All posts tagged: Han

The Early Reviews of In The Camps

Published by Darren Byler

The August 9, 2021 issue of the literary journal Mekong Review featured a lead review of two new books on Xinjiang, one which I authored called In the Camps (Columbia Global Reports), scheduled to come out in October (pre-order it now!), and a recent publication titled The Perfect Police State (Public Affairs), by investigative journalist Geoffrey Cain. “In what is the largest mass detention of people from a religious or ethnic group since the Second World War,” writes Robert Templer. “The persecution of the Uyghurs, ethnic Kazakhs and the Chinese Muslims known as Hui brings together four strands of contemporary life: the surveillance society and its facilitation by smartphones; the use of big data; global supply chains; and the idea that governments can take any actions against what they define as extremism. US policies after the attacks of 9/11, including secret prisons, disappearances and renditions without legal process, opened the door for governments like that in Beijing to apply the same policies without restraint.” Templer’s review joins other early reviews of In the Camps. Scholar of contemporary …

‘Truth and reconciliation’: Excerpts from the Xinjiang Clubhouse

Published by Darren Byler

On Saturday, February 6, two days before it would be banned across China, the social media app Clubhouse had a defining moment. As numerous news outlets have reported, a room called “Is there a concentration camp in Xinjiang?” attracted a brief flourishing of speech and free discussion among Chinese people in the era of state censorship. As noted in an episode of the Sinica Podcast with several of the room’s hosts, one of the features of the Mandarin-language conversation was unique: Uyghurs were placed in moderator positions and invited to share their stories of family separation and disappearance. There was civility and respect in the room, which swelled to as many as 4,000 participants. Crucially, there was largely an absence of what one participant termed “Hansplaining”: Chinese-language discussions of Xinjiang which privilege Han perspectives. The room attempted to center discussions of the Xinjiang camps not on geopolitics or the security concerns of protected citizens, but from the standpoint of those who are most harmed by systems of state violence. The participant said that critiquing Hansplaining is important because it is so …

‘The atmosphere has become abnormal’: Han Chinese views from Xinjiang

Published by Darren Byler

In 2019, when Meng You, an international student from China who is currently in North America, went back to see her family in Xinjiang, one incident really stood out to her. While shopping with her mother in a town near a division of the Xinjiang People’s Production and Construction Corps, or “the Corps” (兵团 bīngtuán) — where her grandparents had settled after moving from central China decades before — they had an encounter with a Uyghur man and the police. They were looking for parking in a crowded part of the market area when suddenly she heard a scraping sound on the side of their car. What happened over the next few moments made her reconsider her position as a Han citizen. A Uyghur fruit seller who was trying to avoid pedestrians had run into their car with his motorized cart. “Even though it was his fault, he was really angry,” Meng You recalled. “In Mandarin he said, ‘You hit my cart, pay me!’ He looked so ‘angered’ (激动 jīdòng). My mom said, ‘No, you hit my car.’” …

The Changing ‘Bright Future’ of Han Life in Xinjiang

Published by Darren Byler

In 2014, in the middle of a neighborhood at the southern edge of Ürümchi, the capital of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, there was a restaurant with a big red sign. In Chinese, the six-foot-tall characters read “BIG MEAT” (大肉 dà ròu), as pork is commonly referred to across China. The sign was an anti-Islamic political statement; it told everyone in the neighborhood that Han migrants had arrived and that they would not respect the values of the Muslims who called it their home. This Uyghur-majority neighborhood known as Dawan was one of the centers of violence during the July 5, 2009 protests. A large number of the Han migrants who were killed or injured during the violence came from this neighborhood. In the years that followed, many Han migrants moved from this neighborhood to majority Han districts to the north. Those who remained marked their space, signaling their defiance. The six-foot-tall sign was a statement regarding the type of “quality,” or sùzhì (素质), that was protected by the institutions of the city. Unlike many places in China, in Ürümchi, …