The Power of Representation: Mimesis and Alterity in Nanzhao-Tang Relations

The Nanzhao kingdom ruled a large region in what is now southwest China and southeast Asia from the mid-seventh century to 903. Its strategic position next to the Tibetan empire and its own expansionist goals meant that Nanzhao had extensive diplomatic and military relations with the Tang dynasty (618–907) during the eighth and ninth centuries. This paper argues that Tang-Nanzhao relations, as well as the Nanzhao court’s relations with its own diverse subjects, were pursued in accordance with the colonial dynamics of mimesis theorized by Homi Bhabha and Michael Taussig. Tang representations of the Nanzhao population and the Nanzhao court’s self-representations conform to colonial modes of depicting difference, namely mimesis (which involves copying or mimicking) and alterity (which involves asserting difference). These representations appear specifically in the 863 Book of Barbarians (Manshu) by the Tang official Fan Chuo, the 766 Nanzhao Stele of Transforming through Virtue (Dehua bei), and the 899 Illustrated History of Nanzhao (Nanzhao tuzhuan).