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Organizing for Languages Preservation, Community Enhancement, and Social Transformation in Kham Tibet: a Dialogical Ethnography

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Organizing for Languages Preservation, Community Enhancement, and Social Transformation in Kham Tibet: A Dialogical Ethnography A dissertation presented to the faculty of the Scripps College of Communication of Ohio University In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy Dongjing Kang May 2015 © 2015 Dongjing Kang. All Rights Reserved. This dissertation titled Organizing for Languages Preservation, Community Enhancement, and Social Transformation in Kham Tibet: A Dialogical Ethnography by DONGJING KANG has been approved for the School of Communication Studies and the Scripps College of Communication by William K. Rawlins Stocker Professor of Communication Studies Scott Titsworth Dean, Scripps College of Communication ii Abstract KANG, DONGJING, Ph.D., May 2015, Communication Studies Organizing for Languages Preservation, Community Enhancement, and Social Transformation in Kham Tibet: A Dialogical Ethnography Director of Dissertation: William K. Rawlins UNESCO (2013) has reported that many Kham Tibetan languages are facing extinction and will disappear by the end of this century if nothing is done. Languages embody the worldviews that enable us to understand, interpret, and share realities with one another. Preserving ethnic minority languages is crucial to the sustainability of plural human social practices. This dissertation research used a dialogical perspective to examine Tibetan teachers’ and community members’ organizing practices for mother tongue preservation, community building, and achieving meaningful social change. Tibetan communities have been historically silent, absent, and (mis)represented by romanticized and reductionist ideological/political discourse. My dissertation recognized Tibetan teachers and community members as active social change agents, organizers, and advocates who are capable of creating partnerships across differences (e.g. class, gender, ethnicity, and educational levels, etc.) to address local issues in communication and to organize for meaningful social transformation in Kham Tibet. To achieve this project, I conducted a dialogical ethnography for the past three summers including archival and textual collection, numerous in-depth interviews, and participant observation in Kham Tibet. Four narratives emerged that exemplified the features of meta-theory of dialogue. They are 1) Boundless Bound, 2) Purposeless Purpose, 3) Embodiment, and 4) Being iii while Becoming. The findings of this study extend the theory of dialogue and advance knowledge in communication scholarship, as well as provide insights for educators, policymakers, governments, and international NPO/NGOs involved with indigenous/ethnic language and cultural preservation program implementation in Tibet. Finally, this study may provide transferable values to other indigenous/ethnic groups working towards similar goals. iv Dedication For the Others. v Acknowledgements Over the past eight years I have received support and encouragement from a great number of individuals. First and foremost, I would like to thank my Ph.D. advisor, Dr. William K. Rawlins (Bill) for supporting me during these past four years. Bill has been a great mentor, colleague, and friend. His guidance has made this a thoughtful and rewarding journey. I remember my very first conversation with Bill when I was a fresh Ph.D. student. I was wandering confused around the second floor of Lasher Hall and invited myself to Bill’s office without making an appointment. I shared with Bill my hesitations about whether to continue graduate school. Bill listened to my concerns and then said to me, “Study and learn about things you love. Because if you learn about things you love, you’ll be good at it. There’s always a place for people who are good at what they do.” I recorded Bill’s words on my “Wisdom Passage” notebook, and it kept inspiring me throughout this dissertation. I am also grateful that Bill’s love for dialogue has brought me exposure to Buber, Bakhtin, and Bateson. Dialogue has a tremendous influence both on my personal and academic life. I have been intrigued by language, dialogue, and meaning in the communication of everyday life. I am so deeply touched by Bill’s practice of living dialogically. As Confucius said, a noble man’s highest virtue was to act along with his own belief. One of my most memorable moments was when Bill wrote his comments in Chinese “” (add oil) on one of my Questions and Contentions assignments. Bill entered my world with my language as a great teacher, mentor and friend. I feel very lucky that I met Bill and have been learning with him for the past four years. Bill’s enthusiasm about art, creativity, and music also