By Tahir Imin Uyghurian
In a chilling display of cultural appropriation and propaganda, China is orchestrating a campaign to create a new generation of “Uyghurs”—not from the Uyghur people themselves, but from Han Chinese children dressed in Uyghur clothing, performing stylized Uyghur dances for cameras.
Across Chinese social media, videos are spreading of Han children dancing in traditional Uyghur costumes, proudly presented as part of the “ethnic harmony” narrative. These scenes are not innocent cultural exchange—they are calculated performances engineered by the Chinese state to replace a living culture with a sanitized, state-approved imitation.
Meanwhile, actual Uyghur children are subjected to a very different reality. Separated from their families, many are forced into Chinese-language boarding schools, stripped of their language, religion, and heritage. Traditional Uyghur dance—once a spontaneous form of joy and cultural expression—is now reduced to a tool for government-controlled spectacles, only allowed when choreographed by the state to display “happy Uyghurs” to the outside world.
This is not cultural celebration; it is cultural colonization. The Chinese government’s strategy is clear: erase Uyghur identity from the inside out while repackaging its outward symbols as part of the greater “Zhonghua Minzu,” or Chinese nation. In this narrative, Uyghur culture is no longer Uyghur—it’s Chinese, and conveniently represented by Han Chinese performers.
By promoting Han Chinese children as keepers of Uyghur culture, Beijing is laying the groundwork for a future where real Uyghurs are erased, but their likenesses are mimicked for political gain. This is not just propaganda—it is an insidious form of replacement, and a direct assault on the survival of a people.
If the world allows symbols to stand in for substance, and performance to replace people, China’s campaign of cultural genocide, after actual genocide, will succeed not just in silence—but in song and dance.