Focusing on Afghanistan's relations with the West during the latter half of the 20th century, this study offers new insights on the long-term origins of the nation's recent tragedies. Roberts finds that, since the 1930s in particular, Afghanistan pursued policies far more complex, and considerably more pro-Western, than previous studies have surmised. By the end of the Second World War, Britain and Afghanistan seemed headed toward an extensive partnership in military and economic affairs. Opportunities to cement Afghanistan to the West existed, but ultimately ran afoul of regional...

Edward Schatz explores the politics of kin-based clan divisions in the post-Soviet state of Kazakhstan. Drawing from extensive ethnographic and archival research, interviews, and wide-ranging secondary sources, he highlights a politics that poses a two-tiered challenge to current thinking about modernity and Central Asia. First, asking why kinship divisions do not fade from political life with modernization, he shows that the state actually constructs clan relationships by infusing them with practical political and social meaning. By activating the most important quality of clans - their...

Soon after the bombs stopped falling on Kabul, award-winning journalist and women's rights activist Ann Jones set out for the shattered city. This is her trenchant report from the city where she spent the next four winters working in humanitarian aid. Investigating the city's prison for women, retraining Kabul's long-silenced English teachers, Jones enters the lives of everyday women and men and reveals through small events some big disjunctions: between the new Afghan "democracy" and the still-entrenched warlords, between American promises and performance, between what's boasted of and...

The Mongols are often associated with the arts of warfare and annals of horror, but a more realistic association would be their contribution to international trade and cultural exchange during the medieval age. Thematic chapters, biographical sketches, a glossary, maps, illustrations, and selected primary documents provide fresh insight on a regretfully underexamined period.

The legacy of the Mongols has often been associated with their contributions to the arts of warfare and annals of horror. A more realistic association would be their contribution to international trade and...

Central Asia's long and complicated history is teeming with diverse cultures and traditions. The nations of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan have served as a major cultural crossroad throughout the millennia, with many customs colliding and blending along the way. In this comprehensive volume, students can learn how Central Asia developed in ancient times and how the nations of the steppes evolved through the Middle Ages into modern history. From the Silk Road to Russian colonization to Soviet rule, Central Asia's ever-changing nations continue to play an...

• Offers a detailed history, from the Indo-Iranian invasions of the second millennium BC and Alexander the
  Great, through to Soviet occupation, Taliban rule, and the 'war on terror'


• Much description of the contemporary period is based on the author's own research in Afghanistan


• Includes a new final chapter covering developments since 2001, including the fall of the Taliban, state...

On October 27, 1991, the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic declared its independence from the Soviet Union. Hammer and sickle gave way to a flag, a national anthem, and new holidays. Seven decades earlier, Turkmenistan had been a stateless conglomeration of tribes. What brought about this remarkable transformation?

Tribal Nation addresses this question by examining the Soviet effort in the 1920s and 1930s to create a modern, socialist nation in the Central Asian Republic of Turkmenistan. Adrienne Edgar argues that the recent focus on the Soviet state as a "maker of...

Drawing on extensive research in the archives of Russia and Uzbekistan, Douglas Northrop here reconstructs the turbulent history of a Soviet campaign that sought to end the seclusion of Muslim women. In Uzbekistan it focused above all on a massive effort to eliminate the heavy horsehair-and-cotton veils worn by many women and girls. This campaign against the veil was, in Northrop's view, emblematic of the larger Soviet attempt to bring the proletarian revolution to Muslim Central Asia, a region Bolsheviks saw as primitive and backward. The Soviets focused on women and the family in an...

Drawing on extensive research in the archives of Russia and Uzbekistan, Douglas Northrop here reconstructs the turbulent history of a Soviet campaign that sought to end the seclusion of Muslim women. In Uzbekistan it focused above all on a massive effort to eliminate the heavy horsehair-and-cotton veils worn by many women and girls. This campaign against the veil was, in Northrop's view, emblematic of the larger Soviet attempt to bring the proletarian revolution to Muslim Central Asia, a region Bolsheviks saw as primitive and backward. The Soviets focused on women and the family in an...

In a new, revised edition of his acclaimed book, Olivier Roy examines the political development of central Asia, from Russian conquests to the War on Terror and beyond.

During the anti-Gorbachev coup in August 1991, most communist leaders from Soviet central Asia backed the plotters. Within weeks of the coup s collapse, those same leaders now transformed into ardent nationalists proclaimed the independence of their nations, adopted new flags and new slogans, and discovered a new patriotism.

How were these new nations built among peoples without any traditional nationalist heritage and...

In this riveting narrative, Peter Hopkirk turns his storytelling skills on the fortune hunters, mystics, mountaineers, and...

As conflicts continue in Iraq and political tensions mount in China, the world is beginning to take notice of Central Asia as the crossroads between the Middle East, Asia, and Europe. "Central Asia: A Global Studies Handbook" explores the three central states of the region, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan, and provides insight to their past, present, and future.

The first of its kind, this reference work covers a wide range of topics on Central Asia as a whole. From the geography, history, and economics to politics, education, and religion, students and teachers will find this an...