Ethnic ChinaLit

Canada’s Globe and Mail recently ran a piece on the impact of modernity and tourism on the Mosuo (摩梭族), a matriarchal tribe that resides at and around Yunnan’s Luguhu Lake (泸沽湖). In China, a Matriarchy under Threat has now been translated, edited and published as 《云南摩梭人遭遇现代化挑战》in the August 17, 2011 edition of Cankao Xiaoxi (参考消息).

Cankao is a respected and influential Chinese-language digest of the world press with a long history, and in many cities across China it sells out every day before noon. Virtually no English is used and little or no content is added. But references deemed unbecoming to China’s image are often “airbrushed.”

As usual in my pieces on Cankao Xiaoxi, I run the original English copy immediately below. For the benefit of English speakers who cannot read the Chinese version published and distributed throughout China, I cross out the English words that were deleted when the article was translated into Chinese, and indicate any added copy (normally just for readability’s sake) by putting it [in brackets]. This way one can better see how Cankao’s editors “package” foreign copy for domestic consumption.

To summarize the deletions you’ll find below:

• All mentions of the Communist Party, and government policy aimed at changing Mosuo behavior, have been deleted
• References to “male lovers” have been heavily edited
• Some phrases that imply that Han visitors treat the Mosuo as curiosities have been deleted
• The writer’s explanation as to why the society evolved into a matriarchal one has been deleted   Read the rest of this entry »

Just started Lijiazela: The Last Matriarchal Society (丽嘉则拉) by accomplished news photographer Chen Qinggang (陈庆港).  Chen takes us into the mountains surrounding Yunnan’s once-pristine Lugu Lake (泸沽湖), into a village where one of China’s few remaining matrilineal tribes continues to live more or less undisturbed.

I would have assumed that the village residents are Mosuo (摩梭族), famous for their zouhun marriage custom (走婚习俗), but the introduction mentions that this village’s residents have been strongly influenced by the Mosuo, Mongolian and Tibetan cultures.

Hopefully this book places less emphasis on exoticism than others in Chinese that have now flooded the Yunnan market, targeting Chinese tourists. Can’t say yet, but must admit that the layout, choice of paper and black-and-white photos are very tasteful.