In "He Recorded China's Detention of Uyghurs. The U.S. Wants to Deport Him to Uganda," the New York Times (Dec 16, 2025) reports: In 2020, a Chinese citizen had heard reports about China’s mass detention and surveillance of Uyghurs. But he wanted to see if they were true for himself. So the citizen, Heng Guan, … Continue reading Documenting Uyghur Detention Camps in Fiction and Non-fiction
Category: Uyghurdom (维吾尔话题)
Synopsis: “The Audible Annals of Abudan” (梗概：《凿空)
Synopsis: The Audible Annals of Abudan (Based on the Chinese novel by Liu Liangcheng) Within your lifetime, many things will disappear before your eyes. Only those you yearn for won’t arrive. … Continue reading Synopsis: “The Audible Annals of Abudan” (梗概：《凿空)
Rectification of Names: Uyghur Towns, Chinese Names
In China has renamed hundreds of Uyghur villages and towns, we learn of the latest policy in the campaign to make Xinjiang look and feel like mainstream, Han-dominated China: Hundreds of Uyghur villages and towns have been renamed by Chinese authorities to remove religious or cultural references, with many replaced by names reflecting Communist party … Continue reading Rectification of Names: Uyghur Towns, Chinese Names
Movie Review: Focus on the Endangered “Nikah” Uyghur Wedding Rite
In ‘Nikah’: An astonishing portrait of Uyghur life on the edge of erasure, Darren Byler introduces a film about a traditional Uyghur wedding rite that has been banned in Xinjiang: The story on the surface is a simple one. Two daughters in their twenties, Dilber and Rena, are caught between their own ambitions — careers, … Continue reading Movie Review: Focus on the Endangered “Nikah” Uyghur Wedding Rite
Disappeared in Xinjiang: Uyghur Ethnographer Rahile Dawut
In A Disappearance in Xinjiang, Financial Times' Edward White profiles Uyghur female ethnographer Rahile Dawut, who disappeared into China's Xinjiang Gulag in 2017: Rahile’s life was devoted to the preservation of cultural diversity across the vast Xinjiang region, nearly three times the size of France and covering about one-sixth of modern China. For centuries, ancient Silk … Continue reading Disappeared in Xinjiang: Uyghur Ethnographer Rahile Dawut
新疆回头看 — Xinjiang’s Ominous “Looking Back Project”
Uyghur poet's memoir recalls the Xinjiang administration's retrospective hunt for unPC content in textbooks once commissioned, edited and published by the state: Following the Urumchi incident in 2009, the regional government had initiated the Looking Back Project (新疆回头看). The Propaganda Department organized special groups to go over Uyghur-language books, newspapers, journals, films, television shows, and … Continue reading 新疆回头看 — Xinjiang’s Ominous “Looking Back Project”
Uyghur Film-maker Who Studied in Turkey Prosecuted in China
In Uyghur film-maker claims he was tortured by authorities in China, the Guardian reports that Ikram Nurmehmet, a director known for his Uyghur protagonists in films such as The Elephant in the Car, recently had his day in court in Ürümqi: “I was held in a dark room for 20 days and physically tortured,” Nurmehmet reportedly said during the … Continue reading Uyghur Film-maker Who Studied in Turkey Prosecuted in China
Uyghur Cineast Mukaddis Mijit on her new film, “Nikah”
. . . il existait par exemple de très nombreux lieux sacrés qui, d’un village à l’autre et même au fin fond des montagnes, constituaient une sorte de réseau spirituel. Des lieux importants pour les femmes qui, dans cette société patriarcale, pouvaient s’y retrouver – pour demander un enfant, résoudre un conflit, etc. J’ai voulu … Continue reading Uyghur Cineast Mukaddis Mijit on her new film, “Nikah”
China’s Culture Wars: Opening Salvo in Crackdown on Uyghur Intellectuals
Incarceration of Xinjiang's Uyghurs and other Turkic peoples expanded massively beginning in 2017, but the campaign targeting intellectuals specifically dates back to mid-2014. At the end of Xi Jinping's April 2014 visit to Xinjiang, an explosion at the Urumqi train station killed three people and injured nearly 80 others, according to the BBC. Just two … Continue reading China’s Culture Wars: Opening Salvo in Crackdown on Uyghur Intellectuals
“Backstreets,” the Novel: The Brutal Life of a Uyghur Man in Xinjiang’s Ürümchi
In Xinjiang Has Produced Its James Joyce, Ed Park reviews the first contemporary Uyghur-language novel to appear in English translation, by an author --- Perhat Tursun (پەرھات تۇرسۇن) --- now languishing in the Xinjiang Gulag: If his [the protagonist's] rural Uyghur upbringing was harsh, his life as a Uyghur man in Ürümchi can be downright brutal. … Continue reading “Backstreets,” the Novel: The Brutal Life of a Uyghur Man in Xinjiang’s Ürümchi
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