Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-j824f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T06:19:39.119Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Ecological Degradation and Endangered Ethnicities: China's Minority Environmental Discourses as Manifested in Popular Songs

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 December 2015

Nimrod Baranovitch
Get access

Abstract

Much has been written in recent years about the environmental degradation in China's ethnic minority regions and the impact that this degradation and the policies that have been implemented to combat it have had on minority populations. To date, however, the research has focused mainly on the livelihood and lifestyle of minority herders and farmers. This article shifts the focus to the more symbolic realm of discourse and identity and to the minority educated urban elite, for whom this environmental degradation is linked primarily to ethnic politics. Based on an analysis of popular songs by famous Mongolian, Uyghur, and Tibetan musicians, along with interviews with the musicians who created them and other minority intellectuals, this article proposes that China's minority intellectuals have appropriated the global discourse of environmentalism to construct minority environmental discourses that they use to assert their ethnic identities, express ethnic concerns and aspirations, and make ethno-nationalist claims.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 75 , Issue 1 , February 2016 , pp. 181 - 205
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 2015 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

List of References

Baranovitch, Nimrod. 2003a. China's New Voices: Popular Music, Ethnicity, Gender, and Politics, 1978–1997. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Baranovitch, Nimrod 2003b. “From the Margins to the Centre: The Uyghur Challenge in Beijing.” China Quarterly 175:726–50.Google Scholar
Baranovitch, Nimrod 2007a. “From Resistance to Adaptation: Uyghur Popular Music and Changing Attitudes Among Uyghur Youth.” China Journal 58:59–82.Google Scholar
Baranovitch, Nimrod 2007b. “Inverted Exile: Uyghur Writers and Artists in Beijing and the Political Implications of Their Work.” Modern China 33(4):462–504.Google Scholar
Baranovitch, Nimrod 2009a. “Compliance, Autonomy, and Resistance of a ‘State Artist’: The Case of Chinese Mongolian Musician Teng Ge'er.” In Lives in Chinese Music, ed. Rees, Helen, 173–212. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Baranovitch, Nimrod 2009b. “Representing Tibet in the Global Cultural Market: The Case of Chinese-Tibetan Musician Han Hong.” In Music and Cultural Rights, eds. Weintraub, Andrew N. and Yung, Bell, 187–218. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Baranovitch, Nimrod 2014. “The 2011 Protests in Inner Mongolia: An Ethno-Environmental Perspective.” Paper presented at the 12th Biennial Conference of Asian Studies in Israel. University of Haifa, May 25–26.Google Scholar
BBC Chinese. 2011. “NeiMeng liang qian xuesheng kangyi mumin bei meiche niansi” [Two thousand Inner Mongolian students protest the killing of a herder by a coal truck]. May 25. http://www.bbc.co.uk/zhongwen/simp/chinese_news/2011/05/110525_inner_mongolia_protest.shtml (accessed September 15, 2014).Google Scholar
Becquelin, Nicolas. 2004. “Staged Development in Xinjiang.” China Quarterly 178:358–78.Google Scholar
Beijing 2008 Official Website. 2005. “Olympic Mascots: Yingying the Tibetan Antelope.” November 11. http://en.beijing2008.cn/89/35/article211993589.shtml (accessed March 28, 2012; URL now defunct).Google Scholar
Brosius, J. Peter. 1997. “Endangered Forest, Endangered People: Environmentalist Representations of Indigenous Knowledge.” Human Ecology 25(1):47–69.Google Scholar
Clarke, Graham E. 1998. “Development, Society, and Environment in Tibet.” In Development, Society, and Environment in Tibet: Papers Presented at a Panel of the 7th Seminar of the International Association for Tibetan Studies, Graz 1995, ed. Clarke, Graham E., 1–45. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.Google Scholar
Coggins, Chris, and Hutchinson, Tessa. 2006. “The Political Ecology of Geopiety: Nature Conservation in Tibetan Communities of Northwest Yunnan.” Asian Geographer 25(1–2):85–107.Google Scholar
Conklin, Beth A., and Graham, Laura R.. 1995. “The Shifting Middle Ground: Amazonian Indians and Eco-Politics.” American Anthropologist 97(4):695–710.Google Scholar
Deqen Baizin. 2005. “First Rock Group in the Highlands.” China Tibet Online, March 11. http://eng.tibet.cn/2010rw/ysj/201009/t20100916_707866.html (accessed September 6, 2015).Google Scholar
