This intensive course has dual objectives of (a) providing students with a solid understanding of Tibetan history, culture, and social issues within the context of contemporary China as well as (b) generating an experiential learning format in which students combine readings with seminar discussions and ethnographic field work in order to write an original anthropological research paper.
Prerequisites:
None
Additional student cost:
None
Learning outcomes:
Understand the issues surrounding minorities and minority regions in contemporary China.
Have a broad appreciation of Tibetan history, culture and religion.
Be able to undertake primary ethnographic research with the help of translators and instructor guidance.
Be able to critically apply, discuss and present relevant thematic concepts in regards to Tibet and Tibetan life in China today.
Method of presentation:
The course will be run as a mobile seminar with extended class meetings that combine lectures with discussion. In addition to covering basic historical, cultural, and social background we will question ways in which historiography, nationhood, and modernity affect contemporary Tibetan life. The methodological emphasis concentrates on interpreting specific and personal encounters, incidents, and observations in the context of background material. Students will consult individually with the instructor to pursue a focus that will build into the final presentation and paper.
The course demands full participation from all students. The first week in Beijing will consist of more direct introductory lectures by the instructor, while the weeks in Tibet will involve more participatory discussions by students. In addition, there will extensive informal discussions, guided site-visits, individual meetings with the instructor and (optional) evening film sessions during travel time. The final days in Beijing will be structured so as to allow students to focus on their individual presentations and final paper.
Required work and form of assessment:
Participation: 30%
Students are required to participate fully in all activities. This will be a physically and emotionally demanding course and so students must take responsibility to keep themselves academically “switched-on”. Please approach me with any personal difficulties or concerns so we can work them out before they become major problems.
Assignments (three): 30%
Topics as explained by instructor and based on readings as well as observation and interviews during field-study. (3-4 pages; 1,000-1,500wds plus pictures)
Final project: 40%
Oral presentation - 15 mins
Written paper (8-10 pages typed; 3,000-4,000wds plus pictures)
content:
The readings are divided into four sections for the sake of conceptual coherence. We will generally follow the themes sequentially but may well alter the specific order of articles as the course progresses. The readings here are minimal and all are required; in addition, you will be expected to read articles or books relevant to your specific research topic as suggested through our individual meetings.
I) Minorities in China:
This section deals with the role of minorities in China. The selected readings and lectures problematize generally accepted notions of the “nation state”, “ethnicity”, and “resistance” and we will discuss the political ramifications of scholarly research and the production of knowledge.
1) James Scott: The Art of not Being Governed -- Chapt 1 “Hills, Valleys, and States”
2) Harrell, Stevan. Ways of Being Ethnic in Southwest China --
- Chapt 1: Some Ethnic Displays
- Chapt 2: Foundations of Ethnic Identity
- Chapt 3: Ethnology, Linguistics, and Politics
II) Tibetan Studies:
This section introduces basic aspects of Tibetan history and culture in attempts to provide background for our journey to Yunnan and Sichuan. The readings offer a sweeping view of everything from Buddhist philosophy to 20th century politics but are directly relevant towards understanding the people and places we will encounter.
3) Donald Lopez: Prisoners of Shangri-La -- “Introduction”
4) John Powers: Introdution to Tibetan Buddhism -- “Tibetan Religious History” and “The Twentieth Century”
5) Donald Lopez: Religions of Tibet in Practice -- “Introduction”
6) Sogyal Rinpoche: Tibetan Book of Living and Dying “Preface”, “In the Mirror of Death”, “Impermanence” and “Reflection and Change”
7) Melvyn Goldstein: Snow Lion and the Dragon -- “Interlude”, “Communist Rule”, and “Post-Mao Era”
8) José Cabezon: “State Control of Monasticism”
9) Melvyn Goldstein et al: “Conflict and the Cultural Revolution”
10) Abraham Zablocki -- “The Taiwanese Connection”
III) Doing Ethnography:
This short section offers some thoughts on anthropology and the process (and results) of doing ethnography.
11) Alexandra David-Neel: My Journey to Lhasa
12) Yu Changjiang -- “Life in Lara Village”
13) Geoff Childs -- “Adolescent Discord”
IV) Contemporary Issues:
The Tibetan regions we visit are subject to forces of the state and market at work throughout the world, but these manifest in peculiarly local ways. These articles address contemporary issues of transformation in areas where there is no homogenous culture or commonly accepted trajectory for development.
