’s collection of books and antiquated texts published during the Republic of China. These resources are significant to the history of city planning and architectural development in the Yangtze River Delta.

Ireland: Boole Library, University College, Cork -- The EMC grant will support the creation of a publicly available digital archive of printed books and papers of mathematician George Boole. Boole laid the foundations in the latter half of the nineteenth century for a system of mathematical expression which formed the basis for all modern computer languages.

Kyrgyzstan: Public Association “Kyrgyz Kitep Borboru” -- The EMC grant will support the digitization of early Kyrgyz books in Arabic type, making selected resources available to the public. Resources include handwritten books and manuscripts which preserve and transmit the history, geography, and ethnography of their time.

Rwanda: Aegis Trust -- The EMC grant will support the creation of a unified digital repository of the Genocide Archive of Rwanda. Resources including audiovisual testimonies, historical photographs, documents, newspapers, and genocide victims’ information will be digitized and indexed to make the collection available to the public.

Ukraine: Crimean Tatar Library (in the name of I. Gasprinskiy) -- The EMC grant will digitize the Gasprinskiy Library’s collection of rare books and documents in order to preserve and publicize Crimean Tatar literature, language, culture, and history.

For more information on the EMC Heritage Trust Project, please visit: www.EMC.com/heritage_trust.

About EMC
EMC Corporation (NYSE: EMC) is the world’s leading developer and provider of information infrastructure technology and solutions that enable organizations of all sizes to transform the way they compete and create value from their information. Information about EMC’s products and services can be found at www.EMC.com.

Developing Volunteerism in Crimean Libraries: A two-day seminar sponsored by the Gasprinsky Library in partnership with the U.S. Peace Corps

2011-05-30T00:51:00.000-07:00

On May 24th and 25th, we held a two-day seminar at the library on developing volunteerism in Crimean libraries. Soon after I came to work at the library in the summer of 2009, my partner at the library, Nadjie Yagya, and I attended a Peace Corps sponsored training in Kyiv on how to recruit, motivate, and manage volunteers in our organizations. The seminar was attended by Peace Corps Volunteers and their organizational partners from across Ukraine. The information we obtained at that training sparked the idea to organize a seminar at our library to promote volunteerism in Crimean libraries. We invited 35 librarians from all the regions of Crimea for a two-day seminar in Simferopol to learn from some of the experts that came to our training in Kyiv.

The seminar opened with a welcome from the new Minister of Culture in Crimea, Alena Plakida, who announced the appointment of Gulnara Yagyaeva as Director of the library. Gulnara Yagyaeva had been the acting director for a year, so we were all thrilled to have her appointment finally be permanent.

The participants were eager for a chance to learn about the possibilities for volunteerism in their libraries.

With the help of Elmas Emirova translating, I presented a slide show on volunteerism in American libraries. Practically every library in America has a volunteer group called Friends of the Library which helps the library with crucial tasks, particularly fundraising.

Constantine Yastrebova from Vinnitsa talked about the partnership of his organization with the city library to promote volunteerism.

Svetlana Cobova from the Youth Resource Center in the Cherkasy region talked about how to motivate volunteers to work in libraries and organizations.

Tatiana Orobchenko, Head of Youth and Family Services in the Poltava region, discussed the legal regulations concerning volunteers working in nonprofit organizations. She also showed many examples of some of the wonderful work of volunteers in the Poltava area.

Elena Ivanchenko and Peace Corps Volunteer Cheryl Pratt from the Sovetsky Central Rayon Library in eastern Crimea presented the Peace Corps sponsored project at their library. Called "Club Bluebird," it is a youth skills building club and has a multi media center to teach web design and other computer and internet skills.

Seminar participants worked in small groups to create innovative ideas for volunteer work at their libraries. Participants from one of the groups presents their ideas to the whole group.

Participants gather on the front steps of the library for a group photograph.

The two-day seminar will be followed by "Volunteer Days" in six regions across Crimea. These Volunteer Days will give local communities a chance to highlight the work of their libraries and nonprofit organizations and to recruit volunteers to their work.

Hydyrlez--A Celebration of Spring

2011-05-17T02:37:00.000-07:00

May 7, 2011 was the first large festival in the Simferopol region to celebrate the Crimean Tatar spring holiday called Hydyrlez. My partner at the library, Nadjie, had told me about it weeks ago, and we had made a plan to go together. However, she ended up not being able to go, so I went with another Peace Corps Volunteer, Cheryl Pratt, and my neighbor family. Staff at the Gasprinsky Library also went and set up a display of books about Hydyrlez in a booth they shared with the Crimean Tatar Art Museum.
Despite early morning chilly temperatures, the day turned into a beautiful sunny day with clouds floating across the distant green hills. Located about 20 kilometers from Simferopol, the festival was held on a large track of land with room for booths, performances, food, sports, and plenty of strolling around. The crowd was estimated at 7,000 to 10,000 people, and it was a great beginning for what will be an annual Crimean Tatar festival.

There were performances of traditional Crimean Tatar music and dance.

Beautiful crafts were for sale.

Many people enjoyed the performances on the large concert stage.

There was lots of wonderful Crimean Tatar food.

Thanks to Peace Corps Volunteer Cheryl Pratt for the photos.

The Peace Corps comes to the Library

2011-04-18T01:56:00.000-07:00

Douglas Teschner, Director of the Peace Corps in Ukraine, meets with my counterpart, Nadjie Yagya, and head of the Bibliographic Department, Delyara Belyalova.

Doug found the Archive Department especially interesting because he used to work as an archivist. Here he is with Medine Alimova, head of the Archive Department, and Gulyara Abdurazakova.
The SNAC group--Peace Corps Volunteers over the ae of 50--gather in the Reading Hall of the Library.

Peace Corps Director Doug Teschner talks with the Volunteers while SNAC president, Jim Eleazer, looks on.
Last week there was a meeting of older (over the age of 50) Peace Corps Volunteers in Simferopol. The group, called SNAC (Social Networking Action Committee), meets three times a year in different regions of Ukraine in order to discuss business but also to tour the local area. I had offered to host the meeting in Simferopol with the idea of acquainting the Volunteers with Crimean Tatar history and culture.
Twenty-six Volunteers arrived on Friday, April 15th, along with the Director of the Peace Corps in Ukraine, Doug Teschner. I met Doug at the train station, took him to his hotel, and then brought him to the library. Unfortunately, the acting Director of the library, Gulnara Yagyaeva, was out of town and couldn’t meet with Doug, but the department heads all had tea with him and discussed the library activities. Afterwards, we took him on a tour of the building. He was very impressed by the library—its mission, staff, and resources—and by the work I and my counterpart do together.
Later in the afternoon, the entire group assembled in the Reading Hall of the library for a short meeting, plus I gave a presentation on the Crimean Tatar history and culture in preparation for our excursion the next day to the Khan’s Palace in Bakhchisaray and other Crimean Tatar historic sites. Being Americans, they were a somewhat noisy group, as there was animated discussion on many issues. But the Volunteers enjoyed seeing the library and some had also earlier in the day toured the Crimean Tatar Art Museum, who had a Peace Corps Volunteer a few years ago. We also went to another former Peace Corps Volunteer site, a Crimean Tatar crafts cooperative in Bakhchisaray (where I was happy to see people buying presents for themselves and family).
Though the weather didn’t exactly cooperate (we are having quite a cold and rainy spring here), it was a successful meeting, and I think fulfilled my goal of educating at least one group of Peace Corps Volunteers about the Crimean Tatar people.

