Subject: This Month in Mongolian Studies - December 2014

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December 2014
In this Issue:

ACMS 2015 Fellowships

Become an ACMS member or renew your membership

Upcoming ACMS Sponsored Programs and Events

New Books Acquired for the ACMS Library

Calls for Papers, Conferences and Workshops

Research Fellowships, Scholarships and Grants

Resources

Other News and Events

Recent Publications


"This Month in Mongolian Studies" is a monthly listing of selected academic activities and resources related to Mongolia. This list is based on information the ACMS has received and is presented as a service to its members. If you would like to submit information to be included in next month's issue please contact the ACMS at info@mongoliacenter.org and/or the editor, Marissa Smith, at msmith@mongoliacenter.org.

This publication is supported in part by memberships.  Please consider becoming a member of the ACMS, or renewing your membership by visiting our website at
mongoliacenter.org/join.  Thank you!
ACMS 2015 Fellowships Announced
ACMS Field Research Fellowship Program
This program provides awards of up to $4,000 to students and/or faculty from US universities to conduct academic field research in Mongolia between May and October 2015. Student applicants can be at an advanced undergraduate, masters, or doctoral level, and all fields of study are eligible. Students graduating in the spring of 2015 are eligible to apply. Faculty applicants can be faculty members from US colleges and universities with plans to conduct short-term field research in Mongolia between May and October 2015. All applicants must be US citizens currently enrolled in or teaching at a college or university in the United States. The program priority is to support faculty from non-research intensive universities and colleges, especially faculty who are helping guide student research projects or who can show how the experience will enhance their teaching. The fellowship is supported with funding from the US Department of State's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs through a grant by the Council of American Overseas Research Centers.

ACMS Library Fellowship Program

This fellowship supports US advanced graduate students or faculty members in library science or related fields from US colleges and universities to conduct short-term projects and/or research in Mongolia between May and October 2015. Applicants must be US citizens. The ACMS Library Fellowship program is to help support the development of the ACMS research library through specific defined projects designed to enhance the collection content and resource availability. The Fellow will also offer training and support for local scholars and the public. Fellows will spend up to 12 weeks onsite in Mongolia at the ACMS library; prior experience working in Mongolia is not a requirement. Fellowships will be awarded to fund travel and living expenses of up to $4,000. The fellowship is supported with funding from the US Department of State's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs through a grant by the Council of American Overseas Research Centers.

ACMS Intensive Mongolian Language Program
The American Center for Mongolian Studies invites students and scholars to enroll in an eight week Intensive Mongolian Language Program from mid-June to early August (dates TBA), 2015 in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. The purpose of this summer language program is to provide Intermediate-level students of the Mongolian language with an opportunity to enhance their communicative competence through systematic improvement of reading, writing, listening and speaking skills, in an authentic environment. The Language Program Fellowship covers the cost of tuition.

Deadlines for receipt of complete applications: February 15, 2015.  For more information visit www.mongoliacenter.org/fellowship
Become an ACMS Member or renew your annual membership
Become a Member of the ACMS!

ACMS Members are an important part of the governance of the organization, having voting rights to elect “At-Large” representatives of the Board of Directors for individual and student members and rights to nominate a representative on the Board of Directors for institutional members. The Board of Directors is the governing body of the organization, and it has complete authority over all programs and activities. Members, both individual and institutional, therefore have a direct stake in the future development of the organization.

Membership is open to individuals, corporations, and institutions that support the ACMS's mission of promoting scholarship in Mongolia, and dues go directly towards supporting the programmatic and administrative expenses of the organization. As a registered 501(c)3 non-profit, academic organization, membership dues and other donations paid to the ACMS are tax deductible in the United States.

Please consider becoming a member.  For more information, on member benefits and ways to pay, please see our membership page at mongoliacenter.org.

If you are unsure if your membership has expired with the ACMS, please contact David Dettmann at ddettmann@mongoliacenter.org.
Upcoming ACMS Sponsored Programs and Events
December 2 5:30 PM, Location: Mongolian National History Museum
Mongolian Premiere "The Tsaatan -Revival of a Forgotten Culture and Language" Documentary and Gala

Fearing the demise of the Tuvan (Tsaatan in Mongolia) culture, one Tsaatan woman, Oyunbadam, is seeking to reverse the trend. She obtained a grant from Santis Productions so that she could achieve her first year’s ambitions. The President of Mongolia issued a proclamation of support. The Ministries of Education and of Culture, Sports and Tourism also have rallied in support, as have the Tsaatan people themselves. This film records the first year of that effort.

