Frontier Stories： Periphery as Center in Qing History

Since at least the 1960s, the importance of the tremendous territorial expansion under Qing role to the modem history of China has been generally acknowledged. Indeed, one can say that the frontier story is one of the things that makes the Qing ＂Qing.＂ However, only in the last twenty years has the study of what is now termed the ＂borderlands＂ come into its own as a sub-field. This essay begins by describing some key concepts and terms in the study of the Qing frontier, including the Manchu wordjecen. It then raises the problem of narrative fiameworks, asking how we might best contextualize the growth of the empire, before going on to explore the implications of the discursive shift represented by the ＂New Qing History＂ and the extensive research on Qing borderlands associated therewith. A poem by the Mongol poet Na-xun Lan-bao provides the focus for a concluding discussion of a distinctive Qing frontier sensibility.     

The Global Frontier: Comparative History and the Frontier-Borderlands Approach in American Foreign Relations

"This trip into the Amazon would help to understand the real potential of Fordlandia: if it were all just an enormous glass container, a cavity made of precious crystal, into which an eccentric millionaire had poured his eccentric dreams; or if, in fact, it really was a pioneering adventure whose goal was to raise the flag of progress in an unknown territory, as unknown as it was beautiful, never to leave."
ldquo;So, don't you think, then, that to tamper with Eden is to destroy it?"     

The Experiences of a Polish Family from the Eastern Borderlands (1914–1921): The Protassewiczes of Borki

ABSTRACT

This article examines how two generations of a large Polish landed family from the Grodno governorate in the Russian Empire were affected by the political and social upheavals brought about by World War One, the Russian Revolution, the threat of Bolshevism, and the rebirth of a Polish state. The Protassewiczes, like other landed noble families in the region, despite their Polish- Lithuanian identity, enjoyed a privileged social status in tsarist Russia. Marriage and work took many of the family’s members to Wilno (Vilnius) and Siberia, while a younger member studied in Austrian Galicia where he joined Pi?sudski’s organisation. The article describes the evacuation to Taganrog in 1915 of the senior Protassewicz and his subsequent return to Borki in 1918 to face the ensuing Polish-Soviet War. Two members of the family who were engaged in railway building in Siberia met a tragic end. The younger generation participated in Polish military efforts in the east in 1919–21 and adapted successfully to life in restored Poland. Attention is paid to issues of national identity raised by rival Polish and Lithuanian claims to Wilno in the context of the fall of empires and the emergence of new national states.     

两汉时代神灵信仰世界中的西王母

起源于中国西部信仰系统中的西王母在西汉中后期开始成为全国性崇拜的最高神灵,其受崇奉程度甚至超过了原先产生于关东特别是楚地并影响于关中地区的太一神。通过考察文献和出土代表性文物可知,西王母超越太一神,这一信仰变革与两汉时代中国西部地区在经济文化上的崛起有着十分密切的关系。     

Military and Civilian Governance in the Western Borderlands of the Russian Empire during the First World War

On the whole, the civilian and military authorities were able to coordinate and compromise in governing Russia’s western borderlands during the First World War, despite constant military interference in civilian governance and a certain apathy in the center, both of which contributed to administrative disunity from the onset of the war.     

The Politics of Belonging: Complexities of Identity in the Catalan Borderlands

The rise of the European nation–state system profoundly influenced the map of linguistic and cultural minorities. Catalonia in northeastern Spain is no exception. The consolidation of the Spanish and French kingdoms during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries left Catalan speakers without political and cultural sovereignty. Furthermore, in the Treaty of the Pyrenees of 1659, the Catalan homeland els Països Catalans was divided by the Franco–Spanish border. Today, Catalan culture and politics enjoy increasing latitude in both Spain and France. This has encouraged various forms of cross–border co–operation in the Catalan borderlands. It has also led many Catalan nationalists to expect still greater political autonomy. Some activists have voiced claims for independence and even the reincorporation of the Spanish (el Principat) and French Catalonias (Catalunya Nord) . However, political tensions regarding the borderland's development exist between the local actors and the Spanish and French national governments, as well as between Catalan nationalists and the population at large. This article examines these tensions, first by looking at cross–border co–operation efforts in Catalonia, and second by assessing the visible markers of identity that Catalan nationalists have placed in the border landscapes. These are contrasted with the results of a survey charting the opinions and attitudes of 'ordinary' Catalans. The article argues that there are significant cleavages among Catalans, and that the era of the nation–states has left a legacy of complex loyalties at international frontiers.     

《晋安帝纪》与东晋安帝朝史书关系研究

黄爽《晋安帝纪》辑本材料出处名称多达六种。经笔者考订，《隋志》所著录王韶之《晋纪》与两《唐志》所著录《崇安记》及《宋书》所载《晋安帝阳秋》皆为《晋安帝纪》之异名，而黄爽辑本中之《续晋安帝纪》与《晋安帝纪》非一书，乃作者误辑。     

Taboo and Descent in the Articulation of Gender Relations: An Eastern Indonesian Case

In the Lio region of Flores Island patrilineal groups coexist with taboos on animals and plants inherited through females, a combination previously interpreted as reflecting a system of double unilineal descent. Drawing on ethnography from the Lio district of Mego, maternal taboos are shown to accompany similar prohibitions conceived as a property of patriclans, most of which, however, are incumbent not on male clansmen but on their wives. As is further demonstrated, both sorts of taboo reflect ideas about female bodies and blood, particularly as women and their children are transformed through marriage into members of patrilineal groups dominated by men. Also discussed is whether variability in the way taboos are currently inherited in Mego may reflect recent social change, and how matrilineally inherited Lio prohibitions can be seen as an instance of complementary female and male principles equally operative in the social life of other eastern Indonesian societies.