Project description
Legal cases and gender roles along China’s ancient Silk Road
Infanticide, adoption, witchcraft allegations, slavery, murder, marriage transactions and other legal disputes will be the focus of research on the Tarim Basin in China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, a strategic area on the ancient Silk Road. Expeditions by European explorers in the 19th and 20th centuries found ruins of ancient oases settlements around the circumference of the Taklamakan Desert. The discovery included some 1 000 documents and document fragments dating back to the 3rd century. The EU-funded GENDISC project will study the documents to identify the types of legal cases and gender roles. As an interdisciplinary project, it will incorporate studies of language, religion, gender, society and law.
Objective
The Tarim Basin in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region of China was strategic on the ancient Silk Road. Expeditions by European explorers in the 19th and 20th centuries found ruins of ancient oases settlements around the circumference of the Taklamakan Desert. Amongst the ruins were artefacts, many documents and manuscripts written in different scripts and languages, some previously unknown. All attest to the cultural, religious and ethnic diversity of the region. The focus of GENDISC is on the Niya Documents, a collection of approximately 1000 documents and document fragments dating to around the 3rd century CE found around the southern Tarim Basin, but mainly around the Niya ruins. Three-quarters of the documents were written in the South Asian Kharosthi script and Gandhari language, earlier used in ancient Pakistan, Afghanistan and north India for inscriptions, manuscripts and coins. Whilst politics, trade and religion are well-studied, there has been little examination of ancient society in the Tarim Basin because the sources are viewed as limited. GENDISC will challenge this assumption by addressing social issues raised as legal disputes in the Niya Documents, including infanticide, adoption, witchcraft allegations, slavery, murder and marriage transactions. It will identify gender roles (O1), the types of legal cases (O2) and the wider context of issues (O3), and will take a statistical and etymological approach (WP1), study religious texts (WP2) and examine other Tarim Basin documents (WP3) to establish if the documents are indicative of gender biases and discrimination. GENDISC is interdisciplinary, incorporating studies of language, religion, gender, society and law within the broader field of archaeology and Asian studies. It is trans-regional in scope and will identify connections between now politically- and culturally-sensitive territories. The findings will be disseminated through conferences, seminars, workshops, articles and a blog.
Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.
- social sciences law human rights human rights violations human trafficking
- social sciences sociology social issues social inequalities
- humanities history and archaeology archaeology
- humanities philosophy, ethics and religion religions
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Keywords
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)
Programme(s)
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.
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H2020-EU.1.3. - EXCELLENT SCIENCE - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
MAIN PROGRAMME
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H2020-EU.1.3.2. - Nurturing excellence by means of cross-border and cross-sector mobility
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Topic(s)
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.
Funding Scheme
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.
MSCA-IF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF)
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Call for proposal
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.
(opens in new window) H2020-MSCA-IF-2020
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Net EU financial contribution. The sum of money that the participant receives, deducted by the EU contribution to its linked third party. It considers the distribution of the EU financial contribution between direct beneficiaries of the project and other types of participants, like third-party participants.
1348 LOUVAIN LA NEUVE
Belgium
The total costs incurred by this organisation to participate in the project, including direct and indirect costs. This amount is a subset of the overall project budget.