14) Emily Yeh -- “Tropes of Indolence and Cultural Politics of Development in Lhasa”
15) Ben Hillman and Lee-Ann Henfry -- “Macho Minority”
16) Vincanne Adams -- “Suffering the Winds of Lhasa”
17) Tashi Dawa -- “The Glory of a Wind Horse”
18) Hu Xiaojiang and Miguel Salazar -- “Market Formation and Transformation”
19) Melvyn Goldstein et al -- “Development and Change in Rural Tibet”
20) Wang Lixiong and Tsering Shakya -- from “After the March Incident” and “Echoes from the Past”
Required readings:
Adams, Vincanne. 1998. “Suffering the Winds of Lhasa: Politicized Bodies, Human Rights, Cultural Difference, and Humanism in Tibet” in Medical Anthropology Quaterly, New Series, 12 (1).
Barnett, Robert. 2006. “Beyond the Collaborator–Martyr Model; Strategies of Compliance, Opportunism, and Opposition Within Tibet” in Contemporary Tibet: Politics, Development, and Society in a Disputed Region, eds. Barry Sautman and June Dreyer. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.
Bohanan, Laura. 1966. “Shakespeare in the Bush” in Natural History Magazine, Aug.-Sept. 1966.
Cabezon, José. 2008. State Control of Tibetan Buddhist Monasticism in the People’s Republic of China. In Chinese Religiosities: Afflictions of Modernity and Sate Formation, ed. M. Yang. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Childs, Geoff. 2004. Tibetan Diary: From Birth to Death and Beyond in a Himalayan Village of Nepal. Berkeley: University of California Press.
David-Neel, Alexandra. 2005 (1927). My Journey to Lhasa. New York: Harper Perennial.
Goldstein, Melvyn. 1997. “Interlude,” “Communist Rule,” and “Post-Mao Era” in The Snow Lion and the Dragon: China, Tibet, and the Dalai Lama. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Goldstein, Melvyn et al. 2006. “Development and Change in Rural Tibet: Problems and Adaptations” in Contemporary Tibet: Politics, Development, and Society in a Disputed Region, eds. Barry Sautman and June Dreyer. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.
Goldstein, Melvyn et al. 2008. “Conflict and the Cultural Revolution: The Nyemo Ani Incident of 1969” in Pirie, Fernanda and T. Huber, eds. Conflict and Social Order in Tibet and Inner Asia. Leiden: Brill.
Hillman, Ben and Lee-Ann Henfry. 2006. “Macho Minority: Masculinity and Ethnicity on the Edge of Tibet” in Modern China 32.
Hu Xiaojiang and Miguel Salazar. 2006. “Market Formation and Transformation: Private Business in Lhasa” in Contemporary Tibet: Politics, Development, and Society in a Disputed Region, eds. Barry Sautman and June Dreyer. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.
Kolas, Ashild. 2008. “Localizing Shangrila,” “The Political Economy of Tourism” and “Tourism, Place-Making and Tibetan Identity” in Tourism and Tibetan Culture in Transition: A Place Called Shangrila. Abingdon: Routledge.
Lopez, Donald. 1998. “Introduction” in Prisoners of Shangri-La: Tibetan Buddhism and the West. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lopez, Donald. 2007. “Introduction” in Religions of Tibet in Practice. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Powers, John. 2007. Introduction to Tibetan Buddhism. Ithaca: Snow Lion.
Scott, James. 2010. The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Sogyal Rinpoche. 2002. The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. New York: Harper Collins.
Tashi Dawa. 2000. “Glory of the Wind Horse” in Tales of Tibet, ed. and trans. Herbert Batt. Manoa: University of Hawaii Press.
Wang Lixiong and Tsering Shakya. 2009. The Struggle for Tibet. New York: Verso.
Yeh, Emily. 2007. “Tropes of Indolence and the Cultural Politics of Development in Lhasa, Tibet” in Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 97 (3).
Yu Changjiang. 2006. “Life in Lara Village, Tibet” in Contemporary Tibet: Politics, Development, and Society in a Disputed Region, eds. Barry Sautman and June Dreyer. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.
Zablocki, Abraham. 2009. “The Taiwanese Connection: Politics, Piety, and Patronage in Transnational Tibetan Buddhism” in Matthew Kapstein, ed. Buddhism Between Tibet and China. Boston: Wisdom.
Recommended readings:
Goldstein, Melvyn et al. 2004. A Tibetan Revolutionary: The Life and Times of Bapa Phüntso Wangye. Berkeley and London: University of California Press.
Alai. 2002. Red Poppies. London: Methuen.
Quintman, Andrew, trans. 2010. Tsangnyon Heruka’s Life of Milarepa. New York: Penguin Classics.
