Houses made from wool that warm in the depths of winter, carpets that tell stories, woven bands that appease ancestors, embroideries that ward off evil, and kilims that store kitchenware, with everything ready to be packed and carried on yak, or camel at a moment’s notice. The little-known nomadic textile cultures of the Kyrgyz, Turkmen and Karakalpak are explored in this lecture, along with Stalin’s destruction of nomadism and the few places where nomads still live in post-Soviet Central Asia. Chris Aslan talks about his own experience of working with nomadic yak herders in the High Pamirs, and the challenges of teaching them to comb their yaks for their cashmere-like down.
Saturday, January 10, 2026 – 10 am PT / 1 pm ET / 6 pm GMT – London
Virtual: Free webinar
Registration required: https://tinyurl.com/TMAYakTsarg
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Image: Central Asian Yurt Textiles and frame
