Kinship, Ethnicity and Landscape: The Contexts of Ethnic Boundaries in Southern Siberia, Mongolia and Inner Mongolia

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to draw attention to the processual nature of the formation of ethnic boundaries. In reference to Fredrik Barth’s concept of the social organization of difference, the author examines three case studies (southern Siberia, Mongolia and Inner Mongolia – China) and shows how ethnic boundaries are interacting and being reshaped within such diverse fields as: nationalism, identity, kinship, space and landscape. The example of southern Siberia shows how the collapse of the Soviet Union has resulted in “closing” the ancestral affiliations of Altaians, Tuvinians and Khakass within the administrative boundaries of the autonomous republics. In Mongolia, differences within one national group are constructed politically, ideologically and discursively as a result of political transformations. In Inner Mongolia, social differences at the ethnic level can be understood as consequences of diverse perceptions on the landscape and “separated” participation in space by the Mongols and Han Chinese.