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This study explores how Tibetans manoeuvre within two contradictory value systems - those of old Tibet and the new People's Republic of China - balancing between ideals and pragmatism. More specifically, it asks how it is that the social categories of pre-communist Lhasa persist and are relevant in daily life despite decades of Chinese rule and the comprehensive restructuring of Tibetan society.
Introduction -- The return of polyandry -- Trajectories into houses -- Fraternal relations -- Female roles -- The house as ritual space -- Moral networks and enduring hierarchies -- Conclusion -- Epilogue -- Appendix. Timeline -- Glossary of Tibetan terms.
Revival of religious practices of all sorts in China, after decades of systematic government suppression, is a topic of considerable interest to scholars in disciplines ranging from religious studies to anthropology to political science. This book examines contemporary religious practices among the Premi people of the Sichuan-Yunnan-Tibet area, a group of about 60,000 who speak a language belonging to the Qiang branch of Tibeto-Burman. Koen Wellens's ethnographic research in two Premi communities on opposite sides of the border, and his analysis of available historical documents, find multiple advocates and rationales for the revival of both formal Tibetan Buddhism and the indigenous Premi p...
The state of Tibetan culture within contemporary China is a highly politicized topic on which reliable information is rare. But what is Tibetan culture and how should it be developed or preserved? The Chinese authorities and the Tibetans in exile present conflicting views on almost every aspect of Tibetan cultural life. Ashild Kolas and Monika Thowsen have gathered an astounding array of data to quantify Tibetan cultural activities--involving Tibetan language, literature, visual arts, museums, performing arts, festivals, and religion. Their study is based on fieldwork and interviews conducted in the ethnic Tibetan areas surrounding the Tibetan Autonomous Region--parts of the Chinese province...
This book, the first scholarly publication in the West to provide detailed documentation of modern life in contemporary Tibet, presents the cutting-edge field work carried out by an interdisciplinary group of researchers studying caste, pop music, media, painting, education, economics, childbirth and environment in Tibetan communities today.
Since its inception, modern anthropology has stood at the confluence of two mutually constitutive modes of knowledge production: participant-observation and theoretical analysis. This unique combination of practice and theory has been the subject of recurrent intellectual and methodological debate, raising questions that strike at the very heart of the discipline. How Do We Know? is a timely contribution to emerging debates that seek to understand this relationship through the theme of evidence. Incorporating a diverse selection of case studies ranging from the Tibetan emotion of shame to films of Caribbean musicians, it critically addresses such questions as: What constitutes viable “anth...
In The Politics of Language Oppression in Tibet, Gerald Roche sheds light on a global crisis of linguistic diversity that will see at least half of the world's languages disappear this century. Roche explores the erosion of linguistic diversity through a study of a community on the northeastern Tibetan Plateau in the People's Republic of China. Manegacha is but one of the sixty minority languages in Tibet and is spoken by about 8,000 people who are otherwise mostly indistinguishable from the Tibetan communities surrounding them. Recently, many in these communities have switched to speaking Tibetan, and Manegacha faces an uncertain future. The author uses the Manegacha case to show how linguistic diversity across Tibet is collapsing under assimilatory state policies. He looks at how global advocacy networks inadequately acknowledge this issue, highlighting the complex politics of language in an inter-connected world. The Politics of Language Oppression in Tibet broadens our understanding of Tibet and China, the crisis of global linguistic diversity, and the radical changes needed to address this crisis.
Although Kerala is well known for being one of India's most progressive states, processes of modernization have had an ambiguous impact on women. This innovative study combines archival research with in-depth fieldwork to trace changes since the 1930s in gender relations among low-caste men and women by examining organization of work, trade union activities and ideologies regarding marriage and family life.
Wogeo Island is well-known to anthropologists of Papua New Guinea through the work of Ian Hogbin. Based on substantial fieldwork, the author builds on and expands previous research by showing how Wogeos establish and maintain social relationships and identities connected to place and movement in the physical landscape. This innovative study demonstrates how Wogeo worldviews and social organization can be described in relation to terms of movements, flows and placements in the landscape while, in turn, the landscape is constituted and made meaningful through people’s activities and buildings. The author not only addresses some of the key issues in contemporary anthropology concerning place, gender, kinship, knowledge and power but also fills an important gap in Melanesian ethnography.
Revolution and social dislocation under the communist regimes of China and the Soviet Union, followed by the upheavals of reform and modernisation, have been experienced by Tibetan, Mongolian and Siberian people, forcibly integrated into these nation states, as conflict, violence and social disruption. This volume, bringing together case studies from throughout the region, assesses the experiences and legacies of such events. Highlighting the agency of those who shape and manipulate conflict and social order and their historical, cultural and religious resources, the contributors discuss evidence of social continuity, as well as the recreation of social order. Engaging with anthropological debates on conflict and social order, this volume provides an original comparative perspective on both Tibet and Inner Asia.