Afghanistan: a Middle Eastern or Central Asian Country?

[Vesuvian Sky]

Centcom definition of ME:



Crazy how Kaz-stan gets lumped in and a few others. Goes to show how arbitrary and politcal cartography can get depending on situation.

A-stan is a victim of current events in relation to how it is defined geographically rather then by actual spatial or cultural considerations put into play.

This is nothing new though for the country.

[Vesuvian Sky]

After googling S. Asian, this what pops up:



Quite a few maps include not only A-stan but also Tajikistan as a South Asian country. This in some regards may be more appropriate then it classed as an ME country.

Less maps define A-stan as ME then C. Asian or S. Asian it seems.

[riverman]

Voted South Asian, but could be Central Asian too IMO.

[Anglojew]

It's a border region between the Middle-East, the Sub-continent and Central Asia.

[Dynamo]

Afghanistan is right in the middle, but personally as an afghan I feel more middle eastern than Central Asian. Keep in mind Central Asians also include Kazakhs and other heavy mongoloid influenced people. Most afggans are tajiks and pashtuns who are both caucasian and share similar phenotypes to other western asians, culturally however, I would say we are a blend between Central asian and Middle Eastern. Language, well we speak Farsi and Pashto, iranic language which shares similarity with Kurds, Persians and other western asians. Historically, we've been part of Persia for a very long time. I don't why South asian is added because I though the "sub continent" ended In Pakistan? That's strange.

Closest populations genetically based on fst distances are iranians, Caucasians, Central asians( Tajiks, Uzbeks, turkmens), turks and northwest Pakistanis.

http://www.theapricity.com/forum/sho...dmixture-graph

[Dynamo]

Some Turkic groups are in Afghanistan though.

Also, Zoroastianism, the official state religion of the Persians is said to have developed in Afghanistan/Tajikistan. Some prehistorians even look towards the development of Indo-Iranian language family as occurring in C. Asia.

They make up a minority

[Dynamo]

After googling S. Asian, this what pops up:



Quite a few maps include not only A-stan but also Tajikistan as a South Asian country. This in some regards may be more appropriate then it classed as an ME country.

Less maps define A-stan as ME then C. Asian or S. Asian it seems.

Why is it more appropriate? Lol

[Vesuvian Sky]

Why is it more appropriate? Lol

Some regards more appropriate since cultural overlap is shared with Pakistan:

The current territories of Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka and Pakistan form the core countries of South Asia, while Nepal, Bhutan, Afghanistan, and Maldives are generally included. By various deviating definitions based on often substantially different reasons, the British Indian Ocean Territory, Maldives, Iran and the Tibet Autonomous Region are included as well. With the 7 core countries considered, South Asia is home to well over one fifth of the world's population, making it both the most populous and the most densely populated geographical region in the world.[2] The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation is an economic cooperation organisation in the region which was established in 1985.[3]

[blogen]

Historically the Hindukush was the borderline between the South and Central Asia. The Middle Eastern influence is weak here, but exist.

[Vesuvian Sky]

They make up a minority

Yeah I know. And at one time Turco-Mongol types ruled over the entire area:

Timur (Persian: تیمور‎ Timūr, Chagatai: Temür; d. 18 February 1405), historically known as Tamerlane[1] (Persian: تيمور لنگ‎ Timūr(-e) Lang, "Timur the Lame"), was a Turko-Mongol conqueror and the founder of the Timurid dynasty in Central Asia.[2] Born into the Barlas confederation in Transoxiana during the 1320s or 1330s, he gained control of Western Chagatai Khanate by 1370. From that base, he led military campaigns across West, South and Central Asia and emerged as the most powerful ruler in the Muslim world after defeating the Mamluks of Egypt and Syria, the emerging Ottoman Empire and the declining Sultanate of Delhi. From these conquests he founded the Timurid Empire, although it fragmented shortly after his death. He is considered the last of the great nomadic conquerors of the Eurasian steppe, and his empire set the stage for rise of the more structured and lasting gunpowder empires in the 1500s and 1600s.[3][4]:1