THE ROLE OF NANZHAO HISTORY IN THE FORMAnON OF BAI IDENTITY by YUQINGYANG A THESIS Presented to the Interdisciplinary Studies Program: Asian Studies and the Graduate School of the University of Oregon in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master ofArts June 2008 "The Role ofNanzhao History in the Fonnation ofBai Identity," a thesis prepared by Yuqing Yang in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Arts degree in the Interdisciplinary Studies Program: Asian Studies. This thesis has been approved and accepted by: • >===-==-- . Dr. Ina Asim, Chair ofthe Examining Committee n IS oloO~ __~ I Date ii Committee in Charge: Accepted by: Dean of the Graduate School Dr. Ina Asim, Chair Dr. Kathie Carpenter Dr. Xiaobo Su © 2008 Yuqing Yang iii iv Master ofArts An Abstract of the Thesis of Yuqing Yang for the degree of in the Interdisciplinary Studies Program: Asian Studies to be taken Title: THE ROLE OF NANZHAO HISTORY IN THE FORMATION OF BAI IDENTITY June 2008 , I Approved: ---~----f-~------------ j Dr. Ina Asim Concentrating on the man-made scenery of a theme park in Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture of China-Nanzhao Folk Island, this thesis explores the way in which the Bai people acquire an identity by sharing a common history that is actively re-created. The state designated minority status of the Bai has been made concrete first by the nationality classification project ofthe 1950s; then continued by ethnic tourism in the reform era. The history of the ancient Nanzhao Kingdom (649-902) is recounted and reenacted on the Nanzhao Folk Island following the ideological guideline for the creation and preservation ofthe historical unity of China. The landscape ofthe Nanzhao Folk Island reveals the interaction between the government's cultural strategy of promoting diversity and the negotiation initiated by the Bai people. The cultural forms on display derived from Nanzhao history are now the resource for a popular reflection ofBai identity. CURRICULUM VITAE NAME OF AUTHOR: Yuqing Yang PLACE OF BIRTH: Tengchong, China DATE OF BIRTH: November 23,1977 GRADUATE AND UNDERGRADUATE SCHOOLS ATTENDED: University of Oregon, Eugene University ofHawaii at Manoa Nankai University, Tianjin, China DEGREES AWARDED: Master ofArts, Asian Studies, 2008, University of Oregon Bachelor of Economics in International Trade, 2000, Nankai University AREAS OF SPECIAL INTEREST: Ethnicity in China's southwest PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE: Graduate Teaching Fellow, the Interdisciplinary Studies Program: Asian Studies, University of Oregon, Eugene, 2007-2008 Project Officer, Division of International Exchange and Cooperation, the Central University ofNationalities, China, 2004-2006 Teaching Assistant, School of Economics, Yunnan University, China, 2000-2004 v vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS In researching and writing this thesis, I have enjoyed support and kindness from my family, teachers and friends. I would like to express my gratitude to Dr. Ina Asim for her guidance and patience. She has offered invaluable advice on everything I wrote, often through line-by-line editing. Without her, this thesis would not have been possible. Thanks also go to the committee members ofmy thesis, Dr. Kathie Carpenter and Dr. Xiaobo Su, for their suggestions and thoughtful comments for revision. For my parents vii V111 TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page I. INTRODUCTION 1 II. MOTHER SHAYI AND THE DISCOUSE OF ORIGIN OF THE BAI 10 The Legend of Mother Shayi and the Nanzhao Kingdom 12 The Nationality Classification Project and the History ofthe Bai 16 The Discourse of Origin ofthe Bai and the Nanzhao Kingdom 27 The Social Stage ofNanzhao and the Legend ofMother Shayi 33 III. THE INTERPRETATION AND REPRESENTATION OF THE TANG-NANZHAO-TIBET RELATIONSHIP 40 Yunnan in a Historical Setting before the Tang Dynasty............................. 44 The Tang-Nanzhao-Tibet Triangular Relationship 49 The Contemporary Scholastic View ofNanzhao 63 IV. MANUFACTURING BAI CULTURE TO DISPLAY DIVERSITy............... 71 The Unique Buddhist Tradition ofthe Bai 73 The Authentic Patron Gods Worship 81 The Invented Bai Culture............................................................................... 89 VI. CONCLUSION 98 APPENDICES 101 A. RULERS OF THE NANZHAO KINGDOM 101 B. NANZHAO AND NEIGHBORING AREAS 102 C. ILLUSTRATIONS OF NANZHAO FOLK ISLAND 103 BIBLIOGRAPHY 105 ix LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Illustration Page 1. Nanzhao Folk Island 103 2. The Statue ofMother Shayi 103 3. Nanzhao Summer Palace 104 4. The Statue ofGuan Yin Acuoye 104 5. The Statue of Duan Zongbang 104 1CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION I have known since I was a little girl that China is a unified country of diverse nationalities (tongyi de duo minzu guojia ~-~~~Jijc~*) and that I am a Bai (8). I spent my childhood in the Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture located in northwestern Yunnan and surrounding Lake Erhai (i'.I+;4ij:). The Dali Prefecture was established on November 22, 1956, right after the Bai people were officially recognized as a minority nationality by the state. The term "autonomy" indicates that the Bai own a certain degree of self-determination in managing their local affairs. The 2000 census gave the total Bai population at 1,858,0631, ranking them the fourteenth most populous among China's 55 minority nationalities.2 About 80% of the Bai are residence ofDali making up more than 30% of the local population. I return to Dali every few years to visit my relatives. During my visit I was surprised to see the amazing speed at which the cultural terrain of Dali is being mapped through the increased sales of ethnic crafts, the springing up of Western style bars for the entertainment of tourists, and the expansion of theme parks centered around minority mythology, history, architecture and costume. Since the economic opening of China, 1 The statistic is from China Statistical Yearbook (2003:48) compiled by the National Bureau of Statistics of China. 