qaraqalpaq.com
This website, by David and Sue Richardson, is a good source of information about the people of Karakalpakstan, especially on textiles, national clothing, and yurts. The page appears to have been last updated in 2012.
A tiny shrimp is a lifeline for communities by the Aral Sea
This article, by Beyond Catastrophe’s Saxon Bosworth, provides an overview of brine shrimp or artemia in the West Aral and highlights the importance of this tiny creature for local livelihoods, aquaculture, and perhaps even as a food source.
Fish and Fur
Moynaq is know for what it used to be, a major fishing town. This old, poetic video shows that it also had a fur industry. Kate of the BC team came across the video in a local Telegram group Суратлардаги тарих, “history in pictures”. Translation of the Russian commentary in the video, by Gulzhan Yermekova:…
Mizdakhan Review
Next Stop Nukus (NSN) is a tourism and English language improvement project initiated through the Small Grants Program by the U.S. Embassy Tashkent Public Affairs Section (PAS) of the U.S. Department of State. The aim of NSN is to increase English language skills of university students and help develop the tourism industry within Karakalpakstan. Students…
Beyond Catastrophe logo competition: Winner Announcement
Contents Introduction 4th place: Shomurodova Zilola Kallibek 3rd place: Yuldashev Islambek Ikram 2nd place: Torejanov Islamjan Berdijan 1st place: Atanazarov Masharifboy Qadam Introduction On November 30th we announced the Seeing Beyond Catastrophe logo contest! We asked across social media for submissions of artwork that represent or imagine the future of the Aral Sea region. We…
Tigers to return to extinct Caspian tiger range
& what it means for global wildlife conservation
Hello! My name is Saxon. Thanks for joining us here on Beyond Catastrophe’s first “story”. I’m a documentary filmmaker currently producing a series about the future of the Aral Sea region, called Mission: Find Aral. Here, I would like to share a remarkable wildlife conservation story that I became aware of in my time living…
Environment and Post-Soviet Transformation in Kazakhstan’s Aral Sea Region: Sea Changes
Abstract: The Aral Sea is well known for its devastating regression over the second half of the twentieth century, and for its recent partial restoration. Environment and Post-Soviet Transformation in Kazakhstan’s Aral Sea Region is the first book to explore what these monumental changes have meant to those living on the sea’s shores. Following the…
Video: Aral: is there life after death?
This video explores the ways that the drying of the Aral Sea has created a new desert habitat and how ecologists can learn from this process. Have a look at some of the creatures in the Encyclopedia of Life. Russian with English subtitles [Warning: contains unsettling images and offensive language].
Conference paper: Incorporating Environmental Flows into Water Management in the Amudarya River Delta
“The goal of the presented work is to assess the vulnerability of the ecosystems of the Amudarya river delta and determine the flow regimes needed to maintain the provision of valuable ecosystem services. We identify several water management options to satisfy ecosystem water requirements within the water limits of the delta region and give an…
Journal article: The Benefits of Marginality: The Great Famine around the Aral Sea, 1930-1934
Abstract: Based on research in Kazakhstani and Russian archives, this article is a regional study of the 1931–1933 Soviet famine. It compares Soviet policies in the southern and northern “halves” of the Aral Sea region. While the Kazaks in the northern part of the region suffered from the famine, the Karakalpaks in the south did…
Book: Monitoring the Dried Seabed of the Aral Sea
This book contains the results of monitoring expeditions in fall 2019 and spring 2020, and compares these data to monitoring data that has been collected in the Aral Sea region since 1994. Areas covered include soil, hydrogeology and vegetation of the dried seabed.
Journal article: The Fluctuating Aral Sea: A Multidisciplinary-Based History of the Last Two Thousand Years
Abstract: The Aral Sea (an intracontinental saline lake in western Central Asia) is of great interest because of its rapid shrinkage during the last 50 years, which caused catastrophic environmental and socio-economic consequences for the region and its population. Geoscientists established the existence of similar multiple fast and deep lake level fluctuations in the past;…
Book: Pipe Dreams: Water and Empire in Central Asia’s Aral Sea Basin
Abstract: The drying up of the Aral Sea – a major environmental catastrophe of the late twentieth century – is deeply rooted in the dreams of the irrigation age of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a time when engineers, scientists, politicians, and entrepreneurs around the world united in the belief that universal scientific…
Journal article: Canals, Cotton, and the Limits of de-Colonization in Soviet Uzbekistan, 1924–1941
Abstract: Why were cotton monoculture and megalomaniac irrigation projects the outcome of the Soviet modernization policies in Uzbekistan? How were economic development and nationality policy related? Which results did policy implementation produce on the ground and within the Uzbek ruling elite? The article argues that these questions can be seen in a new light when…
