Main Abstracts

Main Abstracts

On Bourdieu’s “Style of Life”

LIU Xiaochun

“Style of life” is one of the core terms of Bourdieu’s representative workDistinction. Absorbing Marx’s theory of capital, Durkheim’s original taxonomy, and Max Weber’s exposition that considers “style of life” as the key for defining different classes, Bourdieu constructs his modern social taxonomy by analyzing the differences of different groups’ taste in their daily consumption. “Style of life” is the daily consumer preference that is determined by the capital and the properties of people in different social space. The differences of taste presented in “style of life” can distinguish different classes. The positions people were born with and their changes in social space, determine that taste is the unity of inevitability and historicity. The essence that people keep or change their “style of life” by reason of taste is to compete for the corresponding position in social space and reproduce class structure. And therefore, “Style of life ” gets its symbolic significance.

Bourdieu; Distinction; style of life; stylisation

Life Style of Bourgeoisie:A New Project of Urban Folkloristics

XU Ganli

As a result of globalization, modernity and large-scale urbanization brought by social transformation, people’s life style in contemporary China has experienced tremendous changes, and a kind of modern urban life style is coming into form on a broad scale, which offers a new project for folklore studies and further guides the modern transformation of folkloristics on the one hand. On the other hand, because of the lack of new methods and theories, urban folkloristics that has been highly expected is at a standstill; the folklore studies aimed at urban bourgeoisie’s life style may offer new possibilities for the construction of a new unban folkloristics.

Key Words: bourgeoisie; life style; unban folkloristics

Folklore as “Discussion of Alternative Technology in Life Style”: Urban Folkloristics, Administration and Relief

KOBAYASHI Tadao, translated by LIU Qianzhi

After modern times, the emerging folklore created by urban environment began to appear. We tentatively call it “life technology transmission in cities”. The rise and fall of a city changes significantly, and the matrix of its transmission is dispersed, which makes folklore of a city in a status of developing respectively, and this is exactly the problem that urban folklore needs to study. If applying “alternative technology” advocated by E.F.Schumacher to urban folklore, researchers may find out the existing status of a city’s unique life style (life technology). There are also problems in local revitalization movement, and events such as domestic violence occur frequently in cities and their surrounding areas. Also, in recent years, there has been the phenomenon that the elderly want “sudden deaths”, from which the chaos behind the high-tech society can be seen. What kind of role does current folklore, as a major of administration and relief, actually play? The more artificial the city is, the more people pursue natural living environment and rhythm. Faced with this kind of social requirements, folklore should always be prepared to answer.

Key Words: urban folklore; life technology; Kunio Yanagita; administration and relief

World-View: Everybody’s Museum?

Wolfgang Kaschuba, translated by BAO Hanyi

For a long time, the museum is an organization with clear ideology, which shows the world-view and values of bourgeoisie. However, in a “for all” postmodern city, a “for all” museum is also required, which must absorb multiple ideas and convey various voices. In this way, the museum’s own setting and the interpretative paradigm must make a continuous change, and follow “a new schedule” that adapts to the changing times. Not only in the field of cultural policy, but also in the area of identity policy, and even in the political field, the museum should further improve and strengthen its activities.

Key Words: museum; worldview; multiple; a new schedule

Culture Transfer - A Review on Kaschuba’s Thoughts about the Urban Culture

BAO Hanyi

Kaschuba argues that a broad definition that views culture as all living styles can serve as a basis for researching the transfer of urban culture. He points out that culture almost soly exists in transfer, and it is migratory, deforming, hybrid and procedural. According to the standard of “transfer”, culture transfer can be divided into the natural culture transfer initiated naturally, and new culture transfer intentionally driven by the interests of politics, economy, culture and religion. The latter can be called “the transgenic of culture”, which contributes to the formation of a new community. It is the new mission of Chinese folklorists to draw on the experience of the West, to explore the transfer of cultural inheritance, and to realize the changing of folklore and the social harmony in cities.

Key Words: culture transfer; natural culture transfer; new culture transfer; the formation of a new community

The Four-tier Structures of Material Relations and Material Culture

MENG Fanhang

In the field of material culture research, anthropology and folkloristics eitherput emphasis on the ontology, the structure and the function of material culture, or on the “grammar rules” behind material culture, or on the heritage of material culture, both of which have their own discipline pursuits and research interest, and do their research respectively. In this process, anthropology developed the theory of “total presentation” represented by Marcel Mauss, and folklore developed the theory of “material behavior” represented by Michael Owen Jones. The former emphasizes the sociality of material, and the latter emphasizes its culture, inheritance and concerns of people. Drawing on the virtues of the two theories, “material relations” regards material as the central part of human practice, and places it in the organic system of natural ecology, material, people, society, through which to do integrate research on people and culture. “The four-tier structures of material culture”, under the concept of “material relations” is the basic framework of material culture ethnographic research and writing, which is proposed as the basis of material, or material research.