2 The Bai are the second largest national minorities in Yunnan province. 2cultural diversity has become a source for financial growth and the indigenous culture of national minorities has developed into a target for economic exploitation. There were times when I, standing at the center ofthe ancient town ofDali now boasting of a newly- sculpted dragon statue, was overwhelmed by a feeling that the authenticity ofthe Bai was ruined, since the dragon, in my understanding, was a Chinese Imperial emblem. I grew up immersed in China's orthodox education, and firmly believed that I am, first of all, a Chinese citizen, and only secondly a member of a national minority, but I would curiously develop a repulsive feeling when seeing my hometown ornamented by those artificial structures. Is it because I am a Bai, or does this mean I am in search of some kind of ethnic "authenticity" to distinguish myself from other nationalities just like tourists are searching for "the difference" of the Bai versus the majority of the Han? Only recently did I accidentally bump into a book titled A Collection ofDragon Mythologi. I was shocked to learn that dragons are the protagonists in these folk tales of the Bai supposedly carried down from long ago. Some ofthe legends related to Buddhism register the mythological action ofthe Bodhisattra Guan Yin who, for example, combats a vicious dragon. At other times, dragons are personified to make contributions to the wellbeing or safety ofthe local community. Moreover, a dragon even appears in the creation myth ofthe Bai people. How ironic it was that I had been irritated by the dragon stature propped up in Dali deeming it an unauthentic emblem of commercial tourism. While lamenting my ignorance, I was equally confused by which 3 A Collection ofDragon Mythology (Long Shenhua Chuanshuo ft:t$i:MHJl) complied by Yang Xiandian (~hm:!l4-) eta!' was published by Yunnan People's Press in 1985. The book was one of my favorites when I was little but somehow I forgot that the dragon is one of the most sacred figures in ancient folk tales of the Bai People. Moreover, I always believed that the dragon image of the Bai must be different from that of the Han, a point supported by some scholars. 3elements are artificially imposed and which are original in the development of cultural tourism in Dali. My connection with the local community is, at best, tenuous, but I do not like my Bai identity being questioned. I cannot help but wonder where my sense of Bai identity comes from. Is it really so complicated or so important to comprehend the nature and causes ofthe Bai identity? Who is in the position to know and speak for the Bai? And what is the impact of cultural tourism on local people's consciousness of their identity? These questions will be addressed in this thesis by a study of the formation of Bai identity by means of concentrating on the scenery sites of a spot of cultural tourism. The characteristic ofDali's tourism is to invoke local history to promote a town known for its ancient flavor. The most pronounced and common feature of various theme parks in Dali is that they are in one way or another related to the culture of the Nanzhao Kingdom (649-902) and the Dali Kingdom (937-1253), two ancient kingdoms historically centered in the Erhai region. Examples include Nanzhao Cultural Town and Dali Deva Naga Film Studio, as well as the theme park I will describe in detail, Nanzhao Folk Island (Nanzhao Fengqing Dao i¥j-HllxltF'f.%) situated on the northeastern shore of Lake Erhai. Note that I use the English word "folk" to translatejengqinl on the grounds that it emphasizes the Bai people's traditional way oflife and refers to the Bai as originators or carriers of their customs, beliefs, and arts that make up the distinctive culture of the Bai. To make the history and culture of the Bai explicit to the public, a modem replica of Nanzhao Culture, the Nanzhao Folk Island, is a window to offer a glimpse into how the history of Nanzhao is utilized to make a contemporary Bai identity. 4 Some translate it as ''Nanzhao Love Island," which I think is inappropriate. 4The purpose of fonnulating the historical distinctiveness of the Bai is to secure their control of tourist resources, yet the focus of the thesis is not on the economic effects of cultural tourism but on its implication in the imagination and construction of a Bai identity. The potential of popular theme parks for revenue generating provides a partial explanation of the resurgence and visibility ofminority cultures. Cultural tourism, apart from being viewed as a vibrant economic sector, can shed light on China's ethnic politics. The most salient theme parks in China featuring ethnic culture are China Folk Culture Villages (Zhongguo Minsu Wenhua Cun q:t ~ ~{i:i-Y:. tr.;f;1) in Shenzhen and Chinese Ethnic Culture Park (Zhonghua Minzu Yuan q:t~~:D~rm) in Beijing opened respectively in 1991 and 1994. Both theme parks are playing the role of defining a national essence of the Chinese Nation (Zhonghua Minzu). The organizing theme of the man-made sceneries in these parks is to portray minorities as exotic members of a large harmonious family. Each of the life-sized villages representing the conditions and life style of selected minority groups nonnally consists of two or three oftheir typical dwellings. Folk traditions are joyfully perfonned inside their "households," where minorities in traditional ethnic garments are dancing, singing and smiling. In the words of Gladney, the setting up of this kind of theme parks is the expression of "the sorting out and establishment of paths of nationhood amid conflicting and intenneshed cultural phenomena." This process "is the means by which modem nation-states exert hegemonic discursive control, but it is a control that can never fully mask disorder and temporality of culture" (Gladney 2002:29). Ethnic theme parks transplanted into a non-minority region 5as an entertainment facility in the capital or the economic development zone are the