[Bilimsel Haber] CONF./CFP- Doing Anthropology in Ethnic Minority Regions in China, Urumchi, July 10-12

[Gonul Pultar]

CONF./CFP- Doing Anthropology in Minority Regions in China, Urumchi, 
July 10-12

Posted by: Ayxem Eli <a.eli329 at hotmail.com>


Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Germany
Center for Anthropology and Folklore, School of Humanities, Xinjiang
University, China
School of Ethnology and Sociology, Central University for
Nationalities, Beijing, China


Call For Papers

Conference
Doing Anthropology in Ethnic Minority Regions in China
10-12 July 2008

Organizers:
Ayxem Eli (Max Plank Institute for Social Anthropology)
Rahile Dawut (Xinjiang University)
Sawut Pawan (Xinjiang University/MPI)
Yang Shengmin (Central University for Nationalities)

Venue: Xinjiang University, Urumchi, China

The Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Xinjiang University 
and Central University for Nationalities will hold a joint conference on 
"doing anthropology in ethnic minority regions in China", from 10th to 
12th July 2008. The major aim of this conference is for researchers, 
from a wide range of disciplines to discuss how an anthropological 
perspective can contribute to the understanding of various research 
topics; and, what is the potential of anthropology in these regions?

The growth of ethnographic research in China has gone through several 
stages. It has been heavily influenced by the political turmoil up until 
late 1970s. During this period, state-sponsored research carried out in 
1950s was the most thorough and well- recognized efforts. Anthropology 
in China, however, only stepped out of its traditional focus on "ethnic 
minorities" and "rural populations" during the 1980s, when native 
scholars and institutions attempted to set it up as an academic 
discipline. This led to the expansion of research targets not only to 
Han Chinese, but also to urban settlements. At the same time, the 
contribution of foreign researchers and foreign trained Chinese 
anthropologists have been crucial to enriching the academic spheres of 
interest such as gender and sexuality, nationalism, ethnicity, 
migration, community and education.

In line with all these developments, ethnic minorities and minority
regions continue to attract interest from anthropologists, both from
inside and outside of China. Among these regions, Xinjiang-Uyghur
Autonomous Region is one of the multi-ethnic areas which have gained
some attention in anthropological enquiries in the past two decades.
However, the study of Xinjiang has been mostly limited to areas of
interests such as ethnic relationships, community research and local
customs and habits. Considering the rich resources of possible academic 
exploration, Xinjiang, with its diverse peoples, geographic and cultural 
landscape can still be considered as a virgin land of anthropological 
enquiries. Of course, there are limits to the coverage of any social 
science research concerning the breadth and depth of how far a research 
may go due to government policy, as in many other countries. However, 
the successful on-going cooperation between Max Planck Institute for 
Social Anthropology and the School of Humanities at Xinjiang University 
on the research project "Kinship and Social Support", is a strong case 
in showing how non- native researchers and institutions can conduct 
fieldwork in a joint effort with local counterparts.

With the participation of researchers who are interested in Xinjiang
and other ethnic minority regions, we hope to build up some theoretical 
framework in finding new perspectives in doing anthropology in these 
areas, which in turn may shed light on researches in other disciplines 
and studies in terms of methodology and theoretical approaches. At the 
same time of sharing some most recent research findings, we are 
interested in the potentially motivating phenomena available for 
investigation. Furthermore, it is also of our interest to make an effort 
to strengthen the ties between anthropologists and scholars from other 
disciplines such as historians, folklorists, sociologists and 
economists, so our research can contribute to local knowledge and 
economic development.

The conference languages are English and Chinese. Abstracts of no more
than 300 words and one-page Curriculum Vitae should be electronically
submitted by 25th March to the organizers (pdf and word formats 
preferred). Notification of acceptance will be on 25th of April.
Participants will be expected to submit a full draft of their papers by 
1st of July for distributing amongst the participants.

Abstracts sent to:

Ayxem Eli: eli at eth.mpg.de
Rahile Dawut: rahiled at xju.edu.cn



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