Brief Biography of Instructor:
Cuilan Liu is a PhD candidate in the Department of South Asian Studies at Harvard University. At the Harvard Film Study Center, she is producing a documentary film on a chanting tradition from northeastern Tibet for a secondary Ph.D field in Critical Media Studies. Since 2003, she has spent many summers learning Tibetan language and researching Tibetan folk culture in Amdo, Khams, and Ü-Tsang. Her primary research interests include religious and cultural history of Tibet, Buddhist ethics, Buddhist music traditions, Tibetan folk culture et cetera. During her teaching appointments with Harvard University and Sichuan University (China), she has taught courses on Tibetan language and culture to various students and researchers.
Ethnicity In Contemporary China: Visions And Practices
This intensive course has dual objectives of (a) providing students with a solid understanding of Tibetan history, culture, and social issues within the context of contemporary China as well as (b) generating an experiential learning format in which students combine readings with seminar discussions and ethnographic field work in order to write an original anthropological research paper.
None
None
The course will be run as a mobile seminar with extended class meetings that combine lectures with discussion. In addition to covering basic historical, cultural, and social background we will question ways in which historiography, nationhood, and modernity affect contemporary Tibetan life. The methodological emphasis concentrates on interpreting specific and personal encounters, incidents, and observations in the context of background material. Students will consult individually with the instructor to pursue a focus that will build into the final presentation and paper.
The course demands full participation from all students. The first week in Beijing will consist of more direct introductory lectures by the instructor, while the weeks in Tibet will involve more participatory discussions by students. In addition, there will extensive informal discussions, guided site-visits, individual meetings with the instructor and (optional) evening film sessions during travel time. The final days in Beijing will be structured so as to allow students to focus on their individual presentations and final paper.
The readings are divided into four sections for the sake of conceptual coherence. We will generally follow the themes sequentially but may well alter the specific order of articles as the course progresses. The readings here are minimal and all are required; in addition, you will be expected to read articles or books relevant to your specific research topic as suggested through our individual meetings.
I) Minorities in China:
This section deals with the role of minorities in China. The selected readings and lectures problematize generally accepted notions of the “nation state”, “ethnicity”, and “resistance” and we will discuss the political ramifications of scholarly research and the production of knowledge.
1) James Scott: The Art of not Being Governed -- Chapt 1 “Hills, Valleys, and States”
2) Harrell, Stevan. Ways of Being Ethnic in Southwest China --
- Chapt 1: Some Ethnic Displays
- Chapt 2: Foundations of Ethnic Identity
- Chapt 3: Ethnology, Linguistics, and Politics
II) Tibetan Studies:
This section introduces basic aspects of Tibetan history and culture in attempts to provide background for our journey to Yunnan and Sichuan. The readings offer a sweeping view of everything from Buddhist philosophy to 20th century politics but are directly relevant towards understanding the people and places we will encounter.
3) Donald Lopez: Prisoners of Shangri-La -- “Introduction”
4) John Powers: Introdution to Tibetan Buddhism -- “Tibetan Religious History” and “The Twentieth Century”
5) Donald Lopez: Religions of Tibet in Practice -- “Introduction”
6) Sogyal Rinpoche: Tibetan Book of Living and Dying “Preface”, “In the Mirror of Death”, “Impermanence” and “Reflection and Change”
7) Melvyn Goldstein: Snow Lion and the Dragon -- “Interlude”, “Communist Rule”, and “Post-Mao Era”
8) José Cabezon: “State Control of Monasticism”
9) Melvyn Goldstein et al: “Conflict and the Cultural Revolution”
10) Abraham Zablocki -- “The Taiwanese Connection”
III) Doing Ethnography:
This short section offers some thoughts on anthropology and the process (and results) of doing ethnography.
11) Alexandra David-Neel: My Journey to Lhasa
12) Yu Changjiang -- “Life in Lara Village”
13) Geoff Childs -- “Adolescent Discord”
IV) Contemporary Issues:
The Tibetan regions we visit are subject to forces of the state and market at work throughout the world, but these manifest in peculiarly local ways. These articles address contemporary issues of transformation in areas where there is no homogenous culture or commonly accepted trajectory for development.
14) Emily Yeh -- “Tropes of Indolence and Cultural Politics of Development in Lhasa”
15) Ben Hillman and Lee-Ann Henfry -- “Macho Minority”
16) Vincanne Adams -- “Suffering the Winds of Lhasa”
17) Tashi Dawa -- “The Glory of a Wind Horse”
18) Hu Xiaojiang and Miguel Salazar -- “Market Formation and Transformation”
19) Melvyn Goldstein et al -- “Development and Change in Rural Tibet”
20) Wang Lixiong and Tsering Shakya -- from “After the March Incident” and “Echoes from the Past”
Adams, Vincanne. 1998. “Suffering the Winds of Lhasa: Politicized Bodies, Human Rights, Cultural Difference, and Humanism in Tibet” in Medical Anthropology Quaterly, New Series, 12 (1).