perpetuation of China's discourse ofmajority vs. minority on a national scale. The reduced visibility of the Han culture inside the theme parks and the dominant presence the Han occupy outside the parks mark the sharp contrast between the artificial celebration ofminorities within the park and their peripheral existence in reality. The ethnic other is marginal in the political and economic realm but central to China's project ofnationalism. Various ethnic cultures are appropriated as part of national culture serving as a foil of complementing contrast to the homogeneity of the Han, the majority population of the nation. If theme parks in Dali are categorized as locally embedded, we may ask whether and in what way they are different from those transplanted as national showcases. Just like those parks in Beijing and Shenzhen, theme parks in Dali as a means of exploiting indigenous cultural resources are most often run by commercial enterprises in cooperation with the local government. Yet, local theme parks have more space to express their subjectivity within China's ideological context. Theme parks in Dali are usually devoted to construct a historical and cultural heritage shared by the Bai people, a heritage which would legitimize their status as an officially identified and recognized minzu. It is hard to overlook the agency of the Bai in constructing, defining and representing their own ethnic identity in formulating the landscape of local theme parks. What is made visible in theme parks is the local identity ofDali as shaped by the mobilization of regional cultural symbols. Designers of the theme parks rely on certain styles of imagined representation to create a narrative ofBai identity. Ethnicity, now a 6resource of a popular sense of regional identity, becomes a generator of local people's pride. Through an examination of theme parks in Dali we can achieve an understanding ofthe interaction between the government's cultural strategies and the negotiating process of identity creation initiated by the Bai. The Nanzhao Folk Island, originally named "Yuji Island (~IL.%),,,5 is one of three natural islands in Lake Erhai. The island was exploited by a commercial company and began to accept tourists in 1999. From the top view, the island looks like an aircraft carrier. Countless natural sights cover the island embellished by caves, banyan trees, and white sand beaches. The island boasts eight manmade sites: the dock ofMother Shayi (Shayi Mu yj;1f£}:) group statues, seascape villas, a Guan Yin Acuoye Statue on the Luck of Yunnan (Yunnan Fuxing A'i¥HiJIf.) Square, the Nanzhao Summer Palace, the Square ofthe Patron Gods Culture, an amusement park on the beach, a rock formation ofLake Taihu, and the special view of the fishing families. What is striking is that non-ethnic elements, like, the beach park, villas and the Lake Taihu rock formation6 are included. Villas and the beach park are probably meant to cater to diverse tastes oftourists as a sign of the Island's embracement of the modem concept of tourism. Lake Taihu rocks are said to be found on the island, but the scenery as a representation ofRan culture may suggest in a subtle way the acculturation of the Bai as Chinese. Despite these exceptions, the overall atmosphere of the island is filled with an air of ancient culture of Dali. In my 5 Nanzhao Folk Island is the name of the theme park, but it has come to represent the island. 6 Lake Taihu rocks are known for their beauty and are used for decorating traditional Chinese gardens. They have enjoyed popularity since the Tang dynasty. 7virtual visit to the Island, I will unfold how the process of identity fonnation of the Bai was fused with the ethnic politics of the state. Chapter II begins with introducing the Mother Shayi group statues on the Nanzhao Folk Island. The founders ofthe Nanzhao Kingdom adopted Mother Shayi, a legendary woman from the Ailao (.a~) people, as the illustrious ancestor and took over the Ailao myths and legends as their own. The creation myth of the Nanzhao rulers leads us to the contemporary discourse on the origin of the BaL Who are the Bai people? Did their ancestors found the Nanzhao Kingdom in the seventh century? The first question is probably the most important the nationality classification project in the 1950s needed to define. The argument concerning the second question tells the efforts of Chinese scholars to justify the legitimacy ofthe Bai as a national minority. An important component of the classification project was to write a history ofthe Bai. The statehood in history, the Nanzhao Kingdom, came to play the role of filling the contents ofthe category ofthe Bai. The classification project has a sustaining effect on the public perception of minorities, which is in many ways manifested in today's ethnic tourism. The Nanzhao Summer Palace on the Island is an architectural structure incorporating cultural elements symbolizing Tang China, Tibet and Nanzhao. Chapter III attempts to reveal the design rationale of this architecture. In the refonn era, the theory of anthropologist Fei Xiaotong (~:?JtJm. 1910-2005) with regard to the process of the fonnation of the Chinese Nation lends a strong support to the "pluralistic unity" of China. As the guideline of writing the history of national minorities, the theory paved the way for the visibility of ethnic diversity, for the most part, in minority regions. The 8application of the theory can be best illustrated by the study of the Nanzhao-Tang-Tibet triangular relationship. The focus of Chinese scholars is on Nanzhao's historical association with Tang China under the overarching theoretical guidance of a history of Chinese culture unifying the Chinese people. Furthennore, the official narrative of the relationship between today's Yunnan and China's imperial dynasties will reveal how the notion of the continuity of a Chinese culture was exaggerated to the extent as unchanging and dominating in order to shape the contemporary historical imagination. Only recently did a few Chinese scholars begin to grant