With some twelve million inhabitants, the Ferghana valley is one of the most densely populated places in the world. It is also the most volatile region of formerly Soviet Central Asia. Not only is the area ethnically and linguistically diverse, it is politically divided, with parts ruled by three different states--Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and the Kyrgyz Republic--whose distant capital cities all relegate Ferghana to their respective peripheries. These complexities make a comprehensive, multidimensional understanding of the Ferghana region all the more elusive. In order to construct this analysis, the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute assembled an international, interdisciplinary team of experts on the region. Their carefully planned, collaboratively authored chapters cover the historical and topical terrain with unmatched depth and breadth and balance. --Publisher description.