A Glimpse of Ethnic Borderlands of Modern China through the Lens of Early Chinese Ethnologists

This is a guest post by Wei-chieh Tsai. See information at the end of this post.

Between 1928 and 1943, early ethnologists from the Institute of History and Philology (hereafter IHP), Academia Sinica, went deep into the southern, southwestern and northeastern borderlands of China to conduct fieldwork. They collected a large number of documents, photos and artifacts for preservation and research. In the 1990s, researchers from the IHP once again engaged in the fieldwork of ethnic minorities in southwest China, and also collected some more photographs, artifacts and audio recordings. By comparing them with the above-mentioned early materials, we can explore the changes in the ethnic cultures of China in the past fifty years and the meaning of remaking of Chinese borders within the context of Chinese nation-building.

In order to share the research findings of the collective endeavor of the early and contemporary anthropologists in Academia Sinica, a group of anthropologists devoted to the field of ethnic studies of southwest China established “The Villages”. Being part of a national digital archives project of Taiwan, this website is developed by a team as a branch of the digital archives project of the IHP. The first phase of this project, entitled “Digital Archives of Historical and Cultural Relics preserved in the Institute of History and Philology: Digital archives for Ethnological Artifacts, Photos and Documents,” lasted for a period of five years, from 2002 to 2006. The second phase project began in 2007 and was titled “The Project of Historical and Cultural Heritages developed in the Institute of History & Philology-Digital Archives for Ethnological Artifacts, Photos and Documents.” This project specializes in the organization of ethnographic materials collected by IHP researchers, including audio-visual materials, documents, artifacts, etc. After these materials were digitized, they were organized into websites and databases so as to facilitate the promotion and popularization of this body of research. I had a privilege to join this project and serve as an assistant for developing the Ethnological Artifact Database from 2007 to 2008. In this post, I overview this online resource. 

The Villages

This website contains an introductory section of the project, led by Academician Ming-ke Wang 王明珂, and presents a survey of ethnic minorities in southwest China, which was conducted by the Institute of History and Philology during the first half of the twentieth century. The website also provides information on various aspects of the peoples inhabiting southwestern China, including their society, culture, history, and other related topics, and serves as a place to promote knowledge and academic exchange. 

This website contains three databases:

1. The Ethnological Image Database 民族照片資料庫: 
2. The Ethnic Document Database 民族文書資料庫: 
3. The Ethnic Artifact Database 民族文物資料庫: 

The Ethnological Image Database is developed for digital collection for photo preservation, research and education. Photographs of fieldwork on different subjects, such as religious ceremonies and physical measurements, are collected and managed according to the time of shooting and the subject of the photographs, so as to effectively preserve the collected photos of ethnic minorities. 

The Ethnic Document Database digitalized the documents preserved in the Fu Ssu-nien Library of the IHP, Academia Sinica. Those documents were collected from the 1920s and 1940s. The languages used in the documents include Chinese, Dai 傣, Yi 彝, Naxi 納西 and Buyi 布依 and She 畬, with more than 800 volumes. The Ethnological Survey Specimens, Photographs and Archives digital collection project of the Institute began to organize and digitize the documents in 2002.

The Ethnic Artifact Database is based on the ethnic artifacts collected by the ethnologists of IHP, Academia Sinica during the 1920s to 1940s and 1990s. These ethnic artifacts is divided by twenty-two ethnic minorities, including Buyi 布依, Dai 傣, Miao 苗, Yi 彝, Dong 侗, Jingpo 景頗, Qiang 羌, Hezhe 赫哲, Gelao 仡佬, Achang 阿昌, Hani 哈尼, Lahu 拉祜, Wa 佤, De’ang 德昂, Yao 瑤, Lisu 傈僳, Dulong 獨龍, Tibetan 藏, Zhuang 壯, Naxi 納西and She 畬, as well as a few foreign or unidentified peoples such as Lao-Burma and Tanghuang 偒僙, with more than 1,200 pieces in the collection. 

