Connected Histories in Central Asia

202021 marks the publication of three groundbreaking works, inaugurating a new wave of scholarship on Central Asia. These books turn to sources that have often been overlooked, and introduce new critical approaches to questions around sovereignty, state, and religion. Despite their varying focus, each of these works recover the lost18th century as a pivotal era, challenging the notion of political and intellectual decline or isolation of Central Asian from this period onwards. They explore ideas of connected histories, offering novel ways of conceptualizing the Persianate as an integrated cultural space and object of historical inquiry. The authors will introduce their works, and discuss new directions in Central Asian regional history. The books discussed here include Scott Levis The Bukharan Crisis: A Connected History of 18th Century Central Asia (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020), James Picketts Polymaths of Islam: Power and Networks of Knowledge in Central Asia (Cornell University Press, 2020)