Abduweli Ayup is a Uighur linguist who was trying to stop the Chinese government from replacing the Uighur language with Mandarin. He had been studying the language’s history, teaching Uighur to younger students and writing books in Uighur. But recently, when the Chinese government began forcibly detaining Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang, his work got much more risky. Then, they came for Abduweli himself.
In this podcast, Kerning Cultures looks at Abduweli’s fight to preserve his mother tongue.
Episode Credits and Notes
Special thanks to Abduweli Ayup and his family for sharing their story, and to Arienne Dwyer and Timothy Grose.
This episode was produced by Durrie Bouscaren and Alex Atack, with editorial support from Dana Ballout and Hebah Fisher. Sound design by Mohamed Khreizat. Fact-checking by Zeina Dowidar.
*[This podcast was produced by Kerning Cultures, a partner institution of Fair Observer.]
The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy.










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