Uyghurs
Rian Thum explored the concepts of identity among the ancestors of the modern Uyghurs in Altishahr (the native Uyghur name for eastern Turkestan or southern Xinjiang) before the adoption of the name "Uyghur" in the 1930s, referring to them by the name "Altishahri" in his article "Modular History: Identity Maintenance before Uyghur Nationalism". Thum indicated that Altishahri Turkis did have a sense that they were a distinctive group separate from the Turkic Andijanis to their west, the nomadic Turkic Kirghiz, the nomadic Mongol Qalmaq, and the Han Chinese Khitay before they became known as Uyghurs. There was no single name used by them to refer to themselves, the various native names Altishahris used to refer to themselves were Altishahrlik (Altishahr person), yerlik (local), Turki, and Musulmān (Muslim), the term Musulmān in this situation did not signify religious connotations, because the Altishahris would exclude other Muslim peoples like the Kirghiz when referring to themselves as Musulmān. Dr. Laura J Newby has also noted that the sedentary Altishahri Turkic people felt themselves as a separate group from other Turkic Muslims since at least the 19th century.
Uyghurs
The ancient people of the Tarim Basin originally spoke different languages such as Saka (Khotanese), Tocharian and Gandhari. The Turkic people who moved into region in the 9th century brought with them their languages which slowly supplanted the original tongues of the local inhabitants. By the 11th century, it was noted by Mahmud al-Kashgari that the Uyghurs (of Qocho) spoke a pure Turkic language, but they also still spoke another language among themselves and have two different scripts. He also noted that the people of Khotan did not know Turkic well, and have their own language and script (Khotanese). Writers of the Karakhanid period, al-Kashgari and Yusuf Balasagun, referred to their Turkic language as "Khāqāniyya" (meaning royal), or the "language of Kashgar", or simply Turkic.