The tensions between ethnic Muslim Uighurs and the growing number of Han Chinese in Xinjiang have recently increased, occasionally breaking out into violence. At the same time as being a potential troublespot for China, the province is of increasing strategic importance as China's gateway to Central Asia whose natural resources are of increasing importance to China. This book presents much original research on a range of different aspects of Xinjiang. It covers social, political and economic subjects, concentrating especially on how current trends in Xinjiang are likely to develop in the future.

1. Introduction: Inside Xinjiang Part 1: Identity formation and sense of belonging 2. The burden of the past: Uyghur peasants remember collectivisation in southern Xinjiang 3. 'If there is harmony in the house there will be order in the nation': An exploration of the Han Chinese as Political Actors in Xinjiang 4. Space, Place and Ethnic Identity in the Xinjiang Regional Museum Part 2: Inter-ethnic relations in Xinjiang 5. Whose Xinjiang? Space, Place and Power in the Rock Fusion of Xin Xinjiangren, Dao Lang 6. From Uncle Kurban to Brother Alim: The Politics of Uyghur Representations in Chinese State Media 7. Segregated Diversity: Uyghur Residential Patterns in Xinjiang, China Part 3: Government policies in the region and beyond 8. Socio-economic disparities and development gap in Xinjiang: the cases of Kashgar and Shihezi 9. Health in Xinjiang: Uyghur Adolescents' Vulnerability to HIV/AIDS 10. Protested Homecomings: Xinjiang Class Graduates and Reacclimating to life in Xinjiang 11. Xinjiang from the 'Outside-in' and the 'Inside-out': Exploring the Imagined Geopolitics of a Contested Region