Nanzhao the independent status it once occupied. The factors will be discussed which may have contributed to a more open- minded scholastic atmosphere when it comes to explaining Nanzhao's dynamic role in history. Chapter IV evolves around the statue ofAvalokitdvara Acuoye, or Guan Yin Acuoye on the Luck ofYunnan Square and the statues on the Patron Gods Square. There are two main religions practiced in the Erhai region: Buddhism and Worship of the Patron Gods. The religions preserve the memory ofnumerous legends, which were in many ways intertwined with historical figures ofNanzhao. During the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), all differences between nationalities were repressed, including the ethnic religion. Yet over the past decade, there is a tendency of the Chinese government to accommodate diversity as a response to the needs of economical development in backward minority regions. With regard to the contradiction between the celebration of ethnic diversity and the state's preoccupation of creating an image of a unified nation, it is noteworthy that the revitalization of ethnic religions does not necessarily mean the revival of their practice, but in many cases represents a form of stage show. 9 10 CHAPTER II MOTHER SHAYI AND THE DISCOURSE OF ORIGIN OF THE BAI A discussion of the emergence of a Bai sense of ethnic identity cannot leave out China's nationality classification project in the 1950s. Many ofthe concerns in the early efforts of writing the history of the Bai have remained central to the contemporary field ofBai studies. On the Nanzhao Folk Island, the history of the Bai valorized in service of the political and economic interests is in part based on the research carried out in the 1950s and early 1960s. Generally speaking, there were two major themes structuring the research on Bai history during that period. The first is the origin of the Bai people. Scholars sought to trace their origin by linking them to different names supposedly for the Bai in Chinese historical records. The second theme concerns the history of the Nanzhao Kingdom. This chapter will explore why the origin and the history ofthe Nanzhao Kingdom becomes central to the construction of a contemporary Bai identity. The history ofthe Bai compiled during the classification project has constructed the official representation of what defmes the Bai minzu as bound by their common history. Informed by traditional historiography, scholars presented different interpretations and understandings of the origin of the Bai. Though there were moments of debate and contention, the scholars never challenged the ideological underpinning of the classification project. The fundamental premise was to stand up for the unification of the 11 newly-founded nation-state. In the process ofpromulgating a history for each nationality, the Bai have gained a sense ofbelonging to their state designated status. The writing and the dissemination of the history of the Bai are most often two separate processes. The research for the history-writing project ofnational minorities was first carried out during the classification project, and was not renewed until the 1980s, since the Cultural Revolution had claimed the disciplines of history and ethnology dangerous were bourgeois practice. Moreover, local schools in Dali barely offer courses in the language and history of the Bai, thus the details of scholarly work remain unknown by the ordinary people. Thanks to the conscious construction of a historical Dali, the history ofNanzhao is turned from lifeless events to visual architectures. Local theme parks attached with historical meanings can be viewed as a method ofpopularizing the knowledge collected in academic writing. Moreover, historical legends are widely adopted to embellish the scenery sites in local theme parks. The legends should be studied with more consideration, since chances are that there were actual historical events lying behind their production. Legends are interpreted and utilized differently at different time periods. In this chapter, the crucial question is what the historical legend has meant for those writing the history of the Bai and those designing cultural tourism. The scenery sites on the Island related with Nanzhao history and its legends can satisfy the desire of tourists for an "educational" tour, as well as our quest for the process ofthe formation of Bai identity. 12 The Legend ofMother Shayi and the Nanzhao Kingdom Upon disembarking the ferry of the Island, we find ourselves at the dock ofMother Shayi group statues. The group statues portray an old legend related to the origin ofthe Bai people. Historian Yang Zhong (i%~~) from the Eastern Han (25-220) recorded the legend of the origin ofthe "southwest barbarians'~ in his History ofthe Ailao (History of the Ailao :a~1t), and similar contents appear in various later sources, such as the Annals ofHuayang (Huayang guozhi $~S ffi[;t;)7. The statues on the island are based on the version ofthe History ofthe Later Han Dynasty (Hou Hanshu J§¥J<.1=5). The legend had it that: 8 "A long time ago, there was a woman named Shayi living in the Ailao Mountain. She went fishing one day in a river and touched a piece oflog which gave her a strange feeling and afterwards she was pregnant. The lady bore ten sons and when the children were older, she took them to go fishing in the same river. The log turned into a dragon who popped his head up from the river and asked the lady 'If you have given birth to my sons, where are they?' Nine of the ten boys got so scared when seeing the dragon that they ran away. Only the youngest stayed behind and climbed onto the back ofthe dragon who then gently licked his son. The mother consequently named the boy Jiulong (fLl3i) since the back wasjiu in Ailao's language, and to sit was long. When the sons grew up, Jiulong was elected as the king by his brothers because he had been licked by their father. 7 It is a book recording the history, geography and significant figures in the ancient southwest, written between 384-354 by Chang Qu (1itIl) in the Eastern Jin. 8 My translation is based on the original texts cited by Lian Ruizhi (2007:55). 