Nicholas Tapp Livres

This is a work of ethnographic reflection on Hmong society, history and culture, dealing with questions of the self and the notion that a romantic self inspired the ethos of hedonism associated with the consumer economy. A Hmong identity is shown to have been historically constructed through the works of colonial missionaries, linguists, and anthropologists. Yet Hmong voices have also been powerful in this process. Based on recent fieldwork in Asia and overseas, the Hmong diaspora is examined. The modern Hmong self is presented as a prospective one, constructed in diaspora and through the use of the internet and other modes of modern communication in a movement towards a virtual future which, despite the dissonance of voices appealing to an ideal unity, is one still rich with potentiality.

Tapp discusses paradoxes in the historical and ethnographic construction of Hmong cultural identity compared with the majority Han Chinese identity in this ethnography of the Hmong in China. Based on his own extensive fieldwork, Tapp (anthropology, Australian National U.) examines Hmong rituals and traditions including shamanism, ancestral respect, death, livelihood, kinship, local organization, and intellectual culture. The book also offers accounts of ceremonies, rituals, and folktales with translations of Hmong songs and stories. The book is a reprint of a work first published in 2001. Annotation ©2003 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR