Meshrep
Encyclopedia
A meshrep is a traditional male Uyghur
gathering that typically includes "poetry, music, dance, and conversation within a structural context". Meshreps typically include music of the Muqam
variety and ad-hoc tribunal
s on moral questions. "Meshrep" may also refer to the Islamic youth groups that became a political force in Ili
, Xinjiang
in the 1990s. The voluntary societies used extralegal means such as boycott
s to enforce what they saw as Islamic mores against gambling, alcohol and drug abuse among young Uyghur men. Amid continuing political campaigns and antigovernment protests launched by these meshrep, the Xinjiang government cracked down on key religious leaders, including meshrep leaders, leading to urban violence in 1997
and the flight of meshrep leaders to Kazakhstan
. In November 2010, China successfully petitioned UNESCO
to list the traditional meshrep in its List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding.
, and on wedding
s, circumcision
s, and girls' comings of age
. Each meshrep consists of a leader (yigit bashi, an older man), a disciplinarian (passip begi), and 30 younger men (ottuz oghul), who sit on a carpet according to seniority. As the meshreps were primarily male bonding
events, the women and children of the host's family were to stay inside the house and only interact with the men to bring them food or to otherwise serve them. Music is an essential component of the meshrep, and during the meshrep, men play progressively faster muqam
melodies on the dutar
while others compete to see who could perform whirling circle dances for the longest period of time. Some meshrep also feature songs, skits, and lectures from religious leaders. Aside from the entertainment value of the meshrep, these groups also formed part of the informal governance structure of Uyghur communities, and still do outside of China. Inside the meshrep, the moral transgressions of the men, such as polygamy
, are publicly scolded and the men humiliated by slapping or caning
. There is no limit on the length or attendance of the meshrep, and the Dolan Uyghurs
were famed for hosting meshrep "attended by hundreds of people, and often last[ing] the whole night".
play Gulnissa, where the meshrep is portrayed as a secular, coeducational youth culture. During that time, the meshrep in Yining (Ghulja) consisted of musical performances and "informal court hearings" for community dissidents. Uyghurs in Kazakhstan
began practicing the meshrep as early as the 1970s. After China's economic reforms in the 1980s, a middle class began to develop in China, and ordinary Chinese had more leisure time and discretionary income. At the same time, political and religious controls were loosening, and Chinese officials encouraged the building of mosque
s and the veiling of women
. Contemporary developments in the region, including the global Islamic revival
and the independence of the Soviet Central Asia
n states in 1992, inspired Uyghur independence feeling and the establishment of militant groups like the East Turkestan Islamic Movement
(ETIM). Still, in the 1990s, the social and political life in the city of Yining (Ghulja) was predominantly secular. In Yining, young Uyghur men would informally gather, usually once a week, to drink baijiu
, perform poetry and music, and otherwise socialize. These gatherings, called olturax, grew to perform important political and economic functions in Yining life.
Islamic youth groups organized in the evenings grew in opposition to and eventually eclipsed the olturax, also serving "the foci for Uyghur resistance to Chinese rule". Calling themselves "meshreps", the clubs criticized the secular nature of the olturax and the alcohol consumption within as un-Islamic. These meshreps, which have been compared to the Catholic Knights of Columbus
, were more formal than the olturax: tasked with providing "moral guidance", they kept strict membership lists and organized regular meetings, wherein members would read passages from the Quran. Meshrep practitioners were held to a strict code of Islamic conduct in their daily lives, including abstinence from alcohol and hashish
. Initiation into the meshrep involved hazing
rituals, and once admitted, men who did not continue to meet the group's standards of Muslim piety were given corporal punishment
, such as caning
, or petty fines by the group. These practices diverged significantly from the meshrep's secular tradition, and thus revived the meshrep in Yining with "new religious and nationalist meanings".
Initially, both social reformers and the local government supported the meshreps, as they provided an outlet for young Uyghur men in an environment rife with unemployment, alcoholism, drug abuse, and gambling. But as the popularity of meshrep grew, meshrep groups became more assertive in their opposition to the government's goals. In the spring and summer of 1995, meshreps started a campaign of boycotts and intimidation against shops that sold liquor in Yining and the surrounding villages. Fearing the meshrep's political potential, Xinjiang authorities banned the gatherings in July 1995. However, most meshrep groups continued to operate in secret, or delegated their morals enforcement duties to legal neighborhood watch
groups. When a football game organized by underground meshrep teams was canceled by authorities, the meshrep mobilized several hundred Uyghur men to march across government offices and to gather in Yining's main plaza, although there was no violence and the crowd dispersed after a few days. Authorities then drew a distinction between "healthy, traditional" meshrep and an "illicit" political and religious meshrep, encouraging the former but cracking down on the latter. In 1997, a national anticrime campaign resulted in the arrests of meshrep leaders and talib
s in Yining, leading to mass riots called the Ghulja Incident
.
in Kazakhstan, where they continued to practice the meshrep as they had in Ili. In November 2010, UNESCO
approved China' nomination of the meshrep to the List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding.
Uyghur people
The Uyghur are a Turkic ethnic group living in Eastern and Central Asia. Today, Uyghurs live primarily in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in the People's Republic of China...
gathering that typically includes "poetry, music, dance, and conversation within a structural context". Meshreps typically include music of the Muqam
Muqam
A muqam is the melody type used in Uyghur music, that is, a musical mode and set of melodic formulas used to guide improvisation and composition....
variety and ad-hoc tribunal
Tribunal
A tribunal in the general sense is any person or institution with the authority to judge, adjudicate on, or determine claims or disputes—whether or not it is called a tribunal in its title....
s on moral questions. "Meshrep" may also refer to the Islamic youth groups that became a political force in Ili
Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture
Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture , in northernmost Xinjiang, is the only Kazakh autonomous prefecture of the People's Republic of China.-Geography and coordinates:The following figures excludes both Tacheng Prefecture and Altay Prefecture....
, Xinjiang
Xinjiang
Xinjiang is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China. It is the largest Chinese administrative division and spans over 1.6 million km2...
in the 1990s. The voluntary societies used extralegal means such as boycott
Boycott
A boycott is an act of voluntarily abstaining from using, buying, or dealing with a person, organization, or country as an expression of protest, usually for political reasons...
s to enforce what they saw as Islamic mores against gambling, alcohol and drug abuse among young Uyghur men. Amid continuing political campaigns and antigovernment protests launched by these meshrep, the Xinjiang government cracked down on key religious leaders, including meshrep leaders, leading to urban violence in 1997
Ghulja Incident
The Ghulja Incident was the culmination of the Ghulja protests of 1997, a series of demonstrations or riots in the city of Ghulja in the Xinjiang autonomous region of the People's Republic of China beginning in early February 1997.The protests were sparked by the execution of 30 Uyghur...
and the flight of meshrep leaders to Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan , officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Ranked as the ninth largest country in the world, it is also the world's largest landlocked country; its territory of is greater than Western Europe...
. In November 2010, China successfully petitioned UNESCO
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations...
to list the traditional meshrep in its List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding.
Traditional structure
The practice of meshrep is diverse among Uyghur communities, but there are some commonalities. Meshrep are usually held in the courtyard of one of the members' family home. Traditionally, meshrep were only held on the harvestHarvest
Harvest is the process of gathering mature crops from the fields. Reaping is the cutting of grain or pulse for harvest, typically using a scythe, sickle, or reaper...
, and on wedding
Wedding
A wedding is the ceremony in which two people are united in marriage or a similar institution. Wedding traditions and customs vary greatly between cultures, ethnic groups, religions, countries, and social classes...
s, circumcision
Circumcision
Male circumcision is the surgical removal of some or all of the foreskin from the penis. The word "circumcision" comes from Latin and ....
s, and girls' comings of age
Coming of age
Coming of age is a young person's transition from childhood to adulthood. The age at which this transition takes place varies in society, as does the nature of the transition. It can be a simple legal convention or can be part of a ritual, as practiced by many societies...