Key Words: material; material culture; material behavior; material relations; the four-tier structures of material culture; material research

The Safeguarding of ICH and the Living Characteristics of Handcraft Folklore: A Case Study of Black Pottery Making Technique in Northwest Shandong Province

RONG Hongzhi

In the context of ICH, traditional handcraft revival has become a very important social topic. In a sense, “tradition” itself is a kind of culture construction and imagination in modern society, and the traditional handcraft revival is the result of the conspiracy of various forces in modern society. Researchers need to notice that traditional handcraft itself is a part of everyday life, and is the body technical expression condensed with folk wisdom. Based on the case study of the technical inheritance of black pottery in Northwest Shandong Province, this article discusses how the handcrafts as an expressive form of “tradition” are constructed and shaped by different social forces, and how they are given more cultural value and symbolic meaning in daily life.

Key Words: ICH; handcraft; living character; technology of body

TheInversive Evolution of Pre-Qin’s Popular Religion and Translocation of Men and Gods—Centering on Strategics Study

WANG Zhen

Since the Spring and Autumn Period of Pre-Qin, spirits in popular religion, as opposed to the awakening human mind, began to be relegated to secondary status, while military witchcraft was enjoying an unprecedented prosperity. The popular religion and the translocation of men and gods showed a trend of inversive evolution. The translocation of men and gods affirmed the value of human beings, while the prosperity of military witchcraft based on popular religion indicated that the psychological demands of soldiers were included in the game of command and decision, which reflects the concerns and introspections on men’s spiritual need and home for the soul. The two interpret the awakening of men’s consciousness of the Pre-Qin in different dimensions, and lay the foundation for the binary structure of the long-term coexistence of official ideology and popular religion, and even lay the foundation for the construction of cultural ecology in a pluralistic context.

Key Words: popular religion; translocation of men and gods; inversive evolution; strategics

On the Integration of Folk Religion’s Rituals of Sui, Tang and Five Dynasties

LI Hao

Since the Wei, Jin and Southern and Northern Dynasties, Buddhism and Taoism are both finishing their religious rituals. To the Sui, Tang and the Five Dynasties era, these rituals had been widely practiced in their religious activities as well as in the folk religious activities in a rather mature and normative face. Folk religion with relative simple and humble rituals had a formative trend. After absorbing and integrating the rituals of Buddhism and Taoism, the folk religion appeared with a very complex appearance, and profoundly influenced all kinds of religious activities of people after Song Dynasty and Ming Dynasty.

Key Words: the Sui, Tang and the Five Dynasties；folk religion；rituals

The Faithin the God of Poverty in Contemporary Japan

HUANG Lvping

As in China, the faith in the God of Poverty also exists in Japan. The God of Poverty, called “Binbo Gami” in Japanese, is not welcomed very much, and even expulsed in the folk, because it is said that people who are in his possession would fall into poverty. Legends about the God of Poverty are distributed throughout the country, and many places still retain customs of sending the God of Poverty away and the shrines of worshiping the God of Poverty now. In recent years, with the establishment and development of the “Shrines of the God of Poverty” in Iida city, Nagano Prefecture, the faith in the God of Poverty is given a new meaning, and gets more modern colors.

加藤對家人的情思甚篤。他委托小石川念速寺舉行葬儀，該寺常在日記中出現。根據井上圓了的記錄，“加藤老博士的小孩逝去時，使念速寺舉行葬儀，故同寺平素幸好與加藤老教授親密往來”[注]井上圓了：《加藤老博士に就きて》，《東洋哲學》第22編第8號，1915年8月，第1頁。 。當時念速寺的住持為近藤秀嶺，擔任加藤家的佛教法事。近藤住持是教理學者，“是在東京真宗大谷派(作者注：東本愿寺派)寺院中的佛教學者，大致把握俱舍、唯識、華嚴、天臺等教理”[注]井上圓了：〈加藤老博士に就きて〉，《東洋哲學》第22編第8號，1915年8月，第2頁。 ，與一般住持不同。

Key Words: the God of Poverty; shrine of the God of Poverty; Japan; faith

Trilogy of “the Dead” in Modern China: Mourning, Sacrifice and Salvation of Earthquake Victims in Tangshan, Wenchuan, and Yushu

ZHOU Xing

Through sorting out theissue of mourning, sacrifice and salvation of the collective “dead” among Tangshan, Wenchuan, Yushu earthquake victims, this paper is to present an important aspect of great changes in modern Chinese society, and to analyze the significance of “the dead” as the memory of victims, and the necessity of “the dead” topics in folklore research. The “dead” of collective victims can not be corresponded only at the individual or household level, but need to be comforted at a national and social level. And at the same time, the Chinese state administration and public opinion are always encountering various forms of “the dead” problems.