Library Fair in Kyiv

2011-04-14T04:45:00.000-07:00

My counterpart at the library, Nadjie Yagya, and I were invited by the Peace Corps to take part in a presentation about Peace Corps Volunteers working with libraries at the first annual Bibliomist Library Fair in Kyiv on Monday, April 11th. We eagerly accepted and arrived early Monday morning accompanied by another Crimean Peace Corps Volunteer, Cheryl Pratt, from the Sovetskiy rayon library and her counterpart, Lena Ivanchenko.

We gather with other Peace Corps Volunteers and their counterparts.

The Library Innovations and E-Governance Fair attracted over 500 participants. Forty libraries with Bibliomist projects had booths at the fair, including the Orlova Children’s Library in Simferopol where I work one day a week. Besides the information booths at the fair, there were a number of concurrent workshops. Nadjie and I attended a workshop on grant opportunities for libraries, and even though I understood little because it was conducted in Ukrainian, I was pleased to see Nadjie busy scribbling notes about possibilities for grants.
In our workshop, four Volunteers and their counterparts talked about our work together in our libraries and the possibilities for library cooperation with Peace Corps Volunteers. It was well attended by very interested librarians, and afterwards many talked with the Peace Corps office representative about how to apply to have a Volunteer at their library.

Nadjie and I describing the work we do together at the Gasprinskiy Library.

After returning to Simferopol, Nadjie tells library colleagues about the Bibliomist Fair.

Ismail Gasprinsky's 160th Birthday

2011-03-28T01:00:00.000-07:00

Gulnara Yagyaeva, Deputy Director of the Gasprinsky Library, opens the anniversary event.

The month of March marked the 160th anniversary of the birth of the famous Crimean Tatar educator, writer, and public figure, Ismail Gasprinsky. Ismail Gasprinsky is considered to be the father of the modern Crimean Tatar nation, and our library is named in his honor. See my blog post in July 2010, “Who is Ismail Gasprinsky?” for more details about his life.
To commemorate this anniversary, the Gasprinskiy Library organized a series of events the week of March 21st, beginning with a ceremonial laying of a wreath at the Gasprinsky monument located on the Sagir River in the heart of Simferopol. A special documentary photograph exhibit was on display in the library reading room, titled “The Legacy of I. Gasprinsky,” along with books by and about Gasprinsky and copies of some of his writings.

On March 24th, a two-hour program was conducted in the library with scholars presenting their work on Gasprinsky’s life. The program was attended by the Head of the institutions of culture, arts and national cultural policies of the Ministry of Culture and Arts Elena Emirova, much of the library staff, writers, teachers, representatives of the Crimean Tatar intelligentsia, media and other guests.
Speakers included: Ceiran Useinov, head of the Council of National Education Association of Crimean Tatar Educators and author of the Crimean Tatar/Ukrainian/Russian Dictionary who presented books to the library; Ismail Kerimov, professor and head of the Crimean Tatar and Turkish Literature Department at Crimean Engineering and Pedagogical University (who gave a fiery presentation on ancient Crimean Tatar languages which I so wish I could have understood); Edem Ablaeva who presented the book Ismail Gasprinskiy - Humanist, Educator, and Teacher to the library; Tavrida National University professor Gulnara Seytvanievoy who presented a gift to the library of a disc devoted to the life and work of Ismail Gasprinsky; Gasprinsky librarians Lily Kadyrova and Zarema Islyamova who talked about the library’s collections of the work of Ismail Gasprinsky.
As usual, I had a difficult time understanding much of the presentations, but this time I had the assistance of Elmas, who has recently come to work at the library and speaks fairly good English. Also, of course, my Russian is improving, and I could even catch a few words in Crimean Tatar. And the enthusiasm and interest of those presenting and attending is never lost on me. As one woman who spoke briefly about Crimean Tatar schools, said: “No language equals no people.”

Peace Corps Newsletter highlights our library project

2011-03-14T02:34:00.000-07:00

The Peace Corps office in Ukraine publishes a bimonthly newsletter titled From the Field, which highlights Peace Corps Volunteer achievements across Ukraine. In the last issue, our Peace Corps sponsored project at the library, Training for Crimean Librarians on Crimean Tatar Language, History, and Culture, was honored to be chosen as the cover story. Please click on From the Field Peace Corps Newsletter listed under Websites of Interest to see a copy of the newsletter. And thanks very much to Peace Corps Volunteer Cheryl Pratt who did such a great job writing the story.

The Library creates a 5-year Plan

2011-02-10T02:16:00.000-08:00

I have spent the last two weeks working on translating the Library’s 5-Year Plan (called a “Concept” here) into English. I do not have the language skills to do Russian translations, so I depend on Google translate, hope it is somewhat correct, and then rewrite the translation so it is understandable for English readers. Sometimes when I don’t understand what is translated, I try other online programs and ask my fellow workers here at the library, but even so, I do know much gets “lost in translation.” However, I think that at least in this case, the major ideas came through.
I have added the translated 5-Year Plan to the Pages on my blog, but here are a few highlights. The Plan clearly states the library's mission: “The I. Gasprinsky Crimean Tatar Library is responsible for the preservation, growth, and transfer to present and future generations, of the intellectual wealth, native language, and culture of the Crimean Tatars,” or more simply, “the keeper of the memory of the Crimean Tatar people.” To continue to fulfill this mission, a number of directions for the library are presented: preservation and digitizing of historic documents; bringing the library into the “electronic age” with increased development of its online presence; improving the library environment to make it more user friendly and accessible to the disabled; maintenance and needed repairs to the library building, which is a historical monument; construction of additional book storage; reaching out to the remote Crimean Tatar settlements; promoting ethnic tolerance across the peninsula. For elaboration of these ideas and to find out other interests of the library, please read the 5-Year Plan. It is also available in the original Russian on the library’s website.
I will be gone from Crimea for the next two weeks, first to a training in Kyiv sponsored by the Peace Corps on HIV/AIDS prevention, which I am attending with my counterpart from the Orlova Children’s Library in Simferopol where I work one day a week. Following the training, I will be going to the Carpathian Mountains in western Ukraine to attend a “close of service” conference with my fellow Peace Corps Volunteers who are ending their service in June of this year. I have elected to stay an additional year but am still required to attend the conference. And it will be a chance to see the beautiful Carpathian Mountains in the winter.

New book at the library: A Nomad's Journey

2011-02-03T01:11:00.000-08:00

I am sorry I haven’t written a post lately. The month of January at the library has been taken up with producing and presenting a 5-Year Plan (called a Concept here) for the library. I am now in the process of working on a translation into English and will give highlights of the plan in my next blog post.
I am on the list serve of the International Committee for Crimea, and it gives me the opportunity to read information in English about Crimea, Crimea Tatars, and the Crimean Tatar diaspora. Recently I read a review of a new book and, as I often do when coming across a book I think would be a valuable addition to the library’s collection, I wrote the author and asked him to donate a copy of his book to the library. The author graciously complied, and the book arrived today. As always, the library staff was very happy to receive a new book for their English collection of works by and about Crimean Tatars. The book is A Nomad’s Journey by Atilla Bektore, who is now a resident of Florida. Written in English, it is the incredible story of Atilla Bektore and his father Shevki Bektore and their lives in Crimea, Russia, Turkey, and the United States.
Here is a description of the book from the back cover:
Born in Dobruja, Rumania in 1888, Shevki Bektore dreams of being a teacher in his ancestral land of the Crimea. When the horrifying events of the World War I alters his plans, he joins countless millions of others whose hopes and dreams are shattered in maelstrom of war and revolution. Arrested on a trumped up charge of treason, Shevki spends fourteen years of his life in Stalin’s Gulag in Central Asia and eight years in exile in Siberia.
Told within the context of contemporary world events, A Nomad’s Journey focuses on major milestones of world history that include World War I and the fall of world empires, the birth of Bolshevik Russia, World War II, demise of the Soviet Union, and the rise of the United States as the sole world power.
Shevki’s compelling story of survival, combined with his son’s endurance in the face of the World War II, Stalin’s iron rule, and the turmoil of the 1960s and 1970s, creates a stunning memoir of these two extraordinary men.