The film reports on the steadfast determination of a few remaining Tuvan personalities in Mongolia to prevent their culture and language from dying altogether. Their perseverance resulted in a pilot project amidst the Tsaatan people to have a summer school program teaching the Tuva language and customs to the children of the area. The efforts were greeted enthusiastically, and were recorded on this film. They also attracted the attention of the President of Mongolia, who issued a proclamation in support of these efforts.

To Celebrate the Mongolian Premiere of this film, the ACMS held a Gala event at the National History museum of Mongolia on December 2nd. Included in the evening events was a lecture on the Tuvan people, and a screening of the documentary with a reception following.


Speaker Series
The Speaker Series are formal presentations given by leading academics, experts and community leaders on a wide variety of topics related to Mongolia. Each session has a 30-45 minute formal lecture followed by a 30 minute Q&A session. All presentations are held in the American Corner presentation room of the Natsagdorj Library in Ulaanbaatar. We invite all researchers visiting Mongolia and who are interested in presenting to contact us at their earliest convenience.


December 9th Speaker Series (5:30 pm at the American Corner)
Chogdon Tsedev  - "Challenges in Translation and their Reasons"

Translating documents is a challenge that faces many Mongolian academics.  In order to gain access to the vast quantity of knowledge available in the world,  Mongolian need to make their research available, as well as gain access to information from outside sources.  The key challenge is the quality of the translation and the understanding of not only the words but the intended meaning of the authors. Using two different Mongolian  translations of  “In Secret Mongolia”, originally by Henning Haslund, Professor Chogdon Tsedev will attempt to demonstrate the importance of accurate translation.  He will examine some of the syntactic, stylistic and vocabulary mistakes made in these works and draw conclusions as presented in his article published in “ foreign language teaching methodology” magazine.  There will also be an analysis of English translations of Mongolian works and some of the challenges discovered.

Chogdon Tsedev is Associate Professor (of Russian language), Best Worker of Public Education and Best Worker of Science.  Chogdon Tsedev is also awardee of the North Star medal. He graduated the State Institute of Pedagogues as a Russian teacher in 1961, worked as a specialist-inspector at Ministry of Public Education, as a teacher at the Institute of the Party, Institute of Medical Sciences, Darkhan University of Technology, School of Khailaar, Inner Mongolia, “Tenger” Euro-Asian Institute of Social Science, and now he works as part-time teacher at Ider Institute. He translated books including “Let’s learn to read in Russian”, “In Eternal Recreational Land”, “Zolodya Ulinov” and “Great world leaders” from Russian, wrote several higher education handbooks and textbooks of Russian language (co-author), published “English-Russian-Mongolian translation guide” (2008, 2013) and translated some of “Lady Witrix Goulin’s travel in Mongolia in 1913”, and compiled and published over 10 books including “Mongolian knucklebones”, “Mongolian ger”, “Mongolian Secret History for Kids” and etc. He wrote an article in Russian “Russian language abroad” magazine (1979) and translated a memoir of Prince De from Inner Mongolian book into Cyrillic Mongolian and published it in “Science and life” magazine (2014#1). He did comparative analysis under the theme “Some mistakes in translation and their reasons” (2014).

Call for Posters and Displays for ACMS Annual Meeting in Chicago

The ACMS is organizing a poster session on topics related to Mongolia to be held on Friday, March 27nd, 2015, 7:30-10:00pm at the Chicago Sheraton Hotel & Towers in conjunction with the Association for Asian Studies' annual conference and the ACMS Annual Meeting. Posters or displays on any topic related to Mongolia, Mongolian people or historical subjects related to the Mongols are welcome. All presenters are required to appear at the meeting to discuss their work. Posters and displays may be in either English or Mongolian language, and students and scholars from all countries and fields of study are invited to participate in the poster session and reception. The audience is expected to include students, scholars, and local residents from Mongolia, and members of the community interested in Mongolia. To propose a poster or display for the session, please send a brief abstract or description (no more than 250 words) to David Dettmann at ddettmann@mongoliacenter.org before March 1, 2015. Posters and displays will be accepted on a rolling basis. You do not need to be registered for the AAS conference to participate, but poster presenters should be a member of the ACMS at the time of the meetings. For more information on the AAS conference see: http://www.asian-studies.org/conference/.
New Books Acquired for the ACMS Library
  • Amitai, Reuven. Nomads as Agents of Cultural Change (Perspectives on the Global Past) (University of Hawaii Press, 2014).
  • Bille, Franck. Sinophobia: Anxiety, Violence, and the Making of Mongolian Identity (University of Hawaii Press, 2014).
  • Kaplonski, Christopher. The Lama Question (University of Hawaii Press, 2014).
Calls for Papers, Conferences, Workshops
Call for Papers

