Don’t lose your moustache: community and cultural identity on the Uyghur internet in China

ABSTRACT

This article reports on data collected from the online community forums of four Uyghur language websites between 2014–2016. These posts are representative of a moment in time in which the Uyghur cultural identity was being threatened by increasingly restrictive Chinese government policies. Concept coding was applied to online discussion posts and comments, through which we identified common ideas and ‘concepts’ from the emergent themes. Findings demonstrate how these Uyghur language websites served as a platform for an online community to negotiate their cultural identity and strengthen community ties. Uyghur individuals posted materials that built cultural knowledge, reinforced cultural pride, and encouraged community cultural support.

KEYWORDS:

• Uyghur
• cultural identity
• internet

Acknowledgments

Research for this paper was conducted through a grant from the Drexel University Social Science Research Committee.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

¹ The authors wish to acknowledge the valuable contribution of the research assistants. They did not wish their names to be disclosed or included as co-authors due to political sensitivities.

² The viewer counts were not available for each post.

³ Arzan (Adhan) is the Muslim call to prayer

⁴ UY: Uyghur yéziqini qollimaydighan saheler bolsa, yéziqning igisi bolghan bizler qollaydighan qilsaq bolidu.

⁵ UY: Bu yil yazda junggoni zilzilige keltürgen shinjangliqlar