The dance traditions of present-day Uzbekistan have been enriched by numerous cultures over the centuries because of the its central locations on the Silk Road, the ancient network of trade routes which linked China with the Mediterranean.

Once known as Bactria, Transoxiana, Maveranaher, and Turkestan, the area was first inhabited between 55,000 to 70,000 years ago. The ancient tribes that lived in Central Asia left petroglyphs, bas-reliefs, clay sculptures, and other artifacts depicting dancers and musicians. Later peoples continued to portray dancing figures in wooden and clay sculptures, wall paintings, ornaments and drawings on serving vessels of precious metal. Pictures dating from the first centuries A.D. reflect religious, mythological, and secular subjects in which dancing figures played an important part.

From the fourth to eighth centuries the professional dancers of Samarkand, Bukhara and Tashkent were so widely known that they were in demand at the court of the Chinese emperor. The Arab invasion of Central Asia in the 7th century and adoption of Islam promoted sexual segregation and the practice of veiling. Women danced for each other in the ich kari, or women's quarters. Public performances of dance were the domain of the batcha or dancing boy, who dressed in women's clothing, wore make-up, and mimicked female ways. A notable exception to this practice were the female court dancers depicted in miniature paintings which illustrated manuscripts produced in this area from the middle ages until the nineteenth century.

The surviving dance heritage of the Uzbek people includes both folklore and professional traditions. Folk dances fall into two general categories: dances performed at a specific time and linked to specific occasions, and dances performed at any time for entertainment.

The first group consists of ritual dances performed at festivals associated with the seasons of the year and reflecting mankind's relationship with nature. Especially popular were the songs and dances devoted to the pre-Islamic festival which takes place on the spring equinox. In addition to the all-night ritual of stirring a large cauldron to make sumalak, a special dish made from seven grains, festivities also included suskhotin, a dance asking for rain and majnun tal a dance by girls with fluffy willow buds woven into their braids. Other folk dances depict daily chores, seasonal work, or important events. Some dances relate to ceremonies such as wedding and funeral dances. Vestiges of Central Asian shamanism can be linked to the incantational dances of medicine men and fortune tellers which were still common at the beginning of the twentieth century. Also still performed is the zikr , a Sufi ritual in which dancers travel in a circle with repetitive movements accompanied by chanting and percussion in order to reach a meditative state.

Entertainment dances include koshuk and kairok-ufari, each distinctive to a particular area and featuring the playing of kairok, or castanets made from smooth, flat river stones or metal. Lapar is a duet to sung couplets; yalla is a solo dance accompanied by song. Gul Ufari (jocular rhythms) or khaivonlar-ufari (animal rhythms) are sometimes obvious pantomimes illustrating the habits of animals, birds, or fish; at other times they are sophisticated dances representing the stylized images of wild or domesticated animals.

Uzbek dance is characterized by intricate arm and hand movements, a variety of spins and turns, backbends, shoulder isolations and animated facial expressions. Often portions of the dance are performed while kneeling on the floor. Footwork is relatively simple; high leaps and pelvic isolations are absent from the traditional dance. The primary dancing is done by women and girls. Musical accompaniment takes many forms, varying from purely rhythmic structures and melodies of a narrow tonal range performed by a single percussion instrument or two-stringed instruments, to classical maqom (complex compositions of many parts), to works performed by a large orchestra of folk instruments with singers.

The professional dance tradition falls into three categories. The first includes raqs, oyin, and ufari, technically sophisticated dances performed by virtuoso who may improvise on their patterns. The second group is gul ufari, the humorous, imitative form developed by dancers of the Uzbek theatre of Maskharaboz. The third category consists of dances preformed by traditional circus artists that include various acrobatic stunts. Three regional styles of Uzbek dance, each of which has clearly defined forms and systems of training, developed in the separate political entities which existed in the Turkestan prior to its incorporation into the Soviet Union. The Khanate of Kokand in the Ferghana Valley, the Khanate of Khiva in the Khorezm region, and the Emirate of Bukhara produced Ferghana, Khorezm, and Bukharan styles respectively. The most lyrical of the three schools, Ferghana dance is characterized by intricate wrist circles and undulations of the hands and arms with pliant use of the spine and a shy, yet playful, demeanor. Khorezm dances often feature trembling of the hands and torso, frequent head slides and comic elements. The most popular of Khorezm dances, lazgi, was originally a healing dance.

Dances from Bukhara feature a proud carriage and the juxtaposition of soft, undulating movements with crisp, stacco motions. The Bukharan genre is the most acrobatic of the three, often requiring fast spins, sudden drops to the floor, and deep backbends, Expanded contact with the outside world, especially in the 1980s, encouraged Western dance forms to flourish in the Uzbekistan, including ballroom dance and American break-dance, aerobics, and hip-hop. Cultural exchange, most notably through the sister-city relationship between Tashkent and Seattle, resulted in an increased interest in Uzbek dance abroad with non-Uzbeks in the United States and Europe studying and performing traditional choreographies. In 1985, the Uzbek Dance Society was founded in the United States to preserve and promote Central Asian culture. The name was later expanded to its present form, the Uzbek Dance and Culture Society, to reflect the more inclusive nature of its activities.

copyright 1995, 2009, 2013, and 2015 by Laurel Victoria Gray