A major impetus was given to scholarly research in Tajikistan first with the founding of the Tajik Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in 1924 and then in 1929 with the creation of the Tajik Soviet Socialist Republic. This is particularly true in the field of oriental studies, but before we survey the modern state of the field in the Republic, it is worth casting a glance back over the previous centuries during which scholarship evolved.

The traditions of Tajik orientalism are rooted in the long, rich sociopolitical history of the peoples of Central Asia. The formation and development of Tajik orientalism in all its manifold aspects -- historical, geographical, philosophical, socio-economic, ethnic, and linguistic -- went hand in hand with the formation of a Tajik state system, and with the spread of the Farsi-Dari (Tajik) language throughout the regions of Mawarannahr and Khurasan as the main component of the national culture of the Tajik people.