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A foreign policy of benevolence: reinvestigating identities and material culture in the handscroll Eighteen Songs of a Nomad Flute 胡茄十八拍

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2025

Mia Ye Ma
Mia Ye Ma*
Affiliation:
Assistant Curator, Hong Kong Palace Museum, Hong Kong
*
Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

This article adopts a social constructivist approach to reinvestigate the Song-Liao relations that were manifested in the handscroll Eighteen Songs of a Nomad Flute 胡茄十八拍. Instead of offering a visual analysis of each of the 18 scenes in succession, it will point out the shared cultural practices and connotations of identity in the contrasting depictions of Song urban life and the nomad encampment. It argues that the handscroll probably represents the conservative faction's benevolent attitude towards nomadic tribes in the late Northern Song period, which is also likely to have been associated with the rise of Neo-Confucianism.

Keywords

Song court paintingSong-Liao material culturevisual construction of identitiesSong-Liao relationssocial constructivist approach
Type
Article
Information
Bulletin of SOAS , First View , pp. 1 - 26
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2025. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of SOAS University of London

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