Since the three databases have no English version, here I take the Ethnological Image Database to demonstrate how to browse our databases and find the materials you need. First of all, a user can browse the image collection in three categories: 1) ethnicity; 2) current administrative region; 3) theme. Browsing under the category of ethnicity, you can click the icon of the ethnic group. For the English instructions, see the picture below:

If you click the icon of the Wa people, it will show like the picture below. 

Clicking the first icon “The Wild Ka Women in the Mengdong Market” (猛董街之野卡婦女) , you will see the picture and its basic information (基本資料), such as access number (登錄號), original title (原紀錄標題), contemporary official ethnonym (官方族稱), current administrative region (今所屬地區), Year the photo was taken (拍攝時間), photographer (拍攝者), and description (說明). 

You can find out more about the picture by clicking the button Detail (詳細資料). Under this section, you can find the original number of this picture (原始編號), the color of the original image (原件色彩), size (原件尺寸), and the current location of preservation (典藏單位), and the ethnonym seen in the original record (原紀錄族稱), and the thematic category (主題類別). See the picture below.

If you want to learn the reference, click the button Reference (參考資料). Here you will find the title of the source (書名或刊名), its author (作者), year of publication (年代), title of the article (篇名), page number (頁次), and the relevant content (內文). Sometimes the link of the citation will be provided.

If you are looking for related pictures, you can click the button Related Images (相關影像). 

The ethnological photos are collected from twelve provinces or areas, i.e. Sichuan 四川, Zhejiang 浙江, Hunan 湖南, Guizhou 貴州, Yunnan 雲南, Guangdong 廣東, Fujian 福建, Guangxi 廣西, Hainan 海南, Macao 澳門, Hong Kong 香港, and Burma 緬甸. Click the button “of Current Administrative Region”, and then a map of China and Burma will be shown. A user can click the different areas on the map and browse the photos according to the place where they were taken. Unfortunately, this page is currently not available because it is using Adobe Flash Player which is no longer supported by Microsoft. I have already reported that problem to the former director, but there might be no budget to fix that right now.

The ethnological photos are also divided into twenty-five thematic categories:

1. Daily Life (日常生活);
2. Human: Upper Class (人-人物);
3. Human: Common People (人-一般人);
4. Anthropometry (人體測量);
5. Artifact and Material Culture: Food (物與物質文化-食物);
6. Artifact and Material Culture: Utensil (物與物質文化-工具器物);
7. Artifact and Material Culture: Symbol (物與物質文化-象徵物);
8. Artifact and Material Culture: Body Decoration (物與物質文化-身體裝飾);
9. Artifact and Material Culture: Instrument and craft (物與物質文化-樂器與工藝);
10. Artifact and Material Culture: Letter and Text (物與物質文化-信件文本);
11. Housing (家屋);
12. Trade and Market: Ethnic Group (買賣與市集-族群);
13. Trade and Market: Merchandise (買賣與市集-流通商品);
14. Landscape: Ecology and Environment (地景-生態與生計環境);
15. Landscape: Village (地景-村寨地景);
16. Landscape: Public Architecture (地景-公共建築);
17. Landscape: Wilderness (地景-野外地景);
18. Ritual and Festival: Rite of Passage (儀式節慶-生命儀禮);
19. Ritual and Festival: Village Ritual (儀式節慶-村寨儀式);
20. Ritual and Festival: Family Ritual (儀式節慶-家戶儀式);
21. Ritual and Festival: Custom and Annual Festival (儀式節慶-風俗年節);
22. Communication and Transportation (交通運輸);
23. Performance and Activity (表演活動);
24. Event (事件);
25. Researcher (研究調查者).

You can choose a thematic category and browse the relevant images.   

In the end, for a student, researcher or an instructor who are interested in ethnic issues of modern China, our website and databases would be a useful online resource. I hope this article will draw your attention to our collective work and explore the ethnic borderland of modern China with us!

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Dr. Wei-chieh TSAI 蔡偉傑 is an assistant professor in the Department of History at the National Chung Cheng University. He is a social and cultural historian with interests in migration, ethnicity and state of Inner Asia and China. My current research explores how Han Chinese and Manchu settlers changed their legal status, acquired Mongolian cultural knowledge, and ultimately were integrated into Mongolian society under Qing rule. See his publications here.