Historical Ethnic Conflicts and the Rise of Islamophobia in Modern China

Abstract

In this paper, I show that narratives of historical conflicts between the Han Chinese and Muslims have been deployed to justify anti-Muslim sentiment and practices in modern and contemporary Northwest China. My study analyses Han Chinese narratives during and after the Northwest Muslim Rebellion—the largest ethnic conflict in nineteenth-century China. The historical narratives about the rebellion have been passed down inter-generationally and have been reiterated and reconstructed to fuel contemporary bias against Muslims in the twentieth century and beyond. My study contributes to the debate of Chinese Islamophobia by revealing how narratives of ethnic conflicts could help legitimize hostility against Muslims in modern-day China.

Acknowledgements

The author is thankful to the journal’s editors Karl Cordell and Stefan Wolff, three anonymous reviewers, and to Yue-him Tam, Xiran Liu, Kaishuo Chen, Haimo Li, Chengjun Qian, and Lindsay Pettit for their helpful suggestions and comments on earlier drafts.

Disclosure Statement

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

Notes

1 The cause of the initial outbreak of the Northwest Muslim Rebellion remains contested. See Chu (1966) for detailed accounts from both sides.

2 The rebellion is known in the West by different names. Adopting Jonathan Lipman’s terminology, I use the inclusive term ‘Northwest Muslim Rebellion’ to refer to this event.

3 Little Goose Pagoda, a famous pagoda in the Xi’an, capital of Shaanxi Province.

4 According to the measurement system of Qing Dynasty, one qin approximately equals 61,440 m².

5 Influential pieces in this series of articles include Bai Shouyi’s The Formation of the Hui Nationality (1951) and On the Combination of Ethnic Minority History with the Patriotic Education (1951), and Lin Gan’s The Relationship between the Hui and Islam and the Role of Islam in the Formation of the Hui (1953), etc. These articles were published in Lishi Jiaoxue (History Teaching), a supplement of Chinese government newspaper Guangming Daily.

6 Following the Northwest Muslim Rebellion, Hui inhabitants were prohibited from living inside the cities, leading to the residential segregation between the Hui and the Han. For a detailed study of this phenomenon, see Wu (2006).