Composite: Its Shape, Circumstances and Cognitive Value

Wang Mingming

 Published in Open Times, 2025, Issue 1.

Abstract: When ethnology and sociology were first established in China, Cai Yuanpei, Wu Wenzao and others were busy explaining the essence of the discipline on the one hand and dealing with the applicability of the key western concept of "nation" to Chinese realities on the other. Given that China was a composite, they creatively proposed an eclecticism between the state and the world, and produced the theory of multi-ethnic state. As the discipline evolved, the western norms of the "isolates" and "separate ethnography for each clan" were gaining dominance, leaving aside the notions of complexity in the accounts of the predecessors. This paper sorts out this change and points out that words like "isolate" or "separate" refer to the image of an isolated island derived from Western political thought in modern times, which had raised the eyebrows of Cai Yuanpei, Wu Wenzao and other Chinese scholars. This paper reveals the origin and continuous influence of the image of an isolated island in the social sciences, and argues that disciplinary researches deviated from their original agenda would lead to cognitive crises. To overcome such crises, it is necessary to go back to the basics and start anew. The paper also points out that with the help of the image of a composite in the old theory, it will be of great theoretical and practical significance to restore the intrinsic relationship of communities, cities, regions, ethnic groups, corridors, and other locations, and to break dualism with relational cosmology.

Keywords: ethnology, sociology, nation, image of an isolated island, composite