As the year comes to a close, and I regroup in Beijing after wrapping up my first case study in Jinan, it seems like it's time for reflection about where the project is going. I'm 1/3 of the way through, after all. I'm approaching the 6 month mark for time spent in the country. While I certainly feel like I won't be able to make too many big conclusions until I have something to compare and contrast my experiences in Jinan with, I think it's not too early to do some overview of what I've uncovered. Permit me to think out loud here, if you will. So, what lessons come from the first part of this project?
-For one thing, in eastern cities like Jinan and Beijing, urbanization involves not just a change in physical space, but also a change in population demographics. So many residents of Jinan's Hui Quarter came in as migrants from out west.
-Related: At least in Jinan, this makes for some truly interesting internal divisions within the community between locals and migrants. Migrants frequently remarked that the Hui in Jinan were "more secular" and locals often talked about the migrants as being "more religious."
-There's a definite class tension between migrants and locals. Jinanese Hui see their western counterparts as better Muslims, but also as less well educated and less prosperous.
-There's another really interesting divide in Jinan between cultural/religious identity. Several Hui in Jinan I talked to said that they were Hui, but not really Muslim. Interestingly, these people often continued to observe religious dietary norms, despite not really believing.
-In many cases, respondents expressed a lay/clergy division within the community. These people often claimed to be believers, albiet ones who didn't really understand the faith. They deferred to clergy to be sources of authority about Islam and Hui culture both, and many claimed to be unable to talk about their identity in a meaningful way (I've called this "epistemic deferrence" in a previous post).
-Beyond this there seems to be a practitioner/academic divide in some parts of the community. Some respondents expressed doubts that intellectuals, themselves Hui, who studied the Hui at universities were producing authentic or reliable understandings of what Hui identity was truly about.
-There are wildly different standards for what it means to be danhua (literally, "watered-down," but could also be translated as "lapsed" or "assimilated") within the Hui community. Some respondents claimed that they were danhua because they only were able to make it to weekly prayers on Friday and could only read a transliterated version of the Qur'an in Chinese. Others claimed to be danhua because they had never been to a mosque in their lives, and knew nothing else about their faith beyond the fact that they were not allowed to eat pork.
-In an interesting contrast, the Hui community on Niu Jie in Beijing was nearly universally regarded as cleaner, and having safer food items than other non-Hui places in the city, seemingly based on its repuation as qingzhen (or halal), while in Jinan, the Hui Quarter was frequently regarded as "dirty, disorderly and backward," by both Han and Hui alike.
-In both cities, the Hui were mentioned to be more tuanjie, ("united") than other groups of people and the Han, in particular. However, this phrase took on both positive and negative meanings. For some interviewees, tuanjie meant that there was more support for neighbors within the community. For others, it meant that the Hui were more likely than others to gang-up in ethnic solidarity, or to resist.
-Connections between ethnicity and food abound. Many Hui reported not being able to stomach the smell of pork, and complained that living near Han who ate pork made them physically ill. Some of the Han I talked to made similar remarks about lamb and beef. The taste, they said, though not prohibited or taboo, just didn't agree with them.
-In both Beijing and Jinan, Hui neighborhoods have gone through at least some rounds of urban renewal. Both Niu Jie and Jinan's Hui Quarter recently experienced some form of "demolition and replacement" (or chai qian) style urban renewal. However, in both cases, the buildings that replaced the old courtyard style homes were said to provide more space for businesses and restaurants that catered specifically to Hui dietary and lifestyle needs. Some residents expressed a sense of loss at the community that they had formerly had in courtyards, but many also appreciated the convenience and ease that chai qian and redevelopment brought.
OK, that's enough reflection for now. These narratives will continue to emerge as I continue to work. I am eager to see if regional or situational differences emerge as I move farther west. Stay tuned for more!