. Each meshrep consists of a leader (yigit bashi, an older man), a disciplinarian (passip begi), and 30 younger men (ottuz oghul), who sit on a carpet according to seniority. As the meshreps were primarily male bonding
Male bonding
Male bonding is a term that is used in ethology, social science, and in general usage to describe patterns of friendship and/or cooperation in men...
events, the women and children of the host's family were to stay inside the house and only interact with the men to bring them food or to otherwise serve them. Music is an essential component of the meshrep, and during the meshrep, men play progressively faster muqam
Muqam
A muqam is the melody type used in Uyghur music, that is, a musical mode and set of melodic formulas used to guide improvisation and composition....
melodies on the dutar
Dutar
The dutar is a traditional long-necked two-stringed lute found in Iran, Central Asia and South Asia...
while others compete to see who could perform whirling circle dances for the longest period of time. Some meshrep also feature songs, skits, and lectures from religious leaders. Aside from the entertainment value of the meshrep, these groups also formed part of the informal governance structure of Uyghur communities, and still do outside of China. Inside the meshrep, the moral transgressions of the men, such as polygamy
Polygamy
Polygamy is a marriage which includes more than two partners...
, are publicly scolded and the men humiliated by slapping or caning
Caning
Caning is a form of corporal punishment consisting of a number of hits with a single cane usually made of rattan, generally applied to the offender's bare or clothed buttocks or hand . Application of a cane to the knuckles or the shoulders has been much less common...
. There is no limit on the length or attendance of the meshrep, and the Dolan Uyghurs
Dolan people
Dolan refers to a people or region of what is now Xinjiang Province, China. People who call themselves Dolan can be found in the Yarkand River valley, the Tarim River valley and the Lop Nur region of present-day Xinjiang...
were famed for hosting meshrep "attended by hundreds of people, and often last[ing] the whole night".
Ili Youth Meshrep
The meshrep is attested to in modern Chinese literature as early as 1942, in the socialist realistSocialist realism
Socialist realism is a style of realistic art which was developed in the Soviet Union and became a dominant style in other communist countries. Socialist realism is a teleologically-oriented style having its purpose the furtherance of the goals of socialism and communism...
play Gulnissa, where the meshrep is portrayed as a secular, coeducational youth culture. During that time, the meshrep in Yining (Ghulja) consisted of musical performances and "informal court hearings" for community dissidents. Uyghurs in Kazakhstan
Uyghurs in Kazakhstan
Uyghurs in Kazakhstan form the country's 7th-largest ethnic group, according to the 1999 census.-Migration history:There is a centuries-old history of population movements between the territories which are today controlled by the neighbouring Republic of Kazakhstan and the People's Republic of China...
began practicing the meshrep as early as the 1970s. After China's economic reforms in the 1980s, a middle class began to develop in China, and ordinary Chinese had more leisure time and discretionary income. At the same time, political and religious controls were loosening, and Chinese officials encouraged the building of mosque
Mosque
A mosque is a place of worship for followers of Islam. The word is likely to have entered the English language through French , from Portuguese , from Spanish , and from Berber , ultimately originating in — . The Arabic word masjid literally means a place of prostration...
s and the veiling of women
Hijab
The word "hijab" or "'" refers to both the head covering traditionally worn by Muslim women and modest Muslim styles of dress in general....
. Contemporary developments in the region, including the global Islamic revival
Islamic revival
Islamic revival refers to a revival of the Islamic religion throughout the Islamic world, that began roughly sometime in 1970s and is manifested in greater religious piety, and community feeling, and in a growing adoption of Islamic culture, dress, terminology, separation of the sexes, and values...
and the independence of the Soviet Central Asia
Soviet Central Asia
Soviet Central Asia refers to the section of Central Asia formerly controlled by the Soviet Union, as well as the time period of Soviet administration . In terms of area, it is nearly synonymous with Russian Turkestan, the name for the region during the Russian Empire...
n states in 1992, inspired Uyghur independence feeling and the establishment of militant groups like the East Turkestan Islamic Movement
East Turkestan Islamic Movement
The East Turkestan Islamic Movement The East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) The East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) (also known as the Turkistan Islamic Movement (TIM), and other names; is a Waziri based mujahideen organization. Its stated goals are the independence of East Turkestan and the...
(ETIM). Still, in the 1990s, the social and political life in the city of Yining (Ghulja) was predominantly secular. In Yining, young Uyghur men would informally gather, usually once a week, to drink baijiu
Baijiu
Baijiu , or shaojiu is a Chinese distilled alcoholic beverage. The name baijiu literally means "white liquor," "white alcohol" or "white spirits". Baijiu is often translated as "wine" or "white wine"...