3rd Oxford Interdisciplinary Desert Conference. Please join us at the School for Geography and the Environment at Oxford University for the 3rd Oxford Interdisciplinary Desert Conference, from 16-17 April 2015. Information and registration: http://www.geog.ox.ac.uk/events/deserts/ This event provides a forum for researchers and those interested in desert and dryland environments and societies to present, discuss and debate dryland themes and research. Currently desert issues are atomized in universities, international and governmental organizations and local settings; the conference brings together people researching, working and living across the world's desert and semi-desert regions. The conference focuses on exchanging ideas through talks, discussion sessions and working groups. Generous support from the Wenner-Gren Foundation has allowed us to organize a special workshop focused on pastoralism in Asian drylands and will support the participation of a number of scholars from the Middle East and Central Asia. Natural and social scientists working with mobile pastoralist communities are encouraged to attend. Please let us know if you have any questions. We look forward to welcoming you in Oxford. For inquiries contact Ariell Ahearn or Troy Sternberg at: deserts@ouce.ox.ac.uk.

The Eurasia Studies Society (TESS-GB Europe), Multi-Disciplinary Doctoral Workshop on Central Asia & the Caucasus, Professional Development: Publishing, Grants and Policy Engagement, 24 January 2015, Saturday (from 12.30-18.00), Royal Holloway, University of London, Senate House, Room 216, University of London, Malet Street London, WC1E 7HU. Convened by Dr Gul Berna Ozcan, School of Management, Royal Holloway University of London. This workshop will provide a platform to exchange ideas and for informed discussion about professional development opportunities for young scholars with presentations from some of the UK’s leading scholars. The sessions will include presentations on publishing academic papers, getting research grants and engaging with the policy community. The event is free and open to all doctoral candidates who have completed their second year of PhD studies and post-doctoral researchers working in any social science discipline with a focus on Central Asia and the Caucasus.  The provisional programme will be available in mid-December 2014.  We have limited space and can only offer 25 places for this event. The deadline for reservations is 10 January 2015.Send your name, institutional affiliation and a maximum 400-word summary of your PhD dissertation topic and its methodology to the conference manager Dr. Sevket Akyildiz at the Eurasia Studies Society of Great Britain and Europe (TESS GB-Europe) E-mail: eurasiasocietyuk@gmail.com or sa112@soas.ac.uk

IX Annual Mongolian Studies Conference co-hosted by The Mongolian Cultural Center and The Embassy of Mongolia
, Friday-Sunday, May 8-10th, 2015, Washington, D.C.

Requirements for Papers: The research topic must be relevant to all traditional Mongolian Studies subjects such as Mongolian language, history, religion, arts, literature, anthropology and other subjects that contain Mongolian social, economic, and cultural issues. The papers must be original work of the author(s) and can be written and presented in either Mongolian or English. Submission deadline for paper abstracts is February 1, 2015. Abstracts must not exceed 500 words. Please send your abstracts to info@mongolcc.org.

If your paper is accepted you will have 15 minutes for presenting and 5 more minutes for discussion. The conference will be held at the Embassy of Mongolia in Washington, D.C.,
2833 M Street NW, Washington DC, 20007.

for more information, contact the Mongolian Cultural Center (Монгол соёлын төв)
1948 Hileman Road, Falls Church, VA 22043
Phone: (202) 531-3716
info@mongolcc.org
Research Fellowships, Scholarships and Grants
Conservation Leadership Fellow / PhD Position: The Snow Leopard Trust in collaboration with the National University of Mongolia is looking for an exceptionally motivated candidate dedicated to biodiversity research and conservation. The position allows budding conservationists to simultaneously pursue participation and training in biodiversity research and community-based conservation. This is also an opportunity to pursue a PhD on the research project titled “Multi-site Experiments in Rangeland and Grassland Ecosystems (MERGE) ”. Women candidates are especially encouraged to apply. The position is ideally suited for academically motivated candidates who wish to be trained in research while also trying to dedicate time to on-ground conservation. The selected candidate is expected to set-up and conduct experiments to understand the response of changing nutrients, temperature and precipitation on the vegetation community dynamics in Mongolia under the supervision of Dr Charudutt Mishra (Snow leopard Trust, Seattle, US), Dr. Bazartseren Boldgiv (National University of Mongolia, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia) and Dr. Mahesh Sankaran (National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bangalore, India). The candidate will also work closely with conservationists under the supervision of Agvaantseren Bayarjargal (Snow Leopard Conservation Foundation Mongolia). This position is created with the objective of helping create the next generation of conservation leaders capable of conservation, leadership and advanced research from within the snow leopard range countries. The candidates will be working with our senior staff, they will gain invaluable hands-on experience in conservation, together with rigorous field research skills that can be used towards the fulfillment of their degree and prepare them for employment. The candidates should meet the following criteria: 1. Candidate should be an early career national of Mongolia 2. Candidate should be interested in conservation and motivated to take up the cause of conservation in her/his home country 3. An important objective is to improve the representation of women in conservation thus women candidates will be considered preferentially. 4. The candidate should be eligible for a PhD course in Mongolia. Based on the advice from Dr. Charudutt Mishra and Dr. Bazartseren Boldgiv, the candidate will be expected to enroll for such a degree either in Mongolia or elsewhere.5. The candidates will be expected to maintain excellent academic records. Salary is negotiable according to candidate’s qualification. Your application should include a complete CV, publication list (if available), a one page statement of purpose (Sop) indicating research and conservation interests and experience and names and email address of two referee. Please send your application as a single PDF file to Dr. Kulbhushansingh Suryawanshi (kulbhushan@ncf-india.org). For clarification please contact kulbhushan@ncf-india.org The position will remain open until a suitable candidate is found.

