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The Production of Collective Memory in the Tibetan-Language Materials for the Culture and History of Tibet (1981–2014)

This chapter aims to demonstrate the historiographic significance of a collection of published testimonies based on oral history, entitled Bod kyi rig gnas lo rgyus dpyad gzhi’i rgyu cha bdams bsgrigs (“Selection of Source Materials for the Study of the Culture and History of Tibet”; Ch. Xizang wenshi ziliao xuanji). This Tibetan-language series, consisting of 30 volumes published between 1981 and 2014 on the initiative of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference of the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), belongs to the broader Chinese enterprise of the wenshi ziliao, started in 1960, which aimed at creating a collective memory of half a century, spanning the last years of the Qing dynasty up to the seizure of power by the communists—a collective memory presented by the editors as “raw materials”. A general overview of the content of Materials for the Culture and History of Tibet, the identity of the testimonies’ authors and of the chosen themes, not only shows the historical value of the collection but enables us to better understand the distinctive features of the collective memory produced, and how editorial choices made since 1981 partly reflect local policies in the TAR.