| This dissertation is the product of multi-sited ethnographic field work conducted in Xining, China, Dharamsala, India, and Darjeeling, India. At the heart of this project are the contested definitions and experiences of Tibetan-ness. In particular, this project focuses on the ways that Tibetan-ness is constructed by the Chinese and Tibetan governments and in the American/European public and how these three metanarratives influence the ways that individual Tibetans come to see and describe themselves. From this discussion a dialogical description of Tibetan-ness arises. While there are numerous works in Tibetan Studies on Tibetan identity, none take the same multi-sited approach as this projet for comparing the public discourses on Tibetan-ness to the personal narratives of Tibetans. This project seeks to answer the question "How do Tibetans become Tibetan given such divergent narrative settings?";This project is composed of three main parts: the definitions and descriptions of the metanarratives of Tibetan-ness (Chinese, Tibetan, and American/European), four personal narratives of Tibetan-ness, and the intersection of personal narratives and metanarratives in two public events. To uncover the ways that Tibetans become Tibetan, this project works from a theoretical perspective of the self as unbounded and dialogical. That is, Tibetans come to possess and live out multiple situated selves in a highly personalized way. In doing so, there are inherent conflicts within their identity, where both the Chinese and Tibetan Metanarratives imbue the narratives of single individual. This, then, leads Tibetans to seek ways of making sense of divergent narratives within themselves. A second question arises out of this process, "How do Tibetans mediate the multiple narratives of Tibetan-ness that they experience, such as the crush of 'Chinese modernity' and Tibetan tradition?";These questions are answered by comparing the personal narratives of four individuals (two in Tibet, two in exile) and two public events (a horse festival and a performance at a Tibetan night club) with the metanarratives of Tibetan-ness to reveal patterns across different narratives spaces. Tibetans, in narrating their own lives, must make the past and the future, as portayed in the metanarratives, meaningful and relevant to their present. This leads Tibetans to establish anchors to the past (new traditionalisms), not wanting to leave behind the meanings of tradition and history, even when seeking to establish a future of modernity.;This project concludes that Tibetans readily take up an ambassadorial role, such as dharma teacher, translator of Bon tradition into music, tour guide, or world traveling beacon of peace and harmony, because of the ease of access to past and future that such a role provides. Tibetans, given the contested nature of their lives, must workly doubly hard to ensure that their lives carry the meanings that allow them access to their community, to education, to resources, and to employment, causing them to construct new and emergent forms of Tibetan-ness. |
