Language Education And Uyghur Identity In Urban Xinjiang

As the regional lingua franca, the Uyghur language long underpinned Uyghur national identity in Xinjiang. However, since the ‘bilingual education’ policy was introduced in 2002, Chinese has been rapidly institutionalised as the sole medium of instruction in the region’s institutes of education. As a result, studies of the bilingual and indeed multi-lingual Uyghur urban youth have emerged as a major new research trend. This book explores the relationship between language, education and identity among the urban Uyghurs of contemporary Xinjiang. It considers ways in which Uyghur urban youth identities began to evolve in response to the state imposition of ‘bilingual education’. Starting by defining the notion of ethnic identity, the book explores the processes involved in the formation and development of personal and group identities, considers why ethnic boundaries are constructed between groups, and questions how ethnic identity is expressed in social, cultural and religious practice. Against this background, contributors adopt a special focus on the relationship between language use, education and ethnic identity development. As a study of ethnicity in China this book will be of huge interest to students and scholars of Chinese culture and society, Asian ethnicity, cultural anthropology, sociolinguistics and Asian education.

WINNER – 2020 Central Eurasian Studies Society's CESS Book Award This is the first book-length study of graduates from the Xinjiang Class, a program that funds senior high school–aged students from Xinjiang, mostly ethnic Uyghur, to attend a four-year course in predominately Han-populated cities in eastern and coastal China. Based on longitudinal field research, Negotiating Inseparability in China: The Xinjiang Class and the Dynamics of Uyghur Identity offers a detailed picture of the multilayered identities of contemporary Uyghur youth and an assessment of the effectiveness of this program in meeting its political goals. The experiences of Xinjiang Class graduates reveal how young, educated Uyghurs strategically and selectively embrace elements of the corporate Chinese Zhonghua minzu identity in order to stretch the boundaries of a nonstate-defined Uyghur identity. Timothy Grose also argues that the impositions of Chinese Mandarin and secular Chinese Communist Party (CCP) values over ethnic minority languages and religion, and physically displacing young Uyghurs from their neighborhood and cultural environment do not lead to ethnic assimilation, as the CCP apparently expects. Despite pressure from state authorities to urge Xinjiang Class graduates to return after their formal education, the majority of the graduates choose to remain in inner China or to use their Xinjiang Class education as a springboard to seek global citizenship based upon membership in a transnational Islamic community. For those who return to Xinjiang, contrary to the political goal of the program, few intend to serve the CCP, their country, or even their hometown. Instead, their homecomings are marred by disappointment, frustration, and discontent. “This study demonstrates persuasively that the Chinese state’s attempts to produce—via delivery of a monolingual ‘Xinjiang Class’ education in inner China—a cohort of Chinese-speaking, Sinicized, secularized, and politically reliable Uyghurs, who will then return to Xinjiang to persuade other Uyghurs to support the Chinese Communist Party line, have had mixed results at best, and at worst constitute a failure.” —Joanne Smith Finley, Newcastle University “This book provides a window into the agency of the Uyghur subjects of the Chinese state-building project. The author’s sustained fieldwork in Xinjiang and efforts to reconnect with Uyghur interlocutors multiple times offer an unprecedented glimpse into how members of the Xinjiang class attempt to negotiate between the state’s objective of producing an educated and loyal Uyghur cohort and their own political, social, and cultural identities and imperatives.” —Michael Clarke, Australian National University

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Uyghur Identity and Culture brings together the work of scholars, activists, and native Uyghurs to explore the history and growing challenges that the Uyghur diaspora face across the globe in response to shifting government policies forbidding many forms of cultural expression in their homeland. The collection examines how and why the Uyghur diaspora, dispersed from their homeland to communities across Australia, Central Asia, Europe, Japan, Türkiye, and North America, now has the responsibility to preserve their language and cultural traditions so that these can be shared with future generations. The book critically investigates the government censorship of Uyghur literatures and Western media coverage of the Uyghurs, while centralizing real reflections of those who grew up in the Uyghur homeland. It considers the geographical and psychological pressures that the Uyghur diaspora endure and highlights the resilience and creativity of their relentless battle against cultural erosion. Uyghur Identity and Culture is a key contribution to diaspora literature and calls to attention the urgent need for global action on the ongoing human rights violations against the Uyghur people. It is essential reading for those interested in the history and struggles of the Uyghur diaspora as well as anyone studying sociology, race, migration, culture, and human rights studies.

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Meticulous renderings depict 9 dolls and 46 authentic costumes, including work clothes, winter wear, wedding outfits, more. Broad-brimmed, elaborately decorated hats and leg o' mutton sleeves for the women, derbies, walking canes, starched collars for the men. Descriptive notes.