13 The brothers married the ten daughters of a family living at the foot ofthe Ailao Mountain, and this was how the Ailao people originated and began to flourish." It is noteworthy that the legend long predated the Nanzhao period. Then what is the significance of the legend of Mother Shayi in the Bai history? And what is its relationship with Nanzhao? Around the middle of the seventh century, six small kingdoms, the Six Zhao arose in the Erhai region. Among them, the Mengshe Zhao (~~i:B) is located furthest to the south and therefore called Nanzhao, meaning the "southern Zhao.,,9 It ultimately unified the five other Zhao and established the unified Nanzhao Kingdom in 738. Since there are few written accounts ofNanzhao, what we can rely on is mostly traditional Chinese historiography. An extensive account of Nanzhao is the Book ofthe Southern Barbarians (Man Shu ~-=r;)1O, written by Tang scholar Fan Chuo (~~) in the 860s. Nanzhao was depicted as a well-organized state which ruled over many ethnic groups with the principal constituent group of Nanzhao being the Bai Man. The New Book ofTang (Xin Tang Shu fJf m-=r;) notes that "They (the Nanzhao rulers) themselves say that they are Ailao descendants. 11" Even though the statement is endorsed by many as an obvious evidence ofthe Ailao origin of the Nanzhao king12, some sources indicate skepticism of this link, for the features ofAilao and Nanzhao culture do not share distinct 9 In this thesis, the establishment of the Nanzhao Kingdom is considered as the founding of the Da Meng Kingdom (:*~ 00) by the Mengshe Zhao in the year of 649. 10 "Man" was a common usage for barbarians in the south at the time. II See Ma Yao (1998:444). Ma Yao points out that the comment made by the Nanzhao ruler is also recoded in the Book ofthe Southern Barbarians and other sources. 12 For example, Fang Guoyu (1957b) and Liu Yuandong (1957). 14 similarities. 13 For instance, Wang Jilin (1976), based on the term "they themselves say," speculated that the founders ofNanzhao simply adopted the Ai1ao as illustrious ancestors and took over the Ai1ao myths as their own. Suppose the top stratum of the Nanzhao Kingdom was not related to the Ai1ao, what was their motive to make up the Ai1ao ancestry? The Ai1ao people are believed to have lived in the Lancang River (Mekong) region during the end ofthe Warring States period and the Han dynasty. At least eight minority nationalities in China out of the official fifty five trace their ancestors to the Ailao people, though they boast slightly different versions of the Legend of Mother Shayi. Similar story lines not only appear in the minorities' creation mythI4, but in The Biographies ofWomen (Lienv Zhuan37IJ Jd~) composed by Confucian scholar Liu Xiang eXI] rtJ 77BC- 6BC) in the Han dynasty. The chapter of the Exemplary Mother recorded that Jian Di cFa11X), the mother of the Shang's ancestor Qi (~) , became mysteriously pregnant after swallowing a five-colored egg dropped by a bird when Jian Di was bathing in a river. IS While legends are not history, these myths reflect people's wish to create a mystery around the birth of a founding figure to underline his extraordinarily exceptional qualities. The main characters in those myths are usually the mothers of the founders and forefathers. Thus possibly these stories were invented at the beginning of patriarchal lineage in order to affirm and celebrate patriarchy. I3 See Wang Jilin (1976:2-6) who presents a comparison of two cultures. 14 Eberhard (1982:77) notes that in the Hou Han Shu, the Yelang people, an ethnic group in Han times in present day Guangxi province, had a origin myth in which a girl became pregnant after being touched by a piece of bamboo in a river. 15 See Mou (2004:36). 15 For the Nanzhao rulers, the primary function ofthe legend of Mother Shayi was to create symbols around which a local cultural identity can be formed and mobilized. When dealing with Tang China, Nanzhao rulers refer themselves as descendants of the Ailao people, thus situating themselves as the representative of a multiethnic society in Yunnan. The formation and stability ofthe Nanzhao Kingdom is based on the unification of a wide array of ethnic groups in the Erhai region. First of all, the mythical elements in this story confer supernatural power upon the ancestor of rulers and underscore the sanction ofheaven. Secondly, we should note that the legend ofMother Shayi was recorded in Chinese historiography as a reference to the history of Southwestern Barbarians (Yi/~). The affirmation of their ancestors by the Tang provided symbolic capital for the Nanzhao rulers in a place influenced by Chinese power. Thus the legendary history ofMother Shayi acted as a unifying power in integrating diverse ethnic groups in the Erhai region. In the twenty first century, on a small island in Lake Erhai, the legend ofMother Shayi takes on a new role. The statue ofMother Shayi reveals the propensity ofthe designer ofthe Nanzhao Folk Island to depend on history in the form of genealogies and legends. Before we move on to discuss the role of Mother Shayi in cultural tourism, it is worthwhile to consider two critical issues for understanding Bai identity: Who are the Bai? And did their ancestors found the Nanzhao Kingdom in the seventh century? 