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For our summer 2020 Machik Khabda, we convened a global conversation on the resettlement of Tibetan drokpa (nomadic pastoralists) over the past two decades. To focus our discussion on the experience of resettlement, we featured a short story that has sparked an intensive conversation among Tibetans inside Tibet.
We thank all those who joined us for a week of discussion on the effects of the uprooting and mass relocation of drokpa communities over this past generation. To learn more on this topic, please visit our additional learning materials and other resources pointed below. Background Art by Yak Rianbar |
BACKGROUND |
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For many thousands of years, Tibetan drokpas (nomadic pastoralists) lived and practiced a unique human lifeway in one of the most extreme ecosystems on the planet. Across vast grasslands that cover 70% of the Tibetan plateau, drokpas ensured the fragile natural environment of Tibet would continuously flourish by bringing their deep knowledge and millennia of experience to their relationship to the land and complex ecosystem.
This time-honored Tibetan stewardship of the grasslands came to an abrupt end in the 1950s when the new socialist state mandated the collectivization of livestock. The aggressive new policies led to dramatic overstocking, causing catastrophic man-made grassland degradation the likes of which Tibetans had never before witnessed. The reform era under Deng Xiaoping oversaw the decollectivization of livestock and gave back a degree of agency to Tibetan pastoralists. But it soon became clear that far-reaching and devastating ecological damage had already been done. The effects of grassland degradation were felt at a colossal scale downriver, with drought and dust storms in the Yellow River basin and floods along the Yangtze affecting 24 Chinese provinces and over two hundred million lives. It suddenly became state priority to "protect" the fragile ecosystem of Tibetan grasslands. A new set of state policies were introduced in the early 2000s that included fencing the grasslands and imposing bans on grazing. Most peculiarly, the Ecological Migration Policy has defined Tibetan drokpas as "ecological migrants." The effect of this policy has been to uproot hundreds of thousands of Tibetan drokpas from their ancestral homes in high pastures and relocate them in hastily built settlement sites across the Tibetan plateau. To reflect on the experience of resettlement, Machik Khabda is honored to feature The Valley of Black Foxes -- a short story by writer Tsering Dondrup that has galvanized a conversation among Tibetans inside Tibet. We also include a discussion guide, a piece by Huatse Gyal on the sociocultural life of The Valley of Black Foxes, a reading list of articles on pastoralism, as well as a glossary of basic Tibetan terminology on resettlement. But first we begin here with The Drokpa World, a short introduction by Kunchok Kyid, co-curator of this Machik Khabda. |
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ཝ་ནག་ལུང་བ།
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The Valley of Black Foxes
A Short Story by Tsering Dondrup
The story, titled Wa nag lung wa (ཝ་ནག་ལུང་བ།) in Tibetan, was first published in 2012 in Light Rain (སྦྲང་ཆར།), one of the foremost Tibetan language literary journals in contemporary Tibet. Two years after its first release, the story was published again in the inaugural issue of National Literature (མི་རིགས་ཀྱི་རྩོམ་རིག). Since then, The Valley of the Black Foxes has provoked animated discussion and debate across Tibet about the contemporary experience of drokpas and socio-cultural conditions of the grasslands. The story has been read widely by avid Tibetan fiction readers internationally and has been translated into English, Chinese, French, Japanese and Mongolian. Through Khabda, we hope this story reaches a wider global audience that can generate a new public conversation on the project of resettlement and the contemporary experience of the Tibetan drokpa.
The original Tibetan-language story and English translations are available as downloadable pdfs below. To read the Tibetan original in print, we encourage you to purchase Tsering Dondrup's book from Tsuklag Trengwa (གཙུག་ལག་ཕྲེང་བ།). We are grateful to the translators who have made this story more accessible to non-Tibetan readers. There are currently two translations of the short story. Christopher Peacock's translation appears in The Handsome Monk and Other Stories, the first collection of Tsering Dondrup's acclaimed stories in English; and the second translation is by Tenzin Dickie & Pema Tsewang Shastri and is published in Old Demons, New Deities: Short Stories from Tibet, the first English-language anthology of Tibetan contemporary fiction. We encourage everyone to read both translations, as well as the Tibetan. To support Tibetan literature, please consider purchasing the books below.
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TSERING DONDRUP TIBETAN WRITER
Tsering Dondrup is one of the most influential novelists in contemporary Tibetan literature. He was born in 1961 to a drokpa family in Malho Sogdzong (རྨ་ལྷོ་སོག་རྫོང་།), Tsongon. Tsering Dondrup studied Tibetan language and literature and has worked in education, law and historical research. He began writing in the early 1980s, a time of innovation in form and content in the Tibetan literary canon. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Tsering Dondrup became an enduring literary presence, publishing four full–length novels and numerous collections of short fiction over the course of his celebrated career. His work focuses on the ever–changing cultural, societal, and ecological landscape of Tibetan drokpa. He is the recipient of numerous prominent literary prizes and his work has been translated into many languages including Mongolian, Japanese, Chinese, German, French, and English. The Handsome Monk and Other Stories (Columbia University Press, 2019, translated by Christopher Peacock), is the first collection of Tsering Dondrup’s widely acclaimed work published in English.
