[Huang Longguang] Whose Intangible Cultural Heritage is the Intangible Cultural Heritage? How to Innovate Intangible Cultural Heritage

Yuanqi

Since the China government signed and acceded to the Convention for the Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2004, the protection of intangible cultural heritage in China has been launched for more than ten years.

In the past ten years, whether it is the academic interpretation of the concept of intangible cultural heritage and research on intangible cultural heritage, or the promotion of the practice of intangible cultural heritage protection by governments at all levels, we have basically completed the adjustment and transition of intangible cultural heritage protection from internationalization to China.

In this process, both relevant research on intangible cultural heritage and actual protection of intangible cultural heritage have achieved fruitful results and achieved remarkable results.

The inheritance of intangible cultural heritage is the core and purpose of intangible cultural heritage protection.

Intangible cultural heritage is a living culture rich in life.

Its inheritance and protection must be continuously innovated and developed with the emergence of new historical conditions and new social contexts.

As the protection of intangible cultural heritage in China enters its second decade, it is time to base itself on the foundation of previous intangible cultural heritage protection, calmly summarize experience and lessons, and rationally think about how to innovate in the inheritance of intangible cultural heritage.

On the one hand, for the object of intangible cultural heritage, multiple external entities such as the leading government, the leading academic circles and the leading businessmen have all achieved division of labor and cooperation among the entities, and ultimately obtained their respective benefits.

On the other hand, as the real owner of intangible cultural heritage, the public with the inheritors as the core, is gradually objectified, leading to the transfer of the rights and interests of its intangible cultural heritage subjects.

I.

Whose intangible cultural heritage is it?

Whose intangible cultural heritage is it? This is a primary issue in the inheritance and protection of intangible cultural heritage.

At present, when thinking about and solving the problem of how to innovate in intangible cultural heritage, we may still have to return to the original question of who is the subject of intangible cultural heritage.

The protection movement of China's intangible cultural heritage, from academic concepts to cultural practice, is an administrative order and social mobilization initiated from the top down.

For China society, which has always had a habit of administrative dependence, this programmatic administrative order will largely help urge local and social governments to quickly recognize, attach importance to and truly implement intangible cultural heritage protection.

For the vast number of traditional cultural carriers, before the concept of intangible cultural heritage came into being and the protection of intangible cultural heritage was launched, although they had experienced a series of modern changes in China society, they have always inherited their own cultural traditions as always.

Just as they are internalizing and inheriting cultural traditions, the world's experience, the country's design, the guidance of the academic community, and the emergence of the market, all parties are connecting and embracing a new set of intangible cultural heritage conceptual frameworks and protection mechanisms, urgently connecting and entering with intangible cultural heritage from various places.

There is inevitably a series of collisions between local holders of intangible cultural heritage, foreign promoters of intangible cultural heritage protection, and real intangible cultural heritage and imagined intangible cultural heritage.

In this process, intangible cultural heritage holders, as entities in a disadvantaged position in social capital, gradually lose their voice, lose their power and even lose their position in intangible cultural heritage protection.

Under the excessive manipulation of various foreign powerful entities, intangible cultural heritage, the entities who have truly followed each other since ancient times in daily life have been constantly subject to administrative leadership, professional guidance, and marketization erosion.

As a subject who has had the freedom and rights to inherit and develop intangible cultural heritage since ancient times, it has been objectified to varying degrees, resulting in its passive acceptance and confusion in the process of protecting intangible cultural heritage, which will eventually lead to the de-subjectivity of intangible cultural heritage.

and is seriously alienated.

Academic circles, including folklore, heritage, management, education and other related disciplines, have not only basically constructed an academic discourse system for intangible cultural heritage, but also participated in the review and identification of intangible cultural heritage protection lists at all levels.

Intangible cultural heritage has become a kind of national culture and has been demonstrated as the essence of the national spirit.

Governments at all levels have also highlighted their political achievements by implementing the protection of intangible cultural heritage.

Commercial capital makes profits through the economization of intangible cultural heritage.

As the subjects of intangible cultural heritage and its protection, what have they gained from it?

II.

The principle of moderate innovation

Inheritance is the life of intangible cultural heritage.

As an academic concept in folklore, it has become a hot word with the development of intangible cultural heritage protection.

Unfortunately, the academic community has so far failed to make a clear definition and distinction between the inheritance and dissemination of intangible cultural heritage.

Inheritance mainly refers to the intergenerational transmission of intangible cultural heritage within the community (such as village) from which it originates.

This transmission is naturally realized more through the conscious physical and psychological investment of the intangible cultural heritage holder group., sometimes as a sacred obligation of the ethnic group, it is guaranteed stable inheritance.

On the other hand, communication mainly refers to the spread of culture between ethnic groups in space.

It is not an endogenous transfer, but a process of extrapolated transfer.

Therefore, the inheritance and innovation of intangible cultural heritage must of course be carried out by the group of inheritors who are cultural subjects.

