贵州彝族传统情歌（曲谷）的音乐特色

Being one of the most ancient eth-nic groups in China, the ‘Yi’ have a long history and an abundant culture. Yi folk songs, which are widely sung in many regions of China, have vari-ous forms and styles. These folk songs reflect the lengthy history of the Yi society; indeed they ex-press the happiness and misery, the dreams and desires of the Yi people. Within this context, this article focuses on‘Qugu’ which is a unique type of music belonging to the Yi people. In fact most Yi people of Guizhou live in the Wumeng Mountains. In their quest for survival, over time the Yi had developed a series of natural worship rites which became one of the sources of their traditional mu-sic. In addition, Yi people formed a unique way to express their love: in times past they developed a tradition of singing in the mountains and forests as to convey their love to their beloved;the‘Qugu’ is one of these Yi’ s traditional love song genres.‘Qugu’ means ‘singing’ and this genre has its own social functioning. According to traditional Yi culture and habits, a ‘Qugu ’ should not be sung in front of parents, brothers, or other rela-tives;instead it should only be sung in a place sur-rounded by mountains and forests and on certain singing sites, called ‘Guji’(in Yi language). In most of the Yi settlements, such ‘singing sites ’ were placed far away from the villages, sometimes on flat areas and sometimes in the remote wilder-ness, in forests or caves. The singing activities on those special sites took place according to specific rules and calen-dars. During the so-called ‘singing festival’ peri-od ( from the 1 st to the 15 th day of the 1 st lunar month and on the 5th day of the 5th lunar month), the singing performances were particularly magnifi-cent. People of all ages, young and old, would gather together from all directions and would sing without interruption for several days. Moreover , the singing festival also had certain traditional rites ( ceremonies ) . For example, at the very beginning, certain clan elders or prestig-ious singers would offer wine and water to the‘heavens and earth ’ . After this offering, ‘the soul of the song’ was invited. The Yi people tradi-tionally worship nature and believe in animism, so indeed a ‘Qugu’ also has its own ‘soul’ . There-fore, when the singing festival would commence, they would invite the ‘soul of the song’ to come;this custom is called ‘Guyexi’ in the Yi language. The nextritual would be the ‘Guyidai ’ ( in Yi) , which means‘the settling down of the soul of the song’ at the particular singing site. There are lyrics like:‘If there is no settling down of the soul of the song, then when the next spring comes the sil-ver flowers will sever their roots, the golden flowers will sever their roots, and the singing sites cannot be set up ’ . After the settling down of the soul of the song, the next ceremony would be the ‘Gukoupu’ ( in Yi) or ‘opening of the mouth of the song ’:this basically means the ‘opening of the door of love’ and also indicates the formal beginning of‘Qugu’ activity. All of this shows indeed that the rite of‘Qugu’ is not as solemn as other rites, as in fact the lyrics of ‘Qugu ’ are mostly about love af-fairs and romance. When the‘Gukoupu’ ends, the young people can start to freely sing. There are indeed lyrics like: ‘Three young chaps brought three axes and went into three directions of the universe; they chopped three pine trees, sawed off three boards, made three chairs, and placed these facing three di-rections. They invited girls to take a seat; the girls sat down and sang. The girls invited the chaps to take a seat;the chaps sat down and sang’ . When this‘free singing’ begins, an ‘antiph-onal group singing’ starts at the singing site (‘Gu-ji ’ ); males and females take part in this and stand/sit separately as they all sing in antiphonal style. In the middle there is a ‘go-between ’ in charge of coordination, judging, and passing on information. The males and females sing and ob-serve back and forth. During this process, affec-tions may emerge between a certain male and fe-male. If indeed a guy or young lady takes a fancy to another person, he or she will ask the go-be-tween for help. If the counterpart gives a positive response, then the two will leave the group and go elsewhere to talk and sing. During this ‘antiphonal group-singing’ , each group can allow a certain ‘representative ’ to sing solo;this solo should not be a repeat of some song performed by someone from another group. The young males and females thus can each show off their voices by singing songs with free rhyme, sweet melodies, and serious or deep topics. It is easy to see that this ‘antiphonal group singing ’ provided a major means of romantic communication between young Yi men and women. In fact, the number of songs they could sing as well as the technique used in singing these significantly deter-mined one’ s ability to attract the opposite sex. As a consequence, both males and females were strongly committed to learn to sing, trying their best to master more and better songs. Through learning from their predecessors, they made an ef-fort to improve their singing abilities. As said, traditionally at the beginning of the singing festival, ‘the soul of the song’ would be invited; well, likewise at the end of the festival‘the soul of the song’ should be sent away again. The Yi people believed that if they would not send the soul of the song away, the young would be ob-sessed by affections all the time and even lose their minds. Finally, Guizhou Yi ’ s folk music-generally speaking-has a great variety in content, perform-ance locations, forms, and genres. Moreover, due to the regional differences music styles also vary geographically. All of this makes the multi-colored Yi music even more delightful and appealing. Unfortunately, the entire tradition ( ceremo-nies) of the‘Qugu’ as described above, no longer exists today. The singers who still know these pro-cedures are getting old and eventually will forget these rites. This is a big loss for the living tradition of the Yi culture, and it is a source of grief for those who study Yi culture, in China and abroad.     