ཚེ་རིང་དོན་གྲུབ་ནི༡༩༦༡ལོའི་ཟླ་བཅུ་བར་མཚོ་སྔོན་ཞིང་ཆེན་རྨ་ལྷོ་སོག་རྫོང་དུ་སྐྱེས། རང་ལོ་བདུན་བརྒྱད་ནས་བཅུ་གསུམ་བར་དུ་གནག་རྫི་བྱས། རང་ལོ་བཅུ་གསུམ་ནས་ཉེར་གཅིག་བར་སློབ་གྲྭར་འགྲིམ། བྱ་བར་ཞུགས་རྗེས་སློབ་འབྲིང་དགེ་རྒན་དང་ཁྲིམས་འཛིན་དྲུང་ཡིག དེབ་ཐེར་སྒྲིག་འབྲི་སོགས་ཀྱི་ལས་ཀ་གཉེར་ཞོར་བོད་རྒྱ་ཡིག་རིགས་གཉིས་ཀྱི་ལམ་ནས་བརྩམས་སྒྲུང་སྤེལ། བརྩམས་ཆོས་གཙོ་བོ་སྒྲུང་ཐུང་པོད་གསུམ་དང་སྒྲུང་འབྲིང་པོད་གཅིག སྒྲུང་རིང་པོད་བཞི་ཡོད། བརྩམས་ཆོས་ཁག་ཅིག་དབྱིན་ཇི།ཧྥ་རན་སི།འཇར་མན།འཇར་པན།ཧང་གྷ་རི།སི་ཝེས་དན།ཧོ་ལན། སོག་ཡིག་གསར་རྙིང་སོགས་ཡིག་རིགས་དུ་མར་བསྒྱུར་ཡོད་པར་མ་ཟད་ནུབ་གླིང་གི་སློབ་ཆེན་ཁ་ཤས་དང་བོད་སོག་སློབ་གྲྭ་ཆེ་འབྲིང་གི་བསླབ་དེབ་ཏུ་བདམས་ཡོད། བརྩམས་ཆོས་ཁག་ཅིག་ལ་རྒྱལ་ཁབ་ཕྱི་ནང་དུ་རྩོམ་རིག་བྱ་དགའ་ཐོབ་མྱོང་།༢༠༡༣ལོར་ལོ་ཚད་མ་སླེབས་གོང་རྒན་ཡོལ་བྱས་ཏེ་བློ་སེམས་རྩེ་གཅིག་གིས་དཔེ་ཀློག་དང་གསར་རྩོམ་གྱི་ལས་ལ་གཞོལ་བཞིན་ཡོད། |
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Tibetan student organized forum on The Valley of Black Foxes, Qinghai Normal University, Xining - Nov 2017
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On the Sociocultural Life of The Valley of Black Foxes Inside TibetBy Huatse Gyal
PhD Candidate at University of Michigan No one has written so intimately about the implications of Chinese state-led resettlement policy for Tibetan pastoralists as renowned Tibetan writer, Tsering Dondrup (b. 1962). And no other work has generated as many lively discussions concerning the fate of Tibetan pastoralists in Tibet as Tsering Dondrup’s short story, The Valley of Black Foxes...[more] |
Commentary on Wa nag lung wa from Tibet |
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By Bod Ches
Translated by Somtso The Valley of Black Foxes (henceforth, Wa nag lung wa) has foretold tomorrow’s story today. To the county towns and to the prefectures. To the farmers and to the nomads. Wa nag lung wa has not only sent chills down our spines but also compelled us to pause and reflect deeply. Wa nag lung wa is my Phayul. At the same time, it was also once... [more] |
Supplementary Materials
To kickstart your local Khabda, we're providing a Discussion Guide to give you some starting points for your gathering. The Guide includes Suggested Activities for creating a dynamic space of exchange and learning. To encourage further exploration for your Khabda participants, we're also providing a short list of insightful articles and essays in Further Reading, as well as a Tibetan-English Glossary on key terminology to discuss the issue of resettlement in the Tibetan language.
AcknowledgementsOur appreciation to Huatse Gyal, PhD candidate at University of Michigan, for bringing the impetus for this Khabda at a recent Tibet Governance Lab. We have also drawn inspiration from intensive discussions with Dr. Yonten Nyima at NYU, as well as a beloved network of Tibetan conservationists inside Tibet. We appreciate the work of the translators, as well as the support of our current Machik interns Tenzin Saldon & Rebecca Parry. We are especially grateful to Kunchok Kyid for helping bring this Khabda to life with her generous spirit and wide open heart. Finally, very special appreciation to Tsering Dondrup for embracing Machik Khabda, and for his astonishing life's work that illuminates all our worlds. |
Be part of the Khabda community
To learn more about becoming a local Khabda host in your community, contact us at [email protected].
- Find out where local Machik Khabdas are taking place by contacting [email protected]
- Share your thoughts on the short story on Instagram and Facebook using hashtags such as #ValleyoftheBlackFoxes, #BlackFoxValley, #TibetanFiction, #TibetanStorytelling and #MachikKhabda
- We want to hear from you! What are your ideas, questions, and thoughts on this Khabda? Write a blog post, book review, poetry analysis and share it with us @machik_online or [email protected]!
- Check back here for news and updates from the Machik Khabda community.
To learn more about becoming a local Khabda host in your community, contact us at [email protected].