Resumen de Emblems of independence: script choice in post-Soviet Turkmenistan

Victoria Clement

• Like so many societies that emerged from communism at the end of the twentieth century fortifying a local culture in order to extricate themselves from Moscow's influence, Turkmenistan replaced its script to symbolize a break from its Soviet past. The 1993–1995 plan to transition from Cyrillic to Latin anticipated Turkmenistan's new place in the international community. In exploring post-Soviet script change in Turkmenistan, this article illustrates the remarkable power of alphabets to denote, construct, and even memorialize a speech community's identity.