Dislocating China: Muslims, Minorities, and Other Subaltern Subjects Book

Gladney makes a persuasive case that "minorities" are central to majority Han self-definition, while at the same time stressing the regional differences internal to the Han that are obvious to the Chinese themselves but lost on many Western "China hands."
Precisely because Gladney's work is such a crucial critical intervention its disappointing that as a book Dislocating China is so poorly done. Gladney refers to his own work relentlessly, and is constantly providing the same examples and statistics, so that the book reads like previously published articles and conference papers thrown together rather than a coherent work. A decent editor could have cut fifty pages and dramatically improved readability.