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This paper reflects on the complex political dynamics between the United States, the Chinese Nationalist Party (Kuomintang) and Tibetan leaders from 1950 to 1960. In contrast to the existing literature, this study assesses these trilateral relationships by focusing on attempted covert operations and consequences. While volumes of studies have been published about the United States Central Intelligence Agency's (CIA) involvement in the Tibetan resistance movement, what remains understudied is the secret but unsuccessful attempts at cooperation between the Kuomintang and Tibetans and the role that the U.S. played in these activities. Findings demonstrate that the U.S. and Kuomintang's interest was driven by the desire to exploit the Tibetan resistance to advance their interests in combating Communist China. However, Tibetan resentment towards the Chinese and the lack of Kuomintang influences in Tibet compelled the U.S. to push back the Kuomintang in these trilateral relationships. This created a major barrier in U.S.-Taiwan relations and between Tibetans and the Kuomintang. In the race to exploit the Tibetan resistance, the U.S. became the winner. The Kuomintang, however, continued to explore the opportunity. Intricacies of nationalism, opportunism and pragmatism transiting through this period reveal realities of realpolitik. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, Tibetan Yubeng Village, located in southwest China, has become a hot spot for studying community tourism development in China's minority areas. Studies of Yubeng Village have been made on two tourism benefit distribution systems that are dominated by the community: the accommodation income distribution system and the caravan rotation system. Analysis and discussion of researchers are based on the formation, change, and influence of these two systems. However, different researchers have different interpretations of some fundamental facts, whether in terms of the time of the systems’ changes or in terms of the specific contents of such changes. Based on firsthand interview records and auxiliary secondhand materials obtained from field investigation, this study mainly takes “time of system change” as an example to discuss the reasons for these differences and advises that researchers should be more rigorous when facing those fundamental facts. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper outlines the present situation of Tibetology in contemporary China and shows the achievements and latest developments of Tibetology in contemporary China. It highlights the characteristics of Tibetology in contemporary China, based on analyzing the main fields of Tibetology. Furthermore, this paper assesses the dynamics and excellent features of Tibetology in China. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses opinions of political self-sacrifice amongst Tibetan refugees, and explores their meaning for wider debates on the evolving relationship between religion and politics in the Tibetan national struggle. This is a particularly pertinent question at present, given the recent prevalence of self-immolation in Tibet and connected debates about whether such protests are religious or political issues. Does the increase of self-sacrificial political methodology indicate a secularisation process of the Tibetan movement, as some have suggested, or is it simply reflective of the natural fluidity of religion's political influence? This paper supports the latter position and seeks to explore the nature of this dynamic relationship, including the positioning within it of the Dalai Lama. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hosting the 2008 Beijing Olympics brought about a boost of national pride among the Chinese public. However, Chinese national pride was hurt as soon as the international torch relay of the Beijing Olympics received considerable protests in London and Paris against Beijing's policies on Tibet and human rights. After the chaos of the torch relay in Paris, ordinary Chinese used the internet to vent their nationalist anger and disseminate information of how the Beijing Olympic torch relay was sabotaged by pro-Tibet protestors, as oppose to the official media discourse in which the Paris leg was largely constructed as harmonious and peaceful. Based on a discourse analysis of media texts collected from the People's Daily and Tianya Forum, this paper interrogates how both official and online popular media respectively shape Chinese nationalist discourses through representations and discussions of the Paris leg of torch relay. The paper also attempts to discuss the changing power relations between state and popular players in the context of online political communication in China, and critically discusses the extent to which the rise of online popular nationalism can challenge the role of the Chinese state in the production and construction of nationalist discourse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cenozoic bird tracks are known largely from North America, Europe, and the Middle East. There have been no reports of Cenozoic bird tracks from East Asia. This paper describes a series of two trackways produced by a galliform-like or gruiform-like bird from the Oligocene to Early Miocene of Tibet. The tracks are represented by tracings collected from a coal mine in Shigatse, Tibet, during the late 1970s. The tracks are comparable toOrnithoformipesandPavoformipesand likely represent a medium-sized to large cursorial or flightless bird. In relation to modern bird tracks, the tracks bear a striking resemblance to those produced by the North American Wild Turkey (Meleagris gallopavo) except thatM. gallopavotracks often possess a small, elevated hallux impression. Due to the fact that these are tracings, however, a hallux may have been present and simply have been overlooked. The Shigatse trackways were, unfortunately, lost when the mine was closed and then backfilled during the 1980s, and there is little to no likelihood of recovery. Casts can be catalogued as holotype specimens but tracings cannot; however, all the original tracings have been donated to a public institution by their discoverer, Yimin Wu. