Michael R. Drompp on 'Mutability in the Elite Power Structure of the Early Turks'. That is, attempts to schematize that structure have missed the flexibility.
Peter B. Golden on 'The Qipchac... An Example of Stateless Adaptation in the Steppes'. Statelessness as the norm -- more so in the west, without China to trigger creation of states.
Ruth Dunnell on 'The Fall of the Xia Empire'. Tangut-steppe interaction in greater detail than I have seen from Ruth Dunnell (the expert on Tangut) elsewhere.
Elizabeth Endicott-West on 'Aspects of Khitan Liao and Mongolian Yuan Imperial Rule'. Rejection of Chinese court ritual and the persistence of an Inner Asian identity in both.
Dru C. Gladney on 'The Ethnogenesis of the Uighur'. Uighur identity from origins to present day -- in abeyance for 500 years. How ethnic identities work/are created. ('Ogre' comes from 'Uighur'? Are they kidding? I'll go look that up.)