Molecular anthropology gainsays this statement.
https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/08/greeks-really-do-hav...
The fact the imperial power belonged to foreign dynasties (mainly the Yuan and the Qing) doesn’t mean the people itself and its culture was erased. Actually in case of Manchu the reverse happened with the ruling elite taking Chinese culture while forgetting it’s own culture.
The funniest pattern you can see in news - everyone talks about the other, while ignoring their own mess. Chinese media will bring up Native Americans while American media will bring up Tibet or Honk Kong or Taiwan. Middle East Muslims will complain about Palestine while conveniently ignoring Assyrians.
Are you suggesting that native american genocide isn't a hot topic in America?
The Han suffer from altitude-related health problems and die at much, much higher rates than the Tibetans.
It seemed a little weird that China would want to “settle” Tibet considering that the most economically prosperous regions of the Country are on the Coastal regions. What are the incentives to abandon your home and move to a strange land?
2. Nationalistic pride. A lot of modern China's identity is tied up with using the perceived territories of the old Qing empire as a baseline measure for the country's standing in the world. Tibet was part of the Qing empire (disregarding how pre-modern empires controlled territory in arrangements that gave local rulers much more leeway than modern nations) so not having Tibet as part of modern China would be seen as a major defeat. Try asking a Chinese national to explain why the PRC fought to keep Tibet but not Mongolia despite both being part of the old Qing empire and watch the mental gymnastics.
The reasons for each individual migrant choosing to go to Tibet instead of staying in their home provinces are more likely to be economic: better-paying jobs in tourism, mining, hydropower, ...
You're just asking for Tibet to revolt at that point. Obviously you know this, but longstanding imperial Chinese policy was that no official was ever allowed to administer his own home province. There was good reason for that.
> The reasons for each individual migrant choosing to go to Tibet instead of staying in their home provinces are more likely to be economic: better-paying jobs in tourism, mining, hydropower, ...
Some of them are just assigned as settlers by the government. I don't know how significant the phenomenon is, but e.g. a friend of mine told me that her father had been in the army, and upon leaving he was settled in Xinjiang.
The PRC requires that "The chairman of an autonomous region, the prefect of an autonomous prefecture or the head of an autonomous county shall be a citizen of the nationality exercising regional autonomy in the area concerned." http://www.npc.gov.cn/zgrdw/englishnpc/Constitution/2007-11/...
I'm not sure whether subdivisions in an autonomous area are automatically autonomous as well, but if so, that would require local Tibetan governments at all administrative levels to be lead by Tibetans.
That doesn't mean they can't use the old tactic of promoting officials across regional borders to prevent individuals from building up their own little kingdoms. E.g. the current chairman of Tibet is a Tibetan from Yunnan, so technically he isn't ruling his home province. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Che_Dalha
> her father had been in the army, and upon leaving he was settled in Xinjiang.
How does settlement work in that case? Did they give him a plot of land to farm or a job at a SOE or did they simply order him to stay in Xinjiang and find some way to make a living there?
If you're interested in the issue, the term of art is "China proper". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/China_proper
I asked someone once what the point of China owning Xinjiang was. He responded "we don't want them to attack us".
For Tibet, I agree with magicsmoke that it is incredibly significant as the source of both of China's rivers. I can't imagine China willingly ceding control over those.
The language of modern Greeks is directly descended from that of the ancients. From classical times through the hellenistic period, the Byzantine Empire up to today there is a continuity of culture.
All the areas you're quoting have changed very little since the Bronze Age.
I don’t believe this is true, FWIW. If I’m not mistaken, most of the Mediterranean as had relatively little genetic replacement since the Indo-Europeans first stablished themselves. There has been cultural turnover in the Middle East, but this has mostly taken the form of elites engaging in tax farming conquered populations, rather than genocide and replacement.
Being a black person in snow would attract predators and they would die so people with lighter skins who could camouflage easily in the background would survive.
Nearly every area in the globe was occupied by an earlier group before it was occupied by the present occupying group. Many areas had wave after wave of occupying group, some eliminating the previous group, some merging with the previous group. The people now "Greek" have little relationship to the ancient Greeks, the Mid East is mess, India has fabric of different groups, China was conquered by multiple waves of "barbarians", etc.
Many of these conquests and settlement processes have unspeakably cruel. European process stand out for being the largest and most recent but not necessarily otherwise. The cause for hope is that just hearing all this, most people want something better.