大学共同利用機関法人 人間文化研究機構　国立民族学博物館

Objectives

China is a nation in which many ethnic groups, including the Han majority and a number of ethnic minorities, coexist. In the modern and contemporary eras, the cultures of these ethnic groups have continuously been transformed into resources, and at present as the globalization process unfolds this trend continues to advance. In our preceding joint research we were able to clarify to a degree the state of affairs concerning the diversity of cultural resources as well as their creation and change. Based on those results, we have concluded that there is a need to conduct more in-depth investigation concerning the dynamism in the contemporary fluid societies of China's ethnic groups to study how cultures are being transformed into resources and put to use, and which politics are at work here. This project will focus on cultural resources in South China. Among the questions we intend to consider are the following: How are cultures being turned into resources in terms of preservation, development and use? Also, during the process of turning culture into a resource, what kinds of infighting or struggles for influence are apparent among different actors, that is, government at all levels (the central government and local governments), intellectuals, corporations, and the general public (city dwellers, peasants, etc)? We aim to elucidate the situation through joint anthropological and historical research, and to open new vistas for theoretical approaches to cultural resources. ntial elements of subsistence and production as a single target of examination and illuminate its historicity. That is the research objective of this research project and gives the project its sociohistorical design. First we need to realize that we cannot comprehend the various problems resulting from the complex conditions surrounding the coexistence of low-degree industrialized societies that have been treated as special by anthropologists and high-degree industrialized societies. We cannot comprehend changes to those conditions, if the problems are illuminated solely by a one-way impact of concepts that emanated from highly industrialized societies such as globalization or empire.