Of course, as a large group of non-governmental intangible cultural heritage inheritors who have not yet reached the level of true cultural awareness, they may need some policy support and guidance and professional guidance.

Goodlier divides things into three categories: "things that are given, things that are sold, and things that cannot be given or sold but can only be preserved." As a national cultural tradition with a long historical memory, rich in connotation and playing a series of important social functions, intangible cultural heritage is a heritage subject with cultural self-determination or a promoter subject from external parties.

In terms of inheritance, protection and innovation, we must first distinguish which parts are suitable for development and which must be protected with authenticity.

All parts of folk beliefs involving the logical source of intangible cultural heritage obviously have a sanctity aspect under the festival and sacrificial sites and are not suitable for development.

Most intangible cultural heritage such as folk crafts and song and dance art are closely integrated with the daily life of cultural subjects, cater to the development of modern tourism and cultural industries, etc., and are suitable for productive protection.

Regardless of protective development or productive protection, all relevant participants must have a certain awareness of cultural inheritance and social service, focusing on sustainable inheritance rather than unlimited profit-seeking.

However, what we see is that some unique folk customs in various places, such as worship to gods, marriage and love, satisfy the cultural curiosity of other people because of their primitive, ancient, and mysterious nature.

They are still constantly being explored, designed and even innovated to enter the capital market.

Misinterpretation is widely spread.

From the Yi people's Mizhi Sacrifice, the Wa people's Sigangli Sacrifice, and the development of the Mosuo people's walking marriage custom to the planning and operation of the "Daily Torch Festival" and "Daily Water-Splashing Festival", they all belong to pseudo-folklore practices that violate the functions of the intangible cultural heritage native society.

Of course, we have also observed that today, whether intangible cultural heritage is passed down locally or spread in different places, cultural subjects have in fact implemented a flexible dual-track mechanism for the inheritance of intangible cultural heritage.

That is to say, while intangible cultural heritage, as a cultural resource, is displayed to tourists and other outsiders, local people also have self-oriented intangible cultural heritage inheritance within the community.

Therefore, innovation in the inheritance of intangible cultural heritage must be sustainable development under the principle of moderation, and reasonable innovation must be made on the premise of ensuring the relative original ecology and authenticity of intangible cultural heritage.

Any form of innovation ultimately targets the main body of intangible cultural heritage rather than outsiders.

III.

Public cultural practice

As an important part of the excellent traditional culture of the Chinese nation, China's intangible cultural heritage has the characteristics of national character and should be recognized, appreciated and passed down by the whole people.

The current globalization is embracing commercialization and urbanization, and still has many impacts on the inheritance and protection of intangible cultural heritage.

The existing models of museum-based traditional display, commercial literary and artistic performances, and cultural sales in the tourism market have certainly strongly promoted the inheritance and protection of intangible cultural heritage, but they have also accelerated the process of symbolization and objectification of intangible cultural heritage.

How to effectively combine modern mass communication with local inheritance, how to widely disseminate it inside and outside the communities where intangible cultural heritage is endogenous, and how to fully stimulate the motivation and vitality of intangible cultural heritage inheritance is a question worth considering.

Although American public folklore inevitably has an ideological dimension, its public cultural performance practice model also has a clear awareness of anti-objectification, which has a reverse stimulating effect on the restoration and persistence of cultural traditions.

The author had the honor to attend the 2014 Smithsonian Folk Life Festival in Washington, DC, USA, and was responsible for "China: bilingual presenter on the theme of "Tradition and the Art of Life") truly realized the true significance of the American public folklore cultural exhibition practice, not in the horizontal spread of traditional culture in a new context in different places, but in tracing back to local community cultural subjects.

A reassessment of the value of intangible cultural heritage, thereby enhancing their cultural confidence, and finally the whole people devoted themselves to the group inheritance of intangible cultural heritage.

The organization and implementation of the American public folklore cultural exhibition completely relies on the Smithsonian Institution, a public welfare academic institution.

Public folklore, as the cultural agent of the carriers of local traditional culture, works under a new reset communication framework and context, and works throughout the activity.

During the process, we strive to avoid academic arbitrariness and discourse tyranny, and assist inheritors to effectively display their traditional culture in all aspects from beginning to end.

The public performance practices of intangible cultural heritage in China are often mostly government-administration-led models, and there is also a commercial model in which "culture sets the stage for economic performance." Intangible cultural heritage experts with professional academic backgrounds may sometimes face the result of being assimilated by administration.

As inheritors of the main body of intangible cultural heritage, there is no doubt that they do not have equal rights to consultation and dialogue in the setting of specific performance contexts and performance models.

They are also experiencing the result of constant objectification.

In the long run, the inheritance of intangible cultural heritage will rely heavily on administrative mobilization and commercial driving, and will not help cultivate and stimulate the cultural confidence of intangible cultural heritage inheritors.

At the same time, it is difficult for the intangible cultural heritage research group as the intermediate coordinator to fully display its professional knowledge.

The original text was published in "Central Plains Culture Research", No.

3, 2015)