Introduction: Yi History, Tradition, and Alcohol

It is widely accepted that a significant part of what we think of as heritage or tradition is invented, or at least recreated, according to present-day concerns and ideas. But the relationship of newly invented tradition and its associated discourses to older practice and thought is often obscure in studies that lack historical perspective. This chapter considers the history of alcohol in Nuosu Yi society in relation to the formal codification of an Yi heritage of alcohol-related culture, and the question of alcohol in Yi health. It explores the historical narratives associated with the exposition of an Yi heritage of alcohol, showing that those narratives are woven from a tapestry of threads with histories of their own, and they therefore shape present-day heritage work, as much as the latter seeks to impose its own reconstructions of the past. Following a brief overview of ideas about alcohol in contemporary Yi society, it then analyses historical texts to argue that many of these ideas are remarkably similar to ones that emerged in the context of nineteenth and early twentieth century contact between Yi and Han communities. Discussion of alcohol in contemporary Yi society is often characterised by the notion that Yi drinking habits have been disturbed by either commercialisation or contact with Han culture in the recent past.