Minority Education in China: Balancing Unity and Diversity in an Era of Critical Pluralism

3. How Do You Say “China” in Mongolian?

Introduction: Minzu and Its Translated Practice In this chapter, I employ the method of “nomenclatural archaeology,” which is supported by the revised version of the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis (Lucy 1992; Gumperz and Levinson 1996), to explore the etymological anxiety that underpins multiculturalism and multicultural education in the PRC, arguing that behind mainstream educational thinking lurks a linguistic-cultural anxiety over the much-delayed moment of congruity between the boundaries of the state, language , and culture. This tension is not only evident in the polysemy of Chinese terms like minzu (民族), Zhonghua minzu (中華民族), and so forth, but in the way non-Han people refer to China where, in Mongolian, for example, China can be Khitad (Han) or Dumdadu Ulus (central people/state), indexical to a history of tensions, conflicts and compromises between the Han and non-Han peoples over the past centuries. Although the Chinese word minzu is vital for understanding and interpreting China’s ethnonational configuration, past and present, there is no English equivalent ; it can be polysemously translated as “peoples,” “ethnic group,” “nationality ,” and “minorities” depending on the context. The word minzu can also mean “nation-state.” Han-cultural centralism, with its antiquity of authoritarianism, embraced a brand of civil society but also an ideal model for the nation-state, which asserts its linguistic-cultural border must be in agreement with its newly drawn political border. The word minzu is so polysemous that it often carries conflicting meanings. First of all, in Chinese, China is one minzu (nation); second, this minzu contains again fifty-six different minzu (previously nationalities, or, 3 HowDoYouSay“China”inMongolian? Toward a Deeper Understanding of Multicultural Education in China Naran Bilik 66 Naran Bilik recently, ethnic groups). While scholars in China differ over the English translation of minzu (Lin 1963; Wang 1983; Han and Li 1985; Zhou 1999; Wei et al. 1999), I agree with Kymlicka (1995) and Bulag (2002) that a “multinational state,” which involves “previously self-governing, territorially concentrated cultures ” being incorporated into “a large state” with resulting cultural diversity (to which China is a fit), is different from a “polyethnic state,” in which case “cultural diversity arises from individual and familial immigration.” Hence, in the former case, the incorporated cultures are “national minorities,” for which I would rather use the Chinese pinyin minzu to avoid complications due to different translations and interpretations. In addition, I will also analyze the ambiguity and untranslatability of the Chinese notion of minzu when we find ourselves in the semiotic universe of the Mongolian language. Such translingual ambiguity, if not untangled adequately, will sometimes translate into violent practices against members of different minzu with the help of a variety of political, economic, or other catalysts. With China growing ever stronger economically, there has been a surge of inter-minzu discord and hostility in recent years and international attention has been drawn towards horrific scenes of violence against members of different minzu. In Lhasa, the capital of Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR), ethnic violence broke out on March 14, 2008, and resulted in nineteen deaths and more than six hundred wounded according to government sources (Zhongguo xinwen wang 2008); in Ürümqi, the capital of Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR), ethnic violence again broke out on July 5, 2009, which resulted in 197 dead and 1,700 wounded (Xinhua 2009b); a few weeks prior in Shaoguan, a city in Guangdong Province, fighting broke out between Han and Uyghur workers in a Xuri Toy Factory, and two Uyghurs died and 120 Uyghur and Han employees were hospitalized as a result (Nanfang wang 2009); and in Xinlingol, where on May 11, 2011, a Mongolian herder, Mergen, was run over by a coal truck, the driver was a Han. Mergen led a group of herders who blocked a convoy of coal trucks from moving across grazing lands. This is one of the many incidents that can be traced back, if diagonally, to historical conflicts between nomadic and sedentary ways of life. Multiple protests involving hundreds of herders and students followed the incident and spread to other places including Hohhot, the capital of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region (IMAR). Large numbers of riot police How Do You Say “China” in Mongolian? 67 were dispatched to control the situation (Ramzy 2011). In sum, ethnic tensions between Han and non-Han peoples are on the rise in Tibet, Xinjiang, and, to some extent, Inner Mongolia, while such tensions are also having diverse influences on...