The Department of Central Eurasian Studies in the School of Global and International Studies at Indiana University Bloomington seeks an assistant professor of contemporary Central Asia. Applicants must specialize in the region's international relations, political science, sociology, and/or history. Their research should focus on one or more of the following issues: transnational and trans border activities; law, security, and terrorism; religious and ethnic tensions; resources and development; and impacts on the Middle East, Europe, and/or South Asia. The appointment begins August 1, 2015. Applicants should have an excellent record in the study of Central Asia during the 20th and 21st centuries and fieldwork experience in the region. Proficiency in Central Asian languages and Russian is necessary. Proficiency in European languages will be valuable as well. In addition to maintaining an impressive research program, the holder of this position must possess strong teaching credentials. She or he is expected to teach courses at the undergraduate and graduate levels on relevant aspects of contemporary Central Asia. Candidates should have the PhD at time of appointment and demonstrate commitment to research, teaching, public engagement, and working on program development with Indiana University's world-class faculty of Central Asian studies as well as the School of Global and International Studies. Indiana University is an equal employment and affirmative action employer and a provider of ADA services. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to age, ethnicity, color, race, religion, sex, sexual orientation or identity, national origin, disability status or protected veteran status. Application materials, including a cover letter, career statement describing research and teaching experiences and visions, CV, three reference letters, samples of published or in-press work, and teaching evaluations should be submitted online at http://indiana.peopleadmin.com/postings/1216. Inquiries can be directed to Ms. Jackie Breeding, CEUS, Goodbody Hall 157, 1011 East Third St., Bloomington, IN 47405-7005, or jmbreedi@indiana.edu. Applications received by December 31, 2014 are assured full consideration..

Early and Later Career Fellowships: The Davis Center, Harvard University:
The Davis Center's Fellows Program brings together scholars at early and later stages in their careers to consider a common theme spanning the social sciences and humanities. Each year, a team of faculty affiliates coordinates this theme and leads a regular interdisciplinary seminar series in which Fellows participate, with advanced graduate students and invited speakers, in addition to pursuing their own research. The application period for 2015–2016 fellowships runs from October 1, 2014–January 8, 2015. The theme for 2015–2016 is "Mobility, Boundaries, and the Production of Power in Eurasia," and the program will be coordinated by Professors Kelly O'Neill (History) and Timothy Colton (Government). The Fellows Program Committee is interested in applications from scholars currently working on the or equally, those working on unrelated themes, but who are interested in exploring the theme. (Note that scholars whose work does not address the selected theme are encouraged to apply for fellowships at the Davis Center, and their applications will receive full consideration.) The 2015–2016 Fellows Program Application is now available at: http://daviscenter.fas.harvard.edu/fellows-program-application-2015-2016-academic-year. Deadline: January 8, 2015.