You can read excerpts from the book on the author’s website, www.bektore.com. A Nomad’s Journey can be ordered from amazon.com and through your local independent bookstore. I look forward to reading it!

Volunteerism Training Project

2011-01-04T01:51:00.000-08:00

It is a snowy Tuesday morning here in Crimea, and we are in that week lull between the holidays of New Year’s and the Orthodox Christian Christmas on December 7th. Though it is a shortened work week, I am trying to be productive and am spending time thinking of the upcoming year and possible grants to fund library projects. In December, my partner at the library, Nadjie Yagya, and I submitted a draft proposal for a second SPA grant. Our first SPA grant (SPA stands for Small Project Assistance and is a USAID grant available to Peace Corps Volunteers worldwide) was a 2-day seminar in Simferopol in June of this past year on Crimean Tatar language and literature, and subsequent smaller seminars at twelve district libraries around Crimea, (see photos in previous blogs). We received many wonderful reviews from participants at those seminars and were encouraged to develop a proposal for a second SPA grant.
The idea for our second SPA grant came from a Peace Corps sponsored training Nadjie and I attended in August of 2009, soon after I arrived at my site in Simferopol. The training, which was held for three days in Kyiv, was titled “Volunteerism Strengthening as a Tool of Sustainable Grassroots Development,“ and focused on how to encourage volunteerism in our communities. At the training we learned about the history—or lack thereof—of volunteerism in Ukraine and were provided with successful strategies to recruit and manage volunteers. Nadjie came back from the seminar excited about the prospect of developing a project to encourage volunteerism in Crimea that would be spearheaded by the district libraries.
To put this project into action, we plan to organize a two-day training in Simferopol for librarians from the 23 central rayon libraries of Crimea, along with librarians from the four universities in Simferopol and also from some of the larger schools in the city. Participants at the seminar/training will be provided the information and tools necessary to assist them in organizing volunteer groups in their libraries and communities and to share with people the idea, as Nadjie expresses it in the grant application, “that volunteer work is not just working for someone else, but working for themselves, as it helps to solve the social problems that exist in our society.”
As a result of this seminar/training, we hope that the librarians will return to their institutions and organize “Friends of the Library” volunteer groups that are so common in American libraries and such a great help to them. Furthermore, in at least six of the communities represented, we will help the librarians organize a community-wide “Volunteer Day” to promote volunteerism in their region.
We submitted the first draft of the grant proposal in early December and with some revisions will submit the final proposal this month and will hear the first of February whether or not we receive the funding. The review committee was very encouraging, so I am optimistic that we will be funded. I will post the news on this blog.
The Volunteerism Training in Kyiv in August 2009. Pictured are Peace Corps Volunteers and their counterparts from organizations all over Ukraine. Nadjie and I are standing in the first row.

The Kadiaskerskie Books

2010-12-14T02:20:00.000-08:00

Winter has finally come to Crimea with icy roads, frost covered trees, and a thin layer of snow turning the landscape into a winter wonderland. I am glad to hole up in the warmth of the library, and I spend much of my time researching and writing grants.
One of the grants I am currently working on is a “Partnership Grant” through the Peace Corps, which is basically a way to raise funds in the United States for a project at a Volunteer’s site. Though Nadjie and I haven’t yet finalized plans for this grant, one of the projects we are considering is trying to raise funds to purchase copies of the Kadiaskerskie Books from the National Library of Russia in St. Petersburg. The Kadiaskerskie Books are the court records of the “chief judges” (the Kadi Asker) of the Crimean Khanate, which was the ruling body of Crimea from 1440-1783. They contain the most comprehensive historical record of Crimean Tatar life on the peninsula, including records of civil and criminal court proceedings, spiritual testimonies, the execution of wills, and the costs of public works and buildings.
The Kadiaskerskie Books have an interesting history. In 1738, a fire destroyed most of the Khan palace in Bakhchisaray, the capital of the Crimean Khanate. The Kadiaskerskie Books were long thought to be totally lost, but in fact, 119 books survived and were brought by an employee of the Khanate to the Tauride provincial government and stored in its archives. They languished in obscurity until 1905 when a famous Russian orientalist scholar, Vasily Smirnov (1846-1922), surveyed the Kadiaskerskie Books and recognized their historical importance. He recommended that they be transferred to the National Library of Russia in St. Petersburg for safe keeping, which is where they are today, despite several attempts to return them to their land of origin.
However, early photocopies of 61 of the Kadiaskerskie Books remain in Crimea, and even these have had a colorful history. Initially, they were housed in the Crimean History Museum. But one day, sometime after the Deportation of the Crimea Tatars, an employee of the nearby Crimean State Archives, Antonina Stepanova, stopped by the museum and realized that rare Crimean Tatar books, including copies of the Kadiaskerskie Books, were being used to stoke the boiler fire. She quickly ransomed the books with a bottle of vodka as payment, and took them to the State Archives for safe keeping. In late 1991, the question arose about sending the books back to the museum. However, they were rescued once again when a Crimean Tatar employee of the museum said, “Why send them back to a place where they suffered such a fate? Rather, they should go to the Gasprinskiy Library.” And so, the copies of the 61 Kadiaskerskie Books found a home in the Gasprinskiy Library where they are used to this day by researchers, scholars, and students of Crimean Tatar history and culture.
The copies of the Kadiaskerskie Books at the Gasprinskiy Library, covering the years 1648-1751.

The books are written in the Crimean Tatar language, using the Arabic alphabet.

However, these 61 books represent only a partial collection of the surviving Kadiaskerskie Books. One of the main missions of the Gasprinskiy Library is to be the central repository of books and documents by and about Crimean Tatars: a place where researchers, scholars, and the general public can come and learn about who the Crimean Tatar people are; a place where Crimean Tatar people can reclaim their history, language, and culture. To this end, a complete collection of copies of the Kadiaskerskie Books is crucial to fully understanding not only Crimean Tatar history and culture, but the history of the Crimean peninsula as a whole.
But of course, such a collection does not come without a price, and it is to fund this acquisition that we are considering the writing of a Partnership Grant. Currently, we are awaiting a reply from the St. Petersburg Library as to whether or not obtaining such copies is even possible, and if so, what the cost would be. I will post further information on this project as it develops.

Medine Alimova from the Archives Department at the Gasprinskiy Library holds one of the Kadiaskerskie Books.

Much of the information in this blog post is taken from an article written by Gasprinskiy librarian, Nadjie Tairova.

English Class at the Library

2010-11-23T01:58:00.001-08:00

One of the activities I have been doing at the Gasprinskiy Library since a few months after I came here, is to teach an English class to some of the Gasprinskiy staff members. Starting in September, we expanded the class a bit to include a volunteer and two staff members from the Krymchak Museum and preservation organization. Meeting twice weekly early in the morning before the library opens, my small English class is slowly learning conversational English, using a series of books from Oxford University Press called English for Life. I have never taught English before, but I find the experience very rewarding as my students—old and young—are so eager to learn. And as a person who is trying to learn Russian at the age of 62, I have much empathy for how difficult it is to learn a new language as you get older. Motivation becomes the key factor, I think, and that is something of which my students have an abundant supply.

