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The writing reforms of the Mongolian language in Inner Mongolia from 1954 to 1980 are a notable case of Maoist China's language planning projects. In those years, the Chinese government attempted to implement two consecutive reforms featuring Cyrillization and Latinization of the Mongolian writing system, but neither reform yielded any substantial result and the traditional Mongolian script remains in use today. This article explores the domestic and international dynamics behind these two closely related reform attempts and examines their origins, rationales, processes of implementation, and reasons for failure. Although the rationales of both reforms lay in the communist doctrine favoring easier, more regular, and more universal writing systems that could improve literacy and facilitate communication, hidden behind both reforms were nationalist agendas. The Cyrillization reform sought linguistic unity with the Mongolian People's Republic, while the Latinization reform sought unity of writing systems among languages in China. In both cases, the hidden nationalist agendas undermined the original goals of the reforms, and the reforms lost momentum once contending agendas prevailed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Native-place associations have played an indispensable role in the global migration of ethnic Chinese. Although there has been growing attention to their political role in advancing the Chinese state's interests, few studies have looked into how they are organized and how they operate vis-à-vis the state. This article focuses on post-handover Hong Kong, where native-place associations, despite their long presence, are still growing in number and sophistication after the 1997 handover. It posits that native-place associations there are forming a "cultural nexus" through which the Chinese state fosters political mobilization in support of its interests and policies. Based on an original set of event and biographical data, it shows that native-place associations are consolidating into a massive network connected by power-seeking elites. It also demonstrates how these associations seek to renew the significance of native-place and national identities. The findings point to how native-place associations may serve as a powerful cultural space for the Chinese state to project its influence offshore. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1892, Terrien de Lacouperie (1845-1894), professor of Chinese at University College in London, set out to prove that the Chinese migrated from Mesopotamia in prehistoric times. Despite mixed responses from his colleagues, Lacouperie's "Sino-Babylonianism" found its way into China and captured the imagination of Chinese historians from the 1900s to 1930s. Whether they supported or opposed Lacouperie's view, Chinese historians were intrigued by his boldness in linking early China to the global network of trade and cultural exchange. This article examines how Chinese historians adopted, transformed, and appropriated Sino-Babylonianism in their discourse on the nation. It argues that the rise and fall of Sino-Babylonianism coincided with the Chinese perceptions of the world system of nation-states. Sino- Babylonianism was warmly received when the Chinese perceived the world system of nation-states as a hierarchy in temporality, prescribing a process of evolution that all human communities must follow. Sino-Babylonianism was fiercely rejected when the Chinese saw the world system of nation-states as a hierarchy in space, characterized by incessant territorial expansion of imperialist powers. In both instances, Sino-Babylonianism was no longer what Lacouperie had proposed in the late nineteenth century. Rather, it was an important benchmark for the Chinese understanding of the modern global order. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]