Hostname: page-component-5f745c7db-tvc9f Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-07T04:58:30.262Z Has data issue: true hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Captives, Kin, and Slaves in Xiao Liangshan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 March 2010

Ann Maxwell Hill
Get access

Extract

Located on the high altitude slopes in China's mountainous southwestern hinterlands, the Nuosu (Yi) have long been characterized by ethnologists in China as a slave society. In this essay I explore the appropriateness of the label with reference to the distinction, associated with the classicist Moses Finley in his studies of Greco-Roman society, between slave societies and societies with slaves (Finley 1983, 79–83). But my main purpose in focusing on Nuosu slavery, as we know it from the first half of the twentieth century, is to gain a better understanding of Nuosu identity. It makes sense to me that the process by which outsiders, that is, slaves brought in as captives, became insiders reveals a great deal about the constructs of the Nuosu ideology of common origins and identity and about how this transformation from alien to native worked in practice among people historically “remarkably resistant to acculturation,”with boundaries that remain to this day sharp, clear, and relatively impenetrable (Harrell 1995, 101, 104).

Type
Articles
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 60 , Issue 4 , November 2001 , pp. 1033 - 1049
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 2001

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

Aung Thwin, Michael. 1983. “Athi, Kyun-Taw, Hpaya-Kyun: Varieties of Commendation and Dependence in Pre-Colonial Burma.” In Slavery, Bondage, and Dependency in Southeast Asia, edited by Reid, Anthony. New York: St. Martin's Press.Google Scholar
Berlin, Ira. 1998. Many Thousands Gone. Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beteille, Andre. 1992. “Caste and Family in Representations of Indian Society.” Anthropology Today 8.1 (February): 13–18.Google Scholar
Donald, Leland. 1997. Aboriginal Slavery on the Northwest Coast of North America. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Yuting, Du. 1984. “Yunnan Xiao Liangshan Yizu de nuli zhidu” (Yunnan's Xiao Liangshan slave system). In Yunnan Xiao Liangshan Yizu shehui diaocha (Investigations of Xiao Liangshan's Yi society), edited by Minzu wenti wu zhong congshu Yunnan sheng bianji weiyuanhui. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe.Google Scholar
Fei, Hsiao-Tung. 1981. Toward a People's Anthropology. Beijing: New World Press.Google Scholar
Finley, Moses. 1983. Ancient Slavery and Modern Ideology. New York: Penguin.Google Scholar
Guldin, Gregory. 1994. The Saga of Anthropology in China. New York: M. E. Sharpe.Google Scholar
Harrell, Stevan. 1995. “Languages Defining Ethnicity in Southwest China.” In Ethnic Identity: Creation, Conflict, and Accommodation, edited by Lola Romanucci-Ross and George De Vos. Walnut Creek, Calif.: Altamira Press.Google Scholar
Hill, Ann Maxwell. 1998. Merchants and Migrants: Trade and Ethnicity among Yunnanese Chinese in Southeast Asia. Yale Southeast Asia Series, monograph 47. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Southeast Asia Studies.Google Scholar
Hill, Ann Maxwell, and Diehl, Eric. 2001. “A Comparative Approach to Lineages among Xiao Liangshan Nuosu (Yi) and Han.” In Perspectives on the Yi, edited by Harrell, Stevan. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Shaoming, Li. 1992. “Lun mingai qian Liangshan Yizu shehui de dengji jiegou” (On the structure of ranking in Liangshan Yi society before democratic reforms). Liangshan minzu yanjiu (Research on Liangshan ethnic groups): 65–72.Google Scholar
