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Central Asia

Area	4,003,400 km2[1]
Population	61,551,945[2]
Density	15 per km2
Countries	Kazakhstan  Kyrgyzstan  Tajikistan  Turkmenistan  Uzbekistan
Nominal GDP (2009)	$ 166 billion
GDP per capita (2009)	$ 2,700

Central Asia is a region of Asia from the Caspian Sea in the west to central China in the east, and from southern Russia in the north to Afghanistan in the south. It is also sometimes known as Middle Asia or Inner Asia, and is within the scope of the wider Eurasian continent.

Various definitions of its exact composition exist and no one definition is universally accepted. Despite this uncertainty in defining borders, it does have some important overall characteristics. For one, Central Asia has historically been closely tied to its nomadic peoples and the Silk Road.^[3] As a result it has acted as a crossroads for the movement of people, goods, and ideas between Europe, West Asia, South Asia, and East Asia.^[4]

In modern context, Central Asia consists of the five former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. Other areas are often included such as Mongolia, Afghanistan, northern-Pakistan, north-eastern Iran, north-western India, and western parts of the People's Republic of China such as Xinjiang. Tibet, Qinghai, Gansu and Inner Mongolia, and southern parts of Siberia such as Tuva may also be included in Central Asia.

During pre-Islamic and early Islamic times, Central Asia was a predominantely Persian^[5][6] region that included sedentary Sogdians, Chorasmians and semi-nomadic Scythians, Alans. The ancient sedentary population played an important role in the history of Central Asia. Tajiks, Pashtuns, Pamiris and other Iranian groups are still present in the region. After expansion by Turkic peoples, central Asia became also the homeland for many Turkic peoples, including the Uzbeks, Kazakhs, Kyrgyz, and Uyghurs, and Central Asia is sometimes referred to as Turkestan.

Definitions

Three sets of possible boundaries for the region

Central Asia's location as a region of the world

The idea of Central Asia as a distinct region of the world was introduced in 1843 by the geographer Alexander von Humboldt. The borders of Central Asia are subject to multiple definitions. Many text books still refer to this area as Turkestan, which was the name used prior to Stalin's rule.

The most limited definition was the official one of the Soviet Union that defined the "Middle Asia" as consisting solely of Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Kyrgyzstan, but did not include Kazakhstan, Afghanistan and Mongolia. This definition was also often used outside the USSR in this period.

However, the Russian language has two distinct terms: Средняя Азия (Srednyaya Aziya or "Middle Asia", the narrower definition which includes only those traditionally non-Slavic, "Central Asian" lands that were incorporated within those borders of historical Russia) and Центральная Азия (Tsentral'naya Aziya or "Central Asia", the wider definition which includes "Central Asian" lands that have never been part of historical Russia). However, there lacks a meaningful distinction between the two in the English language; and so "Central Asia" is used for both Russian usages, thus creating some confusion.

Soon after independence, the leaders of the five former Soviet Central Asian Republics met in Tashkent and declared that the definition of Central Asia should include Kazakhstan as well as the original four included by the Soviets. Since then, this has become the most common definition of Central Asia.

The UNESCO general history of Central Asia, written just before the collapse of the USSR, defines the region based on climate and uses far larger borders. According to it, Central Asia includes Mongolia, Tibet, northeast Iran (Golestan, North Khorasan, and Razavi provinces), Afghanistan, Northern Areas and the N.W.F.P. province of Pakistan, Kashmir and Ladakh districts of India, central-east Russia south of the Taiga, and the former Central Asian Soviet Republics (the five "Stans" of the former Soviet Union).

An alternative method is to define the region based on ethnicity, and in particular, areas populated by Eastern Turkic, Eastern Iranian, or Mongolian peoples. These areas include Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, the Turkic regions of southern Siberia, the five republics, and Afghan Turkestan. Afghanistan as a whole, the Northern Areas of Pakistan and the Kashmir Valley of India may also be included. The Tibetans and Ladakhi are also included. Insofar, the mentioned peoples are considered the "indigenous" peoples of the vast region.

There are several places that claim to be the geographic center of Asia, for example Kyzyl, the capital of the Tuvan Republic in the Russian Federation, and a village 200 miles (320 km) North of Urumqi, Xinjiang, China.^[7]

Geography

United Nations geoscheme for Asia:      North Asia      Central Asia      Southwest Asia      South Asia      East Asia      Southeast Asia

Central Asia is an extremely large region of varied geography, including high passes and mountains (Tian Shan), vast deserts (Kara Kum, Kyzyl Kum, Taklamakan), and especially treeless, grassy steppes. The vast steppe areas of Central Asia are considered together with the steppes of Eastern Europe as a homogenous geographical zone known as the Euro-Asian Steppe.

Much of the land of Central Asia is too dry or too rugged for farming. The Gobi desert extends from the foot of the Pamirs, 77° east, to the Great Khingan (Da Hinggan) Mountains, 116°–118° east.

