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Chinese Odyssey:
Summer Program offers
Students rare opportunity to learn Hmong history in China.
By: Yuepheng L. XIONG
St. Paul. Minn.
For approximately the
last six generations, an estimated 300,000 Hmong have come to call Laos home.
Most Hmong know their forefathers emigrated from China but that's been the
extend of their historical knowledge. Few know of such legendary figures as Chiyou,
Tao Tien and Ba yue Wu. Due to limited written documentation, migration and
sometimes forced assimilation, Hmong history is seemingly lost and remains
relatively obscure.
But relearning and interpreting
Hmong roots recently began at China's Xiangtan University in Hunan province
where a handful of U.S. Hmong students attended a two-month summer program in
ancient Hmong history and culture. The program included a month of intensive
(6-hour days, six day weeks) classroom lectures and a month of field research
to Hmong villages in southwestern China. The summer program was initiated by
Xiangtan philosophy professor, An-ping Lei. According to Professor Lei, the
idea was born in the United States. As a participant in the 1995 International
Symposium on Hmong People, Professor Lei discovered that Hmong in the States
were particularly interested in learning more about their history in China.
Upon returning to China, Lei and a group of Hmong-Chinese professors and
research scholars founded a summer program at Xiangtan to share what they know
of Hmong history.
Five students - Txianeng Vang, Cy
Thao, Cziasarh Neng Yang (all from St. Paul, Minn.), Charles L. Fang of San
Diego, Calif. and I - attended this past summer's program. According to the
president of Xiangtan, we were their very first foreign students.
Professor Xin-fu Wu lectured on
ancient Hmong history and reminded us that although Hmong history is richly
unique, it will be rather difficult, perhaps near impossible, to put together
all the scattered parts into one coherent piece. He acknowledged that this
enormous challenge of uncovering the Hmong people's history is the duty and
priority of Hmong scholars in years to come.
Professor Tong-jiang Yang, a 33
year-old Hmong-Chinese historian and author or co-author of more than 20
titles, took us as far back as half a million years, associating Hmong
origination with the Peking man (Homo erectus pekinensis) whose remains were
discovered not far from Beijing in the 1920s. However, Professor Yang agreed
that Hmong history beyond 5000 years remains obscure and speculative. The term
'Miao" appeared in the Chinese Classics and early historical records such
as the 'Zhanguo ce' ("Intrigues of the Warring States") and the
"Shiji' ("Records of the Historians). After the Han Dynasty in 220
A.D., "Miao" disappeared from historical records until the Song
Dynasty (A.D. 947-1279). The reason for the mysterious disappearance remains
unclear.
Scholars seem to agree that the
Hmong had gone through numerous dreadful periods in history in which the term
'Miao" also underwent some changes: from "Miao" to
"Miao-Man" or "Man-Miao", "Wuling Man," 'Wuxi
Man," or simply "Man," and then eventually back to
"Miao". Whether the ancient Miao are today's Miao is debatable among
scholars.
How did the term "Miao' or
'Hmong" come into being? Although the term 'Miao" appeared in Chinese
historical records, the term 'Hmong' never did. What did they call themselves
back then, "Hmong or 'Miao?'. The answer to this question varied from
region to region. For example, the western Hunan Hmong call themselves
"Guo-xiong". Those in eastern Guizhou call themselves
"Amaot" or "Mo'. And those in Yunnan and southeastern Sichuan
call themselves 'Meng" or "Hmong". They may indeed have called
themselves "Hmong" as many assumed, but "Miao' is probably a
name given to them by the Chinese, at least in writing. In his "Insurgency
and Social Disorder in Guizhou: The "Miao" Rebellion,
1854-1873," Robert Jenks wrote, "The most convincing explanation of
the origin of the term 'Miao' is that it represented an effort on the part of
the Chinese to recreate the sound of the word (pronounced 'Mong' or 'Mu,' as
the 'H' is unaspirated) used by members of the ethnic group to refer to
themselves."
Despite its obscurity one thing about
Hmong history was clear to J. Mottin, the author of "History of the
Hmong." "Of their pre-history only one thing is certain, that is that
the Miao were in China before the Chinese, for it is the latter themselves who
indicate the presence of the Miao in the land, which they, the Chinese, were
gradually infiltrating, and which was to become their own country, "
Mottin wrote.
