Elena Caprioni
University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada
Keywords: Xinjiang; Uyghurs and Hans; Ethnicity; Everyday relations; Movable social barriers
DOI: 10.5509/2011842267
In September 2009, the Information Office of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China claimed that Xinjiang benefits from respect and harmony between Uyghurs and Hans. This rhetoric is faithfully propagated by national media: they uniformly praise the unity amongst the majority (Han) and minority (Uyghur) through the common slogans of minzu tuanjie(ethnic solidarity) and hexie guanxi (harmonious relations). Going beyond the official documents and propaganda, my purpose is to explore the relations between these two ethnic groups. I will focus on the ideas, words and actions of Han and Uyghur young people living in Urumqi who are often under-represented in official sources, or other forms of written and scholarly discourse. While comparing their behaviour, I argue that ethnic disharmony between Uyghurs and Hans exists, but it is simplistic to blame only the Chinese government or one of the ethnic groups, and naïve to ask what China can do to solve the problem. Instead, by exploring what the social agents in the young educated society in Xinjiang truly think of ethnic relations between them and the “other,” this paper presents a comprehensive picture of the issue. My ethnographic research interprets how people remember, interpret and sometimes exaggerate their ethnic traditions and cultural practices in daily life in relation to the other ethnic group. The findings demonstrate how young people are determining the course of ethnic relations by constructing movable social barriers that result in segregation between them, raising doubts about the future possibilities for ethnic harmony.
2009年9月,中華人民共和國國務院新聞辦公室宣稱維漢間的的相互尊重和和諧有益於新疆的發展。這一辭藻被全國的媒體所忠實地傳達:即用統一的民族團結及和諧關係的口號來異口同聲地讚揚主要族裔(漢族)與少數民族(維吾爾族)之間的團結。本文旨在超越官方文獻和宣傳而深入探討這兩個民族之間的關係。本文聚焦於一個通常在官方來源或其他形式的書面和學術話語中極少被關注的群體--居住在烏魯木齊的漢族和維吾爾族青年,攷察他們的想法、詞語、與行動。通過對他們行為的比較研究,本文主張,維吾爾和漢族之間的種族不和諧確實存在,但僅責備中國政府或其中一方民族將流於簡單,而詢問中國能如何解決這一問題則失於天真。相反,通過探索新疆的青年知識界作為社會能動者如何看待他們與“他者”之間的民族關係, 本文試圖呈現一幅全面的 畫面。本項民族志研究試圖理解人們如何在日常生活中銘記、詮釋、並有時誇大他們的民族傳統和文化實踐以區別於其他民族群體。本項研究展示了青年人如何通過建造可移動的社會隔離的方式來處理民族關係,並從而導致了他們之間的隔離。本文由此對民族和諧的可能性提出質疑。
新疆維吾爾人和漢人間的日常交往:漢化、融合、還是隔離?
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