Kiva Fellows Program
Kiva has opened the application process for their May 2015 class (KF27) of fellows, which have a unique opportunity to witness the realities of microfinance firsthand by working directly with Kiva field partners or supporting Kiva’s newest initiative (Kiva Zip), for a minimum of 16 weeks. Kiva's microfinance programs are based in several countries around the world, including Mongolia. A limited number of shorter 12-week placements may be available during the summer class for currently enrolled graduate students. The Kiva Fellowship is designed to increase Kiva's global impact, offer participants a unique insider experience into the microfinance industry, and provide a career opportunity of a lifetime. The position is volunteer-based, and all fellows receive a week of in-depth training at Kiva’s headquarters, plus ongoing access to Kiva’s network of staff and former fellows.  The application deadline for the 27th class of fellows, beginning in May 2015, is January 25, 2015. For more information, visit http://www.kiva.org/fellows or contact Kiva at kivafellows@kiva.org.
Resources
Mongolia and Lake Hovsgol GIS Data Repository
ACMS 2014 Summer Research Fellow Chris Free has put together a repository of GIS (Geographic Information Systems) data from his research in Mongolia and more specifically at Lake Hovsgol.  Check it out via his website:
Mongolia GIS data: http://marine.rutgers.edu/~cfree/gis-data/mongolia-gis-data/
Lake Hovsgol GIS data: http://marine.rutgers.edu/~cfree/gis-data/lake-hovsgol-gis-data/

Dissertation Reviews
now includes a section on Inner and Central Asia: http://dissertationrev iews.org/archives/category/review/innercentralasia

Asian Highlands Research Network [AH-RN] is a scholarly discussion group associated with the journal Asian Highlands Perspectives. This group focuses on the Tibetan Plateau and surrounding regions, including the Southeast Asian Massif, Himalayan Massif, the Extended Eastern Himalayas, the Mongolian Plateau, and other contiguous areas. We aim to promote exploration of cross-regional commonalities in history, culture, language, and socio-political context not served by current academic forums. AH-RN will be of interest to Sinologists, Tibetologists, Mongolists, and South and Southeast Asianists. We welcome group members to share information about events and publications related to the study of the Asian Highlands.
Services: timely and exclusive reviews of new books in the field; semi-regular roundup of new open access publications; announcements
of new publications from Asian Highlands Perspectives.
AH-RN is a private group. To join, please contact: Gerald.Roche[at]ymail.com.
For more on Asian Highlands Perspectives:
http://www.plateauculture.org/asian-highlands-perspectives
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/asianhig hlandsperspectives

TheDukha Ethnoarchaeological Project. The primary goal of the DukhaEthnoarchaeological Project is the development of spatial theory of human behavior for application to archaeological problems. Visit the website at:https://sites.google.com/site/dukhaethnoarch/ .

Asian Politics and History Association. Asian Politics and History Association is a non-political, non-profit academic society organized by scholars of Asian studies. Established in 2011 in Hong Kong, APHA currently has members from Asian-Pacific, European and North American countries. APHA supports the Journal of Asian Politics & History, an academic journal published twice a year beginning in October 2012. Visit the website at:http://www.aphahk.org.

Juniper: Online Database for Mongolian and Siberian Studies. This new French scientific tool is created at the initiative of the Centre for Mongolian and Siberian EPHE. It aims to bring together texts (native), images and multimedia on the peoples of Mongolia and Siberia. Several galleries of images are presented, including collections of old prints and a new series of old photographs of the Tuvan National Museum. Sheets populations gather essential information and links to documents relating to the peoples of Northern Asia. Subject files (kinship, Personalia, shamanism and soon others) allow you to browse the data according to thematic itineraries. The bibliography contains references to books and articles, some of which have been digitized and can be downloaded for researchers. Visit: www.base- juniper.org.

Searchable Ornithological Research Archive (SORA). Recently the University of New Mexico Library officially announced the launch of the new, upgraded Searchable Ornithological Research Archive (SORA). The ornithological community is once again indebted to the UNM library for investing in the open access distribution of our historical ornithological literature. SORA has been moved to a new platform that will allow the resource to grow and expand over time. Many of the SORA journal titles have been updated with additional articles, and a new ornithological title has been added to the site. SORA now offers a number of new features for users and provides tools for journal publishers to update the SORA repository directly, with little or no technical support. All of these improvements have been needed for some time, and the UNM Libraries SORA team appreciates your collective patience; it has taken over a year to convert the entire SORA article holdings and prepare the new site for production. A number of ongoing improvements are still in the works for 2014, and as with any major system upgrade, there are a countless number of small details that still require attention. The new URL to the site is http://sora.unm.edu.

