Uzbekistan: A modernizing society

When it rains, it pours. Orbis has just published my scholarly article, "Uzbekistan: A modernizing society". Here's the money quote:

Underestimating Uzbekistan's legacy of modernist secularism, Americans often stereotype the nation as one of the poor and backward '-stans.' Many Central Asia analysts accept at face value nationalist, pan-Turkic, or Islamist versions of the region's past, dismissing as inauthentic anything that is modern, Western, or familiar. Focusing on the exotic or (in the case of the Fergana Valley) dangerous, they foster misperceptions about the character of Uzbekistan that result in flawed policies.

Click on Registan.net to read the whole thing.