ASTANA – A creative initiative of schoolchildren from the town of Ekibastuz in northeastern Kazakhstan to dub popular foreign cartoons into the Kazakh language has secured a grant to expand its cartoon-dubbing venture, announced the city’s education department on its Instagram page on March 28.
Ekibastuz youth spend their holidays creating dubbed entertainment content in the Kazakh language. Photo credit: Instagram @bilim_ekibastuz
The initiative aims to provide dubbed entertainment content tailor-made for Kazakh-speaking youth, including animations.
The project to voice famous cartoons in the Kazakh language was initiated by Yerkin Kusan, a teacher at the Kainar educational and leisure complex. He was interested in creating content that benefits the young generation. The project received support from the Ministry of Information and Social Development, which allocated the grant to open the country’s first children’s dubbing studio.
“To popularize the state language among the younger generation, we had an idea to voice a cartoon in Kazakh. During the summer holidays, we translated and tried to voice the first part of the ‘Baymax!’ cartoon,” said Kusan.
Describing the painstaking work on a seven-minute cartoon, Kusan said the team faced many technical difficulties but eventually uploaded it on YouTube.
“We and the audience liked the result, which gathered thousands of views. The project then entered the Tauelsizdik Urpaktary (Independence Generation) contest organized by the Ministry of Information and Social Development,” Kusan said.
Their dubbing studio project named Ozgeshe Bol (Be unique) became one of the 33 winners of the contest, which received more than 1,000 ideas.
It is now targeting a broader young audience with more sophisticated recording equipment and a studio that they acquired with the grant money.
“Besides the equipment for professional dubbing, the studio also has a special booth for sound recording, a place for translations, and an area for additional filming,” Kusan explained.
“Now we have new plans. The children are eager to voice the best foreign animation, ‘Luck,’ in the Kazakh language and show the result to 800 schoolchildren at the local cinema. Then, every six months we plan to dub one blockbuster animated film suitable for families,” added Kusan.
