Content area
Full text
(ProQuest: ... denotes non-US-ASCII text omitted.)
This work continues the seminal debate of Manchu sinicization, re-energized in paradigm-altering form through the antiphonal statements of Evelyn S. Rawski ("Presidential Address: Reenvisioning the Qing: The Significance of the Qing Period in Chinese History," The Journal of Asian Studies 55.4 [November 1996]: 829-50) and Ping-ti Ho ("In Defense of Sinicization: A Rebuttal of Evelyn Rawski's 'Reenvisioning the Qing'," The Journal of Asian Studies 57.1 [February 1998]: 123-55) over a decade ago. Although assuming a more conciliatory tone than Ho's dictum, Pei Huang maintains firmly that the Manchus were decisively and thoroughly sinicized. Therefore, he reasons, the broad school of analysis conventionally known as New Qing history both unjustifiably ignores this process and overstates ethnic and other distinctions between Manchus and all other Chinese during the late Ming and Qing dynasties. To counteract what he perceives as divisive biases, Huang sets the premise that the Jurchen antecedents of the Manchus had already started adopting Chinese culture proactively and voluntarily, setting an irreversible course that would last throughout the Qing dynasty. Moreover, Huang stresses that only the term sinicization, and not assimilation or acculturation, is a suitable descriptor for the Manchu case before and during Qing rule of China. He defines sinicization as the process by which individuals and...