Tibetan musicologist discusses native culture, documentary

Ngawang Choephel spoke in chops, stopping mid-sentence and using a quiet but resolute voice as he reflected upon his six years of imprisonment by the Chinese. Surprisingly, the film he came to Princeton to discuss was partly the reason he was previously serving an 18-year sentence.

Choephel and Bhuchung Tsering, director of the International Campaign for Tibet in Washington, DC, led a discussion last night in Robertson Hall about Tibet's culture and the oppression it has faced from the Chinese government.

Jen Kunz '05, president of the University's Amnesty International chapter — one of the cosponsors — "would like for students and community members to be introduced to a region in conflict."

Choephel, whose family fled in 1968 from Tibet to southern India to escape Chinese persecution, returned in 1995 to gather material for a documentary film on traditional Tibetan performing arts. More than a year later Chinese authorities indicated Choephel had been arrested and sentenced to 18 years in prison for "espionage and counterrevolutionary activities." A Chinese court tried Choephel in secret, but could never produce evidence that Choephel had been spying.

In 2002 Choephel was freed on medical grounds after serving six and one-half years of his sentence.

Before his imprisonment, officials confiscated several of the 16 tapes on which Choephel had recorded what he had begun of his documentary. Yet, today, along with the tapes he preserved, Choephel's film is still a work in progress.

Tsering said the government's attempt to control religion is worse than the suppression of the religion.

It is important to help the Tibetan cause "in Tibet or anywhere else in the world," Tsering said.

"There was a time in prison when I couldn't imagine [standing before an audience]," Choephel said in the discussion following Tsering's. So far, he has remained silent about certain facts of his imprisonment, partly in the interests of his past fellow prisoners.

The documentary film, narrated by Richard Gere, discusses the history of Tibetan music and the Chinese government's influence. The film includes early footage of Tibetans performing dances in traditional garb, the Chinese occupation and the introduction of the radio. The radio's "box music," included songs whose Tibetan lyrics were changed into Chinese. The radio also was used to spread Maoist messages. The documentary discussed how more modern music is sometimes an amalgam of Tibetan music and Chinese pop. One scene included Tibetans singing for the camera. Before this scene, Choephel in the film stated that the singers could be arrested for their specific participation in the film.