Bishkek: Central Asian Studies

RUSS 193/293/393/403 Russian as a Second Language
Russian is a lingua franca for politics and business in Central Asia and thus forms the foundation for Central Asian Studies. Small, intensive classes focus on reading, writing, grammar, speaking, comprehension, and phonetics.
12 credits

CA-371: The New Great Game
You will gain an overview of the New Great Game as a renewed struggle for hegemony and control over natural resources and geopolitical positioning in Central Asia between competing global powers, the Central Asian republics themselves, and neighboring states.
3 credits

CA-372: Understanding Central Asia
You will take a broad overview of the cultural, social, historical, and religious dimensions of Central Asia, including Afghanistan. Attention is given to the media, civil society, gender, and religious environment in these countries.
3 credits

Required

Identity and Ethnicity in Central Asia
Examine cultural elements that unite and divide society in modern Central Asia. Overview the ethnic and social divisions in Central Asia and understand their historical roots and modern issues such as clan structure. Explore identity formation in modern Kyrgyzstan, including an overview of the Kyrgyz language as well as traditional Kyrgyz foods, holidays, music, and storytelling. Meet locals and experience the cultural elements first-hand through workshops, guest lectures, and field trips. Encompassed in this course are the mountain horse trek and travel to Uzbekistan.
3 credits

****

Electives (choose one)

RUSS 193/293/393/403 Russian as a Second Language
Russian is a lingua franca for politics and business in Central Asia and thus forms the foundation for Central Asian Studies. Small, intensive classes focus on reading, writing, grammar, speaking, comprehension, and phonetics.
6-week Summer (3 credits); 10-week Summer (9 credits);

Linguistic Anthropology in Central Asia
This course offers an introduction to the foundational relationship between language and culture by examining anthropological approaches to the study of language. Learn how language both reflects and creates thought, culture, and power relations. This course will offer a Kyrgyz-focus, covering all material in the Identity and Ethnicity in Central Asia course above. It will also overview how Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Tajik, Turkmen, and Uzbek are used in and are shaped by social, cultural, and individual processes to convey culture, thought, ethnicity, religion, status, and gender.
3 credits. Course is held in its entirety over the six-week period, meaning students on either time frame will take the full course.

Russian Language Electives
If you are at an intermediate language level (at least 300 level, meaning you've taken 4 semesters of Russian) or higher you can replace some of the language credits with any of the following Russian language electives:

• Political and Economic Language (3 credits)
• Literature and Film (3 credits)
• Russian in the Media (3 credits)
• Regional History (3 credits)

Central Asian Languages
It is also possible to replace some Russian language credits with the following Central Asian Language electives, available at all levels:

• Kyrgyz (3 credits)
• Tajik (3 credits)
• Uzbek (3 credits)
• Turkmen (3 credits)
• Kazakh (3 credits)

Fall/Spring: The semester program includes nearly three weeks of travel to Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and either Turkmenistan OR Tajikistan. This travel is designed to compliment your course work, showing you the major sites, but also the culture and how locals live.

Summer: The summer program includes two seven-day trips. One to Uzbekistan to see firsthand the highlights of Uzbek history and culture, and the second, a horse trek into the mountains of Kyrgyzstan to meet modern nomads and not only learn how they live, but to experience it yourself.

All Sessions: On this fully integrated cultural program, you will be given extensive background information on each event, encouraged to make notes or recordings, and will discuss the excursions afterwards in class and with your peer tutors. Gain more real-world experience from which to hear and absorb vocabulary, grammatical structures, and cultural information. Excursions have included:

1. Weekend trip to a Kyrgyz village for a yurt building ceremony
2. Walking tour of the city
3. Ata-Beiit Memorial to the Stalinist purges
4. Burana Tower (ruins of the medieval Karakhanid city of Balasagun)
5. Manas Ordo (memorial park to Manas, a Kyrgyz national hero)
6. Master classes (traditional crafts and/or cooking)
7. Seminars in understanding Central Asia (various locations and topics)
8. Ala-Archa National Park
9. Museum of Fine Arts
10. Historical Museum (ancient to modern local history)
11. Barskoon Waterfall (local landmark and nature)

--Housing

The semester program includes one month of home stay (inclusive of breakfast and supper) after which you move into the dormitory. You may extend your home stay at additional cost ($995 for the semester).

The summer program includes dormitory stay, with home stay an option at additional cost of $12/day (inclusive of breakfast and supper):

• Summer I (10 weeks): $850
• Summer II (6 weeks): $515

Dorms: LSLC has two dormitories. One is attached to the classroom building. The other is a 15-20 minute walk or short bus ride from class.

Home stays are anywhere from a 15- to 50-minute commute from class by public transport. Most Bishkek host families include children and, at times, extended family living under one roof, giving you wide opportunity for language practice and cultural interaction.

--Location

Central Asia is landlocked and sparsely populated. Yet, the area has been strategic for the powerful states that surround it for trade routes (such as the old and new Silk Roads) or as military buffer zones, attack routes, or supply lines (from the Mongols to the modern Middle East and Afghan conflicts). Despite diverse influences, parts of Central Asia were some of the last places on Earth to develop settled societies and even today, modern nomads and traditional lifestyles are not uncommon. Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, with its proud traditional culture, long history, and convenient travel routes to other Central Asian states, provides an excellent vantage for the study of this fascinating region.

Click here to read a short history of Bishkek up to the present day from GeoHistory.
Click here for a fuller discription of Central Asia from GeoHistory.
Click here to read more about what our students do while in Bishkek.

SRAS supports focused research and projects, such as for a capstone project or graduate studies. Support may be in the form of advising sessions, assistance navigating archives or other resources. In many cases this is at no additional cost, but eligibility requires submission of a research or project proposal, and expectations are that output or a modified version/extract of it will be in a form available for publishing in the SRAS Family of Sites. Minimum stay of 8 weeks required.

Informal volunteer opportunities are also possible if you want to be more involved with your local community abroad. We can connect you with opportunities to pursue independently at no cost.

This program is hosted by The London School of Languages and Cultures (LSLC) in Bishkek in cooperation with SRAS. LSLC was founded in 1998 and has a strong, internationally-recognized reputation. The School of Record for this program is University of Montana (Montana, USA).

Credit transfer to your home institution is usually possible. Additionally, a US School of Record means that your program is supported by and documented by an accredited US university. The School of Record will issue an American transcript, making credit transfer relatively routine.

For more on transcripts, credit transfer, and other academic issues, click here.

SRAS Home and Abroad Scholars can receive up to $10,000 toward fall and spring sessions of this program.

SRAS Challenge Grants are stackable grants that can provide up to $3,500 toward this program.

Other, non-SRAS funding sources may also be applicable to this program. SRAS provides a wide list of possible outside funding sources.

* Includes 2 meals per day during 30-day home stay period
** Estimate based on r.t. US East Coast departure.
***For more detail on living expenses in Bishkek, click here.