The Mongolist is a website dedicated to sharing knowledge about Mongolian politics, business, and society. The website is an ever growing resource built on data and information collected on the Internet and in Mongolia. The aim of this website is to make understanding the complexity of the rapid social and economic change occurring in Mongolia not only accessible but also rewarding. The underlying principle guiding the development of all content on this website is evidence based investigation. Whenever possible, opinion, conjecture, and pure guesswork are replaced with facts, data, and extrapolation. And, when this is not possible, opinion, conjecture, and pure guesswork are advertised as such. Visit: http://www.themongolist.com/

Education About Asia (EAA) has become an essential resource for teachers dealing with Asian themes or topics; both in the broad trans-continental and regional contexts. Conceived as a publication for K-12 faculty, it has in fact proved to be extremely helpful for higher education faculty seeking insights on many subjects. The Asian Studies outreach activities of many colleges and universities have greatly benefited from EAA materials. Register (for free) to access approximately 900 articles from all thirty-seven back issues from 1996-2008: http://www.asian-studies.org/EAA/index.htm and subscribe to the Print Edition at https://www.asian-studies.org/EAA- Subscriptions.htm.

Inner Asian and Uralic National Resource Center: Indiana University’s IAUNRC has updated its website to include not only its regular newsletters but podcasts, lecture videos, teaching resources and more:http://www.iu.edu/~iaunrc/.

Mongolia Focus (formerly “Mongolia Today”): “This blog is an attempt by three avid Mongolia watchers to share their observations about current developments in Mongolia.” By Julian Dierkes and Dalaibulanii Byambajav, social scientists at the University of British Columbia, this blog mostly follows Mongolian politics and the mining sector. Visit: http://blogs.ubc.ca/mongolia/.
Other News and Events
Monthly Biobeers Talk: Urlag Cafe is located  in Central Culture Palace  (back door, against to Tiishin Hotel). (Урлаг кафе нь Соёлын төв өргөөний хойд талаас ордог, Түүшин зочид буудлын өөдөөс харсан хаалга) People are requested to arrive after 6pm, in time for the talk to start at 6.30. Biobeers is a monthly gathering of government and NGO staff, biologists,researchers,and other professionals interested in conservation. Each month, Biobeers sponsors presentations on topics relevant to Mongolian conservation, followed by an informal gathering to discuss activities and issues of interest. Biobeers is an opportunity to find out what is happening in the field of conservation in Mongolia, talk informally to other researchers and peers in your field, and share information about issues critical to the environment and people of Mongolia. Biobeers is organised by the Zoological Society of London's Steppe Forward Programme and the Wildlife Conservation Society. At Biobeers the beer is on us! Join the Yahoo! Group Mongolbioweb for announcements.
Recent Publications

Sinophobia: Anxiety, Violence, and the Making of Mongolian Identity, by Franck Bille (University of Hawaii Press, December 2014). Sinophobia is a timely and ground-breaking study of the anti-Chinese sentiments currently widespread in Mongolia. Graffiti calling for the removal of Chinese dot the urban landscape, songs about killing the Chinese are played in public spaces, and rumours concerning Chinese plans to take over the country and exterminate the Mongols are rife. Such violent anti-Chinese feelings are frequently explained as a consequence of China's meteoric economic development, a cause of much anxiety for her immediate neighbours and particularly for Mongolia, a large but sparsely populated country that is rich in mineral resources. Other analysts point to deeply entrenched antagonisms and to centuries of hostility between the two groups, implying unbridgeable cultural differences. Franck Bille challenges these reductive explanations. Drawing on extended fieldwork, interviews, and a wide range of sources in Mongolian, Chinese, and Russian, he argues that anti-Chinese sentiments are not a new phenomenon but go back to the late socialist period (1960-1990) when Mongolia's political and cultural life was deeply intertwined with Russia's. Through an in-depth analysis of media discourses, Bille shows how stereotypes of the Chinese emerged through an internalisation of Russian ideas of Asia, and how they can easily extend to other Asian groups such as Koreans or Vietnamese. He argues that the anti-Chinese attitudes of Mongols reflect an essential desire to distance themselves from Asia overall and to reject their own Asianness. The spectral presence of China, imagined to be everywhere and potentially in everyone, thus produces a pervasive climate of mistrust, suspicion, and paranoia. Through its detailed ethnography and innovative approach, Sinophobia makes a critical intervention in racial and ethnic studies by foregrounding Sinophobic narratives and by integrating psychoanalytical insights into its analysis. In addition to making a useful contribution to the study of Mongolia, it will be essential reading for anthropologists, sociologists, and historians interested in ethnicity, nationalism, and xenophobia.

