Uzbekisation

Uzbekisation or Uzbekization is the process of forcing or inducing an Uzbek identity on people or cultural heritage through a variety of administrative means. The term refers to the specific forms of indigenisation (korenizacija) that took place in Uzbekistan during the process of national delimitation in Central Asia in the 1920s and early 1930s.

Ancient and medieval assimilation

Chagatai Khanate

Genghis Khan's son Chagatai Khan originally governed the khanate named after himself, spanned from Xinjiang to Khorasan, as part of the Mongol Empire. Overtime, the Khanate experienced Karlukification, in which giving birth to a distinctive culture that, while carrying Turco-Mongol traditions, became very much Karluk Turkified nation.

Khanate of Bukhara

The Shaybanids, also known as Uzbeks, were led by Muhammad Shaybani, and originally traced origin from the Kipchak people that had expelled the Timurids from Central Asia to gain control of Transoxiana. Once the Shaybanids came to dominate the region and founded the Khanate of Bukhara, they underwent massive Karlukification of their culture; by the 17th century, most Shaybanid Uzbeks and their descendant khanates (now known as Janids) were entirely assimilated to Karluk frameworks and reconciled with the Timurid dynasty in India by proclaiming themselves heirs and protectors of Timurid heritages.

Xinjiang

When Qing dynasty conquered the Dzungar Khanate in 1755, out of distrust for the nomadic people like Dzungars, Kazakhs and Kyrgyz, Qianlong Emperor triggered the Dzungar genocide to exterminate all nomadic people; the Uzbeks and Uyghurs of Altishahr took part in the mass slaughter of these nomads. The result was that nearly 80% of Dzungars, and an unknown (but high) number of Kazakhs and Kyrgyz perished; Qianlong later resettled these Uzbeks to Dzungarian basin once inhabited by these nomads, permanently exterminated Kipchak and Mongolian majoritarian presences in the region.

Kokand

The Khanate of Kokand was infamously oppressive of the Kipchak Kyrgyz and Kazakhs, viewing them with disdain as the Kokandi Uzbek rulers considered themselves civilised while Kipchaks as savage nomads. Muhammad Khudayar Khan ordered total persecution of all Kipchaks, be it Kazakhs or Kyrgyz, and to replace them with Karluk settlers.

Afghanistan and South Asia

The Timurid Empire had managed to dominate the whole Turan for more than a century, during which the Timurid rulers facilitated the transformation of Afghanistan's landscape originally from just Indo-Iranian Pashtuns and Tajiks with an increasing Karlukification, which centres like Herat and Kabul had become the centre of Chagatai literacy heritage. This also meant a large portion of Karluk Turks like the future Uzbeks, Uyghurs and, partly Hazaras, entered and dominated northern Afghanistan; today, Uzbeks constitute the third largest ethnic group in Afghanistan, after that of Pashtuns and Tajiks.

Karluk influence in South Asia is more subtle, via the Mughal Empire in India founded by Babur, often via various traditions (mostly Islamic) practised by the Mughal court, as well as architecture; at the same time, it also blended with local population, playing roles in the development of modern cultures of Pakistan, Bangladesh and India. Already by the 17th century, various European accounts, like François Bernier and Niccolao Manucci, referred to the Mughal rulers as "Uzbek", which was a misnomer though related to the Karlukification of the Shaybanids and descendants earlier in Central Asia.

Modern assimilation

Soviet era

Because of assimilation pressures that began in 1924 with the creation of the Uzbek SSR, ethnic Tajiks often chose to identify themselves as Uzbeks in population census forms and preferred to be registered as Uzbek in their passports, to avoid leaving the republic for the less‑developed agricultural and mountainous Tajikistan.

Post-Soviet era

After the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the term "Uzbekization" has been applied to the processes in Uzbekistan that reverse the results of Sovietization and Russification. Among these are restoring the importance of Uzbek language, which replaced the Russian language in obligatory education, promotion of Uzbek tradition and culture.[citation needed]

Karakalpakstan and Kazakh minorities

The Karakalpaks are Kipchak Turkic people, whose culture is closer to Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan than that of Uzbekistan. Uzbek government has sponsored multiple discriminatory policies against Karakalpaks, including forcible assimilation attempts.

Kazakh minorities have been historically treated better than Kyrgyz, Tajik or Karakalpak minorities. However, Kazakhs tend to be seen with distrust due to their nomadic life and thus sometimes suffer discrimination.

Tajik minorities

While official Uzbek statistics place the total Tajik population in Uzbekistan at about 5%, subjective expert estimates suggest that the Tajiks may account for as much as 25%-30% of the total population of the country.

In Kyrgyzstan

In 1990, a massive ethnic unrest broke out in Osh, after dispute between Kyrgyz herders and Uzbek sedentary farms slid into full-blown clashes.