Dibben, Nicola. 2009. “Nature and Nation: National Identity and Environmentalism in Icelandic Popular Music Video and Music Documentary.” Ethnomusicology Forum 18(1):131–51.Google Scholar
Dickinson, Debbie, and Webber, Michael. 2007. “Environmental Resettlement and Development, on the Steppes on Inner Mongolia, PRC.” Journal of Development Studies 43(3):537–61.Google Scholar
Economy, Elizabeth C. 2010. The River Runs Black: The Environmental Challenge to China's Future. 2nd ed.Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Fisher, William H. 1994. “Megadevelopment, Environmentalism, and Resistance: The Institutional Context of Kayapó Indigenous Politics in Central Brazil.” Human Organization 53(3):220–32.Google Scholar
Foggin, J. Marc. 2007. “Depopulating the Tibetan Grasslands: The Role of National Policies and Perspectives for the Future of Tibetan Herders, Qinghai Province, China.” Plateau Perspectives. http://tibet3rdpole.org/wp-content/uploads/pastoral-kham-1.pdf (accessed January 2, 2013).Google Scholar
Goldstein, Melvyn C., and Beall, Cynthia M.. 1990. Nomads of Western Tibet: The Survival of a Way of Life. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Government of Tibet in Exile. n.d.a. “State of Tibet's Environment.” http://www.tibet.com/WhitePaper/white9.html (accessed April 25, 2007; URL now defunct).Google Scholar
Government Of Tibet In Exile n.d.b. “Tibet's Environment: A Crucial Issue.” http://www.tibet.com/Eco/Green97/editorial.html (accessed April 25, 2007; URL now defunct).Google Scholar
Harris, Richard B. 2008. Wildlife Conservation in China: Preserving the Habitat of China's Wild West. Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe.Google Scholar
Harris, Richard B. 2010. “Rangeland Degradation on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau: A Review of the Evidence of Its Magnitude and Causes.” Journal of Arid Environments 74(1):1–12.Google Scholar
Hathaway, Michael. 2010. “The Emergence of Indigeneity: Public Intellectuals and an Indigenous Space in Southwest China.” Cultural Anthropology 25(2):301–33.Google Scholar
Hillman, Ben. 2003. “Paradise Under Construction: Minorities, Myths and Modernity in Northwest Yunnan.” Asian Ethnicity 4(2):175–88.Google Scholar
Huber, Toni. 1997. “Green Tibetans: A Brief Social History.” In Tibetan Culture in the Diaspora: Papers Presented at a Panel of the 7th Seminar of the International Association for Tibetan Studies, Graz 1995, ed. Korom, Frank J., 103–19. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.Google Scholar
Huber, Toni 2012. “The Changing Role of Hunting and Wildlife in Pastoral Communities of Northern Tibet.” In Pastoral Practices in High Asia: Agency of ‘Development’ Effected by Modernisation, Resettlement and Transformation, ed. Kreutzmann, Hermann, 195–215. London: Springer.Google Scholar
Humphrey, Caroline, and Sneath, David. 1999. The End of Nomadism? Society, State and the Environment in Inner Asia. Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Jiang, Hong. 1999. The Ordos Plateau of China: An Endangered Environment. New York: United Nations University Press.Google Scholar
Rong, Jiang. 2004. Lang tuteng [Wolf totem]. Wuhan: Changjiang wenyi chubanshe.Google Scholar
Kopel, Dave. n.d. “Tibet: Genocide and Ecocide.” http://www.davekopel.com/env/entibet.htm (accessed April 19, 2007).Google Scholar
Litzinger, Ralph. 2004. “The Mobilization of ‘Nature’: Perspectives from North-west Yunnan.” China Quarterly 178:488–504.Google Scholar
Liu, Hongmao, Zaifu, Xu, Youkai, Xu, and Jinxiu, Wang. 2002. “Practice of Conserving Plant Diversity through Traditional Beliefs: A Case Study in Xishuangbanna, Southwest China.” Biodiversity and Conservation 11(4):705–13.Google Scholar
Loa, Lok-Sin. 2009. “Tibet Activists Don Panda Costumes at Taipei Zoo.” Taipei Times, February 8. http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/print/2009/02/08/2003435562 (accessed June 11, 2012).Google Scholar
Miller, Daniel J. 2000. “Tough Times for Tibetan Nomads in Western China: Snowstorms, Settling Down, Fences, and the Demise of Traditional Nomadic Pastoralism.” Nomadic Peoples 4(1):83–109. http://www.cwru.edu/affil/tibet/booksAndPapers/papers/miller4.htm (accessed January 8, 2013).Google Scholar
People's Daily Online. 2005. “Tibetan Antelope Tipped as for Beijing Olympics Mascot.” March 28. http://english.people.com.cn/200503/28/print20050328_178419.html (accessed March 29, 2012).Google Scholar