On Thursday evenings, some of the group gathers at the Krymchak Museum, only a few blocks away, for an English “club,” in which we find ways to practice using English—games, telling stories, describing events, etc. Lately we have been playing a game that involves describing famous people, like the Russian poet Pushkin. I realized this could be a great opportunity for two groups of people—Crimean Tatars and Krymchak Jews—to learn more about each other’s culture and heroes. So I asked everyone to bring to our next meeting a description of a famous Crimean Tatar or Krymchak to share with the rest of the group. I look forward to what I, too, will learn at that meeting.

Visitors to the Library

The 20^th anniversary celebration at the library continues with visitors from other organizations and libraries. Last week, librarians from the Crimean Engineering and Pedagogical University in Simferopol (know locally as CEPU) paid a visit to library. Many of the women had previously worked at the library, and several of the library’s current staff had worked at CEPU, so it was a joyous occasion. Here we share coffee and sweets in the Reading Hall.

The last of our regional seminars

2010-11-15T05:27:00.000-08:00

This past week we conducted the last of our regional seminars on Crimean Tatar language and literature, funded by a grant through the Peace Corps. We traveled to the far north of Crimea, first to the town of Krasnoperekopsk and then to Armansk. I was unable to go to the Krasnoperekopsk seminar, as it was scheduled on the one day a week that I work at the Orlova Children’s Library in Simferopol. Normally, I would change my schedule at the Children’s Library, but that week, one of my children’s English clubs at the library was putting on a Halloween skit. Needless to say, as “the director” of the play, I had to be there.
But the next day I was able to go with the other librarians to Armansk where we conducted a very well received seminar, and then afterwards, went on a short tour of the town, including a brief visit to their history museum. Once again, as with all the libraries we visited, I found the staff so gracious and hospitable, going out of their way to make us feel comfortable and welcomed. I will miss these weekly and sometimes bi-weekly visits to different libraries across Crimea. Though the time it took to travel that extensively meant I had to temporarily put aside other projects, I felt it gave me a sense of the diverse land and cultures of Crimea, and an appreciation of how devoted Crimean citizens are to their libraries. And it was also gratifying to have a better understanding of how wide spread the Crimean Tatar people are in Crimea, as in every community we visited there were sizeable populations of Tatars.
I feel our presence at the libraries had an impact—that it gave over 250 small libraries across Crimea information and materials to promote Crimean Tatar language and culture. And perhaps even more important, it gave the participants an opportunity to come together to discuss culture similarities and differences, hopefully leading to the longer range goal of increasing ethnic tolerance in Crimea.

Librarians from the villages surrounding Krasnoperekopsk listen to the presentations of the Gasprinskiy staff.
Participant at the Krasnoperekopsk seminar gives the result of her small group's translation of Russian proverb into Crimean Tatar.
At the seminar in Armansk, Alina from the Gasprinskiy Library talks about Crimean Tatar books while Susanna from the library looks on.
Participants at the Armansk seminar.
Nadjie guides participants in translation of the Russian proverb into Crimean Tatar and talking about the cultural differences and similarities.
Much laughter at the translation results.
Staff of the Armansk Library and the historical museum in Armansk pose for a picture with Gasprinskiy staff.

The Library celebrates 20 Years with an International Conference

2010-11-09T01:00:00.000-08:00

September 24, 2010, marked the 20th anniversary of the founding of the Gasprinsky Library, the first Crimean Tatar library. In celebration of this anniversary and also the 120th anniversary of the birthdate of the famous Turkologist, Ahmet-Zaki Validi Togan, the Gasprinsky Library and the international organization TURKSOY, presented a two-day conference in Simferopol and Bakhchisarai on November 4th and 5th.
Guests came from the national libraries of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkey, the Kyrsyz Republic, and the Russian republics of Bashkortostan and Tatarstan. Also present was the daughter of Ahmet-Zaki Validi Togan, Isenbike Togan, who is a professor at the Middle East Technical University in Istanbul. It turns out she is a fluent English speaker, having obtained her Ph.D. at Harvard, and lived for a number of years in my hometown of St. Louis, Missouri, so we had much to talk about.
Besides the guests from the Turkic speaking countries, experts from Tauride National University and Crimean Engineering and Pedagogical University in Simferopol also presented papers, along with staff from the Gasprinsky Library.
Topics at the conference included: The Role of Libraries in the Revival and Development of Crimean Tatar Education and Culture; the Development of Cooperation in the Culture Heritage of Turkic-speaking Countries; and Turkic National and Social-political Identity in the First Quarter of the 20th Century. Several papers were presented on Ahmet-Zaki Validi Togan including: The Influence of Admet-Zaki Validi Togan on Tatar Culture; Admet-Zaki Validi Togan’s Life and Work and The 120 Years Since the Birth of Ahmet-Zaki Validi Togan. His daughter, Isenbike Togan, spoke about Ahmet-Azki Validi Togan “My Father and Teacher.”
On the first day of the conference, a celebratory reception was held at the Gasprinsky Library, an event the library had been preparing for for over a month. “Sprucing up” projects had been occurring for days—the windows and trim on the front veranda were painted; the Reading Hall was revived with a fresh coat of paint and framed photographs of the history of the library; each department created new displays for the hallway information panels; and a beautiful collection of photographs of the paintings of renown Crimean Tatar artist Erfan Hafiev was hung in the hallway.
Guests came from libraries across Simferopol and Crimea to present tributes to the Gasprinsky Library on its 20th anniversary. Though I did not understand all the speeches, the obvious appreciation of the library and the work it has done came through loud and clear, despite the language barrier. And perhaps my favorite moment was when two singers led everyone in heartfelt traditional Crimean Tatar songs. And of course, the celebratory glass of wine I shared with my counterpart, Nadjie. I felt so honored to be part of this event.

Representatives from the Ministry of Culture, Orlova Children's Library, and Franco Library welcome guests to the celebration.
The Reading Hall at Gasprinsky Library is packed with guests.
Ayder Emirov, until recently director of the Gasprinsky Library for most of its twenty years, talks about the founding of the library.
Representatives from the Central Library in Alushta and other Crimean libraries present tributes.
The foreign guests are introduced.
Isenbike Togan talks about her father as Nail Akramovich Kambeev, Director of the National Library of Tatarstan, and Daribaeva Gulshat Gabdullaevna, Deputy Director of the National Academic Library in the Republic of Kazakhstan look on.
Nail Akramovich Kambeev presents a gift to the library.To the left are Tunzhel Azhar, Director of the National Library of Turkey, and Antonina Gezikova, Deputy Director of the National Libary of Ahmet-Zaki Validi Togan.
The audience is led in singing by Crimean Tatar national singer, Rustem Memetov.
Afterwards, guests share conversation and champagne. Here is Ahat Salikhov, Minister of Culture of the Republic of Baskortostan, and Fevzi Yakubov, Rector of the Crimean Engineering and Pedagogical University in Simferopol.
My counterpart, Nadjie Yagya, and I celebrate.