The Lama Question: Violence, Sovereignty, and Exception in Early Socialist Mongolia, by Christopher Kaplonski (University of Hawaii Press, December 2014). Before becoming the second socialist country in the world (after the Soviet Union) in 1921, Mongolia had been a Buddhist feudal theocracy. Combatting the influence of the dominant Buddhist establishment to win the hearts and minds of the Mongolian people was one of the most important challenges faced by the new socialist government. It would take almost a decade and a half to resolve the "lama question," and it would be answered with brutality, destruction, and mass killings. Chris Kaplonski examines this critical, violent time in the development of Mongolia as a nation-state and its ongoing struggle for independence and recognition in the twentieth century. Unlike most studies that explore violence as the primary means by which states deal with their opponents, The Lama Question argues that the decision to resort to violence in Mongolia was not a quick one; neither was it a long-term strategy nor an out-of control escalation of orders but the outcome of a complex series of events and attempts by the government to be viewed as legitimate by the population. Kaplonski draws on a decade of research and archival resources to investigate the problematic relationships between religion and politics and geopolitics and bio politics in early socialist Mongolia, as well as the multitude of state actions that preceded state brutality. By examining the incidents and transformations that resulted in violence and by viewing violence as a process rather than an event, his work not only challenges existing theories of political violence, but also offers another approach to the anthropology of the state. In particular, it presents an alternative model to philosopher Georgio Agamben's theory of sovereignty and the state of exception. The Lama Question will be of interest to scholars and students of violence, the state, bio politics, Buddhism, and socialism, as well as to those interested in the history of Mongolia and Asia in general.

From Yuan to Modern China to Mongolia: The Writings of Morris Rossabi, by Morris Rossabi (Brill, December 2014). This wide-ranging work, consisting of selected essays of Morris Rossabi, reflects the diverse interests of a leading scholar of China and Inner Asia. It encompasses the eras from the thirteenth century to the present, territories stretching from China to Mongolia to Central Asia and to the Middle East, and religions from Islam to Nestorian Christianity to Judaism and Confucianism in East, Central, and West Asia.
Rossabi first challenged the conventional wisdom concerning traditional Chinese foreign relations by showing the pragmatism of Chinese officials who were not bound by Confucian strictures and stereotypes about foreigners and were actually knowledgeable about neighboring regions. His studies of the territories surrounding China led to the discovery of a major omission in historical writing—the lack of a biography of Khubilai Khan, one of the most renowned rulers in Eurasian history. His biography of Khubilai resulted in further studies of the Mongolian legacy on global history and of the significant role of women in the Mongolian empire. His repeated travels in Mongolia, in turn, stimulated an interest in modern Mongolia, especially the turbulence following the turbulence after the collapse of socialism in 1990, a subject he writes about in this book. The need for greater public knowledge and awareness of China, Mongolia, Central Asia, the Silk Roads, and Islam in Asia prompted Rossabi to write general, occasionally pedagogical, articles about these topics for a wider audience.

Inner Asia and the Spatial Politics of Empire: Archaeology, Mobility, and Culture, by William Honeychurch (Springer, November 2014). This monograph uses the latest archaeological results from Mongolia and the surrounding areas of Inner Asia to propose a novel understanding of nomadic statehood, political economy, and the nature of interaction with ancient China. In contrast to the common view of the Eurasian steppe as a dependent periphery of Old World centers, this work views Inner Asia as a locus of enormous influence on neighboring civilizations, primarily through the development and transmission of diverse organizational models, technologies, and socio-political traditions. This work explores the spatial management of political relationships within the pastoral nomadic setting during the first millennium BCE and argues that a culture of mobility, horse-based transport, and long-distance networking promoted a unique variant of statehood. Although states of the eastern steppe were geographically large and hierarchical, these polities also relied on techniques of distributed authority, multiple centers, flexible structures, and ceremonialism to accommodate a largely mobile and dispersed populace. This expertise in “spatial politics” set the stage early on for the expansionistic success of later Asian empires under the Mongols and Manchus. Inner Asia and the Spatial Politics of Empire brings a distinctly anthropological treatment to the prehistory of Mongolia and is the first major work to explore key issues in the archaeology of eastern Eurasia using a comparative framework. The monograph adds significantly to anthropological theory on interaction between states and outlying regions, the emergence of secondary complexity, and the growth of imperial traditions. Based on this approach, the window of Inner Asian prehistory offers a novel opportunity to investigate the varied ways that complex societies grow and the processes articulating adjacent societies in networks of mutual transformation.