Central Asia has the following geographic extremes:

• The world's northernmost desert (sand dunes), at Buurug Deliin Els, Mongolia, 50°18' north.
• The Northern Hemisphere's southernmost permafrost, at Erdenetsogt sum, Mongolia, 46°17' north.
• The world's shortest distance between non-frozen desert and permafrost: 770 km (480 mi).

A majority of the people earn a living by herding livestock. Industrial activity centers in the region's cities.

Major rivers of the region include the Amu Darya, the Syr Darya and the Hari River. Major bodies of water include the Aral Sea and Lake Balkhash, both of which are part of the huge west/central Asian endorheic basin that also includes the Caspian Sea.

Both of these bodies of water have shrunk significantly in recent decades due to diversion of water from rivers that feed them for irrigation and industrial purposes. Water is an extremely valuable resource in arid Central Asia, and can lead to rather significant international disputes.

Climate

Since Central Asia is not buffered by a large body of water, temperature fluctuations are more severe.

According to the WWF Ecozones system, Central Asia is part of the Palearctic ecozone. The largest biome in Central Asia is the Temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome. Central Asia also contains the Montane grasslands and shrublands, Deserts and xeric shrublands and Temperate coniferous forests biomes.

History

Geographical extent of Iranian influence in the 1st century BC. Scythia (mostly Eastern Iranian) is shown in orange.

A Scythian horseman from the general area of the Ili river, Pazyryk, c.300 BCE.

The history of Central Asia is defined by the area's climate and geography. The aridness of the region made agriculture difficult and its distance from the sea cut it off from much trade. Thus few major cities developed in the region, instead the area was for millennia dominated by the nomadic horse peoples of the steppe.

Relations between the steppe nomads and the settled people in and around Central Asia were long marked by conflict. The nomadic lifestyle was well suited to warfare and the steppe horse riders became some of the most militarily potent peoples in the world, limited only by their lack of internal unity. Any internal unity that was achieved, was most probably due to the influence of the Silk Road, which traveled along Central Asia. Periodically great leaders or changing conditions would organize several tribes into one force, and create an almost unstoppable power. These included the Hun invasion of Europe, the Wu Hu attacks on China and most notably the Mongol conquest of much of Eurasia.^[8]

During pre-Islamic and early Islamic times, southern Central Asia was inhabited predominantly by speakers of Iranian languages.^[5][9] Among the ancient sedentary Iranian peoples, the Sogdians and Chorasmians played an important role, while Iranian peoples such as Scythians and the later on Alans lived a nomadic or semi-nomadic lifestyle.

The main migration of Turkic peoples occurred between the 5th and 10th centuries, when they spread across most of Central Asia. During the 13th and 14th centuries, the Mongols conquered and ruled the largest contiguous empire in recorded history.

The dominance of the nomads ended in the 16th century, as firearms allowed settled peoples to gain control of the region. Russia, China, and other powers expanded into the region and had captured the bulk of Central Asia by the end of the nineteenth century. After the Russian Revolution the Central Asian regions were incorporated into the Soviet Union. Mongolia remained independent but became a Soviet satellite state. However Afghanistan remained independent of any influence by the Russian empire.

The Soviet areas of Central Asia saw much industrialization and construction of infrastructure, but also the suppression of local cultures, hundreds of thousands of deaths from failed collectivization programs, and a lasting legacy of ethnic tensions and environmental problems. Soviet authorities deported millions of people, including entire nationalities,^[10] from western areas of the USSR to Central Asia and Siberia.^[11]

With the collapse of the Soviet Union five countries gained independence. In nearly all the new states former Communist Party officials retained power as local strongmen. None of the new republics could be considered functional democracies in the early days of independence, although it appears Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and Mongolia have made great strides. Other parts of Central Asia remain part of China or Russia.

Culture

Blue-eyed Central Asian and East-Asian Buddhist monks, Bezeklik, 9th-10th century.

Religions

Islam is the religion most common in the Central Asian Republics, Afghanistan, Xinjiang and the peripheral western regions, such as Bashkiria. Most Central Asian Muslims are Sunni, although there are sizeable Shia minorities in Afghanistan. Islam is also the most prevalent religion in Northern Pakistan and northwest-India.

Buddhism was prominent in Central Asia prior to the arrival of Islam, and the transmission of Buddhism along the Silk Road eventually brought the religion to China. Tibetan Buddhism is most common in Tibet, Mongolia, Ladakh and the southern Russian regions of Siberia, where Shamanism is also popular. Increasing Han Chinese migration westward since the establishment of the PRC has brought Confucianism and other beliefs into the region.

Nestorianism was the form of Christianity most practiced in the region in previous centuries, but now the largest denomination is the Russian Orthodox Church, with many members in Kazakhstan. The Bukharian Jews were once a sizable community in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, but nearly all have emigrated since the Collapse of the Soviet Union and the revival of Islam in the region.

Arts

Yama, the Lord of Death.

