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The Single Story: How to Avoid Stereotypes of Uzbekistan

ID # 3762

Asia, Uzbekistan

Images in the news, popular media, and school textbooks rarely include the country of Uzbekistan but if they do, they tend to put it in a category of former Soviet Union Republics, Central Asia, or “all countries ending with “stan”.

However, there are countries such Afghanistan and Pakistan that have nothing to do with Soviet Union, Central Asia is big and each country is unique and people do not look all alike as it usually perceived, each of the countries’ people come from different backgrounds and had a different influence from other dominant culture at the time throughout the history.

Throughout the years, I noticed that only a few people in USA ever heard about Uzbekistan and if they did usually they are either European students, college students majoring in Asian Studies, or college professors.

The typical things they associate with Uzbekistan is: a country from Borat movie “Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borat), “Russia” or “Pakistan”, that poor country in Central Asia with a dictator and economically undeveloped (http://christianaidmission.wordpress.com/2012/01/19/freedom-and-uzbekistan-two-words-that-dont-go-hand-in-hand/).

Honestly, I think due to the fact that Central Asian region and especially Uzbekistan is rarely taught at schools, little is known about the people and it is just easier to put it into a big category of former USSR, “stans”, and Central Asia. This is why I decided it is important to address common issues that occur in the process of teaching about Uzbekistan, how to improve them, and avoid the “single story”.

  • When teaching about Uzbekistan it is important to mention its historic background besides being occupied by Soviet Russia, it had a history before and was influenced by other cultures such Turkish, Mongolian, and Persian, it has a history after its independence.

Its historic background brings many ethnic groups to the country, you might be Uzbek but you look completely different than another Uzbek. People’s skin color, features, and first language they learned all depend on their families’ background. Here is the useful link about Uzbekistan Society and Culture: http://www.mapsofworld.com/uzbekistan/society-and-culture/

  • Uzbekistan is not like all “stans”. Each Republic in Central Asia is unique in its own way, talk about food, dances, music, and compare to others but also show that people there also love Rihanna, Jay-Z and classical music from Western Europe. Tell different stories, there might be conservative believers like in each country in the world but there are also people that live just like Western families, travel, send their children to schools abroad, and learn many languages besides its own.
  • Because it is Central Asia, it does not mean it is uneducated and economically undeveloped. There are always many sides to the story, an American might think that the life there is not good according to the media and certain stories, but you as a teacher should show pictures and stories of all classes from poor to middle to upper class.

For example, it is important to show how different people live, where they shop, where they go to school to, where they work. Show different buildings, markets, and entertainment places.

There are many stories about Uzbekistan but here is a link to one of them. A documentary made by BBC World on Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. It is a great video to watch during your free time but remember it is only one side of the story!

 

Created By

Ruksona Usmanova

Hi, everyone! My name is Ruksona Usmanova and I am a junior at UNC-Chapel Hill, double majoring in Global Studies with the concentration in Economics and European Union Intergration. I was born in Tashkent, Uzbekistan and lived there until I was 14.

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