affected me strongly. With vi his encouragement, I renewed my passion for music and started learning guitar two years ago. Music enables me to live a life with appreciation. I also would like to thank my dissertation committee of Dr. Raymie McKerrow, Dr. Jaylynne Hutchinson, and Dr. Yea-Wen Chen, for their support over the years as I moved from an idea to a completed study. I love Ray’s seminars on Foucaultian power- relations. With Ray’s guidance, I now am well-equipped with a “power-relation” detector in my sensory capacities. And I thank Jaylynne for cultivating me as a person-centered researcher and teacher today. I really enjoyed Jaylynne’s classes on Paulo Freire. And I have engaged and practiced Freire’s dialogical conceptions in both my research and my teaching. I thank Yea-Wen for her generous support in sharing professional development opportunities that exposed me to editing and publication in major communication journals. With Yea-Wen’s help, I gradually am growing as a mature scholar. Next, I am grateful to Dr. Kathy Krone, my Master’s advisor, who has provided valuable advice and suggestions in studying local-centered organizing in Tibet. I also would like to thank Doctors Austin Babrow, Xing Lu, Roger Aden, Lynn Harter, Lawrence Wood, and Laura Black for their gracious help and insightful feedback that have enabled me to create this dissertation. I appreciate my grammar editors Charlie and Alex for improving my English writing during the editing process of this dissertation. I also thank Lowell (ཨ་རིང་&ོ་བཇང་།) for translating my dissertation abstract into Tibetan. In addition, I’d like to thank the two “co-authors” of my life. Jiaying Liu and Xinxin Shen, two lifelong friends of mine, regarded me as a person and supported me in countless situations during the past ten years. I cannot begin to express my gratitude and vii feelings for these gregarious women. We’ve laughed, cried, and cursed together. I thank these two for corrupting me and enabling me to continuously create my new selves along my journey. My gratitude to my Tibetan teachers, friends, and co-actors is beyond words. Namgyal (!མ་$ལ།), taught me Tibetan and Buddhist spiritual practice that opened up a new world for me. His compassion to all beings and his openness to other cultures influenced my intercultural learning along the way. And I appreciate Tenbe Tsering (བ"་འབེལ་ཚ(་རིང་།), who shared with me his life world without reservation. Tenbe’s companionship to me has been a true blessing throughout this dissertation. Guabhum Gyal (བཀའ་འ#མ་%ལ།), a scholar and a great friend, has provided me with critical feedback for this dissertation. I thank my friend and companion Yongcuo (གཡང་མཚ#།) for her wholehearted trust and support over the past three years. I thank the Tibetans and their communities who have had faith in me, cared for me, and shared a life together with me on my way. With all my heart—བཀའ་#྄ིན་ཆེ། (Thank you!) Lastly, I would like to thank my family and friends for all their love and encouragement. For my parents and grandparents who raised me with love of humanity and supported me in all my pursuits; for my high school English teacher Youding Luo who encouraged me to explore languages and meanings; for the friends I met in Athens— Ran Ju, Moyi Jia, Adil Al-Busaidi, Aaron Dunkan, Nathaniel Simmons, Atish Baidya, Peter Rapaso, and Maria Subert; for the presence of my friend-family Zhou Li here since 2007; and most of all for my loving, supportive, encouraging, and patient partner Donald Pan whose faithful support during all stages of this Ph.D. is so appreciated. Thank you! viii Table of Contents Page Abstract .............................................................................................................................. iii! Dedication ........................................................................................................................... v! Acknowledgments .............................................................................................................. vi! List of Figures .................................................................................................................... xi! Chapter 1: Introduction ....................................................................................................... 1! Lost in Modernity ........................................................................................................... 1 Evolving Purpose ............................................................................................................ 3 Kham Languages ............................................................................................................ 5 Attitudes towards History ............................................................................................... 8 Political and Ideological Representations
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