Article ID: CBB270745543

Hacking the Yak: The Chinese Effort to Improve a Tibetan Animal in the Early Twentieth Century (2018)

unapi

This article considers the roles of yak bodies in relations between Han Chinese and Khampa Tibetan communities during the early twentieth century. It argues that bovine bodies were sites of Han-Tibetan interaction wherein culture, biology, and locality were intertwined. I chronicle the earliest large-scale engagement of the Chinese state with yak pastoralism in the context of its efforts to consolidate control over the eastern Tibetan region of Kham. Yak husbandry is traditionally an enterprise of Tibetans and other Himalayan ethnic groups, but the yak was targeted for ‘improvement’ by Han Chinese modernizers beginning in the 1930s. An effort to decouple the yak from its Tibetan cultural context at the Taining Experimental Zone saw mixed results. Livestock scientists there made modest gains in productivity, yet they did so by approximating to a high degree the nomadic mode of production from which they were attempting to extract the yak.

...More
Included in

Article David A. Bello; C. Michele Thompson (2018) Focus Introduction: Swarms, herds, and peoples—Examinations of Interspecies Dynamics in China. East Asian Science, Technology, and Medicine (pp. 9-16). unapi

Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB270745543/

Similar Citations

Book Nathan F. Sayre; (2017)
The Politics of Scale: A History of Rangeland Science (/isis/citation/CBB313856535/)

Article Warwick Eather; Drew Cottle; (2018)
Stymied Solutions for the Pest: Farmers, Graziers, Rabbits and the Search for a Biological Agent, 1880–1908 (/isis/citation/CBB026049098/)

Article Han, Yi; (2007)
Livestock Epidemic Diseases and Countermeasures by the Song Government (/isis/citation/CBB001090007/)

Article Yeh, Emily T.; (2009)
From Wasteland to Wetland? Nature and Nation in China's Tibet (/isis/citation/CBB000932190/)

Article Chen, Zhenghong; Yang, Guifang; Wray, Robert A. L.; (2014)
Shiyan Tao and the History of Indigenous Meteorology in China (/isis/citation/CBB001422089/)

Book Hofer, Theresia; (2018)
Medicine and Memory in Tibet: Amchi Physicians in an Age of Reform (/isis/citation/CBB460433093/)

Article Barbara Canavan; (2014)
Riding the Permafrost Rooster Across the Roof of the World (/isis/citation/CBB077851401/)

Article Craig, Sienna; Adams, Vincanne; (2009)
Global Pharma in the Land of Snows: Tibetan Medicines, SARS, and Identity Politics across Nations (/isis/citation/CBB000931897/)

Book Collinson, Diané; Plant, Kathryn; Wilkinson, Robert; (2000)
Fifty Eastern thinkers (/isis/citation/CBB000110655/)

Article Hofer, Theresia; (2009)
Socio-Economic Dimensions of Tibetan Medicine in the Tibet Autonomous Region, China (/isis/citation/CBB001020985/)

Thesis Ga, Yang; (2010)
The Sources for the Writing of the “Rgyud Bzhi”, Tibetan Medical Classic (/isis/citation/CBB001561054/)

Article Dreyer, Alden H.; (Fall/Winter 2010)
To the Rooftop of the World: A memorable trip over China’s Qinghai-Tibet railway. (/isis/citation/CBB806320218/)

Book Connor, Linda H.; Samuel, Geoffrey; (2001)
Healing Powers and Modernity: Traditional Medicine, Shamanism, and Science in Asian Societies (/isis/citation/CBB000620138/)

Authors & Contributors
Mueggler, Erik
Hofer, Theresia
Frank, Mark E.
Sayre, Nathan F.
Eather, Warwick
Cottle, Drew
Concepts
East Asia, civilization and culture
Medicine
India, civilization and culture
Medicine, Chinese traditional
Medicine, traditional
Livestock
Time Periods
20th century, early
20th century
21st century
20th century, late
19th century
Song Dynasty (China, 960-1279)
Places
China
Tibet
Korea
India
Sichuan Sheng (China)
Indonesia
Institutions
Qinghai-Tibet Railway
Comments

Be the first to comment!

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}

Log in or register to comment