16 The Nationality Classification Project and the History of the Bai Bai was named Minjia (~*), literally meaning "the civi1ians,,,16 before the classification project. In the first half of the twentieth century foreigners came into contact with the Minjia for whom the categorization of the people living in the Dali plain had to do with race. Flitzgerald notes in his The Tower ofFive Glories; a Study ofthe Min Chia ofTa Li, Yunnan (1941) that the Minjia were not Chinese, even though they bore significant similarities with the Han. A contradictory comment has come across in Francis Hsu's famous monograph, Under the Ancestor's shadow, Chinese culture and personality (1948). The book makes little mention of the origin of the people living in the Dali plain. Hsu chose the West town ofDali 17as the site of his field research of a typical Chinese village. He noticed that everybody in the West town spoke Minjia as the mother tongue, and most men and fewer women spoke Chinese with a local accent. In his opinion, "whether West Towners are a mixture of Chinese and an earlier inhabitant of the region or are a pure group of earlier inhabitants which has taken to Chinese culture is not important"(1948:19). It was the social mobility and the inner structure of the local family that seemed to make the town an ideal representation of a Chinese village with age-old customs and rituals. Suppose that the Minjia in the Western town deserve the title of an ethnic group; then we can infer that they must have adopted a Han lifestyle. 16 There are discussions about the exact meaning of the "Min," It could be derived from "ming" (~) as in "kunming" or "ming" (-1S) meaning, "those with names," aristocrats. Fang Guoyu (1957a:12) notes that the term "Minjia" came into being at the end of the Ming dynasty for the purpose of distinguishing the local from Han military immigrants called the Junjia (~~q. 17 A pseudonym of today's Xizhou, a town (Ui;) of the Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture. 17 Hsu is not alone in viewing inhabitants of the Dali plain as non-Chinese. Half a century later, David Wu (1990) summarized in the results of his field research stating that there are no distinct differences between contemporary Bai villages and surrounding villages ofthe ethnic Chinese. Only through the government's classification project was a self-perception of Bai identity realized. In Wu's words, "the Bai villagers did not appear to be different in physical features, appearance, behavior, or custom from other ethnic Chinese villagers in the region" (2002: 176). The only perceivable difference was language, and even so, the Bai language contained a large number of loanwords from Chinese. 18 The difference between two Han groups, say Cantonese and Shanghainese, can be more striking than that between the Han and those minorities that lack a unique culture. At first glance, David Wu's argument is well grounded. Anthropologists tend to identify ethnic groups by the presence of a list of cultural traits that differ from those of the Han and/or from those of neighboring ethnic groups. The key markers are those most easily observed and described, such as house style, costumes, customs etc. Even the name "Bai" was applied by others, rather than names previously used by the group itself. The category of Bai is one that has been constituted by outside observers. The identity within the population of the Bai is based on individuals' perceived commonalities with other members of the same group and their differences from others. As a result, to define the commonalities and the differences became a major task ofthe nationality classification project in the 1950s. What can speak for the difference of the Bai from other groups 18 The Bai language has classification difficulty. It is considered to be an independent branch of the Sino- Tibetan language family, or a Tibetan-Burman language. 18 according to the definition of the classification project and unnoticed by David Wu relies on the nuanced difference between the definition of "ethnic group" and "nationality" in the Chinese context. The Chinese word minzu was originally imported from Meiji Japan. Its usage in China has been full of ambiguity (Harrell: 1995b), since nowadays it can comprehensively refer to the Chinese Nation, or to a single group identified as a part ofthe nation, say, the Han minzu, the Bai minzu. Due to the Russian influence in the 1950s, minzu was translated into English as "nationality." According to Williams (1989), "ethnicity" stresses the self-perception of a group as possessing a different culture and a collective identity; while "nationality," on the contrary, emphasizes the status ofthe groups as recognized by the state. Harrell notes that "minzu as used in China is really not an ethnic group" (1995b: 102). The boundary of an ethnic group is fluid, yet minzu identity is rigidly fixed by the state. Minzu is an exclusive category in that one can be registered as Han or Bai upon being born even if having parents from different minzu. In recent years, the problematic nature ofthe term minzu has given rise to a debate about the English terminology of choice. Some Chinese scholars are calling for replacing "nationality" with "ethnic group." Yet the opposing voice insists that the counterpart of "ethnic group" in Chinese is zuqun (:D3Cff). Wu Xiaohua (2003) notes that the definition of "ethnic group" should be considered as a supplement to that of "nationality," and the supplement can assist our studying of subgroups within a nationality. Xu Jiexun (2002) emphasizes the political attributes of the concept of "nationality" in comparison with the cultural connotation of "ethnic group." An ethnic group can be a nationality but is not 19 necessarily so. By the same token, a nationality termed as an "ethnic group" can consist of several "ethnic groups." It is noticeable that his opinion is quite in line with that of Williams. No wonder Xu further points out that the introduction ofthe concept "ethnic group" (zuqun) is a way to strengthen the communication between China's anthropological research with Western academia. The clarification of the terminology on the part of Chinese scholars suggests implicitly that it is inappropriate to be particular about the classification project using Western anthropological principles. Following this vein, an equation between "ethnic group" and "nationality" made by David Wu seems to be the source ofhis confusion. On top ofthat, he extends his argument to equate the status ofminority sanctioned by the state with that of"Non- Chinese." He notes that the Bai ''previously claimed to be ethnic Chinese, now claim to be a minority-non-Chinese" (2002: 177) based on Hsu's observation