Between five and six thousand years
ago, the Hmong people lived in today's Hebei province, said Professors Wu and
Yang. Their leader at the time was the legendary Chiyou, and his people were
known as the Jiuli tribes. The ancestors of the Han Chinese, ruled by leaders
Huang Di and Yan Di, lived to the northwest of the Jiuli Kingdom. As Chinese
population grew, they expanded southward into Hmong territory. A major war
broke out between the two sides on the northwestern part of modern-day Beijing.
Professors Wu and Yang cited that according to legends and folk songs,
"the Hmong won nine battles but lost on the tenth."
After their defeat, the Hmong
emigrated southward into the lower reaches of the Yellow River where they
re-established a new kingdom approximately four thousand years ago. The
San-Miao Kingdom and its people were led by Tao Tie and Huan Tuo.
Unfortunately, history repeated itself; the Han Chinese expanded, encroaching
and taking over on what had become Hmong land. In the ensuing war the San-Miao
Kingdom was defeated and "largely exterminated" by Yu the Great at
about 2200 B. C., wrote Jenks. The Hmong then became disintegrated and lived
dispersely in China's south and southwest corners. "After San-Miao,"
Professor Wu said, "the Hmong people could never be united again, and be
strong as a nation."
After the destruction of San-Miao,
the Hmong continued to migrate southward into today's Hubei, Hunan and Jiangxi
provinces. Much was talked about their living in the Dongting Lake and Poyang
Lake areas, where the Chu Kingdom during the Eastern Zhou and Qin Dynasties
encompassed. Many scholars, both Hmong and non-Hmong, argue that the state of
Chu was a Hmong kingdom. If it was not Hmong, it certainly was not Chinese.
Conrad Schirokauer, a published scholar of Chinese history, referred to the Chu
state as a "semi-Chinese." Many researchers, including our Xiangtan
professors, argue that the intact female corpse (died and buried during the Chu
Kingdom and excavated from a highly elaborate tomb in 1972 in Changsa, Hunan)
was Hmong because the drawings on her caskets and on the piece of silk covering
her coffin are designs unique to the Hmong.
Based on the seal unearthed, this
female corpse was named Xin Zhui, the wife of Li Cang who was the Marquis of
Dai. Even after more than two thousand years, her body was well preserved and
protected from decay by a set of four coffins carefully arranged inside one
another.
Along with her body, over 1,400
cultural and funerary objects were buried inside the tomb, ranging from
agricultural seeds, combs, mittens, stockings, shoes, gowns, wooden dolls, food
and wine containers to zither-like stringed and reed-pipe instruments.
On top of the innermost coffin,
there laid a splendid and exquisite T-shaped painting on silk. The painting
details a person's three souls - one which remains to watch over the body, the
second which goes in search of the ancestors and the third which just wanders.
This belief in three separate souls and their duties upon death exist today.
Having published a paper on this unique piece of painting, Professor Yang
believes this old pictorial lends even greater evidence to the claim that the
corpse and the Chu Kingdom could be Hmong. He argued that except for a few
minor illustrations on the top left, the rest of the intricate illustrations
coincided with legends and folk stories of the Hmong. Pointing to the wooden
dolls, a tour guide of the museum mentioned that many visiting scholars argue
that they are dressed in Hmong-style clothing.
Throughout history, if the Hmong
people found any kind of peace, it never lasted long. They have been forced to
emigrate from northeastern China into the country's southwestern corner. During
the Qing Dynasty, several major wars further pushed hundreds of thousands of
Hmong into Southeast Asian countries of Vietnam, Laos, Burma and Thailand.
The first major war during the Qing
Dynasty erupted in 1735 in southeastern Guizhou province as a result of Chinese
southward expansion and forced assimilation. Eight counties and 1,224 villages
were said to be involved in this war. When the Hmong were suppressed in 1738,
Professor Wu said 17,670 Hmong had been killed in combat, 11,130 were captured
and executed and another 13,600 were forced into slavery. Half of the Hmong
population were affected by the war.
The second war (1795-1806) was
started in three provinces - southeast of Sichuan, east of Guizhou and west of
Hunan. The Hmong were led by Ba-yue Wu, Liu-deng Shi, San-bao Shi and Tian-ban
Shi. As in the past, this war was launched to resist the Chinese and the Qing
government from taking over their land. The popular slogan at the time was,
"Get back our fields. Drive the Han people and he Manchus out off our
fields."
