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Accepted Paper:
A Socio-linguistic Analysis of Women’s Work in Qing Altisheher and in Modern Xinjiang
Akbar Amat
(University of Kansas)
Modernization has created greater career and employment opportunities for many women around the world. However, a careful reading of some Chaghatay manuscripts, foreign travelers accounts of Altisheher women’s work reveals that the range of activities of modern Uyghur women has narrowed down, which finds its expression in a terminological differentiation of domestic work and wage labor. As many travelers to Tarim basin have observed, the Altisheher women had greater presence in the public sphere, and the marketplace mostly due to their wider range of activities. The Altisheher cities were seats of international commerce and sites where imported goods, handicraft products and farming surpluses were exchanged. However, despite a great functional differentiation in society, there was no terminological separation between men and women’s work; women’s work at home and their income generating activities. The word ish ‘work’ subsumed most of the work done by men and women. In contrast, modern Uyghur language strictly differentiates not only between öy ishi ‘household chore’ and xizmet ‘wage-labor,’ but also between öy ayali ‘housewives’ and ma’aschi ayal ‘wage-earning women.’ This paper argues that this change was a result of industrialization. After the 1980s, Industrial production replaced many economically productive activities traditionally done by women, such as sewing, tailoring, selling vegetables and dairy products. As a result, modern rural Uyghur women are less active in the marketplace, and their activities are mostly confined within the household. Due to this reduction, modern Uyghur women’s activities acquired a separate terminology, öy ishi ‘household chore.’