in the 1940s that local people would feel slightly offended when being suggested that they were not Chinese. In other words, inhabitants of the Dali plain are Chinese, and were only categorized or designated as "non-Chinese," no matter whether in the name of "nationality" or "ethnic group." China is a unified country with 55 minorities, whose population is first of all citizens of the PRC and, only secondly, ethnic minorities, thus the "non-Chinese" assumption seems not applicable to the contemporary situation. But questions still remain: Were these people at one time Chinese prior to 1949? What was the place of them in China prior to 1949? And how did they relate to the Chinese? In order to address these questions, it would be beneficial to take into account the Bai people's selfperception oftheir identity. In the foreword ofExploration ofthe History of 20 the Bai Nationality in Dali, contemporary Bai scholar Zhang Xu (*)@ 1912-2001) wrote about how he came to live his ethnic identity, or in other words, how he assumed the state designated role as a Bai, and was motivated to explore the history ofthe Bai. Zhang Xu, in his childhood which he spent in the countryside ofDali, only knew two types of people: those who spoke Bai (Minjia) and those who spoke Chinese. Later in the elementary school he was taught about the "Republic of Five Peoples (wuzu gonghe liJ-*~*O):" the Han, Man (Manchu), Meng (Mongolian), Hui (all Muslims in China), and Zang (Tibetan). He had never realized that there were so many fraternal nationalities (xiongdi minzu JL~ ~!-*) besides the five peoples until 1938 when attending a meeting in Yan'an. 19 For the first time in his life, he was referred to as a member ofthe "fraternal nationality" by a Communist Party member. Zhang was deeply touched, yet at the same time he was overwhelmed by embarrassment due to his incapacity to name his own nationality, let alone its history. He notes that few of the ethnic groups living in the southwest frontier were clear about their ethnic category and history before the classification project. The process of the self-realization and self-identification of Zhang Xu shows the politics of ethnic differentiation in the twentieth century. In Republican China, the "Five Peoples' policy" brought up by Sun Yat-sen was intended to "imagine" a new China constituted by the Han mini!' and other "internal foreigners" within its border. At moments of national crisis, the New Republic asserted the sovereignty over the subjects of the Qing Empire, namely Mongolia, Tibet and Xijiang, to counter the trend of disunity. By 19 Zhang Xu joined the Communist party in the same year. A minority cadre, he was appointed the vice governor of the Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture is 1979, and was once the president of the Academy of Nanzhao History. 21 incorporating various peoples, such as the Cantonese and the Northerners, under the umbrella of the Han minzu, Republican China erased differences between the majority to mobilize them to fight against Western colonialism and imperialism. As a result, Han mini!' is an entirely modern phenomenon arising with the transition of China from a feudal empire to a modern nation-state. The Communist Party inherited the strategy of de-emphasizing differences between the Han, and established, as early as the Yan'an period, its basic policy towards ethnic minorities, such as the equality of minzu and the autonomous rights of ethnic minorities. The Party had built relations with many minorities encountered during the Long-March (1934-1935), for example, in Guizhou and Yunnan province so that the importance of these frontier peoples was acknowledged. The Yan'an period witnessed not only the birth of the CCP's minzu theory, but the preliminary practice of its ethnic policy. The Han began to assume the role of the older brother. The metaphor of a family was created for the political necessity of enlisting the support of ethnic groups on the borders for the revolutionary cause. Once the PRC was founded, maintaining the unity of the new nation at all costs was stressed. The theories formed in the Yan'an period remained constant in processing problems of the minority people. In the Constitution of 1954, minorities were granted rights of self-governance at different levels in autonomous regions. In order to assort minorities into manageable quantities so that each of them could be allocated seats in the National People's Congress, as well as funds and developmental projects, the nationality 22 classification project took off in 1956. 20 The project was based on Stalin's four characteristics of a nationality, namely, language, territory, economy and psychological nature manifested in a common culture. The metaphor of a family was invoked widely in order to illustrate how different nationalities, like related members of a large family, make individual contribution to the nation. Yet the membership in the family should be assigned by the state. In the areas of Inner Mongolia, Tibet and Xinjiang, the criteria worked reasonably well, since these people are territorially based, and more importantly, have recent independent statehood (Harrell: 2001). The Tibetans, for instance, well deserved a legitimate status as "non-Chinese" before the 1950s, while in the Southwest, where different ethnic groups live intermixed, there is still much dispute over whether particular nationalities were identified properly. The classification project was conducted by state-authorized ethnologists, linguists, and anthropologists, most of whom, notably, were not members of a certain ethnic group, but it was their opinion that counted. Ethnologists relied heavily on "historical relatedness" of groups but not enough on local people's own wishes, especially when they found Stalin's standards inapplicable in the field. In most cases, physical and anthropometric data were not the sole criteria of the classification, which instead to a much larger extent depend upon linguistic and historical analysis. It was not until the 1980s that a few Chinese scholars began to question the premises of the nationality 20 By 1955, there were more than four hundred different ethnic groups that registered the names by which they wished to be identified. The state decided to limit the number into a manageable quantity. 