Geopolitical Exotica
Subtitle: Tibet in Western Imagination (Borderlines)
Publisher: Univ Of Minnesota Press; University of Minnesota Press
Published: January 18, 2008
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 256
ISBN-13: 9780816647651
Subjects: Political Science; Politics / Current Events; Politics/International Relations; Tibet; Asia - China; Asia - Tibet; International Relations - General; Political Science / International Relations; Geopolitics; Group identity
Description: Geopolitical Exotica examines exoticized Western representations of Tibet and Tibetans and the debate over that land's status with regard to China. Concentrating on specific cultural images of the twentieth century--promulgated by novels, popular films, travelogues, and memoirs--Dibyesh Anand lays bare the strategies by which "Exotica Tibet" and "Tibetanness" have been constructed, and he investigates the impact these constructions have had on those who are being represented. Although images of Tibet have excited the popular imagination in the West for many years, Geopolitical Exotica is the first book to explore representational practices within the study of international relations. Anand challenges the parochial practices of current mainstream international relations theory and practice, claiming that the discipline remains mostly Western in its orientation. His analysis of Tibet's status with regard to China scrutinizes the vocabulary afforded by conventional international relations theory and considers issues that until now have been undertheorized in relation to Tibet, including imperialism, history, diaspora, representation, and identity. In this masterfully synthetic work, Anand establishes that postcoloniality provides new insights into themes of representation and identity and demonstrates how IR as a discipline can meaningfully expand its focus beyond the West. Dibyesh Anand is a reader in international relations at the University of Westminster, London.