Oasis Identities
 

Author: Justin Jon Rudelson Format: Hardcover Pub. Date: January 1998 ISBN: 0231107862 Format: Hardcover, 224pp Publisher: Columbia University Press B&N Price: $51.50

ABOUT THE BOOK
FROM THE PUBLISHER
Drawing upon extensive fieldwork in the Xinjiang oasis of Turpan, Rudelson assesses the factors that undermine the creation of a pan-Uyghur identity.

Rudelson has done a wonderful job of providing an overview of the issues that confront Uyghur intellectuals over the meaning and use of history.

FROM THE CRITICS
Rudelson has done a wonderful job of providing an overview of the issues that confront Uyghur intellectuals over the meaning and use of history.

Social anthropologist Rudelson presents the results of his fieldwork among the Muslim Uyghur people of the Tarim basin in China's Xinjiang province. He explores the interethnic tensions that foster or undermine ethnic nationalism and discusses how geographical and social boundaries shape competing ethnic identities at the local and regional levels. An important issue is how Uyghur intellectuals are influential in the creation of pan-Uyghur identity, but are often undercut at the local level by peasants and merchants who maintain other notions of Uyghurness.