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The central government's pouring of money into the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR) or other Tibetan autonomous areas is apparently not really easing the tension in these regions. In response to Western criticism of the Chinese government policy in Tibet, President Hu Jintao says that the Tibetan problem is not about ethnicity, religion, or human rights, but about national unity or integrity. In fact, the Tibetan problem is about all of these things, and they are intertwined with one another. This paper attempts to understand each of them from an institutionalist perspective and to see in what way such an understanding of the problems may help solve them. Specifically, I first explain new institutionalism. Then I analyze the following problems from mainly a sociological new institutionalist perspective: (1) sovereignty and autonomy; (2) ethnicity and human rights; and (3) culture and religion. Finally I look at the possibility of social change under the institutionalist constraints. It is true that much research has been done on the Tibetan issue and the solution of it, but rarely do we see an institutionalist analysis. I hope that such an analysis will shed light on the understanding of the problem and help avoid the scene we see in the quote at the start of this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper evaluates the Tibet question through the looking glass of Taiwan, by considering four dimensions of comparative dynamics between the two cases of Taiwan and the Tibetan government-in-exile (TGIE) in relation to China: territorial, economic, ethnic and cultural. Of the four, the paper argues, Taiwan has high convergence with China in the economic, ethnic and cultural dimensions, and managed divergence in the territorial dimension. The TGIE, on the other hand, has high divergence with China in all four dimensions: territorial dispute, economic incongruence, ethnic estrangement, and cultural gulf. Further, the TGIE is ideologically and sentimentally charged by this divergence and thrives by exploiting it. It therefore should have few incentives to see the lessons of Taiwan applied in resolving the Tibet question. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rationale behind this paper is to stimulate reflection, open a debate and provide its readers with some much overlooked perspectives, perceptions and approaches from China, India and the Tibetan émigrés in India as regards the Tibet issue. These are formulated on the basis of author's interviews and enquiries with the representatives of the Dalai Lama's Tibetan Government in Exile, the leaders of Tibetan Youth Congress, the representatives of Students for a Free Tibet, as well as the Tibetan émigré in India and ordinary Indians. Besides, the paper also throws light on major differences and contradiction between India and China over Tibet issue; the future course of the Tibetan movement; and explores the possibilities of establishing a mechanism between India and China on Tibet. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper explores the introduction in Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR) of the new Chinese curriculum for basic education. In contrast to many previous initiatives since 1949 the present reform attempts to change not only what is taught, and by whom, but fundamental notions of how learning is best facilitated. The paper considers the connections between the reform and current directions in international education policy, and seeks to explore the ways in which the values inherent within this approach to teaching and learning relate to the practices that characterise Chinese/Tibetan classrooms. It is suggested that the meaning attributed to education at the local level shapes profoundly the types of cultural production that can emerge from it. International and national reform efforts must be and are always mediated through such understandings. In the case of Tibet, where often incompatible interests are at play, the impact of national level reform is unpredictable and uneven. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What Western academic literature described as ethnic or cultural Tibet in fact implies something composite and processually constructed: Tibet then often appears as a typical example for explanations of collective identity (and ethnicity). Such approaches increasingly are applied in present-day anthropology and historical studies, highlighting the historical conditions and the politically, socially and ideationally constructed features of identity. In Tibet, identity-building was strongly related to the spread of Buddhism. The new religion was introduced in the time of the Tibetan Empire (seventh to ninth century), but it was only its later spread (from the eleventh century) that led to the effective, all-embracing establishment of Buddhism in the Highlands. It was interlinked with regionally different forms of political manifestations—the founding of Buddhist kingdoms at the periphery and the emergence of monastic hegemonies in the central regions. These developments correlated with processes of conversion, which in its narrative model is described as an act of conquest, taming and civilizing the physical universe and which in theory actually never ends. Apart from considering current anthropological discussions of the phenomenon of religious conversion, this paper will include a comparative view of the history of Christianization in early medieval Europe (especially in Western Europe—the Frankish kingdom and the barbarian zones North of the Rhine and the Danube, fifth to tenth century). Inter alia this also raises questions about the initial social forces and interests promoting the new religion's adoption, and to what extent formal similarities with the Tibetan case are ascertainable in Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is concerned with the historical process by which elements drawn from a religious ‘civilisation’ have been reinvented as specifically national phenomena. It examines the Mongolian state ceremonies for sacred mountains conducted by the President as an example of the reinvention of an institution originally produced by the wider culture or civilisation of the Buddhist ecumene encompassing both Mongolia and Tibet. Such ritual, I argue, can be thought of as ‘cosmopolitical’ in that sense that they engaged with non-humans as actors in the political arena. Furthermore, the contemporary reinvention of these practices has generated a space for a very different, but also cosmopolitical, register for conceiving of relations between human persons and the landscape. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines bilingual education policies and practices in China and the interconnection and influences of the west in the new developments in bilingual education in this country. It focuses on bilingual education in Tibetan areas considering the sociopolitical context, the Tibetan tradition, and the current developments and new knowledge in the area of bilingual education. It discusses the challenges and limitations that Tibetan teachers and students face today as well as their strengths and aspirations for an improved bilingual education system through which teachers can teach better, students can learn faster, achieve higher, and consequently communities can prosper. It presents the experience and lessons learned from the Gannan Tibetan Bilingual Education Project in Gansu Province, a bilingual teacher training project for Tibetan primary teachers, supported by the UK Department for International Development in China in collaboration with the Gansu Provincial Department of Education. This experience can provide insight and useful information for educators, policy-makers, and governments in the design and implementation of similar bilingual teacher professional development projects in countries where minority and indigenous people live. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The recent debates within and beyond Marxism around empire and imperialism focus on deterritorialization, but fail to see non-Western states as anything other than collaborators or victims. Highlighting the importance of center-periphery relations within the territorially bounded political space of the nation-state, this paper puts forward a new concept of the Postcolonial Informal Empire (PIE) to characterize the emerging powers of China and India. The greatest paradox of PIEs is that a postcolonial impulse—to critically appropriate Western ideas and technologies such as sovereignty, nationalism, and the free market to build the multinational state and combine it with an affirmation of stories of historical greatness and long existing, pre-Westernized, civilizational-national cultures—enables the political entities to consolidate and discipline their borderlands and reduce diverse inhabiting peoples to culturally different but politically subservient subjects. It is predominantly a nationalist politics, and not economic calculability or financial interests, that shapes PIEs’ center-borderlands relations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In recent years what has been witnessed is that Indians have been encouraged to study contemporary China not only due to the cultural richness of that civilization, but also because of China's already significant influence on world events. In fact, with the incorporation of Tibet into the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1950 and the Government of India's oft-repeated official acknowledgement of Tibet as an autonomous region of China, the PRC ceased to be a ‘distant neighbour’ and became as proximate to India as the states of the Indian subcontinent itself. Obviously, for Indian scholars whose prime focus is South Asia, there is an imperative to study China as well. Tibet, which has been one of the key areas of China studies, needs to be researched comprehensively so as to gauge the extent of its influence on China studies in India in general and India-China relations in particular. It is in this context that this paper seeks to examine how academics, journalists, policy makers, politicians and China studies experts in India have viewed Tibet so far as its influence on India-China relations in the broader context is concerned. It also highlights the viewpoints of Chinese scholars on such issue, besides examining whether Tibet would continue to be an important factor impacting China Studies in India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In March 2008, Tibet erupted in the biggest challenge to Chinese rule since 1959. While Beijing and Dharamsala engaged in their familiar battle of representations, pundits speculated on the causes of the uprising, ranging from conspiracy theories to informed policy analysis. Applying the framework of the insecurity dilemma, this article argues that Tibetan identity insecurity on account of the post-1989 hard-line Chinese policies was the chief cause of the uprising. Largely peaceful protests and occasionally violent riots in Tibet have been integral to Tibetan efforts to mitigate their societal insecurities provoked by Chinese migration, 'assimilationist' policies and 'cultural imperialism'. However, Tibetan protests and riots heighten Chinese insecurities and harden Beijing's policies both inside Tibet and towards the Dalai Lama. This paper reveals the dynamic cycle of hard-line Chinese policies provoking Tibetan uprisings; the resulting hardening in Chinese policies feeds back into Tibetan insecurities and protests. The 2008 uprising was the most recent cycle in the long-running saga of the Sino-Tibetan insecurity dilemma. The article warns that unless the Tibetans and the Chinese find a way to break out of the insecurity dilemma, Tibet could explode into another frenzy of violence and counter-violence in the near future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The ongoing retreat of glaciers in the Hindu Kush-Himalaya (HKH) is associated with climate change. While deglaciation can cause a suite of impacts, one of the most visible and tangible impacts is the formation of glacial lakes. Some of these lakes can burst out causing large flash floods with the potential to cause significant damage to property, lives and livelihoods. At the moment, knowledge of the current glacial lake outburst flood (GLOF) risk in the HKH is incomplete, and a proper risk assessment is often circumvented. There is a need for a comprehensive GLOF risk assessment in order to support proper planning of mitigation and adaptation strategies in this context. In this paper we present a methodological approach for the GLOF risk assessment. The major part of the risk assessment is GLOF simulation and downstream impact assessment. The methodology was applied to the Sun Koshi river basin, a trans-boundary river basin between Tibet (China) and Nepal. A glacial lake outburst hydrograph was simulated using a dambreak model. The outburst flood was routed along the river using a hydrodynamic model to estimate the potential impact areas. A field survey was conducted to assess the potential damage caused by the GLOF. The peak outburst flood could be in the order of 7900 m3 s-1. The analysis shows that about 950 ha of land and a large amount of infrastructure are exposed to the GLOF. The economic risk due to the direct impact of a GLOF is estimated to be about US$197 million. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Illness narratives and explanatory models have been a research focus for the discipline of medical anthropology for decades. In recent years, standardized qualitative research tools have been developed to elicit illness narratives as a means of conducting socio-cultural analysis and as a springboard for health-related interventions - particularly with reference to communities experiencing rapid socioeconomic transition or those in which trauma has been experienced. Nevertheless, gaps persist in terms of the latent methodological and epistemological challenges of translating and transplanting such research tools to new contexts. This paper chronicles the adaptation of the McGill Illness Narrative Interview (MINI) for use in the culturally Tibetan region of Mustang, Nepal. This analysis is based on 44 in-depth interviews using an adapted version of the MINI to elicit narratives about experiences of illness. The MINI proved to be a compelling research tool, particularly in terms of engaging research assistants in the field. Yet its deployment in a context where distinctions between individual and social suffering can be blurred, where the dichotomization of 'religion' and 'medicine' makes little sense, and where understandings of causality are rooted in the concept of karma, revealed the extent to which the MINI - and, by extension