Cultural Encounters on China's Ethnic Frontiers

by Stevan Harrell

China's exploitation by Western imperialism is well known, but the imperialist treatment within China of ethnic minorities has been little explored. Around the geographic periphery of China, as well as some of the less accessible parts of the interior, and even in its cities, live a variety of peoples of different origins, languages, ecological adaptations, and cultures. These people have interacted for centuries with the Han Chinese majority, with other minority ethnic groups (minzu), and with non-Chinese, but identification of distinct groups and analysis of their history and relationship to others still are problematic.

 

Cultural Encounters on China's Ethnic Frontiers provides rich material for the comparative study of colonialism and imperialism and for the study of Chinese nation-building. It represents some of the first scholarship on ethnic minorities in China based on direct research since before World War II. This, combined with increasing awareness in the West of the importance of ethnic relations, makes it an especially timely book. It will be of interest to anthopologists, historians, and political scientists, as well as to sinologists.

 

Stevan Harrell is professor emeritus of anthropology at the University of Washington. Other contributors are Wurlig Borchigud, Siu-woo Cheung, Norma Diamond, Shih-chung Hsieh, Almaz Khan, Ralph A. Litzinger, Charles F. McKhann, Shelley Rigger, and Margaret Byrne Swain.

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Studies on Ethnic Groups in China presents research from a wide variety of disciplines on ethnic groups and ethnic relations in China. Anthropologists, historians, geographers, political scientists, and literary scholars have contributed works on minority ethnic groups from various regions of China, as well as on the majority Han and their relationships with other groups. Works are both historical and contemporary and cover topics ranging from identity, local relations, folk literature, and religion to medicine, governance, education, and economic development. The open access editions of many of the books in this series were made possible by a grant from the Transformation Fund of the Kenneth S. and Faye G. Allen Library Endowment.

Series editor: Stevan Harrell

Metadata

  • isbn
    9780295804088
  • publisher
    University of Washington Press
  • publisher place
    Seattle, WA
  • rights
    CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0
  • series title
    Studies on Ethnic Groups in China