In his article “Backwardness and the Quest for Civilization: Early Soviet Central Asia in Comparative Perspective,” Adeeb Khalid addresses the problematic use of colonialism when discussing the government of the Soviet Union. Khalid argues that the Soviet Union’s control over its territories in Central Asia should not and cannot be discussed in terms of colonialism. Using the Turkish Republic as a comparison, Khalid demonstrates that in both cases the state wielded its power to create a universal standard within the nation’s culture that forced all citizens into a new, modern era.… Read the rest here
Tag Archives: Central Asia
Shrinkage of the Aral Sea: Detrimental Effects
Elizabeth Lowman
When the Bolsheviks came to power in 1917, their rule was marked by the desire to control everything, including nature. What resulted is what demographers Murray Feshbach and Alfred Friendly referred to as “a sixty-year pattern of ecocide by design.”[1] Ecocide is the practice of destroying an environment’s ecosystems. Alternatively, sustainability is the practice of taking no more from the environment than can later be replaced. The Soviet Union abandoned the idea of giving back to the earth by taking as much as they could to make a profit.… Read the rest here
Shrinkage of the Aral Sea
My final report is about the shrinkage of the Aral Sea. I will be concentrating on four points. The first point is the cause of the shrinkage of the Aral Sea. I will discuss how the Soviets in Moscow wanted to harvest great quantities of cotton from Central Asia. In order to do this, they used the Aral Sea for irrigation to such an extent that the sea’s area shrank by 44%. This caused many health and environmental consequences for Central Asia.… Read the rest here