More library seminars around Crimea

2010-11-04T02:46:00.000-07:00

The past two weeks we have been traveling quite a bit, taking our seminar on Crimean Tatar language and literature to libraries in Sudak, Oktabrske, Nezhnegorski, and Belagorsk. Each seminar brought 25 to 35 librarians from the small libraries in the surrounding villages, anxious to hear of the resources available from the Gasprinsky Library to help them establish and expand the Crimean Tatar sections in their libraries. At several of the libraries we were presented with performances by local Crimean Tatar children--singing, dancing, reciting of Crimean Tatar poetry. Here are some pictures:
Here I am with the director of the Crimean Tatar library in Belagorsk.
Nadjie and I talk about having a Peace Corps volunteer at a library.
Participants at the Belagorsk seminar.
Three librarians from different departments at Gasprinsky attend each training.
We gather with the participants in Oktabrske.
Crimean Tatar dance performance at the library in Oktabrske.
Refika from Gasprinsky Library shows some of the literature available.
Participants gather around the table in Oktabrske.
Medine from the Gasprinsky Library at the seminar in Sudak.
Participants at the seminar in Nezhnegorski.
In Nezhnegorski, Nadjie helps particpants translate a Russian proverb into Crimean Tatar.
Fatma from Gasprinsky Library shows some of the books available.
Mavie from the Gasprinsky Library with some of the staff at the Sudak Library.

New Crimean Tatar linguistics book at the library

2010-10-19T04:06:00.000-07:00

Darya Kavitskaya, Associate Professor of Linguistics at Yale University, recently sent a copy of her new book to the library for their English language collection of books about Crimean Tatar history, language, and culture.
Published by Lincom Europa, Crimean Tatar is the first full description of the Crimean Tatar language to appear in English or in any other language. From the back cover:
“It covers all major aspects of the phonology, morphology, and syntax of the Central dialect of Crimean Tatar, and it also mentions the unique features of the Northern and Southern dialects where possible. Three texts in Central, Northern, and Southern Crimean Tatar with interlinear glosses and English translation are included.”
For more information and to order the book, contact Lincom Europa at www.lincom.at.

Library seminar in Pervomayskoe

2010-10-19T02:28:00.000-07:00

Last week we traveled to Pervomayskoe in northern Crimea to visit their beautiful library and present our seminar on Crimean Tatar language and literature. The seminar was attended by twenty librarians from the surrounding villages.

We gather in front of the library. From left to right: me, Tamara, Mavie from Gasprinskiy, Svetlana, Valentina, Gulara from Gaspinskiy.

Photos from our seminar in Kirovskoe

2010-10-14T02:07:00.000-07:00

We are welcomed to the Kirovskoe Library.
The reading hall in the library is filled with librarians from the surrounding communities.
Medine from the Archival Department talks about the important collections in the Gasprinskiy Library of the personal papers of famous Crimean Tatar writers, artists, and activists.
Mavie from the Bibliography Department shows some of the many bibliographies available at the Gasprinskiy Library.
Nadjie, the leading methodlogist at the library, breaks the participants into small groups to translate a Crimean Tatar proverb into Russian and to talk about the similarities of the cultures.

To much laughter, each group reads their proverb in Crimean Tatar and Russian and talks about its meaning.

Library seminars around Crimea

2010-10-11T04:51:00.000-07:00

Director of the Alushta Library, Tatiana, along with Gasprinskiy librarians Zarema and Elzira, on the Alushta waterfront.
The Central Library of Alushta.
Librarians at seminar in the Alushta Children's Library.
Nadjie talks about the Crimean Tatar language.
The new internet center of the Chernomorsky Library.
Last spring Nadjie (my counterpart at the library), and I applied for a grant from the Small Program Assistance program of the USAID administered through the Peace Corps. We received approximately $5000 to conduct a series of seminars for Crimean librarians on Crimean Tatar language, literature, and culture, with the goal of helping to promote ethnic understanding and tolerance in Crimea. In June we conducted a two-day seminar in Simferopol for twenty-five librarians from the central district libraries in Crimea—see the July 9th blog post for more information on this seminar. The librarians attending the June seminar found it very helpful—“A very interesting, useful, and informative seminar. I gathered a lot of new ideas and would like that such seminars were held more frequently,” said one participant.
A second phase of our grant is to conduct smaller seminars in regions around Crimea to be attended by staff from village libraries. On October 4th, we went to the central library in Chornomorske, a seaside town on the far western coast of Crimea, about a two-hour car trip from Simferopol. The enthusiastic director, Valentyna Kysil, was a gracious host, showing us around the central and children libraries, located next to one another. After the seminar, she also showed us the beautiful park and beach of Chornomorske, only a short walk from the library.
A few days later we went to Alushta, a town on the southern coast of Crimea. We also received a warm welcome there from library director, Tatiana Grigorievna, who gave us a tour of her library located in an historic mansion, and then the popular seaside boardwalk of Alushta.
For both seminars, two librarians came from Gasprinsky, along with Nadjie and me. The librarians talked about the resources of Gasprinsky—biographies of Crimean Tatar writers, bibliographies listing Crimean Tatar children books, traditions, and customs; bibliographies describing the books in the library collection published before the Deportation, and also books published during the czarist times by foreign travelers to Crimea. Also showcased were bibliographies of stories in Crimean Tatar language, a quarterly publication of new books in the library, and an annual calendar published by the library with Crimean Tatar traditions, religious holidays, and birth dates of famous Crimean Tatars. We also did a presentation on the displays and events in the Reading Room of the Gasprinsky Library, and I did a short talk and presentation about the role of a Peace Corps Volunteer in a library. Lastly, Nadjie, the leading methodologist at Gasprinsky, talked about the help Gasprinsky can provide to regional libraries in their work to open up their libraries to their Crimean Tatar communities. We ended the seminars with an exercise in cross cultural communication, with small groups translating a Russian proverb into Crimean Tatar and talking about the similarities—and differences—of the two cultures.
On a personal note, I found traveling to the regional libraries very rewarding. I have met some wonderful people and have come to appreciate even more the diverse physical and cultural beauty of Crimea. I look forward to the rest of this month as we make our way across the peninsula, visiting a library network that represents the over 700 libraries in Crimea.

The Library turns twenty.

2010-10-05T05:44:00.001-07:00

The staff of the library gather on the front steps for a portrait on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the library. Niyaver Kurshutov, one of the founders of the library is in the center. To his right is Nadjie Yagya and Nadjie Tairova is the woman in the white jacket. I am the gray haired woman in the upper left corner.
September 24, 2010 was the 20th anniversary of the founding of the Library. Though the official celebration will be November 4-5, when there will be series of seminars and events with many international visitors from the Turkic speaking world, a local television station wanted to do a special program on the Library to be aired on the anniversary date. So the day before found the staff busily cleaning up the library, freshening up the displays and information boards, straightening the stacks, and all those other tasks to make a library sparkle for its anniversary. Later that afternoon, we all gathered in the reading hall, along with two of the original founders, Ayder Emirova, the director of the library for the last twenty years who only recently resigned to devote more time to other endeavors, and Niyaver Kurshutov, who was assistant director all those years and retired last year at the age of 70. Nadjie Yagya and Nadjie Tairova, who were also at the library from the beginning, are still part of the staff.
The founders sat in the front of the room and answered questions from the TV station reporter. At some point, Nadjie Yagya, who is my counterpart at the library, starting talking about the experience of having a U.S. Peace Corps Volunteer at the library. And then the reporter turned to me and asked my impressions of working at the library. “In Russian?” I responded. “Well, of course,” she said. Yikes, I actually was going to have to talk in Russian on TV! My struggle to learn Russian has been the biggest stumbling block for me in my work here as a Peace Corps Volunteer. A few of the library staff speak a very limited English, and one of my activities here has been conducting an English class for some of the library staff, but for the most part, I have had to do almost all my communicating in Russian. But despite my surprise and awkwardness, I made an attempt to say how much I love working at the library and the people I work with and how important I think is the mission of the library. Though after stumbling along for a bit, I switched to English so I could really say what was in my heart, that it is a great privilege to have ended up at the Gasprinskiy Library as my volunteer site and to have Nadjie Yagya as my counterpart. What a wonderful gift it has been to learn about this rich and beautiful Crimean Tatar culture and to get to know some of its peoples. My fervent hope is that someday I will be able to communicate that appreciation of the Crimean Tatar culture and people to a wide audience of American people.