The Mongol Empire between Myth and Reality: Studies in Anthropological History, by Denise Aigle (Brill, October 2014). In The Mongol Empire between Myth and Reality, Denise Aigle presents the Mongol empire as a moment of contact between political ideologies, religions, cultures and languages, and, in terms of reciprocal representations, between the Far East, the Muslim East, and the Latin West. The first part is devoted to “The memoria of the Mongols in historical and literary sources” in which she examines how the Mongol rulers were perceived by the peoples with whom they were in contact. In “Shamanism and Islam” she studies the perception of shamanism by Muslim authors and their attempts to integrate Genghis Khan and his successors into an Islamic framework. The last sections deal with geopolitical questions involving the Ilkhans, the Mamluks, and the Latin West. Genghis Khan’s successors claimed the protection of “Eternal Heaven” to justify their conquests even after their Islamization.Historical Atlas of Northeast Asia, 1590-2010: Korea, Manchuria, Mongolia, Eastern Siberia by Li Narangoa and Robert Cribb (September 2014, Columbia University Press. Cloth, 352 pages, 78 Maps, ISBN: 978-0-231-16070-4). This atlas tracks the political configuration of Northeast Asia in ten-year segments from 1590 to 1890, in five-year segments from 1890 to 1960, and in ten-year segments from 1960 to 2010, delineating the distinct history and importance of the region. The text follows the rise and fall of the Qing dynasty in China, founded by the semi-nomadic Manchus; the Russian colonization of Siberia; the growth of Japanese influence; the movements of peoples, armies, and borders; and political, social, and economic developments—reflecting the turbulence of the land that was once the world’s “cradle of conflict.” Compiled from detailed research in English, Chinese, Japanese, French, Dutch, German, Mongolian, and Russian sources, the Historical Atlas of Northeast Asia incorporates information made public with the fall of the Soviet Union and includes fifty-five specially drawn maps, as well as twenty historical maps contrasting local and outsider perspectives. Four introductory maps survey the region’s diverse topography, climate, vegetation, and ethnicity.

The Baron's Cloak: A History of the Russian Empire in War and Revolution, by Willard Sunderland, Cornell University Press (2014). Willard Sunderland tells the epic story of the Russian Empire’s final decades through the arc of the life of Baron Roman Fedorovich von Ungern-Sternberg (1885–1921), which spanned the vast reaches of Eurasia. Tracking Ungern’s movements, he transits through the Empire’s multinational borderlands, where the country bumped up against three other doomed empires, the Habsburg, Ottoman, and Qing, and where the violence unleashed by war, revolution, and imperial collapse was particularly vicious. In compulsively readable prose that draws on wide-ranging research in multiple languages, Sunderland recreates Ungern’s far-flung life and uses it to tell a compelling and original tale of imperial success and failure in a momentous time. Sunderland visited the many sites that shaped Ungern’s experience, from Austria and Estonia to Mongolia and China, and these travels help give the book its arresting geographical feel. In the early chapters, where direct evidence of Ungern’s activities is sparse, he evokes peoples and places as Ungern would have experienced them, carefully tracing the accumulation of influences that ultimately came together to propel the better documented, more notorious phase of his career. Recurring throughout Sunderland’s magisterial account is a specific artifact: the Baron’s cloak, an essential part of the cross-cultural uniform Ungern chose for himself by the time of his Mongolian campaign: an orangey-gold Mongolian kaftan embroidered in the Khalkha fashion yet outfitted with tsarist-style epaulettes on the shoulders. Like his cloak, Ungern was an imperial product. He lived across the Russian Empire, combined its contrasting cultures, fought its wars, and was molded by its greatest institutions and most volatile frontiers. By the time of his trial and execution mere months before the decree that created the USSR, he had become a profoundly contradictory figure, reflecting both the empire’s potential as a multinational society and its ultimately irresolvable limitations.

Mongolia and the United States: A Diplomatic History (Jonathan Addleton)  Former U.S. ambassador Jonathan Addleton provides a pioneering firsthand look at the remarkable growth of civil society and diplomatic ties between two countries separated by vast distances yet sharing a growing list of strategic interests and values. While maintaining positive ties with Russia and China, its powerful neighbors and still-dominant trading partners, Mongolia has sought "third neighbors" to help provide balance, including Canada, Japan, Korea, European nations, and the United States. For its part, the United States has supported Mongolia as an emerging democracy while fostering development and commercial relations. People-to-people ties have significantly expanded in recent years, as has a security partnership that supports Mongolia's emergence as a provider of military peacekeepers under the U.N. flag in Sierra Leone, Chad, Kosovo, Darfur, South Sudan, and elsewhere. While focusing on diplomatic relations over the last quarter century, Addleton also briefly describes American encounters with Mongolia over the past 150 years. More recently, Mongolia has emerged as a magnet for foreign investment, making it one of the world's fastest growing economies.


Nomadismes d'Asie centrale et septentrionale
[Nomadism in Central and North Asia] by Charles Stépanoff, Carole Ferret, Gaëlle Lacaze, Julien Thorez.  For more information in French about this publication visit the website of the publisher, or find a table of contents pdf here.