Ptackova, Jarmila. 2011. “Sedentarisation of Tibetan Nomads in China: Implementation of the Nomadic Settlement Project in the Tibetan Amdo Area; Qinghai and Sichuan Provinces.” Pastoralism: Research, Policy and Practice 1(4):1–11.Google Scholar
Richardson, S. Dennis. 1990. Forests and Forestry in China: Changing Patterns of Resource Development. Washington, D.C.: Island Press.Google Scholar
Robin, Françoise. 2009. “Performing Compassion: A Counter-Hegemonic Strategy in Tibetan Cinema?” In Tibetan Arts in Transition: A Journey through Theatre, Cinema and Painting. Seminar Proceedings, Rome and Naples 2008–2009, 37–49. Rome: ASIA Onlus.Google Scholar
Rudelson, Justin Jon. 1997. Oasis Identities: Uyghur Nationalism along China's Silk Road. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Shichor, Yitzhak. 2004. “The Great Wall of Steel: Military and Strategy in Xinjiang.” In Xinjiang: China's Muslim Borderland, ed. Frederick Starr, S., 120–60. Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe.Google Scholar
Sneath, David. 2000. Changing Inner Mongolia: Pastoral Mongolian Society and the Chinese State. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Spencer, Richard. 2006. “Tibetans Clash with Chinese over Fur Bonfires.” Telegraph, February 20. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/tibet/1510990/Tibetans-clash-with-Chinese-over-fur-bonfires.html (accessed May 6, 2012).Google Scholar
Taylor, James L. 2006. “Negotiating the Grassland: The Policy of Pasture Enclosures and Contested Resource Use in Inner Mongolia.” Human Organization 65(4):374–86.Google Scholar
Ge'er, Teng. 2005. Tian chang: Wo de yishu rensheng [The sky sings: My artistic life]. Beijing: Zuojia chubanshe.Google Scholar
Togochog, Enghebatu. 2006. “Ecological Migration and Human Rights.” China Rights Forum 4:26–30.Google Scholar
Toops, Stanley W. 2004. “The Ecology of Xinjiang: A Focus on Water.” In Xinjiang: China's Muslim Borderland, ed. Frederick Starr, S., 264–75. Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe.Google Scholar
Van Vleet, Stacey A. 2006. “The ‘Righteous Power’ of Modern Tibetan Music within the PRC.” MA thesis, University of Colorado.Google Scholar
Vergani, Matteo, and Zuev, Dennis. 2011. “Analysis of YouTube Videos Used by Activists in the Uyghur Nationalist Movement: Combining Quantitative and Qualitative Methods.” Journal of Contemporary China 20(69):205–29.Google Scholar
Williams, Dee Mack. 2002. Beyond Great Walls: Environment, Identity, and Development on the Chinese Grasslands of Inner Mongolia. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Winkler, Daniel. 1998. “Deforestation in Eastern Tibet: Human Impact Past and Present.” In Development, Society, and Environment in Tibet: Papers Presented at a Panel of the 7th Seminar of the International Association for Tibetan Studies, Graz 1995, ed. Clarke, Graham E., 79–96. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften.Google Scholar
World Wildlife Fund. n.d. “Habitat of the Panda.” http://wwf.panda.org/what_we_do/endangered_species/giant_panda/panda/where_panda_lives_habitat/ (accessed June 11, 2012).Google Scholar
Xu, Jianchu, Ma, Erzi T., Tashi, Duojie, Fu, Yongshou, Lu, Zhi, and Melick, David. 2005. “Integrating Sacred Knowledge for Conservation: Cultures and Landscapes in Southwest China.” Ecology and Society 10(2). http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol10/iss2/art7/ (accessed October 15, 2015).Google Scholar
Xun, Lili, and Zhiming, Bao. 2008. “Government, Market and Households in the Ecological Relocation Process: A Sociological Analysis of Ecological Relocation in S Banner.” Social Sciences in China 29(1):113–28.Google Scholar
Yang, Guobin. 2005. “Environmental NGOs and Institutional Dynamics in China.” China Quarterly 181:46–66.Google Scholar
Yeh, Emily T. 2005. “Green Governmentality and Pastoralism in Western China: ‘Converting Pastures to Grasslands.’” Nomadic Peoples 9(1–2):9–30.Google Scholar
Yeh, Emily T. 2009a. “From Wasteland to Wetland? Nature and Nation in China's Tibet.” Environmental History 14(1):103–37.Google Scholar
Yeh, Emily T. 2009b. “Greening Western China: A Critical View.” Geoforum 40(5):884–94.Google Scholar
Yeh, Emily T. 2013. “Blazing Pelts and Burning Passions: Nationalism, Cultural Politics, and Spectacular Decommodification in Tibet.” Journal of Asian Studies 72(2):319–44.Google Scholar
Zhang, Munkhdalai A., Borjigin, Elles, and Zhang, Huiping. 2007. “Mongolian Nomadic Culture and Ecological Culture: On the Ecological Reconstruction in the Agro-Pastoral Mosaic Zone in Northern China.” Ecological Economics 62(1):19–26.Google Scholar