A new translation of the Koran

2010-09-16T04:43:00.001-07:00

Lilia Kadirova introduces publisher Valery Basyrov.
The Koran in Ukrainian.
A well wisher greets Basyrov.
Basyrov is interviewed by the press outside the library.
A display of different editions of the Koran.
Yesterday (September 14, 2010), the Library hosted one of their frequent events in the Library’s Reading Room. The occasion for this event was a work-in-progress translation of the Koran into the Ukrainian language. Well-known Crimean writer and publisher, Valery Basyrov, presented the translation of the Koran he has been working on for a number of years. Though not yet finished, he has released ten advance copies and arranged this presentation in hopes of obtaining constructive feedback for the final translation.
Basyrov, whose mother is Polish and father Kazakhstan Tatar and whose grandfather was an imam, told about his impetus for the translation of the Koran into Ukrainian. Though not a speaker of Arabic which is the original language of the Koran, he has studied many translations of the Koran in Russian and Polish languages over the years and has attempted to create an accurate translation of the Koran into the Ukrainian language. At this event he gathered writers, representatives of the Mufti of Crimea, and scholars of the Koran to show them his efforts and to listen to their comments and suggestions.
Present at the event was the writer Risa Fazil who translated the Koran into Crimean Tatar, the Deputy Mufti of Crimea Eider Bey Ismailov, the chairman of the Ukrainian Information Center who expressed confidence that the translation will be welcomed by the Ukrainian community, a representative of the Crimean Tatar Educators’ Association, journalists, and others. All of them expressed their comments and good wishes for Basyrov.
Deputy Mufti of Crimea Eider said that the Ukrainian community is in need of a translation of the Koran into the Ukrainian language, that Islam is a religion for all people, regardless of nationality or language.
The Library prepared a display of different editions of the Koran in Crimean Tatar, Arabic, and Russian languages.
Though my very poor Russian and nonexistent Crimean Tatar and Ukrainian prevented me from understanding much of what was being said (this description is mostly taken from a Library press release), I nevertheless did grasp the essential reason for the event—the pending translation of the Koran into Ukrainian—and was grateful to be present at what I perceive to be a welcome expansion of an influential sacred text.

The Lenin Banner

2010-09-11T23:51:00.000-07:00

The first issue of The Lenin Banner, published in 1957 in Uzbekestan.

Alime Mennanova (left) and Nadjie Tairova on the front porch of the library, going through old issues of the paper and binding them into folders.
Nadjie Tairova
Alime Mennanova
One of the foremost missions of the Gasprinskiy Library is the collection and preservation of documents in the Crimean Tatar language and by and about Crimean Tatars in other languages. The Library has an impressive collection—over 40,000 documents including complete sets of magazines and newspapers published in the Crimean Tatar language.
When the Crimean Tatars were deported en masse by Stalin in 1944 to Uzbekistan and other distant Soviet republics, they were forbidden to use their native language. For thirteen years there were no written Crimean Tatar publications. When the ban was lifted, the first newspaper to be published in Crimean Tatar was the Lenin Bayragi, which means “Lenin Banner” in Crimean Tatar. Founded in 1957 in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, Lenin Bayragi was published three times a week and had an initial circulation of 23,000. It was published until 1990 when it ceased publishing for one year as Crimean Tatars flooded back to their homeland of Crimea. In 1991, the Committee to Assist the Deported Nationalities in Crimea revived the paper and began publishing it in Simferopol, Crimea. At that time, the newspaper changed names and became Yani Dunya, which means, appropriately enough, “New World” in Crimean Tatar. It continues today to be published on a weekly basis in Simferopol.
The Gasprinskiy Library collection of Crimean Tatar language documents contains a complete set of Lenin Bayragi. Full of information depicting the life of Crimean Tatars in exile in Uzbekistan, Lenin Bayragi is an important resource for the many researchers and students who use the library. Preservation of these newspapers and other vital documents is an ongoing task at the library, hindered by a lack of funding for the necessary equipment and materials. Ultimately, it is hoped that many of the library’s documents can be scanned and put into digital format for wider access for researchers and also to preserve the original documents. But for now, the newspapers are bound into folders and library patrons have access to them in the library reading room. Pictured are two of the librarians, Nadjie Tairova and Alime Mennanova, sitting out on the veranda of the Library on a hot summer day, sorting through the dusty old issues of Lenin Bayragi and binding them into the appropriate folders.

A Crimean Tatar writer’s life is celebrated at the Library

2010-08-19T04:46:00.000-07:00

Summer is a slow time here at the library. Many staff workers take their annual four-week vacation. Most stay at home and work on “home projects,’ much as we do in America. Others travel—my office mate Refika just returned from a trip to Uzbekistan with her daughter to visit her sister and other relatives there. Four-days, coming and going, on a hot, unairconditioned train. “Next time, I’m flying,” she said.
I spent a week in Belarus, accompanying a friend from America. Her parents were Holocaust survivors and were from Belarus (then Poland). She wanted to see the villages they lived in and talk to people who knew them, to find out what she could about the lives of her family before the Holocaust that killed almost all of them. It was an unforgettable experience, and I returned to Simferopol with a greater insight into some of the tortured history of this part of the world.
A Crimean Tatar writer’s life is celebrated at the Library
The Library holds many events throughout the year in its reading hall. Last spring there was a gathering to celebrate the life of Crimean Tatar novelist Cengiz Dagic on the occasion of his 90th birthday. Though Dagic was not in good enough health to attend (he lives in London), his sister was present, as were many scholars and friends. There were several speeches talking about his life and work, and performances of his poetry.
Cengiz Dagci is best known for the descriptions in his novels, poems, and writings about the Crimean Tartar life in Crimea from 1932 to 1945. Published in Turkey with some translation into Russian (unfortunately, I have not found any of his longer works translated into English), Dagci writes of the difficult life of the Crimean Tatar people during those years as they tried to find a way to survive the war between Nazi Germany and Russia, culminating in their eventual mass deportation in 1944. His work has been widely read in Turkey and is considered to be very important in keeping alive the plight of the Crimean Tatar people among Turkish people.
Cengiz Dagci was born in 1920 in Kiziltash, a village near Yalta. He attended school there and in Ak Mechet (then the name of Simferopol), and after finishing his secondary education in 1938, he went to the Crimean Pedagogy Institute where he studied for two years. In 1940 he was drafted into the military where he eventually served at the Ukrainian front and was captured by the Nazis. He escaped the prisoner camp and sought asylum in Great Britain. He settled in London in 1946 and has lived there ever since.
Here is a poem by Cengiz Dagci:
Aren't Crimean Tatars
a tree which is
supposed to die,
not to get greener
and not to give
new branches?
Since the day that they
lost their independence,
there wasn't any day
passed without
chopping the branches
of this tree, but
again new branches
came out of its body.
These branches were
not allowed to grow
and were chopped
again. But branches
came out again.
At the end,
this tree is chopped
at its root,
and thrown away
on a lonely, desert land.
But again new branches
come out of this body
and get longer and
longer, and they reach
to the land where
this tree was planted
one thousand years ago.

