April 20th, 2011

Dear All,

I am delighted to inform you of the launch of a new project resulting from the collaboration of Nomadic Peoples, Berghahn Publishers, the Ford Foundation, and the Centre for Rural Environmental Social Studies (CRESS) of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS).

During the last thirty years, China’s grassland has experienced dramatic changes, including land privatization, implementation of 'carrying capacity' measurements, promotion of intensive livestock breeding, and reconstruction of social relationships, which have had significant impact on both the ecosystem and the herders’ livelihoods. Today, Chinese scholars are intensifying research on the grasslands, and are eager to know about similar experiences in other countries. As the journal most consistently concerned with anthropological and ethnological research of the dryland pastoralism for the last thirty-years, and therefore a source of valuable theoretical thinking and case studies, Nomadic Peoples was contacted by CRESS for a project of translation into Chinese supported by the Ford Foundation.

The project involves the translation of thirty articles from the whole NP archive, to be published into an anthology in three volumes with the title 'Transition and Modernity of Nomadic Society'. Volume 1 will be devoted to Mongolia, volume 2 to Africa and volume 3 will collect significant articles on other countries. Each volume will be structured into a range of topics: risk management, land tenure, market development, herders’ livelihood, grassland degradation and so on. The volume of Mongolia is due to be published by the end of this year, and the other two will be published respectively in 2012 and 2013.

An brief introduction describing the history, goal, and activity of Nomadic Peoples will be included in each of the volumes.

With best wishes,
Saverio