Lara Maconi specializes in cultural studies and modern literature. A Sinologist by training and with a further specialization in Tibetology, her interests lie in contemporary Sino-Tibetan literature, in Sino-Tibetan cultural transfers in modern times and in the relationship between technologies of power and cultural forms in the Sino-Tibetan area during the 20th and 21st centuries.
Her doctoral thesis, entitled ’ Je est un autre’: la littérature tibétaine d’expression chinoise entre questions identitaires, débats linguistiques et négociations culturelles (INALCO, 2008) is a study of Sino-Tibetan literary life and activities during the Maoist and post-Maoist era. It is scheduled for publication by Presses de l’EFEO.
During her postdoctoral studies, Lara has been turning her attention to research on "The Modern Fate of the ’Land of the Yellow Lama’: a Study in Muli and Traditions and Modernities" which covers the cultural history of the multiethnic Buddhist kingdom of Muli in Kham. The study was financed by a grant from CCKF with additional funding from the Maison des Sciences de l’Homme and CRCAO-CNRS. Lara’s doctoral and postdoctoral research has resulted in several articles and in papers that were presented at various international symposia.
At present, on a contract with the Centre d’études himalayennes ("Kham" Project 2012-2016 funded by the European Research Council and coordinated by Stéphane Gros) in her capacity as associate researcher, Lara is conducting a study on competing cultural powers in Kham during the pre-Mao era. She has written two articles in this context: the first, "Dans les yeux des artistes: visions chinoises de Muli et du Kham pendant la Seconde guerre sino-japonaise", is an analysis of the vision/construction of the "Khampa Other" by a group of young Han painters in the years 1930-1940 ( Cahiers d’Extrême Asie . No.23, 2014); the second, only just completed, is entitled "Before Mao. Chinese Language Schooling and Education in Kham prior to 1949 ", is to be published in a collective volume edited by Stéphane Gros.
Lara is also a lecturer in the history of Tibetan literature and in the theory of literature at INALCO.
Main publications:
2014, "Dans les yeux des artistes : visions chinoises de Muli et du Kham pendant la Seconde guerre Sino-Japonaise", No. 23, Cahiers d’Extrême Asie, 163-199.
2008 & 2009, "Au-delà du débat linguistique : comment définir la littérature tibétaine d’expression chinoise ? Autour des ‘spécificités nationales’ et des ‘spécificités régionales’", Revue d’études tibétaines (RET) , No. 14, October 2008, http://www.digitalhimalaya.com/collections/journals/ret/index.php; in Françoise Pommaret et Jean-Luc Achard (eds.), Tibetan Studies in Honor of Samten Karmay, Dharamshala, Amnye Machen Institute, 2009, 117-155.
2008, "One Nation, Two discourses. Tibetan New-Era Literature in the Diglossic Context of ‘China’s Tibet’: the Language Debate", in Lauran R. Hartley & Patricia Schiaffini-Vedani eds., Modern Tibetan Literature and Social Change, Durham & London, Duke University Press, 173-201.
2007, "Contemporary Tibetan Literature from Shangri-la: Literary Life and Activities in the Yunnan Tibetan Region (1950-2002)", in Steven Venturino (ed.), Proceedings of the 10th Seminar of the IATS – Oxford 2000, Leiden, Brill, 43-86.