Authenticating Tibet: Answers to China's 100 Questions

Average Rating:
3.77778
9 Reviews
Categories: , , , , , , , .
TitleAuthenticating Tibet: Answers to China's 100 Questions
Publication TypeBook
Year of Publication2008
AuthorsBuffetrille, Katia, Anne-Marie Blondeau, and Donald Lopez
Number of Pages402
PublisherUniversity of California Press
ISBN978-0520249288
Abstract

The land of Tibet—its people, culture, and religion—has long been both an object of contention and a source of fascination. Since 1959, Tibet has also been at the center of controversy when China's "peaceful liberation" of the land of snows led to the Lhasa uprising and the Dalai Lama's escape to India. Authenticating Tibet: Answers to China's "100 Questions" offers clear and unbiased responses to a booklet published by the Chinese government in 1989, which sought to counter the criticism generated by the Dalai Lama and his followers and offer the PRC's "truth" about Tibet and Tibetans. In Authenticating Tibet, international Tibet scholars provide historically accurate answers to 100 Questions and deal evenhandedly with both China's "truth" about Tibet and that of the Dalai Lama and his followers. Designed for use by a general audience, the book is an accessible reference, free of the polemics that commonly surround the Tibet question. Although these experts refute many of the points asserted by China, they do not offer blanket endorsements for the claims made by the pro-Tibet movement. Instead, they provide an accurate, historically based assessment of Tibet's past and its troubled present. (Amazon)
URLhttps://www.amazon.com/Authenticating-Tibet-Answers-Chinas-Questions/dp/0520249283

Supplemental Contributions

Average Rating:
3.77778
9 Reviews

Reviews for Authenticating Tibet: Answers to China's 100 Questions

4

Posted By: Tammy Taylor

Posted On: May 26, 2018

This book was written in response to the 1989 booklet that the Chinese government published, "100 Questions about Tibet" which sought to counter the negative image and criticism brought on the PRC by the Dalai Lama and those in exile. It is written by international scholars of Tibet and addresses each question and each answer given by the Chinese government, checking accuracy and giving factual information so that the reader can come to their own conclusion.
"Authenticating Tibet" answered many of the questions I had about the history of the situation in Tibet, including all aspects of the Chinese occupation. It highlights the falsehoods and misleading facts in the PRC's answers and explains much of their propaganda. It addresses the motivations for many of the policies of the Chinese government and how they relate to the Tibetan Buddhist religion and the Dalai Lama. It is organized in an interesting and cohesive manner with small segments for each question and response.
One note for the reader - Prior knowledge of the history of the Cultural Revolution is needed to in order to understand the references to this time.

3

Posted By: Niklas Berry

Posted On: May 24, 2018

This book was created as a response to a Chinese publication about Sino-Tibetan relations entitled 100 Questions About Tibet. The answers (and the questions themselves) were quite obviously written in favor of the Chinese perspective of their territorial and cultural claims over the Tibetan state. The book itself consists of retorts from the perspective of Western scholars who study Tibetan history.

As a scholarly source I'm sure that it is valuable, but for me it was definitely not a page turner. One needs to have a good degree of background knowledge in Chinese, Central Asian, and Tibetan history to truly make sense of the author's arguments. For instance, on page 73, Sperling writes "When the Cultural Revolution broke out in 1966, Tibet was soon swept up in it. The ravages of the Cultural Revolution are sufficiently well known and there is no need to describe them in detail." For those with limited to no knowledge of the Cultural Revolution, the ensuing pages would not be particularly accessible.

I enjoyed that the book was broken up into small questions/sections, so that it could be used as reference material fairly quickly by an educator with a specific question about the Sino-Tibetan relationship.

4

Posted By: Lisa Brimhall

Posted On: May 23, 2018

The book provides an interesting perspective of how the Chinese view Tibet. The book Authenticating Tibet: Answers to China’s 100 Questions gives the Chinese answer to each question and then a more impartial answer to the question from an academic scholar. I would definitely recommend this book to other teachers or anyone interested in learning more about Tibet from a mostly unbiased viewpoint. Excerpts from the book would work well in upper level high school courses. It was extremely interesting. I enjoyed learning the Chinese perspective but even more I loved the expert critique of the ideas/topic in question. It provided historical context to many of the situations to give a clearer understanding.

4

Posted By: Kelly S Muldowney

Posted On: May 21, 2018

Authenticating Tibet: Answers to China’s 100 Questions, edition by Ann-Marie Blondeau and Katia Buffetrille is a collection of questions related the region of Tibet in China. In the late 1980s and again in the early 2000s the Chinese government attempted to clarify/justify policies put on Tibet through responses to 100 questions. These questions were both written and responded to by the Chinese government and give the reader a government-accepted view of the region of Tibet. Blondeau and Buffetrille along with several other scholars provided unbiased background information after each question.

The collection of questions is subdivided into smaller sections addressing specific issues with the region of Tibet. The editors respond to each question with factual information. It is not always clear to the non-expert reader when the Chinese government is omitting information or pushing a political agenda, but with the commentary this becomes apparent. However, with nominal knowledge of the region, one can get a good overview of the social, economic, religious, and political situations in Tibet from this book. I would recommend this for anyone interested in the region of Tibet as well as the Chinese government’s public image. It would be appropriate for upper level high school students, although, it may be easier to examine in smaller chunks.