23 classification, at a time when the category had come to exist firmly in the minds of minorities. 21 In spite of its limitation, the project is more a productive process than a repressive one. In the case of the Bai, Chinese bureaucracy was gradually introduced into the Erhai region after Kublai Khan conquered Yunnan in 1253. Attempts to civilize and culturally transform the indigenous people by instilling a Chinese socio-cosmological order have been going on since the Yuan dynasty. In the eighteenth century, schools were opened for boys to inculcate literacy and Chinese values as a means to incorporate the Minjia into the Qing Empire. One of the legacies of the imperial strategy is Hsu's observation that most Minjia men were able to speak Chinese while most women could only use Minjia. By now it is clear that David Wu's non-Chinese assumption of the Bai/Minjia did not give enough consideration to the historical setting, though he is right in affirming the influence of the classification project on people's consciousness oftheir ethnic identity. The Bai were often assumed as a homogenous group named Minjia, and only through the classification project were other branches of the Bai living in mountainous regions identified. 22 Through a course of several decades, Minjia, Lemo ('j]~) and Nama Oj~!:b) people came to accept that Bai is the Chinese-language term for them, and that there are other kinds of Bai besides their own groups. The category of the Bai is far from irrelevant to their daily life today. Though the Bai and the Lemo may find their languages mutually 21 Zhang (1990) points out there were many disputes, but he did not question the premises of the classification project. Harrell (2001) questions the classification of the Yi nationality. 22 There are 129,000 Lemo people living in Nujiang, Yunnan province. Lemo is the name originally given by the Lisu people living in the same area, and the name used by themselves is Baini, Fenzi etc. There are also a few communities ofBai in Sichuan and Guizhou province. 24 unintelligible and their customs different, they have come to know through propaganda and media, that they share a common history. According to the common history complied by the national government, the Lemo are a derivative branch of the Bai, who migrated from the Dali plain to settle in the mountains ofNujiang in ancient times. Zhang Xu (1990: 1) mentions that the Lemo people referred to themselves as "the authentic Bai" (zhen bairen Jt S A..), while those living in the Dali plain are "the Han-Bai" (han bairen rJ... s A..). Moreover, the Lemo people are said to have preserved the true nature of the Bai since their language is hardly mixed with and influenced by other languages, and the reason, presumably, is their lack of contact with the outside world and their relative independence from imperial rules. Apparently, the existence ofBai subgroups is resonating with the aforementioned notion of "ethnic groups" constituting a nationality. The Bai's selfperception was reinforced, if not invented, by concerted efforts of both Bai and Han scholars in the 1950s and early 1960s to legitimize the category ofthe Bai as an inseparable part of the classification project. Of central concern to those involved was the problem of who the Bai people were. The collection The Origin and Formation ofthe Bai Nationality published in 1957 contains contributions of 18 scholars and is dedicated to analyze how the features possessed by the Bai were in line with Stalin's four-part definition ofnationalities. Nevertheless, though the shaping of the Bai ethnicity was in favor of a Soviet designated format, the focus was on how the four characteristics of the Bai nationality were formed gradually over the course of history. Stalin's definition ofnationality was developed based on the model of the "full-fledged ethnicity" in European nations. Another theoretical base of the Soviet model that the --_ ..._-_._------ 25 classification project used was Lewis Morgan's five stage evolution of human society- from primordial communism, slave, feudal, capitalist to socialist society. A rigid application of the theory denied "nationality" to any pre-capitalist groups, which should instead be allocated into one of the three other stages of human organization, namely, clans (shizu ~»*), tribes (buluo $~) and tribal federations (buzu $»*), but Mao Zedong argued in 1953 that "the scientific analysis (of ethnic groups) is permissible but, politically speaking, we should not go about making distinctions between which groups are minzu and which are buzu.,,23 Huang Guangxue and Shi Lianzhu (2005) note that China's nationalities may not comply with the stringent Stalinist notion, given that none of China's potential minzu had reached the capitalist stage, but their four characteristics are latent or manifest in varying degrees since they are advancing towards full-fledged ethnicity. In the words of Mullaney (2004b), Chinese scholars intentionally expanded upon "the connotative breadth of the term minzu itself." The requirement of acquiring a minzu status boils down to the "potential" of a group to evolve into a nationality. As a result, the classification was maneuvered to hinge on the unbroken line of the ethnicity rather than the current condition of a group. Chinese scholars meticulously working within the political paradigm of the project managed to enumerate the necessary components of an ethnic category- language, territory, common culture etc, but there were times when these items appeared not sufficient to mark a group's distinction from the other, or more frequently, a subgroup's similarity with the 23 Mullaney (2004b) cites Huang Guangxue. ed., Dangdai Zhongguo de minzu gongzuo (shang) (Ethnicity work in contemporary China, vol. 1 ~1-tr:p 00 Ef