This paper examines the historical formation and contemporary flourishing of certain temple and trust networks that emerged from the Xinghua area along the coast of Fujian province in the late 19 th century, and spread across Southeast Asia over the last 150 years. This article examines three out of at least eight different networks that spread from this region to Southeast Asia (Fujiangsheng, Putianshi difangzhi, 2001). These are the 1) Spirit medium Altar Association networks; 2) extended lineage networks; and 3) Buddhist master-disciple networks. These ritual “trust networks” were constructed from cosmopolitical ritual technologies that were transportable, like the portable altar of a Daoist priest, the incense ash of a local god’s temple, methods of collective spirit medium training, or rites conducted before the spirit tablet of an ancestor or a master monk. This paper shows how these ritual methods were employed in a great variety of different political and multi-ethnic settings around Southeast Asia. These networks had a powerful impact on their founding villages and local cultures as well. Rather than simply preserving traditional forms, these networks engaged in continuous ritual revolution, constantly negotiating the forces of modernity within evolving ritual contexts.

Open Access February 12, 2015

The Religiousness of “Confucianism”, and the Revival of Confucian Religion in China Today / 关于“儒”的宗教性与儒教在当代中国的复兴

Fan Lizhu, Chen Na

Page range: 27-43

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Abstract

The English term “Confucianism” may refer to three different concepts in the Chinese language: the school of Confucianism, scholastic tradition of Confucianism, and the religious tradition of Confucianism. From a sociological perspective, Confucianism as an official political orthodoxy no longer exists. However, Confucianism as a cultural tradition remains, and it is expressed in various aspects of the Chinese social life, which echoes the diffused characteristics of a typical Chinese religion. In this research, we try to demonstrate that the religiousness of Confucianism fulfills the cultural and ethical needs of the on-going new religious movement in China. Also, it helps modern people in their search for a life of meaning in times of cultural crisis and social anomie .

Open Access February 12, 2015

Three Tongues and Two Identities: A Case Study of Ersu Ethnic Identities in Sichuan, China / 三种语言和两种认同中国四川藏族尔苏人族群认同的个案研究

Wu Da

Page range: 44-67

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Abstract

Apart from their mother tongue, most Ersu people can speak their two neighboring languages, Mandarin and the Nuosu Yi language, fluently. Therefore, the Ersu people have three languages. In the beginning of the 1980s, two ethnic identities among the Ersu people emerged. Some of them recognize themselves as being of Tibetan nationality, while others requested to be recognized as a distinct minzu (nationality or ethnic group). The writing system used by the Ersu people played an essential role in the dispute. The Tibetan canons used by the religious practitioners of the Ersu people, Shuvuer , strengthened the Ersu people’s identification with the Tibetans, while the Shaaba hieroglyph used by another type of religious practitioners of the Ersu people, Shaaba , stressed the uniqueness of the Ersu culture. Focusing on the use of the two writing systems of the Ersu people, this paper offers an analysis of this kind of ethnic dispute which is based on “subjective identification” and “imagined communities” from the perspective of reconstructionist ethnic theory in anthropology.

Open Access February 12, 2015

Missionary Encounters at the China-Vietnam Border: The case of the Hmong / 中越边境的传教士活动---以赫蒙人为例

Tam Ngo

Page range: 68-83

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Abstract

This paper examines missionary encounters that faciliate the extraordinary conversion of nearly one third of approximately one million Hmong in Vietnam to Evangelical Protestantism in the last two decades. Since this conversion is not officially approved by the Vietnamese government, these missionary encounters and the networks that facilitate them are highly informal and largely underground. This paper argues that the informality of Hmong evangelical networks as well as the conversion that they facilitate can only be fully understood if one seriously takes into account their ethnic and transnational aspects. Ethnic ties are important factors that motivate overseas Hmong to carry out missionary work in Vietnam, and such ties are also the primary reason why evangelism, carried out by Hmong missionaries, was and is so readily accepted by so many Hmong people in the country. In other words, it is from an ethnic aspiration to change their group’s marginal position and to become modern that many Hmong in Vietnam decide to convert to Christianity. Similarly, the missionary zeal of many American Hmong Christians is connected to their ethnic commitment to the Hmong in Asia while simultaneously shaped by their conversion to Protestantism during and after their migration to America. In this paper, I will show that it is also because of an ethnic commitment that many Hmong missionaries undertake the risk and danger to evangelize in Vietnam.

