Foreword

Summary

Dr Shabana Shamaas Gul Khattak is the proud daughter of a proud and noble people. Her tribe, the Khattak, belongs to one of the largest and most celebrated ethnic groups in the world, the Pukhtun. They live in one of the most inaccessible areas of the world, yet in terms of geo-political location a vital region of Asia. The Pukhtun have produced ruling dynasties and in modern times presidents of major nations like India and Pakistan. The region has invariably attracted high-quality writing. From the very start of the British-Pukhtun encounter, there was a detailed study by Mountstuart Elphinstone. Other colonial officers fascinated by the Pukhtun wrote monographs that have lasted, and these include names like Sir Evelyn Howell and Sir Olaf Caroe. There were of course novelists writing about this area and its people. Rudyard Kipling's Kim features a dashing, though stereotypical, Pukhtun horse trader, and the novels of John Masters feature Pukhtun tribesmen. After the creation of Pakistan in 1947, this region continued to attract fine writers. Leading anthropologists like Frederick Barth, Andre Singer and Charles Lindholm contributed to Pukhtun studies. There is the popular Pashtun Tales from the Pakistan-Afghan frontier by Aisha Ahmad and Roger Boase. Sahibzada Riaz Noor and Ijaz Rahim, two outstanding officers and poets, have written extensively on the people and area. Another civil servant, Gulam Qadir Khan Daur, has written a powerful book on his tribe in Waziristan.

In spite of limited access to educational facilities and living in a patriarchal society, the area has also recently produced some high-quality scholarship by female Pukhtuna associated with the region. Dr Amineh Hoti obtained her PhD from Cambridge University studying Yusufzai women in Swat and Mardan, and Dr Faryal Leghari recently got her PhD from Oxford University based on her work in Waziristan. Amineh is the great-granddaughter of the Wali of Swat, and Faryal's mother was from Mardan. Malala Yusufzai, is also from Swat and has written and spoken extensively about the area.