Nathan Light

Genealogy, history, nation

This article uses Central Asian examples to challenge theories of ethnic nationalism that locate its origins in intellectual activism (Hroch), state modernization processes (Gellner), or the rise of mass media (Anderson). Modern Uyghur cultural politics and traditional Central Asian dynastic genealogies reveal related processes used in constructing modern nationalist symbols and pre-modern ideologies of descent. Modern territorial states with ideals of social unification and bureaucratic organization rely upon nationalist discourses to elaborate and rework cultural forms into evidence for the ethnic nation. The state links citizens to institutions through nationalist content used in political discourse, schooling, and public performances. Because such content is presented as authentic but used instrumentally, its contingency and fabrication have to be concealed from view: the culturally intimate spaces of bureaucratic production of culture and narratives are separated from public performances. The creation of genealogies used to legitimate pre-modern states are similar: compositional processes and goals are kept offstage, and little is disclosed in the public historical narratives and performances.

Turkestan chinois. Le Muqam des Dolan. Musique des Ouïgours du désert de Taklamakan. (Chinese Turkestan. The Muqam of the Dolan. Music of the Uyghurs of Taklamakan Desert) : CD recording review

Dolan muqam music from Xinjiang, China, has gained some renown in recent years because it is one of the few suitelike musical forms that has not had to be revived from the moribund condition of other Uyghur muqam traditions. Th e performers are generally not educated, modernized, urban professionals, but have come in a steady stream from the same social and religious contexts as earlier performers. Th ey are representative of traditional Central Asian performers because they are generally local community members who have spent their lives performing at large dance celebrations. Th eir heterophonic style of singing is a remarkable contrast to the mostly monomelodic forms of other Uyghur music, both muqam and folk. Nonetheless, more questions exist about Dolan lives and musical repertoires than answers. Th e Dolan are agriculturalists and herders who live primarily in the area around Mäkit and Maralbashi, two communities roughly 200 kilometers east of Kashgar and somewhat distant from each other (Svanberg 1996). Th ere is not much ethnographic research on the Dolan and probably will not be more until Chinese offi cials change their attitudes toward rural research in Xinjiang. China’s muchtouted openness to international researchers has not affected Xinjiang and no foreigners are allowed to do substantial projects outside of major urban areas. A few people have been able to travel and document the music cultures of the Dolan, with the muchlamented ethnomusicologist Zhou Ji (1943–2008) being one of the most successful, but his works have been published only in Chinese and Uyghur. He is heavily referenced by both Sabine Trebinjac (2000) and Rachel Harris (2008), as well as in my own work (Light 2008), but only the fi rst two briefl y consider the Dolan muqam repertoire. Th e recording under review was made as part of Dolan Muqam performances in Paris by six traditional performers from the Dolan community. Brief details about the lives of the performers are given in the liner notes, and they also show up in Harris’s book albeit with diff erences in the transliteration of their names: