The Babas are Dead: Street Talk and Contemporary Views of Leaders in Tibet

In a memorable essay some 16 years ago Melvyn Goldstein demonstrated the value for students of Tibet of studying popular street songs. His account of pre-1959 Lhasa presented popular quatrains as a vehicle used by Tibetans in the capital to satirise the élite and to convey veiled political opinions, living as they did under a regime where open political dissent or ridicule would have been dangerous. In that respect the situation has perhaps not greatly changed, and Lhasa Tibetans still customarily make political comments through coded and often ironic remarks. In this paper I look at a single phrase which, while it is part of popularly generated street talk rather than the élite-produced songs collected by Goldstein, is used by Lhasa Tibetans in a not similar way to comment on the political leadership today. I treat this text as a multi-layered commentary by its users on the political process, as a key indicating various perceptions of the current Tibetan élite, and as a popular tool for interpreting political change.