Some 5,000 members of national and regional folk artist
associations will be participating in a ten-year "Project to Save
Chinese Folk Cultural Heritages" that will record in words,
graphics and videotapes different ethnic heritages for books and
television series.
Chinese folk cultures -- which in the broadest sense includes folk
art, folk literature, folk culture and folk custom -- are in a
perilous condition, according to Bai Gengsheng, chairman of the
China Folk Artist Association which is organizing the project. It
is sponsored by the Publicity Department of the Chinese Communist
Party Central Committee, the China Federation of Literary and Art
Circles, the State Ethnic Affairs Commission and Ministry of
Culture.
Included on the endangered heritage list: Traditional operas in all
their aspects; ethnic and folk dances as performed at festivals,
sacrificial rites and other ceremonies; ethnic and folk music and
their instruments; and folk fine arts and traditional handicrafts
like cloth weaving and dying, embroidery, engraving, pottery, and
paper cutting.
Traditional Chinese culture will be open in all directions,
especially since China has joined the World Trade Organization.
With the rapid speed of globalization and modernization, Chinese
folk culture will be impacted on all sides by western culture.
Meanwhile, traditional Chinese culture as found in the vast
countryside is moving to the cities along with the farmers who are
swarming into towns to become part of the urban population. The
appreciation of traditional Chinese culture is becoming inundated
by high-speed tastes.
Bai Gengsheng sees a danger of gaps being created for traditional
Chinese culture. For example, much valuable architecture like
historical towns and streets are vanishing. They can never come
back once they are torn down, since culture can not be
reclaimed.
Experts and scholars participated in the project said the salvage
project includes many aspects such as folk culture rescue,
protection, inheritance and development, with culture rescue as the
most important. Moreover, the government should give more aid and
support and intellectuals should actively involve in the project.
As for the heritages themselves, people directly involved must try
to reinvent themselves into a cultural industry by making full use
of current technology. Bai Gengsheng cited
Naxi ancient music as an example. With the efforts of Doctor
Xun Ke, Naxi ancient music has been heard worldwide and has been
promoted as a Yunnan Province tourist attraction.
The work to preserve Chinese folk cultural heritages is urgent, Bai
emphasized. Meanwhile, relevant laws also need to be devised to
better protect cultural heritage.
(china.org.cn by Chen Peng on January 30, 2002, translated by
Unisumoon)