Published August 20, 2021
| Version v1
Journal article
Open
THE LAST MONGGHUL PLOWMAN IN 2019: HUZHU COUNTY, QINGHAI PROVINCE, PR CHINA
Description
Lajangja Mongghul Village is in a steep mountain region of the northern part of Hongyazigou Township, Huzhu Tu Autonomous County, Haidong Municipality, Qinghai Province, PR China. With twenty-five households and approximately one hundred Mongghul residents, it is one of the most remote Mongghul villages in Huzhu County. The focus of this paper is a village household that, in 2019, used mules to plow. Two maps and three photographs are provided.
Notes
Mongghul historically used mules, horses, donkeys, and oxen to plow, transport goods and agricultural produce, and thresh crops. Livestock were essential in their daily work activities.
After the 1980s, tractors, seeders, harvesters, automobiles, and other machinery were introduced and gradually replaced animals in agricultural work. Additionally, hard-surfaced roads connected villages, running water came to many rural households, and solar-powered street lights illuminated rural village life. In the spring of 2019, only one Mongghul family plowed fields with a pair of mules in Lajangja Village, Hongyazigou Township, Huzhu County. This article explores why this family still uses livestock in farming. In 2019, I interviewed Yangbin (b. 1961, male, illiterate) from Lajangja Village. He rarely leaves his village. In 2019, he was the last Mongghul plowing fields with livestock in Mongghul communities. I recorded my interview with him using an audio recorder. Later, as I listened to this material again, I took notes in Mongghul and then wrote this text in English.