China's Last Nomads: The History and Culture of China's Kazaks

Author: Linda Benson, With Ingvar Svanberg ISBN: 156324781X Format: Hardcover, 270pp Pub. Date: March 1998 Publisher: Sharpe, M.e., Inc. Series: Studies on Modern China B&N Price: $88.95

ABOUT THE BOOK

China's Last Nomads: The History and Culture of China's Kazaks

FROM THE PUBLISHER
A growing interest in China's borderlands accelerated after the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union, which brought independence to new states like Kazakhastan as well as a new configuration of power to Central Eurasia. Despite renewed interest in the region and its peoples, information on the Kazakhs, and particularly on the Kazakhs living in China, has remained limited. This new study, based on Chinese publications and archival materials as well as on recent field-work, provides an up-to-date treatment of Kazakh history and culture, emphasizing the Kazakhs in twentieth century China and, in particular, their status today as one of China's minority nationalities.

FROM THE CRITICS/Book news
Provides an account of the history and circumstances of the Kazaks in China, particularly in the multiethnic region Xinjiang, in the 20th century, a period that saw them separated from Kazaks in the USSR, introduced to Communism, and, most recently, allowed to return to family-owned herds and flocks that constituted the local Kazak economy prior to 1949. Discusses factors that impact their future, such as increasing interaction with Han Chinese residents, and Chinese policies that determine patterns of land and water use as well as market exchange.