other such qualitative research tools - emerges from particular models of narrative construction and assumptions about the relationships between self and other, cause and effect. Concluding recommendations are made regarding the adaptation of this tool to other settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the Chinese government began implementing economic reforms in the late 1970s, China has undergone profound economic change and growth. Since then, associated policies have provided many business opportunities in Tibetan areas of China, but Tibetans are poorly equipped to respond to and take advantage of these opportunities. The factors restricting effective market participation are complex and difficult to assess. There are no easy answers. Many political, social, cultural and environmental factors explain the difficulties encountered by Tibetan communities. However, this paper argues that relevant economic development policy is among crucial factors explaining the inability of Tibetans to compete with non-Tibetan migrants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Eastern Karakoram is a remote and under studied region of Ladakh in the northwestern Himalaya. The geology of the area provides insight into the evolution of the south Asian margin since the Paleozoic and is dominated structurally by the Karakoram fault, an ∼800 km long dextral strike-slip fault that bounds western Tibet. In this paper, a 1:250,000 geological map is presented based upon fieldwork and interpretation of satellite imagery. An overview of the geology of the Eastern Karakoram is also presented and includes a discussion of the architecture and kinematics of the central segment of the Karakoram fault. The construction of the map has aided our understanding of the initiation and evolution of the Karakoram fault and of the geology of the south Asian margin in this region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines agropastoral transhumance in 12 sampled villages on the southeast Tibetan Plateau. By analysing trends in this indigenous livelihood system and examining causes and potential consequences, we conclude that Tibetan agropastoral transhumance is a fragile system extremely vulnerable to external impacts. Within the context of China's rapid development and globalisation, this agricultural heritage is changing rapidly, as is most saliently reflected in herd size and structure, movement patterns, relative economic importance of pastoral activities and the relations between pastoralism and crop cultivation. Immediate causes of changes are local changes in livestock management objectives, land uses and labour availability, which are driven by more fundamental changes of environmental, political, socioeconomic, technological and cultural profiles, from local to global scales. Changes in local livelihood systems can have multifaceted and profound political, socioeconomic, cultural and ecological consequences, in both constructive and destructive terms. Policy-makers and/or project designers must have a holistic perspective so as to integrate multiple objectives of promoting sustainable socioeconomic development, preserving biological and cultural diversities and maintaining the environmentally stable balance of human society, animal population and ecosystem that has existed in the area for centuries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to simulation analysis of the advanced integral equation model (AIEM), there is a good linear relationship between emissivity and soil moisture under conditions of given roughness. The normalized difference of emissivities at 19.35 GHz and 10.65 GHz with vertical polarization can partly eliminate the influence of roughness and the squared correlation coefficient is about 0.985. This paper uses the normalized brightness temperature for retrieving soil moisture in Tibet from TRMM/TMI data. This method avoids parametrizing the land surface temperature which is a key parameter for the computation of emissivity. We make some sensitivity analysis for the atmosphere which is the main influence factor for our method. The analysis results indicate that our method is very good for clear days but is not very good when there is rainfall. We evaluate our algorithm by using the ground truth data obtained from GAME-Tibet and the retrieval error of soil moisture is about 0.04m3 m-3 relative to experimental data. The analysis indicates that the relationship obtained from the theoretical model should be revised through the local ground measurement data because the method is still influenced by roughness and vegetation. After making a regression revision, the retrieval error of soil moisture is under 0.02m3 m-3. Finally, we retrieve the soil moisture in Tibet from TRMM/TMI data, and the distribution trend of retrieval results is consistent with the real world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explores household perspectives on school access at the village level in rural Tibet. Data from two rural areas are compared. This paper argues that despite abolition of all school fees, the use of Tibetan as a medium of instruction, the provision of boarding schools, and other incentives, dropout rates in rural areas remain high. This is largely due to the opportunity costs associated with removing a child from the household labor force. Beyond acquiring basic literacy, rural households seem less willing to make the sacrifices involved without receiving direct economic return through access to non‐farm labor jobs after graduation. Nevertheless, there are other factors at work. Moreover, villages in different parts of Tibet are far from homogeneous with respect to the factors that affect school attendance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study takes a thorough look at basic education in some Tibetan nomadic communities. It is carried out by a senior Tibetan scholar who was born in eastern Tibet and has wide experience in working with governments, international organisations, academic institutions and private foundations. The paper provides a detailed examination of the main factors affecting the drop-out rate of students in Tibetan nomadic areas. (Ed.) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a multinational state, China's ethnic minority issue (e.g. Tibet and Xinjiang) is always a large political concern. China often treats this issue exclusively as a sovereignty matter and refutes outside criticism. What is the viable explanation of China's position? Is China's behavior consistent with the global norms and international law, especially the principle of national self-determination? This paper addresses these questions through an examination of China's ethnic minority issues in the context of foreign policy and international relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the transformation of the Tibetan government-in-exile through democratisation. The issues addressed include: the extent to which the development of Tibetan democracy is connected with the Tibetan independence struggle; the reasons behind the process; how far the development of democracy is directed toward the achievement of international legitimacy; and whether the aim of Tibetan democratisation is to ensure a smooth transition period after the death (or retirement from political life) of the present Dalai Lama. Answers to these issues benefit from consideration of the parallels between Tibetan democratisation and the Weberian concept of the routinisation of charismatic authority. Conclusions as to the nature of Tibetan democracy vary, although it is clear that the Tibetan concept of democracy is radically different from that of the west. This analysis of Tibetan democracy-in-exile finds many obstacles to full democratisation, including: a lack of competitive elections for the leadership; an absence of political parties in the Tibetan government-in-exile; the conflict of the religious and political roles of the Dalai Lama; a lack of formal opposition; and an unwillingness to embrace diversity within the Tibetan community in exile for fear of harming unity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China is not only the most populous country in the world, but also a multinational country with 56 ethnic groups. Tibetans (4.6 million in 1990) ranked in number as the ninth largest minority group. The Tibet question has attracted wide publicity in the Western media in recent years. The Chinese government is frequently criticised for political oppression and human rights violation in Tibet, particularly in three population-related areas: genocide, forced birth control programmes and population transfer. Surprisingly, international demographic circles show little interest in these controversies. This paper aims to re-examine the myths and facts about the Tibetan population in China, in an attempt to achieve a better understanding of the Tibet question as a whole. This paper is organised roughly into four parts: introduction, including the definition of Tibet, total Tibetan population in China, an examination of the 'genocide' myth, and a review of family planning programmes and population transfer in Tibetan inhabited areas. Government data used in this paper come primarily from various publications of the 1990 National Census results. Information compiled by the Tibetan Government-in-Exile (TGIE), is used as a comparison, in addition to some other Western sources. Analyses show that the 'genocide' myth is not supported by indirect estimates on Tibetan mortality, and the 'forced birth control' allegation lacks solid demographic foundation. On the contrary, Tibetan population has experienced an unprecedented growth since the early 1960s. Still dominant in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), Tibetans were only slightly outnumbered by non-Tibetans in other Tibetan prefectures in neighbouring provinces. However, the number of non-Tibetans transferring into ethnographic Tibet is on the rise. Instead of explicit resettlement programmes, the migration flow is triggered primarily by structural transformation and the Government's modernisation policy. It is historic coincidence if the current policies run counter to the interest of Tibetan nationalists. However, under no circumstances should one believe that time is running out for a political solution of the Tibet question. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents information on a visit by Thubten Gyatso, the thirteenth Dalai Lama of Tibet, to Peking, China from September 30 to December 1908. Why the Dalai Lama visited Peking; Reference to relations between Tibet and Britain; Refusal by the Chinese to ratify a 1904 treaty between the British and the Tibetan government.

The Zoige wetland located in the eastern margin of the Tibet Plateau, is very important for the runoff regulation and biodiversity in the Yellow River basin. Due to the large non-uniformity of the alpine wetland surface, the use of higher spatial resolution satellite remote sensing data is essential to match or validate the results of ground observation. The land evapotranspiration in this survey was estimated by using the GF-4 satellite data from 2016 to 2020 into the Two Source Energy Balance (TSEB) model, and the estimated evapotranspiration is compared to the ground observation. The results show that: (1) the regression analysis of the actual observed evapotranspiration and the evapotranspiration estimated by the TSEB model shows that the actual evapotranspiration and the evapotranspiration calculated by the TSEB model have a good positive linear correlation (R2 > 0.8) at the Maqu observation site and the Huahu wetland observation site. Therefore, the accuracy of the evapotranspiration calculated by the TSEB model is high. (2) The spatio-temporal distribution of evapotranspiration and relevant land surface variables is generally characterized by high in the southeast and low in the northwest over the Zoige wetland basin. (3) The mean daily evapotranspiration for different GF-4 observation over the Zoige area is as follows: 1.8 mm on 8 April 2018, 3.6 mm on 20 July 2016, 1.4 mm on 29 November 2020 and 0.9 mm on 15 December 2017, and the magnitudes of evapotranspiration of the different surface are as follows: waterbody > grassland > bare land. (4) The histogram of the frequency distribution of evapotranspiration show that 3.2–4.0 mm on 20 July 2016, 0–0.8 mm on 15 December 2017, 0.8–1.6 mm on 8 April 2018 and 1.6–2.4 mm on 29 November 2020 are the maximum evapotranspiration range over the Zoige wetlands area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article proposes an analytical framework to address why implemented autonomy outcomes may differ across ethnically-defined autonomous regions in China. The framework consists of a structural explanatory variable, inter-ethnic boundary-making processes, and an agential intervening variable, titular elites' representation in the ethno-regional state. It is applied to a synchronic comparison of four ethno-regions with differing autonomy outcomes for 2010–2015, Xinjiang, Tibet, Inner Mongolia, Ningxia. Titular elites' representation in the ethno-regional state is used as a proxy for titular elites' bargaining capacity with the central state. This article argues that an 'integration-distinction balance,' or rather, higher inter-ethnic integration combined with robust consciousness of inter-ethnic distinction, can contribute to titular elites' representation in the ethno-regional state, which can lead to greater autonomy outcome for the ethno-region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focuses on the materials which should be used in the teaching of the Han-Language courses for minority-nationality middle and primary school students in the Tibetan Autonomous Region in Tibet China while highlighting ways in which the quality of these courses can be improved with regards to examinations concerning these courses. Requirements of the schools in regard to the teaching of the Han-Language; Examinations regarding these courses.