The last war was the biggest and
longest of the three. As a result of the Taiping Rebellion, the Qing government
demanded more taxes and labor from the Hmong. The Hmong, led by Xiu-mei Zhang
and other leaders, revolted in southeastern Guizhou in 1854 and fought until
1873. In excess of one million people were involved in this war, which spread
to cover hundreds of cities and counties. According to Professor Wu, only 30
percent of the Hmong survived the war. Seventy percent of them were either
killed or ran away. Zhang, a native of Taijiang, Guizhou, was captured and
taken to Changsa, Hunan where his life r ended under cruel tortures.
While a major portion of the Hmong
emigrated to Southeast Asia during periods of the last two wars, hundreds of
thousands of Hmong were left behind in China. According to the 1990 Chinese
census, there are still 7,398,035 Hmong scattered in Chinas southwestern
provinces - approximately 3,686,900 in Guizhou province; 1,557,073 in Hunan;
896,712 in Yunnan, 535,923 in Sichuan, 425,137 in Guangxi, 200,702 in Hupei,
52,044 in Hainan Island; and 43,544 in other provinces.
Because of the many years of
warfare and assimilation, the Hmong in China have been divided into five main
branches - Hong (Red), Hei (Black), Bai (White), Hua (Flowery) and Qing (Green)
Hmong. They have also been separated linguistically into three main dialects -
eastern, central and western. One group cannot understand the other two's
dialects. Fortunately, all three groups pay respect to the same ancestry, the
legendary Chiyou. Legends, folk tales and folk songs are similar in many ways
between the three groups. All of the different groups of the Hmong - in and out
of China-have continued to practice the so-called showing the way or qhuab ke
in Hmong, a funeral song sung to the deceased. Qhuab ke precisely guides the
deceased individuals soul from his present location to the original homeland of
his ancestors, tracing backward the migration route from village to village,
city to city northeast towards the Beijing area. Besides written materials,
Hmong scholars have recently used qhuab ke as a major source to help them
relearn and interpret Hmong history.
Although their culture and
tradition are similar in many ways, a few major cultural practices are
different between those in China and those outside China. Unlike the Hmong in
and from Southeast Asia, those in China standardize how a person is called.
According to our professors and the Hmong-Chinese community, the Hmong
traditionally call each other and oneself by the given name first, followed by
the family or last name. Unless one is talking to Chinese people (who go by
last name followed by first name), or putting down his name on official
document, he would never go by the family name first. In short, inside the
Hmong-Chinese community, one is always called by the given name first. On the
contrary, a minority but growing percentage of Hmong from Southeast Asia prefer
to be called by their last name first,
Moreover, we also learned that the
Hmong in China don't toss cloth balls during new year's celebration. Our
professors concluded that the Hmong in and from Southeast Asia may have adopted
this practice from the Zhuang or other nationalities in southwest China before
entering Southeast Asia.
Our field research to Hmong
villages in southwest China was an informative but a physically demanding one.
Roads ended in the cities or nearby villages so we walked for miles crossing
over mountains and valleys before reaching Hmong villages. There, we were shock
to see how they managed to survive living in poverty in mountainous locales.
Experiencing only the natural
spring water in Laos and filtered tap water from the kitchen sink in the United
States, I could not believe how terrible their drinking water was. The water
color wasn't clear but dark yellow. Young boys fished in it. Pigs and chickens
are within its vicinity. People and animals take turn drinking from the same
pond. That's how it is in many Hmong villages in the remote countrysides. They
purify their water by placing limestone (zeb qaub in Hmong) into the bucket of
water to separate the dirt from the water.
Educational opportunities are
lacking in Hmong villages. For as long as it has come into existence, Hei Shan
village, for example, has not produced a single junior high graduate. High
school and college education are beyond their dreams. Most of these children
drop out before or after fourth grade for various reasons ranging from
financial inability to lack incentives.
Economically, the Hmong-Chinese
remain undeveloped and backward. This is especially true for those in Yunnan
province. Shortage of land for cultivation is their initial problem. Having no
money to buy fertilizer to enrich the exhausted soil is another. According to
village leaders, they are always hungry six months of every year. They said that
if they have fertilizer, they would be in a much better condition.
The barren surroundings where most Hmong live
accelerated our concern for their well-being. Most of them seem to give up on
everything, even their dreams. A few have just began to develop and enrich
Hmong society. A one-year-old committee of Hmong scholars and leaders was
organized and is in the process of trying to erect a statue of Chiyou in
Guiyang, the capital city of Guizhou. If this happens, this single statue may
become a symbol of national pride, identity, unity and commonality for the
Hmong people, regardless of where we're all living
