From Migration Legends to Regional Identity: the Formation of the Ming-Qing State

Recent years have seen extensive discussions on identity issues across various disciplines. Within the field of history, particularly significant are the debates concerning the “New Qing History” in American Sinology and the special issue on James Watson in the American journal Modern China . These discussions are closely tied to the emphasis on diversity and the exploration of the grand unification mechanism in Chinese studies, both domestically and internationally. Migration legends offer a critical lens for examining regional identity, encapsulating the dynamic shifts in regional identities and the historical processes of state formation during the Ming and Qing dynasties, from the 16th to the 18th centuries. Such discussions of identity and state formation should be contextualized within specific historical and spatio-temporal frameworks.