(1918–1995)
He was born on 15 November in Lugovoy District, Zhambyl Region. In 1955, he graduated from the Higher Party School under the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Kazakhstan, and in 1961 from the Higher Party School under the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
He held various party and administrative positions, including instructor and head of the organisational department of the Lugovoy District Party Committee in Zhambyl Region; secretary of the Keles District Party Committee; second secretary of the Ilyichev District Party Committee; first secretary of the Georgievka District Party Committee; secretary of the party committee of the Kyzylkum Territorial Production Administration; chairman of the Algabas District Executive Committee; and head of the pricing department of the Shymkent Regional Executive Committee.
From 1976, he served as chairman of the Party Commission under the Shymkent Regional Party Committee. He was awarded the Order of the Patriotic War, First Class, two Orders of the Red Banner of Labour, the Order of the Badge of Honour, and various medals.
Omarbai Malkarov (1908–1993)
He was born on 3 December in Shu District, Zhambyl Region. In 1936, he graduated from the workers’ preparatory faculty at the Kazakh Pedagogical Institute. He subsequently studied at a two-year state teachers’ institute in Alma-Ata.
In 1938, he worked at the Alma-Ata branch of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. He began writing poetry in 1937. At the end of 1938, the Writers’ Union of Kazakhstan appointed him as its permanent representative responsible for coordinating the work of poets and writers in South Kazakhstan Region. He held this position for 15 years and also worked for more than a decade at the newspaper Ońtústik Qazaqstan (South Kazakhstan).
Taushen Abuova (1932–2004)
A female improvisational poet and performer of aitys, the traditional Kazakh poetic contest between akyns. She worked as head of a mobile cultural club in the Department of Culture of Otrar District.
Although she entered the art of aitys relatively late, she made a significant contribution to its development and promotion among the public. In her performances, she sang of her homeland, her people, their cultural and spiritual values, and their future.
Between 1985 and 1990, Taushen Abuova took part in several aitys contests, competing with prominent folk poets, including Manap Kokenov from Kyzylorda, Koken Shakeev from Kokshetau, Kyrgyzstan’s folk poet Amir-Ali Aitaev, and other improvisational poets. She became a multiple winner and prize recipient at regional, national and international aitys competitions, and also won the grand prize in a national televised contest.
She received two first-degree diplomas from the Ministry of Culture and was awarded the Order of Dostyk (Friendship). Two documentary films and two books have been dedicated to her life and work.
Beisenbai Kenzhebayev (1904–1987)
A scholar, Doctor of Philology (1959) and professor (1961).
He worked as a department head, deputy editor and editor at a number of newspapers and journals, including Zhas Qairat, Leninshil Zhas (now Zhas Alash, 1923–1928), Kenес Tuy (1929–1930), Ońtústik Qazaqstan (1932–1933), Socialist Kazakhstan (now Egemen Qazaqstan, 1928–1929, 1931–1932 and 1933–1935), and other publications.
From 1938 to 1941, he worked as a translator for the Bulletin of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. From 1941 to 1944, he was editor-in-chief of the Kazakhstan State United Publishing House. In 1961, he became head of a department at Kazakh State University and served as a professor there from 1975 to 1987.
He defended his doctoral dissertation on the subject of “Kazakh Democratic Writers of the Early Twentieth Century,” based on his monographic research.
Kenzhebayev authored major scholarly works on Kazakh literature and the history of the Kazakh press, as well as studies on the lives and works of Abai, Sultanmakhmut Toraigyrov, Zhambyl Zhabayev, Mukhamedzhan Seralin, Mukhtar Auezov, S. Sharipov and other writers.
He published the textbook Kazakh Literature of the Early Twentieth Century for university students and the Anthology of Early Kazakh Literature (1967). He also collected, classified and studied examples of Kazakh oral folk literature.
During the Soviet period, he challenged the mistaken view that the history of Kazakh literature began with Bukhar Zhyrau (18th century). Through scholarly research, he demonstrated that its origins could be traced back to the Orkhon–Yenisei inscriptions.
Kenzhebayev also worked in fiction, publishing Asau Zhurek (1928), and translated stories by Guy de Maupassant, Ernest Hemingway, Lu Xun, Jaroslav Hašek, Anton Chekhov and other writers. Together with M. M. Fetisov, he compiled a Kazakh-language bibliographic index of the works of A. S. Pushkin.
He received several orders and medals.
Sultan Nazaruly Dosymbekov (1927–1988)
A Doctor of Law, professor and Honoured Scientist of the Kazakh SSR. He was born in 1927 in the city of Turkistan.
In 1950, he graduated from the Faculty of Law at Lomonosov Moscow State University. In 1954, he defended his candidate’s dissertation entitled The Formation of the Kazakh ASSR and Its State-Legal Status.
At S. M. Kirov Kazakh State University, he served as dean of the full-time and correspondence divisions of the Faculty of Law in 1970, head of the Department of Administrative Law and Soviet State Administration in 1972, and head of the department of social sciences and humanities.
In 1970, he defended his doctoral dissertation entitled Problems of State Administration of Industry in a Union Republic. He was awarded the academic title of professor in 1973.
His research focused on the theory of public administration in the USSR and the Kazakh SSR, state management of industry and agriculture, and the theory and history of the formation and development of Kazakh Soviet statehood. Under his supervision, eight candidate’s dissertations were successfully defended.
