A Study of Contemporary Funeral Rituals among the Mosuo of Lanhe (Ninglang)
This article presents a field-based ethnographic study of funeral rituals among the Langqu Mosuo people in south-central Ninglang Yi Autonomous County, Yunnan, an area whose rituals had previously received little scholarly attention. The author first traces the historical origins of the "Langqu" place name and the Mosuo ethnonym through historical records such as the Yuan Shi and Huayang Guozhi, arguing—based on the Dabaist genealogical scripture "Guizong Yinlu Jing"—that the Langqu Mosuo migrated from Sichuan and have a documented history exceeding 1,500 years, dating to the Wei-Jin period. It notes that Mosuo religious life combines an indigenous primal religion (Bizha) with Tibetan Buddhism (Lamaism), both integral to funerals. Drawing on direct participant observation of an eleven-day funeral (November 2008) for an 85-year-old woman in Duobi village, conducted jointly by Buddhist lamas and Bizha priests before nearly 800 villagers, the article begins analyzing the ritual's procedural structure and religious-anthropological significance.
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