ABSTRACT
This chapter reveals the Muslim community’s disengagement from state schools and the larger society, as a response to their ethnic identity as a people of ‘familiar strangers’ (Lipman 1997) in the wider Chinese Han cultural context. This alien identity received by Muslims from their wider society in general, and in this Tibetan-dominated region in particular, largely blocked their access to opportunities for social mobility and education. As a response, Muslims showed limited motivation, enthusiasm for and confidence in state education, which led to their poor school performance. This was grounded in their pessimistic outlook about their socio-economic status, and the prejudice and hostility they received from individuals as well as institutions. Therefore, education, the major way to achieve upward social mobility, became irrelevant to Muslims to a large extent.
