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Inner Asia refers to the northern and regions spanning North Asia, Central Asia, and East Asia. It includes parts of Western China and northeast China, as well as southern Siberia. The area overlaps with some definitions of "Central Asia", mostly the historical ones, but certain regions that are often included in Inner Asia, such as Iran, are not a part of Central Asia by any of its definitions. Inner Asia may be regarded as the western and northern "frontier" of China proper and as being bounded by East Asia proper, which consists of China proper, Japan and Korea.
The extent of Inner Asia has been understood differently in different periods. "Inner Asia" is sometimes contrasted to "China proper", that is, the territories originally unified under the Qin dynasty with majority identifying their ethnicity as Han Chinese populations. By the year 1800, Chinese Inner Asia consisted of the Tibetan Plateau, Xinjiang and Mongolian Plateau. They were governed through administrative structures different from those of the older Chinese provinces.The Cambridge History of China: Volume 10, Part 1, by John K. Fairbank, p37 The frontier regions of China proper are also sometimes included as part of Inner Asia.
Some scholars or historians use the term "Inner Asia" to describe territories outside of Chinese speaking proper, New Qing Imperial History: The Making of Inner Asian Empire at Qing Chengde, ed. Ruth W. Dunnell, Mark C. Elliott, Philippe Foret and James A. Millward although previous empires like the Han dynasty, Tang dynasty and Ming dynasty also expanded their realms and influences into Inner Asia.
According to Morris Rossabi, Inner Asia is composed not only of the five Central Asian countries, which includes Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan, but also includes western and northern China, Iran, Mongolia, Afghanistan.
The Committee on Inner Asian and Altaic Studies of Harvard University defines Inner Asia as a region consisting of West Turkestan, East Turkestan (i.e., Xinjiang), Eastern Iran, Northern Pakistan, Afghanistan, Tibet, Qinghai, Sichuan, Gansu and northwestern Yunnan.
The Mongolia and Inner Asia Studies Unit at the University of Cambridge defines Inner Asia as "an area centred on Mongolia and extending across the region of Eurasian Steppe to the Himalayas", including Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, East Turkestan, Tibet, Qinghai, Gansu, Sichuan, Yunnan, Nepal, Sikkim, Bhutan, Inner Mongolia, Liaoning, Jilin, Heilongjiang, Altai Republic, Tuva, Buryatia and Chita Oblast.
The terms meaning "Inner Asia" in the languages of Inner Asia itself are all modern translations of terms in European languages, mostly Russian.
The definition that can be given of Central Eurasia in space is negative. It is that part of the continent of Eurasia that lies beyond the borders of the great sedentary civilizations.... Although the area of Central Eurasia is subject to fluctuations, the general trend is that of diminution. With the territorial growth of the sedentary civilizations, their borderline extends and offers a larger surface on which new layers of barbarians will be deposited.
Aurel Stein's discoveries of Inner Asian antiquities contributed significantly to the knowledge of the civilizations of this region. In 1928, he published his 4-volume work entitled Innermost Asia: Detailed Report of Explorations in Central Asia, Kan-su and Eastern Iran, Carried Out and Described under the Orders of H.M. Indian Government. In 1940, the first academic chair for Inner Asian studies was established by Lajos Ligeti at the University of Budapest.
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