, perform poetry and music, and otherwise socialize. These gatherings, called olturax, grew to perform important political and economic functions in Yining life.
Islamic youth groups organized in the evenings grew in opposition to and eventually eclipsed the olturax, also serving "the foci for Uyghur resistance to Chinese rule". Calling themselves "meshreps", the clubs criticized the secular nature of the olturax and the alcohol consumption within as un-Islamic. These meshreps, which have been compared to the Catholic Knights of Columbus
Knights of Columbus
The Knights of Columbus is the world's largest Catholic fraternal service organization. Founded in the United States in 1882, it is named in honor of Christopher Columbus....
, were more formal than the olturax: tasked with providing "moral guidance", they kept strict membership lists and organized regular meetings, wherein members would read passages from the Quran. Meshrep practitioners were held to a strict code of Islamic conduct in their daily lives, including abstinence from alcohol and hashish
Hashish
Hashish is a cannabis preparation composed of compressed stalked resin glands, called trichomes, collected from the unfertilized buds of the cannabis plant. It contains the same active ingredients but in higher concentrations than unsifted buds or leaves...
. Initiation into the meshrep involved hazing
Hazing
Hazing is a term used to describe various ritual and other activities involving harassment, abuse or humiliation used as a way of initiating a person into a group....
rituals, and once admitted, men who did not continue to meet the group's standards of Muslim piety were given corporal punishment
Corporal punishment
Corporal punishment is a form of physical punishment that involves the deliberate infliction of pain as retribution for an offence, or for the purpose of disciplining or reforming a wrongdoer, or to deter attitudes or behaviour deemed unacceptable...
, such as caning
Caning
Caning is a form of corporal punishment consisting of a number of hits with a single cane usually made of rattan, generally applied to the offender's bare or clothed buttocks or hand . Application of a cane to the knuckles or the shoulders has been much less common...
, or petty fines by the group. These practices diverged significantly from the meshrep's secular tradition, and thus revived the meshrep in Yining with "new religious and nationalist meanings".
Initially, both social reformers and the local government supported the meshreps, as they provided an outlet for young Uyghur men in an environment rife with unemployment, alcoholism, drug abuse, and gambling. But as the popularity of meshrep grew, meshrep groups became more assertive in their opposition to the government's goals. In the spring and summer of 1995, meshreps started a campaign of boycotts and intimidation against shops that sold liquor in Yining and the surrounding villages. Fearing the meshrep's political potential, Xinjiang authorities banned the gatherings in July 1995. However, most meshrep groups continued to operate in secret, or delegated their morals enforcement duties to legal neighborhood watch
Neighborhood watch
A neighborhood watch or neighbourhood watch , also called a crime watch or neighborhood crime watch, is an organized group of citizens devoted to crime and vandalism prevention within a neighborhood...
groups. When a football game organized by underground meshrep teams was canceled by authorities, the meshrep mobilized several hundred Uyghur men to march across government offices and to gather in Yining's main plaza, although there was no violence and the crowd dispersed after a few days. Authorities then drew a distinction between "healthy, traditional" meshrep and an "illicit" political and religious meshrep, encouraging the former but cracking down on the latter. In 1997, a national anticrime campaign resulted in the arrests of meshrep leaders and talib
Talib
A talib or talibé is a student, particularly a student of Islam, who may study in a madrasah or with a religious teacher....
s in Yining, leading to mass riots called the Ghulja Incident
Ghulja Incident
The Ghulja Incident was the culmination of the Ghulja protests of 1997, a series of demonstrations or riots in the city of Ghulja in the Xinjiang autonomous region of the People's Republic of China beginning in early February 1997.The protests were sparked by the execution of 30 Uyghur...
.
Modern meshrep
After the Ghulja Incident, local antigovernment Uyghurs migrated to AlmatyAlmaty
Almaty , also known by its former names Verny and Alma-Ata , is the former capital of Kazakhstan and the nation's largest city, with a population of 1,348,500...
in Kazakhstan, where they continued to practice the meshrep as they had in Ili. In November 2010, UNESCO
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations...
approved China' nomination of the meshrep to the List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Need of Urgent Safeguarding.