History of Incarnations (’Khrung rabs) of Sangs rgyas rgya mtsho

1. Introduction As is generally known, after the 1642' s triumph of the dGe lugs sect, a sect of the TibetanBuddhism, against the opposing, the Karma sect, three important figures appeared upon the sceneof Tibetan history. One of them was, of course, Gusi Khan from the Oyirad tribe of Mongol, whosupported the dGe lugs sect militarily. Another was the Regent who was originally the treasurer of     

The Spring Festival Celebration of the Nianzhe Family Clan---An Ethnography of a Mosuo Family's Spring Festival

The Nianzhe ( family name ) family is a Mosuo family in Dapo village , Yongning Town-ship , Ninglang Yi Autonomous County in Yunnan Province .The Nianzhe family is a big Mosuo fami-ly full of harmony a...     

Abstracts about the Treatises of the Seminer

In the Tibetan calendar, the years are mentioned by a system known as Sexagenary Cycle. Inessence, it consists of the cycle of 60 years----each cycle called a Rab--byung. One of the prob-lems concerning the Chronological Tables is thus decoding this system for our understanding of theyear referred to in terms of the European calendar. But it seems important to mention here thatthere is some risk of inaccuracy in the standard practice of mechanically converting the Tibetan     

The Impact of Change within the “Cultural Context” of the Contemporary Art of Qiang Paper Cutting-Based upon an Investigation of the Art of Paper -Cutting in Mao County

The original meaning of “cultural context” refers to the socio -cultural background relating to language communication .The cultural context of the Qiang art of paper -cutting in Mao county discussed i...     

Tibetan Classical Literature and the U.S.Library of Congress:Preservation of Knowledge

Tibetan classical literature Of all the world's rich classical literary traditions, that which is preserved in the literature ofTibet, is probably one of the most outstanding and also the least well--known. Of the thousands oftexts once available inside Tibet, only a fraction have been translated into Western languages, andthe number of trained scholars capable of making accurate translations is very small. Nonetheless,     

Fabricatingthe Glory of the “Sun King”：The Divine Kingship and the Shaping of Nation-State in The Fabrication of Louis XIV

Louis XIV ( September 1638—Sep-tember 1715 ) , known as Louis the Great or the Sun King, was a monarch of the House of Bourbon who ruled as King of France from 1643 until his death.His reign of 72 year...     

Labtse and the Reinscription of Sacralized Social Space

One of the most widely reported, yet ignored, Tibetan folk rituals concerns labtse. In westernliterature, the longest discussion of labtse is S. Hummel's, which appeared in Anthropos some 30years ago. There Hummel discussed the symbolic significance of labtse from the perspective of Kul-turkreislehre. Most writings on the subject, both in China and the west, seem to have followed inthe same epistemological footsteps. Studies of labtse have been dominated by what we shall call the     

of great theoretical and practical guiding significance in

e basic conditions of our country are in the primary stage of socialism the author discusses the basic contents of two powers theory and explains his own viewpoints on public finance and distribution of its two attributes, the realizing form of ownershi     

An Investigation and Analysis of the“Huaxin Model”of Complementary Counterpart Assistance to Tibet

Tibet is located in the high Qinghai-Tibet plateau. Surrounded by tall mountains,it, thus,forms a relatively complete inland geograph-ical unit,and is largely sealed off from the rest of the country. T...     

Elements of the Chinese Cultual Grammar：Sacrifice1

This article explores definitions of ＂sacrifice＂, and arrives at a definition based on the ＂internal logic＂ of Chinese cultural facts .Through a detailed analysis on the two kinds of relations with gods , i.e.＂homage＂ （ or reverence ） and＂request＂, the concept of ＂sacrifice＂illustrated in the novel The Investiture of the Gods;a Taoist cosmic renewal rite named Jiao;and the imperial altar of Heaven , the author introduces a method for studying the ＂grammar＂ of Chi-nese cultural life , of which sacrifice is an element found in a contrastive relationship with other cultural elements in China .     

