Paper long abstract:

Mobile pastoralism is practiced in drylands and highlands. We may divide mobile pastoralism into several types according to geographic, economic and cultural diversities. One of them is the Central Asian steppe type that covers steppes, deserts, and semi-deserts. Drylands of this area consisted of several small oases with limited water resources and pastures were available for grazing livestock in certain times of a year. For these reasons, pastoralists usually had to graze their herds in various areas by moving one pasture to the other one.

When the Russian Empire came to Central Asia, stockbreeding began to lose its value for colonial authority because stockbreeding was not satisfying a requirement of colonial administration in political and economic cases. Therefore, the colonial authority took direct and indirect measures intended to destroy stockbreeding as practiced in Central Asia. One of these measures was the creation of forest areas in the steppe areas in Central Asia that which caused stockbreeders to limit their seasonal migrations. This paper forwards an idea that the creation of forests in the pasture territories of Central Asia in 1886-1916 made difficulties to pastoralists in moving from one pasture to another one. Furthermore, I will attempt to show that pastoralists had to pay additional fees for using pastures that they used them free before. This paper is based on archival documents that held in National Archive of Uzbekistan. These sources include reports and petitions. Reports made by the colonial administration and petitions written by pastoralists provide evidence on the creation of forest areas in Central Asia under Tsarist rule and how this process impacted mobile pastoralism. By comparing these materials, I will attempt to catch some examples regarding mobile pastoralism in the forest-pasture areas.

Paper short abstract:

This research seeks to study the symbolic complexity of food in history of XX c., as well as its social importance in contemporary society of Kazakhstan. I am trying to examine how ethno-demographic changes and social interactions of the past influenced eating behaviors and identities nowadays.

Paper long abstract:

This research seeks to study the symbolic complexity of food in history of XX c., as well as its social importance in contemporary society of Kazakhstan. I am trying to examine how ethno-demographic changes and social interactions of the past influenced eating behaviors and identities nowadays.

Over the XX c. the ethno-demographic situation in Kazakhstan has undergone major changes. Taken place historical events such as Stolypin land reform, World War I, Revolt of 1916, the civil war, famines in 1921-1922 and 1932-33, the state policy of forced settlements in the Soviet Union. In the result, Kazakhstan turned into a giant reservation, where hundreds of thousands of people were exiled from different parts of the USSR.

Mas crimes under Stalin toughed many public and state figures, representatives of various segments of the population, as well as entire peoples and ethnic groups were deported from their permanent places of residence. Nowadays, all of them together they formed a unique cultural environment and the basis of a multi-ethnic state - Kazakhstan. In the conditions of an independent country and a civil understanding of the theory of "national identity", they all make up one nation - Kazakhstani. Accordingly, mixed cultures with different historical background and located in one land created unique national cuisine - regionally specific and full of recipes which indelibly influenced by historical background.

This study based on fieldwork materials like oral history interviews, surveys, archive sources. These research experiences have culminated in an enduring interest in varied aspects of food, foodways and national identity. Research methodology of this study based on conceptual approaches and general methods of scientific knowledge: historicism and objectivity (observation, comparison, measurement, analysis)

Paper long abstract:

In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, some changes took place in the socio-economic life of Turkestan. In particular, new industrial apparatus and technologies began to be applied in various spheres of life. State institutions and entrepreneurs were interested in the appearance of equipment and technologies in Turkestan. Since it brought capital to the state reserve and allowed entrepreneurs in the region to earn more money.

In this period, in Turkestan, the first steps were taken to mechanize agriculture. Specialists in the region who taking into account world experience tried to store and process agricultural products by using modern equipment and technologies. At the same time, sewing-machines, musical instruments and new type of transports started to enter into the market in Turkestan. Also, there were first factories such as oil mills, brick factories, modern type mills, small enterprises that became the first steps of light industry in the region. They were equipped with machine tools that brought from different countries, in particular from USA, England, Germany. In order to give advantages of these technologies, entrepreneurs and state institutions used advertisement as a tool for sharing technologies. I argue that despite advantages of these new types of technologies, local people, in most cases, preferred traditional technologies because of prices of new industrial machines were expensive and they were incompatible to local natural condition. I use materials of periodical press that published in 1870-1917 and archival sources that held in National Archive of Uzbekistan. The both sources provide reports of state institutions about putting new technologies into practice and attitudes of local users of these industrial machines. I attempt to compare opinions of these two groups and bases on these, I try to show the fate of modern technologies in Turkestan.

Paper short abstract:

In world historiography, the second half of the XIX century is called the "century of empires", the heyday of globalization and economic convergence. Central Asia has also not remained on the sidelines of globalization.

Paper long abstract:

After the creation of the Turkestan Governor-General (1867), imperial financial institutions began to appear in the region. The history of banks and banking in Central Asia has not been studied in fact, and is covered in fragments in the light of the concept of "monopolistic capitalism" The article examines the Soviet, post-Soviet and foreign historiography of the activities of the Russian-Asiatic Commercial Bank (RAC). Russian Russian-Asian (until 1910, Russian-Chinese) was the largest bank in Central Asia, which had 13 branches. Russian Russian-Asian Commercial Bank was established on the basis of the merger of the Russian-Chinese and Northern banks, opened its operations on October 4, 1910. It should be noted that as an explanatory model, Soviet historiography was based on the hypothesis that the colonial periphery of the Russian Empire was the least modernized in economic terms and monopolized by "international capital" and concerns. According to the author, post-Soviet historiography in most cases repeats the main provisions of Soviet historiography. The main task of commercial banks was to involve Turkestan in the general imperial market. The increase in investment in Turkestan, in particular in Fergana, is not due to the dependence of the Russian Empire on "foreign capital", it was largely determined by the general economic situation in the region and the opinion of authoritative scientific experts. It should be noted that the activities of the RACB in Central Asia can be characterized as an imperial bank that sought to involve the region in world trade and the capitalist system.

Paper short abstract:

An attempt will be made to answer the question whether the Pamirs can be considered a colony, or was it a phenomenon of a slightly different order? All this will be considered on the example of the tax policy of the Russian Empire, in the Pamirs from 1892 to 1917.

Paper long abstract:

As a result of the Pamir campaigns 1891-1895. on the territory of the Pamirs and Pamir region the power of the Russian Empire was established. Here a new, to a certain extent unique, phenomenon appeared in the colonial world, which I conventionally called “non-colonized colonies” or “colonies without colonization”. So in the Pamirs and Pamir regions, after they became part of the Russian Empire, the authorities did not particularly try to extract income from subordinate lands in any way, but mainly limited themselves to concern for the welfare of the local population, raising its standard of living, without taking almost no taxes (although sometime in the future it was supposed to start collecting them in full from local residents, but this intention was not realized until the establishment of Soviet power here), with the exception of only a few duties suitable for ensuring the life of the Russian Pamir detachment and local administration. All of this, poorly fitting into the traditional framework of the colonial discourse developed in science in recent decades.

I will try to show the uniqueness of the region in the system of Central Asian colonies of Russia. And to answer the question, can the Pamirs be considered a colony or was it a phenomenon of a slightly different order? All this will be considered on the example of the tax policy of the Russian Empire, in the Pamirs, from the moment its power was established here until 1917.