At the crossroads of Asia, shamanist practices live alongside Buddhism. Thus Yama, Lord of Death, was revered in Tibet as a spiritual guardian and judge. Mongolian Buddhism in particular influenced Tibetan Buddhism. The Qianlong Emperor of China in the 18th century was Tibetan Buddhist, and would sometimes travel from Beijing to other cities for personal religious worship.

Note the human skulls and severed heads that festoon Yama's crown and necklace, which give some concept of the size that Yama was expected to be when one faced him at one's death. This particular Dharmapala is painted wood, four feet high in total.

Central Asia also has an indigenous form of improvisational oral poetry which is over 1000 years old. It is principally practiced in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan by akyns, lyrical improvisationists. They will engage in lyrical battles, the aitysh or the alym sabak. The tradition arose out of early bardic oral historians. They are usually accompanied by a stringed instrument—in Kyrgyzstan, a three-stringed komuz and in Kazakhstan a similar two-stringed instrument.

Some also learn to sing the Manas, Kyrgyzstan's epic poem (those who learn the Manas exclusively but do not improvise are called manaschis). During Soviet rule, akyn performance was co-opted by the authorities and subsequently declined in popularity. With the fall of the Soviet Union it has enjoyed a resurgence, although akyns still do use their art to campaign for political candidates. A 2005 Washington Post article proposed a similarity between the improvisational art of akyns and modern freestyle rap performed in the West.^[12]

Territory and region data

Country	Area km²	Population (2009)	Population density per km²	Nominal GDP millions of USD(2009)	GDP per capita (2009)	Capital	Official languages
Kazakhstan	2,724,900	16,004,800	6	107,714	$6,700	Astana	Kazakh,Russian
Kyrgyzstan	199,900	5,482,000	27	4,576	$800	Bishkek	Kyrgyz,Russian
Tajikistan	143,100	7,349,145	51	4,736	$700	Dushanbe	Persian
Turkmenistan	488,100	5,110,000	10	16,197	$3,200	Ashgabat	Turkmen
Uzbekistan	447,400	27,606,000	62	32,710	$1,200	Tashkent	Uzbek

Territories sometimes included

Country or Territory	Area km²	Population (2009)	Population density per km²	Nominal GDP millions of USD(2009)	GDP per capita (2009)	Capital	Official languages
Afghanistan	647,500	31,889,923	49	13,320	$400	Kabul	Persian,Pashto
Pakistan	803,940	168,925,500	210	164,557	$900	Islamabad	Urdu, English, Punjabi, Pashto, Sindhi, Balochi
Mongolia	1,564,116	2,736,800	2	4,212	$1,500	Ulan Bator	Mongolian
China- Xinjiang Province	1,660,000	21,586,300	13	62,520	$2,900	Urumqi	Chinese, Uyghur

Demographics

The ethnolinguistic patchwork of Central Asia

By the most inclusive definition, more than 80 million people live in Central Asia, about 2% of Asia's total population. Of the regions of Asia, only North Asia has fewer people. It has a population density of 9 people per km², vastly less than the 80.5 people per km² of the continent as a whole.

Languages

The languages of the majority of the inhabitants of the former Soviet Central Asian Republics come from the Turkic language group.^[13] Turkmen, closely related to Turkish (they are both members of the Oghuz group of Turkic), is mainly spoken in Turkmenistan and into Afghanistan, Iran and Turkey. Kazakh, Kyrgyz and Tatar are related languages of the Kypchak group of Turkic languages, and are spoken throughout Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, and into Afghanistan and Xinjiang. Uzbek and Uyghur are spoken in Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Afghanistan and Xinjiang.

Russian, as well as being spoken by around six million ethnic Russians and Ukrainians of Central Asia,^[14] is a lingua franca throughout the former Soviet Central Asian Republics. Mandarin Chinese has an equally dominant presence in Inner Mongolia, Qinghai and Xinjiang.

The Turkic languages belong to the much larger, but controversial Altaic language family, which includes Mongolian. Mongolian is spoken throughout the region of Mongolia and into Buryatia, Kalmyk, Tuva, Inner Mongolia, and Xinjiang.

East Iranian languages were once spoken throughout Central Asia, but the once prominent Sogdian, Khwarezmian, Bactrian and Scythian languages are now extinct. However, the East Iranian Pashto is still spoken in Afghanistan and northwestern Pakistan, and other minor East Iranian languages, such as Shughni, Munji, Ishkashimi, Sarikoli, Wakhi, Yaghnobi and Ossetian are also spoken in various places in Central Asia. Varieties of Persian are also spoken in the region, locally known as Darī (in Afghanistan), Tojikī (by Tajiks in Tajikistan), and Bukhori (by the Bukharan Jews in Bukhara).

The Tibetan language is spoken by around six million people across the Tibetan Plateau and into Qinghai, Sichuan and Ladakh.

Dardic languages are predominant in the Northern areas of Pakistan and north-western India and spread into Ladakh and NWFP and include Shina, Kashmiri and Khowar.

Tocharian, an Indo-European language, was once spoken in Xinjiang and parts of Afghanistan, but is now extinct.