We compared 385 Han participants and 302 Tibetan participants' death metaphors and investigated the associations between death metaphors and death attitudes. The results show that the death metaphor "Separation from loved ones" was the most common among both groups. Both groups scored highest in the Empty death metaphor subscale. Ethnicity had a significant effect on the Empty subscale and age had a significant effect on the Sorrowful death metaphor subscale. Death metaphor is significantly positively correlated with approaching acceptance and escape acceptance attitudes to death. Our comprehensive exploration of death metaphors enables a better understanding the Chinese concept of death. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study compared the responses of 380 Han and 315 Tibetan respondents regarding their attitudes about death and factors influencing those attitudes using the Death Anxiety Scale and Death Attitude Profile-Revised. The results show that Tibetan respondents expressed more death anxiety, fear of death, death avoidance, and escape acceptance than the Han participants, while Han participants showed more neutral acceptance than the Tibetan participants. There was a significant interaction between age and gender around Approaching Death. In addition, the death attitudes of Han and Tibetan participants were influenced by religious beliefs, funeral experiences, and the way their families talked about death. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a response to: Knight, J., 2012. The shape of glacial valleys: comment on Hall (2010). South African Geographical Journal, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/03736245.2012.663953. This was in turn a comment on: Hall, K., 2010. The shape of glacial valleys and implications for southern African glaciation. South African Geographical Journal, 92, 35–44. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the Tibet Autonomous Region of China (TAR), the local labor policy has contributed to converting the Tibetan population into citizens of the People's Republic of China (PRC). This paper analyzes this socio-political process by looking at the changing labor relations and management in a Tibetan carpet factory amidst China's modernization projects. I argue that in the labor policy discourse and implementation, varied labor categories and labels were constructed to legitimize socialist or exploitive labor relations and to create a class of carpet weaver-workers within the PRC framework of citizen-laborer. In this case, the making of Tibetan weaver workers has intertwined with ethnicity and gender politics. Sino-centric and gendered labels associated with carpet weavers provoked discontent among the Tibetan cadres and workers. However, such discriminatory labeling is increasingly applied to justify the exploitive conditions in today's TAR carpet industry. Using archival and oral history materials, I demonstrate that since the 1970s Tibetan carpets have been celebrated as Tibetan cultural heritage under the protection of the Chinese Communist Party. But Tibetan women weavers, who migrated to Lhasa, Tibet's capital, from the rural areas in the 1990s are treated as "temporary" workers and their contribution to this economically and symbolically important industry is not acknowledged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Describes the first Tibetan serial titled 'La-dvags-kyi ag-bar.' Issuance of the serial monthly from 1904 to 1907 by the Moravian missionaries; Profile on the Moravians; History of the paper; Sections; Pagination; Regular pattern of contents.

Situated in the contemporary contexts of Tibetan language movement and development in the education field, this article draws attention to the interactional nature of state-society relations and dynamic language ideologies in Tibet. It focuses on the ideological process underlying the discursive sensemaking patterns in official remarks and Tibetan reactions in the aftermath of a high-profile state intervention to reform Tibetan education in one part of the Tibetan region of Amdo in China. Although Tibetan people's concerns over language education and appeals to 'Tibetanness' empower them in resisting the repressive policy interventions from local authorities, this resistance also deploys the same metanarrative of legitimation that is fostered in state propaganda. As a result, Tibetan people's appeal to 'pure' language ideology accommodates speakers as much as it sets boundaries in the Tibetan society in the process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study sets out to see if the Western media frames of China change over time and how the dominant ideology emerges in the representations. It investigates how the Tibet-China conflict was portrayed and represented in the British national daily newspapers across four research periods from 1949 to 2009. It examines the frames chosen by the press and the influence of the sources (especially external journalistic influence) reflected on the frame-building process. In this research, both content analysis and qualitative frame analysis were used to analyse 955 news articles from ten newspapers. The present study shows that the British media frames of the Tibet-China conflict evolved over the period of fifty years. During the Cold War period, the coverage reflected the ideology of anti-Communism and during the post-Cold War period, it presented China as a human rights violator in Tibet. The changes in frames can be attributed to the external reality of the Cold War, the constantly changing international relations, and other internal or external journalism factors. It indicates that the frame-building process not only reflects news frames as tools used by journalists to construct reality, but also explains which external journalistic factors influence this evolving process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

States that in the Tibet region in Tibet, China unified examinations were instituted for student recruitment by technical secondary schools and senior middle schools in 1994. Amount of the total number of examinees; Details on the basic situation; Indications from statistical analysis; Problems encountered in conducting physical examinations.

