Central Asian post-independence media and communication industries, professional practices, education, persisting and evolving values, and traditions remain critically understudied with a notable scarcity of research and scholarly publications on the complex and increasingly changing communicative ecology landscape of this region. Mapping the Media and Communication Landscape of Central Asia: An Anthology of Emerging and Contemporary Issues addresses this gap in literature by exploring, analyzing, and shedding light to the field, practice, research and critical inquiry of media and mass communication in four countries in Central Asia—Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan. This book includes local authors as well as new and emerging researchers from this region to contextualize the issues explored and provide a supportive dialogue between different points of view.

Central Peripheries explores post-Soviet Central Asia through the prism of nation-building. Although relative latecomers on the international scene, the Central Asian states see themselves as globalized, and yet in spite of – or perhaps precisely because of – this, they hold a very classical vision of the nation-state, rejecting the abolition of boundaries and the theory of the ‘death of the nation’. Their unabashed celebration of very classical nationhoods built on post-modern premises challenges the Western view of nationalism as a dying ideology that ought to have been transcended by post-national cosmopolitanism. Marlene Laruelle looks at how states in the region have been navigating the construction of a nation in a post-imperial context where Russia remains the dominant power and cultural reference. She takes into consideration the ways in which the Soviet past has influenced the construction of national storylines, as well as the diversity of each state’s narratives and use of symbolic politics. Exploring state discourses, academic narratives and different forms of popular nationalist storytelling allows Laruelle to depict the complex construction of the national pantheon in the three decades since independence. The second half of the book focuses on Kazakhstan as the most hybrid national construction and a unique case study of nationhood in Eurasia. Based on the principle that only multidisciplinarity can help us to untangle the puzzle of nationhood, Central Peripheries uses mixed methods, combining political science, intellectual history, sociology and cultural anthropology. It is inspired by two decades of fieldwork in the region and a deep knowledge of the region’s academia and political environment. Praise for Central Peripheries ‘Marlene Laruelle paves the way to the more focused and necessary outlook on Central Asia, a region that is not a periphery but a central space for emerging conceptual debates and complexities. Above all, the book is a product of Laruelle's trademark excellence in balancing empirical depth with vigorous theoretical advancements.’ – Diana T. Kudaibergenova, University of Cambridge ‘Using the concept of hybridity, Laruelle explores the multitude of historical, political and geopolitical factors that predetermine different ways of looking at nations and various configurations of nation-building in post-Soviet Central Asia. Those manifold contexts present a general picture of the transformation that the former southern periphery of the USSR has been going through in the past decades.’ – Sergey Abashin, European University at St Petersburg

This book provides a profound geographical description and analysis of Central Asia. The authors take a synthetic approach in a period of critical transformation in the post-soviet time. The monograph analyzes comprehensively the physical and human geography as well as human-nature interactions of Central Asia with focus on Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Natural processes are described at a systemic scale, focusing on ecological impacts and consequences and contemporary human adaptations and organization. It also discusses in which ways the human organizations try to apply solutions for their needs such as security, territorial management and resources renewability, material and functional needs, identity elaborations, culture and communication. The Geography of Central Asia appeals to scientists and students of regional geography and interested academics from other areas such as social, political, economic and environmental studies within the context of Central Asia. The book is also a very useful resource for field trips into this area.

This volume is a compilation of studies on interactions of changes in land cover, land use and climate with people, societies and ecosystems in drylands of Greater Central Asia. It explores the effects of collapse of socialist governance and management systems on land use in various parts of Central Asia, including former Soviet Union republics, Mongolia and northern drylands of China. Often, regional land-atmosphere feedbacks may have large global importance. Remote sensing is a primary tool in studying vast dryland territories where in situ observations are sporadic. State-of-the-art methods of satellite remote sensing combined with GIS and models are used to tackle science questions and provide an outlook of current changes at land surface and potential scenarios for the future. In 10 chapters, contributing authors cover topics such as water resources, effects of institutional changes on urban centers and agriculture, landscape dynamics, and the primary drivers of environmental changes in dryland environment. Satellite observations that have accumulated during the last five decades provide a rich time series of the dynamic land surface, enabling systematic analysis of changes in land cover and land use from space. The book is a truly international effort by a team of scientists from the U.S., Europe and Central Asia. It is directed at the broad science community including graduate students, academics and other professionals at all levels within natural and social sciences. In particular, it will appeal to geographers, environmental and social scientists, economists, agricultural scientists, and remote sensing specialists.

In Media in New Turkey, Bilge Yesil unlocks the complexities surrounding and penetrating today's Turkish media. Yesil focuses on a convergence of global and domestic forces that range from the 1980 military coup to globalization's inroads and the recent resurgence of political Islam. Her analysis foregrounds how these and other forces become intertwined, and she uses Turkey's media to unpack the ever-more-complex relationships. Yesil confronts essential questions regarding: the role of the state and military in building the structures that shaped Turkey's media system; media adaptations to ever-shifting contours of political and economic power; how the far-flung economic interests of media conglomerates leave them vulnerable to state pressure; and the ways Turkey's politicized judiciary criminalizes certain speech. Drawing on local knowledge and a wealth of Turkish sources, Yesil provides an engrossing look at the fault lines carved by authoritarianism, tradition, neoliberal reform, and globalization within Turkey's increasingly far-reaching media.

In the last decade, the Chinese media have imposed themselves in the global arena and have started to become a reference point, in business and cultural terms, for other national media systems. This book explores how the global media landscape was changed by this revolutionary trend, and why and how China is now playing a key role in guiding it. It is, on the one hand, a book on how the Chinese media system continues to take inspiration and to be shaped (or remapped) by American, European and Asian media companies, and, on the other, a volume on the ways in which recent Chinese media’s “going out” strategy is remapping the global media landscape. Organised into two sections, this book has eight chapters written by American, Chinese and European scholars. Focusing on different markets (such as the movie industry, the press, broadcasting, and the Internet), different regions and different actors (from Donald Trump to the Tanzania-Zambia Railway to journalists), this book provides a fresh interpretation on the main changes China has brought to the global media landscape.

This handbook-style edited volume discusses historical, but predominantly current political, economic, and societal trends in Central Asia comprising Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan. The five countries exhibit many cultural and historical commonalities and face similar internal and external challenges. Despite different transformation paths and frequent intra-regional tensions, a common regional identity has emerged in the countries since gaining their independence in 1991. Besides covering their political systems, a variety of topics such as human rights, media, terrorism, and civil society are addressed. As well, bilateral relations with seven external actors are examined. Lastly, the authors explore the opportunities and limitations of institutionalized regional cooperation in various fields of action.