Discography

Askar [Ai'sikaer]. 1999. Huilang-Wan/Grey Wolf—Play. An'ni yinxiang zhizuo youxian gongsi/Zhongguo changpian zonggongsi. ISRC CN-A01-99-314-00/V.J6.Google Scholar
Askar [Ai'sikaer] 2001. Zhufu/Blessing/Tilag. Beijing Xiyangyang wenhua fazhan youxian gongsi/Hebei yinxiang chubanshe. ISRC CN-C12-00-365-00/A.J6.Google Scholar
Askar [Ai'sikaer] 2005. Yongbao taiyang de ren [The people who embrace the sun]. Zhongguo yinyuejia yinxiang chubanshe. ISRC CN-A50-05-414-00/A.J6.Google Scholar
Hong, Han. 2002. Han Hong—gandong [Han Hong—touched]. Changchun dianying zhipianchang yin sheng yinxiang chubanshe. ISRC CN-D16-02-339-00/A.J6.Google Scholar
Ge'er, Teng. 2001. Teng Ge'er yu cang lang yuedui 2001 yanchanghui [Teng Ge'er's 2001 concert with the Blue Wolf Band]. Guoji wenhua jiaoliu yinxiang chubanshe. ISRC CN-A26-01387-00/A.J6.Google Scholar
Ge'er, Teng 2003. Teng Ge'er—yongyuan de cang lang [Teng Ge'er—blue wolf forever]. Zhongguo changpian Guangzhou gongsi. ISRC CN-F13-03-304-00/V.J6.Google Scholar
Vajara. 2003. Vajara. Gnam lcags. Tianchu [Heavenly club]. Zhongguo changpian Chengdu gongsi. ISRC CN-G01-03-350-00/A.J6.Google Scholar