The Differences Between China And Overseas Anthropological Studies About Hani Women

This thesis is through discussing academic papers concerning the discourse about "Hani women’s status", expounded to their background and arbitrariness, at the same time, pointed out the differences between Chinese anthropology/ethnology and Western anthropology.The first chapter, I surveyed foreign studies related to Hani minority and Hani women. Until establishing the People’s Republic of China, there is no "Hani minority" which has common meaning as now, but after 20th century, some travelers and administrative officials who had visited Yunnan province began to publish their works. During the Second World War, the Yunnan and Southeast Asian Studies were temporary interrupted, but shortly after the war, in Thailand, Hani/Akha study were reopened. After the second half of 1980s, based on some studies made after the WW2, expert anthropologists began long-term fieldwork, using Hani/Akha language. It can be said that this time is the most active period foreigner do Hani/Aka study. The second half of the 90’s, foreign researchers could start to research in China, and then the Hani studies became more and more international. The characteristics of foreign studies are, first, as a common language, a lot of people have been using English to publish their article. Second, because of historical reasons, the field research area is mainly based on the Thailand’s Akha area. Third is because of this reason, very few paper refer to the Chinese studies.The second chapter, I surveyed China’s studies related to Hani and Hani women. In order to realize Regional Ethnic Autonomy, ethnology had started national identification work when established the People’s Republic of China. This time the new category of "Hani minority" was created. In 1960’s, ethnology was denied by state for a while, but after the policy of reformation and opening, a lot of works about Hani started to appear again. At this time, there are comparatively a lot of works describing about customs, folkways and translation of their myth etc... In the second half of the 90’s, Hani studies in China also began to internationalize. Same time, their theory, content ware diversified too. The characteristics of Hani studies in China are as follows: First, China’s papers are mostly written by Chinese people. Worthy of attention is that there are some Hani researchers in there. Second, although there are a few exceptions, but almost all researches are based on the survey in china. Third, for this reason, rarely refer to Thai study.The third chapter, I discussed the specific differences in Chinese and Western Hani women’s studies in anthropology. When I investigate these two studies, there are a lot of differences, such as research methods, research background and thought, thesis structure and wording, word definition, categorization, a purpose of its work etc. Although they are different in many ways, but I think they still have a same technical base, I mean Ethnology/ anthropology. That is why they can refer to each other, compare with each other. I think that the word "status" is obvious difference between Chinese and western, so took notice on this ward and analyzed their background.In conclusion, I pointed out that many studies although discussing about the same object "Hani women", but according to the different knowledge background, different historical background, appearing discourses came out in different way.