| Summary: | Some ethnic groups are remarkably resistant to surrounding influences, and only slightly undergo assimilation. What, then, are the most significant factors affecting ethnic assimilation? The foremost is state intervention. The state can support the nationalist tendencies of one group of inhabitants while suppressing the ethnic expressions of non-dominant groups. How do various ethnic groups respond to this kind of support or oppression? In this research note the Baloch minority, a relatively small group in Turkmenistan, have been chosen as a case study to examine the questions raised above. The chosen ethnic group under investigation here does not have a homeland to provide it with support. There are numerous such ethnic groups in non-dominant positions without states that cause tension between minorities and majorities. The tension is often extremely strong, even when such groups have political autonomy (e.g., the Kurds in Iraq and the Uyghurs in China). The aim of this report from the field is to explain how self-aware the Baloch of Turkmenistan are of their identity and the extent to which they have succumbed to modernization and attempts to render them Turkmen.
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