The 2010 South Kyrgyzstan ethnic clashes, which occurred between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks, was started over the fear of Uzbekisation, which many Kyrgyz believed Uzbeks were trying to "take over" southern Kyrgyzstan.

See also

References

  1. ↑ "The Society for the Exploration of EurAsia / www.exploration-eurasia.com". www.exploration-eurasia.com. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  2. ↑ "THE HISTORY OF THE UZBEK LANGUAGE – тема научной статьи по языкознанию и литературоведению читайте бесплатно текст научно-исследовательской работы в электронной библиотеке КиберЛенинка". cyberleninka.ru. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  3. ↑ "11.9: The Khanate of Chagatai - Humanities LibreTexts". human.libretexts.org. 24 July 2019. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  4. ↑ The Shaybanids (Chapter 11) - A History of Inner Asia. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511991523.013. ISBN 978-0-521-65704-4. Retrieved 2026-10-15 – via www.cambridge.org.
  5. ↑ "The Shaybanids, Central Asia's last great dynasty - Blue Domes". bluedomes.net. 13 February 2020. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  6. ↑ Comstock-Skipp, Jaimee. "(PDF) Heroes of Legend, Heroes of History: Militant Manuscripts of the Shaybanid Uzbeks in Transoxiana | Jaimee Comstock-Skipp - Academia.edu". Archived from the original on 2022-08-02. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  7. ↑ Crowe, David M. (2014). War Crimes, Genocide, and Justice: A Global History. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 978-1137037015. Retrieved 22 April 2014.
  8. ↑ Perdue, Peter C. (2009). China Marches West: The Qing Conquest of Central Eurasia (reprint ed.). Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0674042025. Retrieved 22 April 2014.
  9. ↑ "Khanate of Abu'l - Khayr | Special projects". e-history.kz. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  10. ↑ "Национализмы в Средней Азии. В поисках идентичности - Абашин С.Н. - 2007". Archived from the original on 2025-05-14. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  11. ↑ "Kyrgyz Under the Rule of the Kokand Khanate » News of Kyrgyzstan, Bishkek and Osh — latest events today". open.kg. 25 May 2014. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  12. ↑ Kenoyer, J. Mark (2020). "Reviewed work: The Archaeology of Afghanistan: From Earliest Times to the Timurid Period (Revised and updated edition), F. R. Allchin, Warwick Ball, Norman Hammond". Asian Perspectives. 59 (2): 492–494. doi:10.1353/asi.2020.0028. JSTOR 27136704.
  13. ↑ Werner, Christoph (2007). "David J. Roxburgh. « the Timurid and Turkmen Dynasties of Iran, Afghanistan and Central Asia », in : David J. Roxburgh, ed., the Turks: A Journey of Thousand Years, 600-1600. London, Royal Academy of Arts, 2005, pp. 192-200 (192-259 with catalogue entries)". Abstracta Iranica. 28. doi:10.4000/abstractairanica.18071.
  14. ↑ "Uzbeks of northern Afghanistan: history of formation, socio-economic life, culture as a people". Archived from the original on 2025-08-21. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  15. ↑ "Imperial Continuities in the Mughal Empire – Haus Lilienfeld". erichlilienfeld.com. 12 January 2022. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  16. ↑ "THE GREAT MUGHAL EMPIRE - HISTORY MARG". www.historymarg.com. 23 October 2023. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  17. ↑ "IRVI - Indus River Valley Institute". indusrivervalley.org. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  18. ↑ "Travel Accounts of Bernier and Manucci | PDF | Mughal Empire". www.scribd.com. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  19. ↑ Rahim Masov, The History of the Clumsy Delimitation, Irfon Publ. House, Dushanbe, 1991 (in Russian). English translation: The History of a National Catastrophe, transl. Iraj Bashiri, 1996.
  20. ↑ "World Directory of Minorities and Indigenous Peoples - Uzbekistan : Karakalpaks | Refworld". June 2018. Archived from the original on 2025-02-09. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  21. ↑ "GreenNet | Internet services, web design and hosting for activists". www.equalrightstrust.org. Retrieved 2026-10-15.
  22. ↑ "Results of population censuses in Uzbekistan in 1959, 1970, 1979, and 1989". Archived from the original on 2008-06-20. Retrieved 2008-06-09.
  23. ↑ CIA World Factbook: Uzbekistan (1996 est.)
  24. ↑ Richard Foltz, "The Tajiks of Uzbekistan", Central Asian Survey, 15(2), 213-216 (1996).
  25. ↑ "Pogroms in Kyrgyzstan" (PDF). International Crisis Group. 23 August 2010. p. 1. Archived from the original (PDF) on 3 April 2012. Retrieved 8 October 2012.
  26. ↑ "Uzbeks of Kyrgyzstan complain of discrimination and corruption". Eurasianet. 30 January 2006. Archived from the original on 29 February 2012. Retrieved 9 October 2012.