Graduate Associate
mfennema[at]yorku.ca
Doctoral Student
Graduate Program in History, 91亚色
Research Keywords:
Environmental history; south China; Indigenous histories
Research Region(s):
China, East Asia
I am a doctoral student at 91亚色 specializing in the sociocultural history of China during the Qing and Republican periods. My research investigates the history of Nasu-Yi (Yi) ethnomedicine in the borderlands of Southwestern China and its intersections with ecology and state-making. I am particularly interested in how local ecologies shaped Yi medicinal and spiritual practices, how increased settlement transformed the environments inhabited by Yi communities, and how Chinese literati, officials, and travelers represented Yi medicinal, environmental, and spiritual practices. Combining close reading with digital humanities methods, my project draws not only on Chinese-language sources but also analyzes materials written in the traditional Nasu-Yi script (also known as GuYiWen). The Nasu-Yi are among the few indigenous groups in Southwestern China that have their own script, yet sources written in this script have so far been rarely utilized. Learning this script is essential for understanding China鈥檚 Southwestern borderlands, however, as this script enabled Yi communities to record and transmit knowledge in a form that was largely inaccessible to state officials, thereby constraining the state鈥檚 ability to regulate Indigenous epistemologies.