Silk Mirage: Through the Looking Glass in Uzbekistan by Joanna Lillis

A SSEES Politics and Sociology seminar with journalist and author Joanna Lillis

Journalist and author Joanna Lillis presents Silk Mirage, her new book on Uzbekistan, a country at the heart of the ancient Silk Road and nowadays the centre of a power struggle between reformers and reactionaries for the soul of this strategic land in Central Asia. In 2016, the long-ruling dictator Islam Karimov died, sparking a period of transformation under his reforming successor, Shavkat Mirziyoyev, dubbed the “Uzbek Spring”. But, as this book shows, spring has struggled to break through in one of the world’s most totalitarian states. A tale of both reform and repression, Silk Mirage weaves in the voices of Uzbeks living through these tumultuous times: from politicians to former political prisoners, from journalists to human rights crusaders, from entrepreneurs to environmentalists, from artists to architects, from silk-makers to carpet-weavers. Conjuring up Uzbekistan as a place full of life and loss, Silk Mirage gives a voice to courageous people who probe to find the cracks in an oppressive regime through which the light gets in.

Joanna Lillis

Journalist and author

is a Kazakhstan-based journalist and author writing about Central Asia who has lived and worked in the region since 2001, in Uzbekistan (2001-2005) and Kazakhstan (since 2005). Her reporting has featured in outlets including The Economist, the Guardian, the Independent, the Eurasianet website and Foreign Policy and POLITICO magazines. Prior to moving to Central Asia, she lived in Russia and worked for BBC Monitoring, the BBC World Service’s global media tracking service.