ABSTRACT
This chapter explores Tibetan wine production in Yunnan Province, where areas have been transformed into vineyards for state-promoted ‘Shangri-La Wine,’ marketed using Tibetan culture and landscapes. This marketing is also based upon a history of Catholic missionaries who first introduced grapes and wine into the area during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In the chapter I focus on a Tibetan Catholic community, examining how state promotion of tourism and wine has led to the engagement by villagers with their Catholic history through the production of wine and to the transformation of the village landscape into one defined by vineyards. Historical transregionality of Catholic Tibetan winemaking with France and Switzerland, and contemporarily with the larger Chinese and global economy is also emphasized.
