Living in the highlands of northeastern Afghanistan, rural Tajiks work as migrant farmers and herdsmen. Although they live in tribes, they seem to have little tribal organization. For example, many of them own their own land where they farm mostly wheat, barley, and grain. The more urbanized Tajiks often work as traders or as highly skilled artists. They live in villages of flat-roofed mud or stone houses.
Tajik men wear turbans over brightly embroidered caps while working in the fields.
Most Muslim women wear veils, but rural Tajik women prefer shawls. Those women living in cities usually wear sack-like dresses that cover them from head to toe. Preserving their values and traditions is very important to the Tajiks. They use folklore, folk songs, and folk dances to pass their celebrated customs on to the next generation. Most of them are Sunni Muslims of the Hanafi Sect, but there are a few Ismaili Shia Muslims living in the remote mountain areas.