LIN ZEXU’S SECOND ACT: SETTLEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE TARIM BASIN 1844–1847
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- The Qing empire’s early development of its western frontier remains an under-studied area in English and Chinese scholarship. Shortly after the First Opium War (1839–1842), the emperor turned his attention to the looming overpopulation crisis facing the empire. The Taklamakan oases of the Tarim Basin seemed to provide a ready solution: the emperor resolved to settle the landless farmers from the interior provinces in this western borderland, also known as the “Muslim Region.” In time, he argued, the migrants would become “natives,” i.e. people born of the land. When his local administrators rejected the idea, he sent the cashiered official-in-exile Lin Zexu to conduct a fact-finding trip. Drawing on the diaries, letters, and field reports of Lin Zexu, this project uses the history of an individual actor to illuminate Qing’s attempt to assimilate the Taklamakan oases via a settlement policy focused on social structure, water management, and frontier security. The project provides a useful comparison to other empires’ expansion efforts and China’s current development programs in the region.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Publication date | December 31, 2023 |
Creators/Contributors
| Author | Zhu, You Jia |
|---|---|
| Thesis advisor | Sommer, Matthew |
| Degree granting institution | Master of Liberal Arts Program, Stanford School of Humanities and Sciences |
Subjects
| Subject | Lin, Zexu, 1785-1850 |
|---|---|
| Subject | 林則徐 |
| Subject | Daoguang, Emperor of China, 1782-1850 |
| Subject | 道光帝 |
| Subject | Bu-yan-tai, 1791–1880 |
| Subject | 布彥泰 |
| Subject | Mujangga, 1782–1856 |
| Subject | 穆彰阿 |
| Subject | Tarim Basin |
| Subject | Tarim River |
| Subject | Taklamakan Desert |
| Subject | Borderlands |
| Subject | Xinjiang |
| Subject | settlement |
| Subject | migration |
| Subject | oasis |
| Subject | Qing Empire |
| Genre | Text |
| Genre | Thesis |
Bibliographic information
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- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY).
Preferred citation
- Preferred citation
- Zhu, Y. J. (2023). LIN ZEXU’S SECOND ACT: SETTLEMENT AND DEVELOPMENT OF THE TARIM BASIN 1844–1847 . Stanford Digital Repository. Available at https://purl.stanford.edu/rn191mf2559. https://doi.org/10.25740/rn191mf2559.
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Master of Liberal Arts Theses
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