Key Words: earthquake; the dead; national mourning system; atheism

Between “Sacrifice” and “Memorial”: A Study on the Public Memorial Ceremony of “the First Seven” in “Oriental Star Event”

WANG Xiaokui, LEI Tianlai

As part of a public social activity and ritual symbol system, public memorial ceremony of disastercan reflect the relationship between national ideology and social cultural tradition. After the Oriental Star Shipwreck, the government took the time of “the first seven” in folk belief to hold the public memorial ceremony, which was different from the folk belief in ritual, connotation and subject. Behind this, it implies not only the contradiction between secular event handling and sacred ritual of Yin-Yang communication, but also reflects the consistent logic that secular power can make the meaning of death valued and signified through public memorial ceremony. What’s more, it indicates the differences of the concept of life and death between public “memorial” ceremony constructed by state power and personal sacrifice supported by folk belief. By analyzing the complex relationship between “sacrifice” and “memorial” in contemporary society, it can be seen that materialistic view of life and death and traditional belief are showing an intersectional and conflicting relationship.

Key Words: disaster; folk belief; public memorial ceremony; “the first seven”

From Flood Myth to Flood Narrative: Survivor-centered Disaster Narrative and Community Rebuilding in Hongtong, Shanxi

YOU Ziying

Flood myth is widely spread all over the world, which has attracted many scholars’ attention. Scholars from different schools have created different theories to interpret flood myth from different perspectives. In post-structuralism era, the boundary between myth, legend and history is blurred, and they are examined as narratives in a dynamic social process. Relying on Elinor Ochs and Lisa Capps’ research on “living narratives” and Carl Lindahl’s concept of “disaster legend”, the author attempts to construct the concepts of flood narrative and disaster narrative. Drawing on the case study of the flood in Hongtong County, Shanxi Province in 2013, the author illustrates how survivors express their flood experience in narratives and how they draw on disaster narratives to reflect and shape reality as well as to rebuild their community.

Key Words: flood myth; flood narrative; disaster legends; disaster narratives

The“Sin Identity” of Chinese Sports People：A Study on the Survival Situation of Chinese Martial Groups on the Basis of Culturology

LU Yunting

Chinese sports people originated from warriors, refugees and loafers in ancient China. Since the ancient times, these people have had natural sociability as well as closure as a group, and have taken their relative special belief and taboo system as their psychological fulcrum. The Chinese sports people have a potential agency that makes them isolated from Confucian civilization, and once there arose the phenomenon that the whole group escaped from the sports circle. Sports, which involved the habitual social functions of the wizards of ancient non-Confucian group, have often become a transformative tool of identity for Chinese sports people. Out of the meaning system of Confucianism, Chinese sports people show more common features with the Westerners in behavior, though the social prejudice they have suffered cannot be experienced by the Westerners. The “sin identity” of Chinese sports people originates from the discrimination of Confucianism, absolutely not because of the lack of so-called knowledge of literature and history. With the popularity of universal values, the phenomenon of Chinese sports people escaping from the sports circle should be reduced. Sports people have already assumed the task of improving Chinese people’s values.

Key Words: Chinese sports people; Samurai Clan; escaping phenomenon; martialman discrimination; worship of science; physical self-salvation

An Exploration of Traditional Violence Custom and Its Admonishments on Contemporary Society

ZHENG Guohua

Resorting to forces to resolve disputes of uneven distribution of public resources has been an old tradition in China’s rural society. Based on literature review and field investigation, the author finds that inter-village disputes were normally resolved by violence or civil mediation, and social order was thereby constructed under the means of force-mediation system in rural China, which became a bad convention. The root of this convention resulted from corrupt governments, judicial absence, villagers’ worship of local heroes and their struggle for the rights of discourse. In present rural China, force custom revives, spreads fast and co-exists with judicial power, which disturbs the social order and endangers the public security. To eradicate this bad convention, it is necessary to re-examine the government’s rude rural governance, further normalize civil sports associations, guide free competition among them, and meet the villagers’ justified demands by an effective reconciliation of legal governance and villagers’ self-governance.

Key Words: force; ruling by law; rural society; authority; village order

SocialOrganization and Folk Religion: Meihuaquan Being Not Only A Kind of Boxing

TANG Shaojun, WANG Meijuan

Meihuaquan, or Plum Flower Fist is not essentially different from other schools of martial arts in practicality of attack and defense. The real difference is that it is not just a kind of boxing, but also a social organization, and a kind of folk religion. Through literature research method and field investigation, from the perspective of folkloristics and sociology, this paper studies Meihuaquan’s institutional framework, organizational activities and religious content, and rituals. It points out that a widespread organization and a firm belief are the two major weapons for it to be deeply rooted and prosper in all walks of life. By doing so, it aims to provide a window for contemporary boxing study, and promote the inheritance and development of traditional martial arts in modern society.

Key Words: plum flower fist; organization; religion; folk custom; show off the martial arts; face