A Visit to the Krymchak Museum

2010-08-10T05:33:00.000-07:00

A late 19th century Krymchak family.
This is a beautiful triptych painting that depicts in detail the history of the Krymchaks in Crimea.
Traditional Krymchak clothing
The entrance to the museum, located only a few blocks from the Gasprinskiy Library.
After the museum tour, we had tea with Qrimzalar Society members. The man in the middle with the white shirt is the artist of the triptych.
This week, Nadjie Yagya, my counterpart at the library, and I visited the Krymchak Museum in Simferopol and met members of the Qrimzahlar Crimean Republic Society for Culture and Enlightenment. A few weeks earlier I had met Rabbi Misha Kapustin, Rabbi of the Reformed Judaism synagogue here in Simferopol, and he had told me about the Krymchaks and offered to take me to the museum. I invited Nadjie to come along because although, of course, she knew about the Krymchaks, she was unaware of the museum.
The Krymchak Museum is a small but very well organized museum that gives the history of the Krymchak people in Crimea. The Krymchaks are a Jewish community that developed in Crimea in the medieval period of Crimean history. No one seems to know for sure what their origins are or how they adopted Judaism, but they were an established ethnic-religious group on the peninsula for many centuries, numbering approximate 7000 in 1913. Their dress, music, appearance, and customs were very closely tied to the Crimean Tatars, and they spoke a similar Turkic based language.
As professed Jews, approximately 80% of the Krymchak population was killed by the Nazis in the Second World War. Some Krymchaks were also deported along with the Crimean Tatars in 1944. Today, there are very few Krymchak people left, living mostly in Crimea and Israel, and according to the museum director, only one fully fluent native speaker. The Qrimzahlar Crimean Republic Society for Culture and Enlightenment was formed in 1989 to promote the preservation of the Krymchak cultural heritage.
One of the main goals of the Gasprinskiy Library is the preservation of the Crimean Tatar language, also an endangered language, with only 5% of Crimean Tatar children able to speak their native tongue. Nadjie and I have been discussing the possibility of a language training center devoted to the threatened Crimean languages of Crimean Tatar, Krymchak, and Karaite (another Jewish ethnic minority in Crimea), because they are all very similar Turkic based languages. Visiting the museum and meeting members of their preservation organization helped to give us the impetus we need to continue work on this important project. And I found out later that two of the museum staff want to come to my little English class at the library! So I look forward to future collaboration with the Krymchak people and learning more about their culture and how they coexisted side by side with the Crimean Tatars--Jews and Muslims together--for centuries.
For more information about the Krymchaks, see their website, www.crymchaks.org.

Peace Corps sponsored seminar at the Library

2010-07-09T05:12:00.000-07:00

On June 25th and 26th the Gasprinskiy Library hosted a gathering of librarians from across Crimea to discuss and learn about Crimean Tatar language and literature. Funded by a USAID grant I obtained through the Peace Corps (a grant program that is open to all Peace Corps Volunteers known as the Small Program Assistance ---SPA), the purpose of the seminar was to raise awareness of the state of Crimean Tatar language—it is now listed with UNESCO as one of the world’s disappearing languages—and to promote tolerance and understanding among the ethnic groups of Crimea. In the second phase of the project, we will help the participating librarians conduct similar seminars in their own regions.
The Simferopol training/seminar was a rousing success. Twenty-five librarians attended, representing all the regions of Crimea. Experts from the Crimean Engineering and Pedagogical University and the Ministry of Culture and Arts of Crimea provided training and lectures on Crimean Tatar language and literature. The Gasprinskiy staff provided the participants with a wealth of materials for their libraries, including biographies of famous Crimean Tatar writers and artists. We were also to provide each library with a copy of the new—and only—dictionary of Crimean Tatar/Ukrainian/Russian.
I presented a short presentation on my work at the library and talked about the role of the Peace Corps in community development. And, of course, I promoted the advantages of having a Peace Corps Volunteer assigned to one’s library. I know the community development program of Peace Corps Ukraine would like to partner with more libraries. It is a perfect fit for promoting the goals of the Peace Corps of providing technical assistance and mutual understanding and respect between the peoples of America and Ukraine.

Who is Ismail Gasprinskiy?

2010-07-09T01:46:00.000-07:00

For the last 17 years, there has been an annual International Library Conference in the seaside town of Sudak in Crimea. Sponsored by the governments and libraries of Russia and Ukraine, the conference brings over 2000 participants from all over the world to discuss issues of contemporary libraries. At the conference, the Gasprinskiy Library traditionally has sponsored a roundtable for libraries from the Turkic speaking world. This year the theme of the roundtable was the writings and legacy of Ismail Gasprinskiy. The library asked me to do a short presentation on the works by and about Gasprinskiy available in English. I have been reading about Ismail Gasprinskiy since coming to the library including his one full length book translated into English, and was glad to have the opportunity to talk about this interesting and forward thinking individual.
Ismail Gasprinskiy (there are several different spellings of his last name—I chose to use the Crimean Tatar spelling for this blog) was a Crimean Tatar writer, educator, and activist who lived at the turn of the 20th century (1851-1914) and is generally considered to be the foremost modern thinker in the Muslim world of the Russian empire at that time.
Among his many accomplishments, Gasprinskiy was responsible for instituting a new system of Muslim education that revolutionized the traditional Islamic schools. By the time of his death, more than 5000 of these schools with a modern curriculum based on literacy and contemporary knowledge had been established across the Russian empire.
In addition to his work to modernize Muslim education, in 1883 Gasprinskiy started the first newspaper in Crimean Tatar history, called Tercuman (the Translator) which continued publication until four years after his death. In this paper, he espoused his modernist thinking, opening the minds of his Muslim readers to the broader world. He also used the paper as a vehicle to talk about women’s rights, an issue he believed fervently in. The only book length translation of his writings is the French and African Letters (annotated and translated by University of Southern California scholar Azade-Ayse Rorlich), a fictional travelogue that Gasprinskiy serialized in his newspaper.
In one of the episodes in the Letters, the protagonist and his traveling companions encounter a group of “Amazons” (the mythical women warriors) while traveling across the African desert. Gasprinskiy uses this episode to expound on his views of women:
“The life and courage of these amazons…clearly proved that education and world views could endow women with much courage, strength, and fortitude …It became clear that in other countries women were fearful, weak, had a delicate nature, frail nerves and no will of their own, not because this is how it should be, but because their education, world view, and those life conditions which had shaped them over time, had made them what they were.” Letter #20, French and African Letters.
Ismail Gasprinskiy was truly a remarkable individual, who was responsible for affecting the culture of his people in a way that opened their lives to the modern world. For this, he is considered the founding father of the modern Crimean Tatar nation.

Photos of the Crimean Tatar Gasprinskiy Library

2010-07-08T01:03:00.000-07:00

The library is used by teachers, students, researchers, and the general public looking for information on the Crimean Tatars. This is the reading room, where library users can spend time looking at the many documents on file at the library.

The reading room has a permanent display of traditional Crimean Tatar arts and crafts.

A plaque at the front door tells of the founding of the library and the date of its restoration with the help of the Netherlands government and the International Renaissance Foundation. Originally an Islamic school in the 1700 and 1800's, the building was restored in 1999.

The library hosts many events. On the wall of the reading room is a display about Cengiz Dagci, a Crimean Tatar writer who lives in London. The library held a celebration of his life and work on the occasion of his 90th birthday.