Yaohua, Lin (Yueh-Hua). 1961. The Lolo of Liangshan. New Haven, Conn.: HRAF Press.Google Scholar
Xianjun, Long. 1993. Zhongguo Yizu tongshi gangyao (An outline of the comprehensive history of China's Yi nationality). Kunming: Yunnan minzu chubanshe.Google Scholar
Erzi, Ma. 1993. “Dui jiu Liangshan Yizu shehui jiegou de zai renshi ji ‘hei Yi’ ‘bai Yi’ de bianxi” (A new consideration of the former social structure of the Yi in Liangshan and an analysis of “Black Yi” and “White Yi”). Liangshan minzu yanjiu (Research on Liangshan ethnic groups): 38–48.Google Scholar
Meillassoux, Claude. 1991. The Anthropology of Slavery: The Womb of Iron and Gold. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
NINGLANG YIZU ZIZHI XIAN GAIKUANG BIANXIE ZU (NYZXGBZ) (The Editorial Group for an Overview of Ninglang Yi Autonomous County). 1985. Ninglang Yizu zizhi xian gaikuang (An overview of Ninglang Yi autonomous county). Kunming: Yunnan minzu chubanshe.Google Scholar
Pan, Jiao. 1997. “The Maintenance of the Lolo Caste Idea in Socialist China.” Inner Asia: Occasional Papers 2.1: 108—27.Google Scholar
Reid, Anthony. 1983. “Introduction: Slavery and Bondage in Southeast Asian History.” In Slavery, Bondage, and Dependency in Southeast Asia, edited by Reid, Anthony. New York: St. Martin's Press.Google Scholar
Enchang, Song. 1980. “Yunnan Xiao Liangshan Yizu shehui xingzhi chu tan” (An initial exploration of the nature of Yi society in Yunnan's Xiao Liangshan). In Yunnan xiaoshu minzu shehui diaocha yanjiu (Investigative research into the societies of Yunnan's nationalities), vol. 1, edited by Enchang, Song. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe.Google Scholar
Chengquan, Wang and Chengxu, Zhan. 1984. “Ninglang Yizu zizhi xian Paomaping xiang Yizu shehui jingji diaocha” (Investigations of the economy in the society of the Yi of Paomaping Township, Ninglang Yi Autonomous County). In Yunnan Xiao Liangshan Yizu shehui diaocha (Investigations into Yunnan's Xiao Liangshan Yi society), edited by Minzu wenti wuzhong congshu Yunnan sheng bianji weihuanhui bian. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe.Google Scholar
Shuwu, Wang. 1984. “Ninglang Yizu zizhi xian Hongqiao qu Shifushan xiang Yizu shehui diaocha” (Investigations of Yi society in Shifushan District, Hongqiao Township, Ninglang Yi Autonomous County). In Yunnan Xiao Liangshan Yizu shehui diaocha, edited by Minzu wenti wuzhong congshu Yunnan sheng bianji weihuanhui bian. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe.Google Scholar
Watson, James L. 1980a. “Transactions in People: The Chinese Market in Slaves, Servants, and Heirs.” In Asian and African Systems of Slavery, edited by Watson, James L.. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Watson, James L. 1980b. “Slavery as an Institution: Open and Closed Systems.” In Asian and African Systems of Slavery, edited by Watson, James L.. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Winnington, Alan. 1959. The Slaves of the Cold Mountains. London: Lawrence & Wishart Ltd.Google Scholar
Wu, Ga. 1997. “Gender Issues in Government Minority Development Policies: Four Communities in Ninglang County, Yunnan Province.” Ph.D. diss., University of Michigan.Google Scholar
Ruxian, Yan and Yaohan, Liu. 1984. “Ninglang Yizu Zizhi xian shaliping xiang Yizu shehui jingji Dianxing diaocha” (Investigations into some typical economic cases among the Yi in Ninglang Yi Autonomous County, Shaliping Township). In Yunnan Xiao Liangshan Yizu shehui diaocha (Investigations of Yunnan's Xiao Liangshan Yi society), edited by Minzu wenti wuzhong congshu Yunnan sheng bianji weihuanhui bian. Kunming: Yunnan renmin chubanshe.Google Scholar