THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN TERMA AND DOSTON IN THE SURKHANDARYA EPIC SCHOOL

Abstract

This article examines the artistic, compositional, functional and performative relationship between terma and doston in the Surkhandarya epic school, one of the most distinctive regional traditions of Uzbek oral epic culture. The study proceeds from the premise that terma and doston should not be interpreted as mechanically isolated folklore genres, because in the living repertoire of the bakhshi they operate as two interdependent layers of one epic-performing system. Terma prepares the performer, gathers the attention of the audience, opens the moral and emotional field of the gathering, and frequently functions as a condensed poetic expression of the same worldview that later unfolds in the large-scale narrative structure of the doston. Doston, in turn, expands the thematic seed of terma into a full narrative universe with heroes, trials, conflicts, journeys, lyrical monologues and ethical resolution. UNESCO describes bakhshi art as the performance of epic stories with traditional musical accompaniment, and the state cultural policy of Uzbekistan emphasizes the scientific study, preservation and popularization of bakhshi art, dostons and folk termas [1; 2]. Within the Surkhandarya environment, especially the Boysun-Sherobod line of epic performance, the relation between terma and doston appears through introductory performance, repertoire memory, ethical commentary, musical transition, improvisational testing, social communication and intergenerational transmission through the ustoz-shogird tradition. The article argues that terma is not only a preliminary song before the doston, but also a semantic and structural key to the epic universe of the Surkhandarya bakhshi. It compresses moral codes, regional speech, melodic identity, poetic formulae and performer authority into a mobile form. Therefore, the artistic-compositional specificity of the Surkhandarya epic school cannot be fully understood without analyzing how terma enters, frames, supports and sometimes reinterprets doston performance.