Examines the status of Tibetans in India in 2000. Information on the social conditions of the exiles from Tibet in India; Comparison between the self-sufficiency of Tibetans and Palestinians; Key to the success of Tibetans-in-exile. INSET: Escape to freedom.

We present light and scanning electron microscopical observations on frustules of a new species of Clipeoparvus Woodbridge et al. from Tibet. Cells are small, lens-shaped to conical, have internally occluded areolae and lack any processes. The Tibetan species differs from Clipeoparvus anatolicus Woodbridge, E.J. Cox & Roberts, the only other known species of the genus described from Turkey, by the number, size and structure of the spines on the valve face. Two morphs were encountered, one bearing spines and the other without spines, and they can occur separately or in the same frustule. This phenomenon may be an example of Janus cells within this taxon. The biogeographic distribution of this taxon is discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Considered a major ethnic policy aimed at providing "intellectual aid for Tibet", the interior Tibet schools have recruited more than 100,000 primary school graduates to undertake secondary education in China's developed cities. This kind of dislocated schooling, although purportedly offering better pedagogy, has been criticised for jeopardising the local educational ecology in Tibet and disconnecting Tibetan students from their families and home communities. Some claim the downplaying of the Tibetan language and culture in these schools implies an assimilatory agenda. Yet the interior Tibet school system, with its primary goal of promoting national unity, has also cultivated a group of culturally and politically conscious Tibetan elites. In order to address these concerns, a localised version has emerged with the establishment of Tibetan schools in the regional capital of Lhasa and the importing of Han teachers from interior cities. Some have praised this new hybrid model, but my interviews with Tibetan teachers working in these schools reveal complicated uncertainties over this policy diversion. By comparing the aid politics of the two different models of dislocated minority education, this article highlights the importance of integrating indigenous voices into the policy process, especially if the state wants to sustain its educational programs for Tibetan students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Zircon U-Pb dating of two samples of metagabbro from the Riwanchaka ophiolite yielded early Carboniferous ages of 354.4 ± 2.3 Ma and 356.7 ± 1.9 Ma. Their positive zircon εHf(t) values (+7.9 to +9.9) indicate that these rocks were derived from a relatively depleted mantle. The metagabbros can be considered as two types: R1 and R2. Both types are tholeiitic, with depletion of highfield- strength elements (HFSE) and enrichment of large-ion lithophile elements (LILE) similar to those of typical back-arc basin basalts (BABB), such as Mariana BABB and East Scotia Ridge BABB. Geochemical and isotopic characteristics indicate that the R1 metagabbro originated from a backarc basin spreading ridge with addition of slab-derived fluids, whereas the R2 metagabbro was derived from a back-arc basin mantle source, with involvement of melts and fluids from subducted ocean crust. The Riwanchaka ophiolite exhibits both mid-ocean ridge basalts- and arc-like geochemical affinities, consistent with coeval ophiolites from central Qiangtang. Observations indicate that the Qiangtang ophiolites developed during the Late Devonian-early Carboniferous (D3-C1) in a back-arc spreading ridge above an intra-oceanic subduction zone. Based on our data and previous studies, we propose that an oceanic back-arc basin system existed in the Longmuco-Shuanghu-Lancang Palaeo-Tethys Ocean during the D3-C1 period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present our new investigation into the depositional environment and provenance of the Yingshuiquan Formation in the central Qiangtang region of northern Tibet, in order to further our understanding of the environment of the Longmu Co-Shuanghu Palaeo-Tethys during the Early Triassic. The Yingshuiquan Formation is composed of oolitic limestone, calcareous sandstone, calcarenite, thin-bedded ribbon limestone, bioclastic limestone, and coarse oolite limestone that were deposited in a shallow-marine basin and contain abundant Lower Triassic conodont fossils (e.g. Hadrodontina anceps, Pachycladina sp., gen. et sp, Pachyclaina oblique, Hibbardelloides sp). We selected detrital zircons from four calcareous sandstone samples for U-Pb dating, yielding minimum age peaks of 263, 269, 275, and 280 Ma, respectively, and a minimum age of 249 Ma, based on several zircons around the same age. Analysis of the conodont biofacies and zircon LA-ICP-MS dating of calcareous sandstone indicates that the data is consistent with deposition in the Early Triassic. The Yingshuiquan Formation records Early Triassic shallow-water sediment in the Longmu Co-Shuanghu Palaeo-Tethys, and has a Southern Qiangtang and Northern Qiangtang terranes provenance. During the Early Triassic, the carbonate sediments of the Yingshuiquan Formation were deposited in an active environment around the Longmu Co-Shuanghu Palaeo-Tethys, which has became a residual sea basin. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The People’s Republic of China is home to over 20 million d/Deaf and hard-of-hearing people, many among them belonging to ethnic minorities. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in two minority regions, the Tibet Autonomous Region and the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region, this article comparatively discusses findings on sign language use, education and state welfare policies. The situation in these domains is analysed through the framework of the ‘civilising project’, coined by Harrell, and its impacts on the d/Deaf and hard-of-hearing among ethnic minorities are shown. For instance, through the promotion of Chinese and Chinese Sign Language over and above the use of local sign and written languages as well as through education and the medicalisation of disabilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China's "Olympic Year" (2007-2008) was a watershed moment for the country and its ruling Chinese Communist Party. In this article, the author draws on her fieldwork experience as one of the few foreigners living in rural Tibetan regions during the Tibetan unrest in spring 2008 to consider the implications of the Olympic year from the margins of the state. Taking inspiration from recent anthropological debates about the nature of humanitarianism and sovereignty in neo- liberal and post-socialist states, the author considers the Tibetan unrest and the Sichuan earthquake that occurred just three weeks later on 12 May as particularly emblematic disastrous events linked by a new biopolitics of "charity" or "compassion" (Ch. aixin) in the context of state-led disaster relief. To get at the contested nature of morality and sovereignty in practice, the author focuses on nationally televised post- quake death rituals in which statist abstract compassion for lost Chinese citizens confronted the universalized compassion of embattled Tibetan Buddhist monastic communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Conclusion: In the northwest of China, the prevalence of mutations of the three prominent deafness-related genes, GJB2, SLC26A4, and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) 12S rRNA, among Tibetan, Tu nationality, and Mongolian subjects is high, at 19%, 28.57%, and 21.05%, respectively. Molecular genetic screening for these mutations and genetic counseling are effective methods to prevent the occurrence of hereditary hearing loss. Objective: To analyze the prevalence of the three common deafness genes GJB2, mtDNA, and SLC26A4 gene mutations in Tibetan, Tu nationality, and Mongolian patients with nonsyndromic hearing impairment in the Northwest region of China. Methods: Genomic DNA was extracted from a total of 189 Tibetan, Tu nationality, and Mongolian probands from the northwest of China. PCR and direct sequencing were used to analyze the coding region of GJB2, mtDNA, and SLC26A4 genes. Results: The mutant allele rate of GJB2 gene was 6.2% in Tibetan and 11.22% in Tu nationality patients, c.235delC was the most prevalent mutation, accounting for 75% of the mutant GJB2 alleles. Mutant allele frequency of SLC26A4 in Tibetan, Tu nationality, and Mongolian subjects was 4.54%, 6.12%, and 15.79% respectively; p.IVS7-2A>G was the most common form. Mongolian cases were significantly higher than Tibetan cases (χ2 = 7.281, p = 0.007 and p < 0.05). mtDNA A1555G mutation was detected in six Tibetan, five Tu nationality, and one Mongolian subject; one Tibetan patient carried the C1494T mutation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Asymmetric growth in foreign policy dynamics and power posture between China and India at the regional level is the new contour of current Asian politics. One vital aspect of it is the multilateral power politics or engagement through which rising powers connect and integrate with regional vis-à-vis global conditions in order to contend and compete with each other's strategic interests and primacy. This Asian rendezvous is part and parcel of the rhetoric of liberalist sentiments, which realistically do not work in favor of the developing countries' relationships. The history of the China–India bilateral discourse suggests that. In today's context, the increasing multilateral engagement between the two countries is a potential medium for denying space and holding an edge over each other's priority of acquiring assorted global resources, forming an Asian and a global identity, and notably in securing respective national strategic objectives. Current foreign policy contours of both countries are quite different from the previous order and politics. The boundary will continue to be the fundamental problem in their bilateral discourse, while the Asian discourse of Sino–Indian multilateral politics will be decided by their competition and power rivalry in resources and identity. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

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Putting into context the sentiment expressed by Tibetans on both sides of the Himalayas that true Tibet is located elsewhere, this essay focuses on an under-commented-upon consequence of Tibetan trans-Himalayan mobilities since 1959: the creation of two incommensurable modes of nationalism. One of these is territorial, the other embodied in the form of the Dalai Lama himself. The result of this dual nationalism has not been mutual compatibility and an increase in potential modes of Tibetan belonging, but mutual interference and a broadened scope for unbelonging. As such, the dispersed spatiality of community it enacts is reminiscent not so much of the romantic, organic unity of Herderian modes of (methodological) nationalism as it is of Heine's experiences of manifold unbelonging and contemporary German-Jewish articulations of a ‘portable homeland’. Ultimately, to reckon with such originary unbelonging, theories of diaspora and mobility must treat concepts of both home and mobility as mixtures of stability and instability, movement and stasis. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]