Barnett, Robert. 2006. “Beyond the Collaborator–Martyr Model; Strategies of Compliance, Opportunism, and Opposition Within Tibet” in Contemporary Tibet: Politics, Development, and Society in a Disputed Region, eds. Barry Sautman and June Dreyer. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.
Bohanan, Laura. 1966. “Shakespeare in the Bush” in Natural History Magazine, Aug.-Sept. 1966.
Cabezon, José. 2008. State Control of Tibetan Buddhist Monasticism in the People’s Republic of China. In Chinese Religiosities: Afflictions of Modernity and Sate Formation, ed. M. Yang. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Childs, Geoff. 2004. Tibetan Diary: From Birth to Death and Beyond in a Himalayan Village of Nepal. Berkeley: University of California Press.
David-Neel, Alexandra. 2005 (1927). My Journey to Lhasa. New York: Harper Perennial.
Goldstein, Melvyn. 1997. “Interlude,” “Communist Rule,” and “Post-Mao Era” in The Snow Lion and the Dragon: China, Tibet, and the Dalai Lama. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Goldstein, Melvyn et al. 2006. “Development and Change in Rural Tibet: Problems and Adaptations” in Contemporary Tibet: Politics, Development, and Society in a Disputed Region, eds. Barry Sautman and June Dreyer. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.
Goldstein, Melvyn et al. 2008. “Conflict and the Cultural Revolution: The Nyemo Ani Incident of 1969” in Pirie, Fernanda and T. Huber, eds. Conflict and Social Order in Tibet and Inner Asia. Leiden: Brill.
Hillman, Ben and Lee-Ann Henfry. 2006. “Macho Minority: Masculinity and Ethnicity on the Edge of Tibet” in Modern China 32.
Hu Xiaojiang and Miguel Salazar. 2006. “Market Formation and Transformation: Private Business in Lhasa” in Contemporary Tibet: Politics, Development, and Society in a Disputed Region, eds. Barry Sautman and June Dreyer. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.
Kolas, Ashild. 2008. “Localizing Shangrila,” “The Political Economy of Tourism” and “Tourism, Place-Making and Tibetan Identity” in Tourism and Tibetan Culture in Transition: A Place Called Shangrila. Abingdon: Routledge.
Lopez, Donald. 1998. “Introduction” in Prisoners of Shangri-La: Tibetan Buddhism and the West. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lopez, Donald. 2007. “Introduction” in Religions of Tibet in Practice. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Powers, John. 2007. Introduction to Tibetan Buddhism. Ithaca: Snow Lion.
Scott, James. 2010. The Art of Not Being Governed: An Anarchist History of Upland Southeast Asia. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Sogyal Rinpoche. 2002. The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. New York: Harper Collins.
Tashi Dawa. 2000. “Glory of the Wind Horse” in Tales of Tibet, ed. and trans. Herbert Batt. Manoa: University of Hawaii Press.
Wang Lixiong and Tsering Shakya. 2009. The Struggle for Tibet. New York: Verso.
Yeh, Emily. 2007. “Tropes of Indolence and the Cultural Politics of Development in Lhasa, Tibet” in Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 97 (3).
Yu Changjiang. 2006. “Life in Lara Village, Tibet” in Contemporary Tibet: Politics, Development, and Society in a Disputed Region, eds. Barry Sautman and June Dreyer. Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe.
Zablocki, Abraham. 2009. “The Taiwanese Connection: Politics, Piety, and Patronage in Transnational Tibetan Buddhism” in Matthew Kapstein, ed. Buddhism Between Tibet and China. Boston: Wisdom.
Goldstein, Melvyn et al. 2004. A Tibetan Revolutionary: The Life and Times of Bapa Phüntso Wangye. Berkeley and London: University of California Press.
Alai. 2002. Red Poppies. London: Methuen.
Quintman, Andrew, trans. 2010. Tsangnyon Heruka’s Life of Milarepa. New York: Penguin Classics.
Cuilan Liu is a PhD candidate in the Department of South Asian Studies at Harvard University. At the Harvard Film Study Center, she is producing a documentary film on a chanting tradition from northeastern Tibet for a secondary Ph.D field in Critical Media Studies. Since 2003, she has spent many summers learning Tibetan language and researching Tibetan folk culture in Amdo, Khams, and Ü-Tsang. Her primary research interests include religious and cultural history of Tibet, Buddhist ethics, Buddhist music traditions, Tibetan folk culture et cetera. During her teaching appointments with Harvard University and Sichuan University (China), she has taught courses on Tibetan language and culture to various students and researchers.