Open Access February 12, 2015

Creating a Common Fate: The Negotiation Meeting of the Bai’s Ethnonym / 制造共同命运:以“白族”族称的协商座谈会为例

Liang Yongjia

Page range: 84-100

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Abstract

Based on archival studies, this paper analyses an “ethnic symposium” organized by the party committee of the Dali Prefecture in 1956. The author argues that determining the Bai as the ethnonym is a process of “name standardization”. It was neither the decision of the state power, nor was it led by the scholar’s opinion, but by the local elites’ deliberate complicity with the state project. It could be thus called a process of “creating a common fate” under the combined principles of the discourse of “liberation-cum-backwardness”, historical evidence, anti-discrimination, legibility to the ordinary member, conformity to the communist value, etc. It defamiliarizes the everyday knowledge of the people and creates a liminal stage in which a shared fate could be felt. Therefore, this paper is not intended to deconstruct the ethnic identity, but attempts to provide the empirical analysis on a sociological issue of knowledge through contextualizing the usage and implication of the word “minzu” (ethnicity, nation).

Open Access February 12, 2015

Symbolic Representation of Rural Christianity and the Inventiveness of Faith Traditions / 乡村基督教的象征表现与信仰传统的发明性

Huang Jianbo

Page range: 101-114

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Abstract

There are two dominant perceptions on the relationship between Christianity and rural society and culture in China. One is more concerned about the authenticity of Christianity from the church’s perspective, while the other talks about ‘cultural security’ from the view of the local tradition of China. These seemingly contradictory views are in fact based on the same historical model known as impact response. It is a welldeveloped model in that it could explain the “mission church” (church in China), while it seems less or less likely to help us grasp the nature and reality of the “local church” (China’s Church). Hence, this article deals with the following questions, taking Huanan church ( South China Church , or SCC ) as a case study. Is it plausible for us to consider this kind of local church and its believers as a sort of Christian faith tradition de facto? In light of the assumption, how do we understand the diversified symbolic representations and even inventions? Furthermore, how do we understand the continuity and discontinuity of tradition, if we consider the faith tradition as a cultural tradition?

Volume 1 Issue 1 -

Issue of Cultural Diversity in China

Frontmatter

The Bitter Pleasures of Tea and Opium / 苦乐情之茶叶与鸦片

Ritual revolutions: Temple and Trust networks linking Putian and Southeast Asia / 仪式革命： 联结莆田与 东南亚的寺庙与信任网 络

Abstract

The Religiousness of “Confucianism”, and the Revival of Confucian Religion in China Today / 关于“儒”的宗教性与儒教在当代中国的复兴

Abstract

Three Tongues and Two Identities: A Case Study of Ersu Ethnic Identities in Sichuan, China / 三种语言和两种认同 中国四川藏族尔苏人族群认同的个案研究

Abstract

Missionary Encounters at the China-Vietnam Border: The case of the Hmong / 中越边境的传教士活 动---以赫蒙人为例

Abstract

Creating a Common Fate: The Negotiation Meeting of the Bai’s Ethnonym / 制造共同命运:以“白族”族称的协商座谈会为例

Abstract

Symbolic Representation of Rural Christianity and the Inventiveness of Faith Traditions / 乡村基督教的象征表现与信仰传统的发明性

Abstract

Ritual revolutions: Temple and Trust networks linking Putian and Southeast Asia / 仪式革命：联结莆田与东南亚的寺庙与信任网络

Three Tongues and Two Identities: A Case Study of Ersu Ethnic Identities in Sichuan, China / 三种语言和两种认同中国四川藏族尔苏人族群认同的个案研究

Missionary Encounters at the China-Vietnam Border: The case of the Hmong / 中越边境的传教士活动---以赫蒙人为例