What is the Crimean Tatar Gasprinskiy Library?

2010-07-06T01:28:00.000-07:00

As Crimean Tatars flooded back to their homeland in the late 1980’s and early 1990’s, they began to establish organizations to serve their returning people. In 1990, the Crimean Tatar Library in the name of I. Gasprinskiy (known as the Gasprinskiy Library) opened as a branch of the central library system in Simferopol, the capitol of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea in Ukraine. Five years later, it became an autonomous library under the Ministry of Culture in Crimea.
The mission of the library is to acquire, store, and make available to users of the library the world’s largest collection of documents in the Crimean Tatar language and about Crimean Tatars in other languages. Today, the library has a collection of more than 32,000 books plus 9000 complete sets of magazines and newspapers in the Crimean Tatar language; 4500 books in Turkish and other Turkic languages; and more than 2000 rare and valuable books.

Among the especially valuable collections in the library are:
• Photocopies of 61 volumes of the Kadyaskersky books which contain invaluable scholarly material on the stories, economy, laws, and social and demographic processes in the Crimean khanate from 1608 to1780;
• Microfilms of the newspaper Terdzhiman (Translator), published by Ismail Gasprinskiy from 1883-1918; a collection of the magazine Alemi нисван (The Female World); and the newspapers Millet (Nation) and Vetan Hadimi (Attendant of the Native land), 1905-1908;
• Complete editions of the works of Ismail Gasprinsky, Dzhafer Sejdamet, Bekira Choban-zade, Amet Ozenbashly, Asan Sabri Ajvazov, Osman Akchokrakly, Shevki Bektore, Arslan Krichinsky, Eshref Shemyi-zade and other outstanding figures of the Crimean Tatar culture;
• Crimean Tatar books published in Crimea before the Deportation of 1944;
• Complete set of the magazine Емеl (1930 to the present) and the magazine Kirim (1918);
• Complete set of the periodical Lenin Bayragi (Lenin Banner) which was published in the Crimean Tatar language by the Crimean Tatar diaspora in Uzbekistan from 1957 to 1990;
• Collection of the magazine Yildyz (Star), from 1976 to the present.

In 2000 the library opened a special section dealing with manuscripts and archival materials. The library staff research and acquire for preservation the personal archives of famous Crimean Tatar writers, scholars, and public figures, such as B. Garfarov, E. Semyi-zade, U. Kurkchi, and D. Ursu.

With the help of the International Renaissance Foundation in Ukraine, the library has produced a series of editions of Crimean Tatar writings and translations called Source of Knowledge. Sixteen books have been published through this program.

The Gasprinskiy Library also performs a number of services to benefit the Crimean Tatar community across Crimea. They hold frequent workshops and trainings, providing organizational and practical assistance to Crimean libraries serving the Crimean Tatar population. In addition, the library staff prepare Crimean Tatar language manuals and bibliographies to help disseminate information about Crimean Tatars and to serve their Crimean Tatar readers.

In its twenty years of existence, the Gasprinskiy Library has truly become the culture center of the Crimean Tatar people of Crimea. The library’s active assistance in the revival and development of Crimean Tatar language and culture has gone far in helping preserve and popularize the historical, spiritual, and moral heritage of the Crimean Tatar people.

Who are the Crimean Tatars?

2010-06-17T00:35:00.000-07:00

When I received my Peace Corps assignment to Ukraine, six months before I left the United States, I began to read about the country—its history, people, culture. A brief entry about the Crimean Tatar people, “a Muslim ethnic minority,” caught my interest. Who are these people that seem so different from what I think of as Ukrainians? I filed away the information I gleaned from books such as The Ukrainians: Unexpected Nation by Andrew Sullivan and began the process of packing up my life in America to go and live in another country thousand of miles away.
On April 1, 2009 I found myself with 35 other volunteers in the northern city of Chernigov to begin my 10-week training period in the Russian/Ukrainian language and the customs of Ukraine. As we struggled to learn the language and understand the peculiarities of life in another country, we continually speculated where we would end up in Ukraine, where we would be living and working for the next two years. Two days before we would be officially sworn into our service in the Peace Corps and depart for our site, it was finally revealed where each of us would be going. To my utter surprise and delight, when my name was called, I heard Simferopol, Crimea, and then to further intrigue me, I was told that I would be working at the Crimean Tatar Library in the name of I. Gasprinskiy. After a 15-hour train ride from Kiev to Simferopol with my new friend, my counterpart from the library Nadjie Yagya, I arrived in Simferopol and my new home, Ak Mechet, a Crimean Tatar settlement on the edge of Simferopol.
So here I am, one year later, living and working with Crimean Tatar people, a very different life than what I had imagined when I thought of myself as a “Peace Corps Volunteer in Ukraine.”
And exactly who are the Crimean Tatars? I have spent the last year trying to answer that question to myself, by reading what English language books and materials on Crimean Tatars that I could find, by talking in my very poor Russian with my neighbors and library staff, by observing and understanding as best I can, what goes on around me. Here is some of what I know:
The Crimean Tatars are a Turkic Muslim people who inhabited the Crimean Peninsula—the southern land mass of Ukraine surrounded by the Black Sea and Sea of Asov—for over seven centuries. For three hundred years, from 1441 to 1783 when Crimea was annexed by Russia, the Crimean Tatars ruled the peninsula through the Crimean Khanate. At the height of the Crimean Khanate, there were over six million Crimean Tatars inhabiting the peninsula, and at the time of annexation to Russia, they constituted 98% of the population. The intense Russification of the peninsula over the next century forced many Crimean Tatars to leave their homeland, and by the time of the Russian Revolution, there were only 300,000 Crimean Tatars left on the peninsula. Under the Bolsheviks a brief flowering of Crimean Tatar culture occurred between 1921 and 1927, and Crimean Tatar was made the official language of the peninsula along with Russian. However, Stalin’s repressive policies soon ended this “Golden Age” and resulted in further devastation of the Crimean Tatar people and culture, culminating in the mass overnight deportation on May 18, 1944 of all Crimean Tatars to Uzbekistan and other distant Soviet Republics. Over 46% of the Crimean Tatar population died during transport and in the subsequent camps, and almost all evidence of Crimean Tatar culture—mosques, place names, art and literature—were destroyed in Crimea, leading to the desired final solution of a “Crimea without Crimean Tatars.”
However, the Crimean Tatars--living in exile, not allowed to speak or teach their language, practice their religion, play their music, or write their stories--kept alive the dream of their homeland and formed a national movement which, after fifty years of nonviolent struggle, brought them back to their native land of Crimea. In 1985 the Crimean Tatars slowly began to return, a momentum that gathered strength as more and more restrictions were lifted, and in a 4-year period from 1989 to 1993, over 200,000 Crimean Tatars flooded back to Crimea. Today, an estimated 300,000 Crimean Tatars live in Crimea, constituting 13% of the population. They have an official governing body, representatives in the Crimea and Ukraine Rada (Congress), national schools that teach all subjects in Crimean Tatar, a university that educates Crimean Tatar language teachers, art and history museums, theater, radio and TV stations, and the Gasprinskiy Crimean Tatar Library where I so happily find myself working as a Peace Corps Volunteer.
This is just a very brief synopsis of who the Crimean Tatar people are, a culture that has a long history and is rich in many traditions. An excellent English language website to read more about the Crimean Tatars history, culture, and present activities is the website of the Diaspora group, the International Committee for Crimea, www.iccrimea.org.