DOI: 10.13189/sa.2015.030308 Cultural Crisis and Cultural Change in the Central Asian Muslim World: Looking at Social Change through the Lens of Art

Abstract The dynamics of change in the Muslim world continue to be felt throughout Asia. This study presents the choices and challenges of the Uyghur community, which is in the Turkic Muslim area of Western China. There is enormous interest exhibited by contemporary social theorists and anthropologists (Shiner, Bourdieu) in the impact of the artist in shaping and being shaped by the 'culture ' of the viewer. This impact deals with 'modernity and social change' as it is now occurring in Uyghur and Muslim society. A sample of Uyghur students discusses paintings by well-known contemporary Uyghur artists. There are also interviews with Uyghur faculty, artists, and editors, and interviews taken from Uyghur arts magazines. This discussion illustrates some of the critical issues facing Muslims in Central Asia. Typically, Uyghur 'national intellectual ' leadership in the post-liberation period in China (1949-2010) was secularist and Muslim. The cultural changes that are part of the ‘awakening ’ in Muslim Asia has challenged assumptions in contemporary cultural life, and produced some new explorations in both art and culture