Afghanistan Dispossessed

- Blurb -

How does normal social, cultural, religious life survive in constant turmoil? How can the people flourish? These basic questions are examined and answered by Razia Sultanova' s academic analysis and deep fieldwork, with extensive eye-witness and personal contacts and conversations with a wide variety of Afghan men and women. She looks at basic questions of gender, identity, nation, tradition, history, popular culture and especially the role of music - classical, popular, modern and contemporary - as a vital element for survival. And all is over-shadowed by the Taliban with on-going threat of terror and repression especially for women and girls. Here is a classical story of a people' s struggle for everyday normality and preservation of cherished traditions in a war-torn society. AUTHOR: Dr Raza Sultanova is a musicologist and social scientist with an international reputation. She graduated from the Uzbek State Conservatory and her PhD is from Moscow State Conservatory. She was a Research Fellow at Goldsmith' s College and the School of Oriental and African Studies in the University of London. She is Visiting Professor at Charles University, Prague, Chair of ICTM SG on Global Music, Editor-in-Chief of Encyclopaedia of the Turkic-Speaking World, Research Fellow, Sarajevo University, Research Fellow, University College, Cork, and Research Fellow, Cambridge Muslim College. She authored major studies including From Shamanism to Sufism: Women, Islam and Culture in Central Asia; On the Ruins of Empire: Central Asia migrant' s music in 21st century Russian metropolises; Why Women Sing: Female performance in traditional societies; The non-Russian sound of post-Soviet Moscow. 16 b/w illustrations