Miscellaneous Remarks on the Lineage of Byang La-Stod

In 1974 Tibetan savant Rtsis--dpon Zhwa -- sgab -- pa Dbang--phyug bde--ldan published acollection of historical works selected from his private holding. One of the texts made available as aresult is a short account of the Byang La--stod area in Central Tibet, the Sde--pa G. yas--ro Byang--pa' i rgyag--rabs rin -- po -- che bstar ba(hereafter Byang -- pa' i rgyal -- rabs; it is comprised oftwenty--two folia of which six [ff. 16v -- 21v; the colophon is on ff. 21v--22r] deal with the ab-     

A Study on the Change in Occupational Structure of China’ s Ethnic Minorities

The occupational structure of the employed population and its changes reflect the level of economic development and the change of social status of a population group .Based on cen-sus data , this paper analyzes the occupational structure of the employed population of China ＇ s ethnic minorities.It shows that： 1 ） Among the employed population of the eth-nic minorities （ excepting those people who are en-gaged in forestry , animal husbandry and fishery , etc., a proportion which is higher than the overall population or the Han ） , the proportion is lower than in either the overall population or the Han population . 2 ） The gender differences and directional change of the occupational structure of the em-ployed population indicates that the status of women was gradually promoted during the period 1990 to 2010. 3） Seen from the proportion of those engaged in mental labor versus physical labor;the proportion ethnic minorities engaged in mental labor is low . 4） The degree of diversity in the occupational structure of the ethnic minorities has made some improvement. 5 ） The ethnic differences in occupational structure are obvious . 6） The urbanization level and the educational level of the population are the key factors which determine the occupational structure of the em-ployed population . From this study , we feel that the degree of so-cial exclusion of the ethnic minorities has gone up during the past ten years .This ＂going up＂ has lead or is leading to social problems .Hence, it is necessary to pay high attention to this issue .Re-garding this, the author thinks that , firstly, sup-port to ethnic minority education should be en-hanced;secondly , the proportion of ethnic minori-ty people in civil servant recruitment should be im-proved;thirdly, the proportion of the employment of ethnic minority workers in projects in ethnic mi-nority regions should be stipulated .     

Two Courts of the’Phags-pa Era

1. Preamble An event which is said to have taken place in 1267, just prior to' Phags--pa's leisurely re-turn to the Mongol imperial court in China was his organization of an entourage of attendants andofficials who were responsible for the wide variety of duties and functions that had accrued to him inthe course of his growing prestige and influence. In keeping with his position in Tibet as the spiritual     

Research on the System of Town Buildingin China’s Ethnic Minority Areas

Town building is one of the most important methods for China to promote new-pat-terns of urbanization in ethnic minority areas. This article analyzes the characteristics of the scale, distribution,popu...     

The “Nationalization” of Oil Painting and Cartoons

1 .Breakout of Oil Painting After crushing the "gang of four"in October 1976, Deng Xiaoping returned to political power , and all China advocated “emancipating the mind , and seeking truth from facts...     

An Exploration on the Realization of the Approach for Harmonious Ethnic Relations from the Perspective of“the Pattern of Diversity in Unity” Theory

1 .The “Pattern of Diversity in U-nity ” is a true reflection of the Chinese Nation ’ s ethnic relations     

Was Tibet of 1913-1914 Fully sui juris to Enter Into Treaty Relations with Another State?

It is considerably difficult to assess and evaluate the Simla Conference (1913--1914) and itsoutcome in all theoretical and practical aspects, and considering the permanent unavailability andrelative inaccessibility of some sources related directly or indirectly to the course and conclusions ofSimta proceedings, it is also impossible, as a matter of fact. However, this should not prevent usfrom trying -- with the given means -- to analyze at least partially some of the most important and     

现代文明背景下的传统文化传承——以“羌族文化进校园”活动在四川汶川县的实践为例

Modernization and globalization have already become the central themes of contem-porary China. As the carriers of traditional ethnic culture, ethnic minority villages and families have inevitably been involved in this development trend. After school-aged children in ethnic minority fami-lies enter schools, they are separated from their o-riginal cultural environment; meanwhile, the school curriculum is entirely based on the modern western education system. As a result, traditional culture inheritance among contemporary China’s younger generations has been facing unprecedented challenges and crises. The project of ‘Ethnic Culture Entering School Activities’ , which has been implemented in some ethnic minority regions in recent years, can be considered as a beneficial effort to realize the live transmission of ethnic intangible culture by means of school education. ‘Ethnic Culture Ente-ring School Activities ’ , was first initiated in Guizhou province, and later was gradually expand-ed to Yunnan, Guangxi, Hunan, and other prov-inces that have a number of ethnic minorities. Al-though Sichuan province is home to many Tibetan, Qiang , and Yi peoples, this project was implemen-ted in Sichuan very late, thus there is little rele-vant research. Based on the investigations on the status of ‘Qiang Culture entering School Activi-ties’ at three schools in Sichuan’s Wenchuan coun-ty, this article summarizes the characteristics and existing problems in different schools for the trans-mission of ethnic culture so as to provide a reliable reference for related projects in the future. With a survey analysis, the author discovers that ‘Qiang Culture entering School Activities’ at these three schools show differences in terms of the richness of course design, the awareness of its im-portance, and implementation effect; meanwhile, those exiting problems not only reveal the perva-siveness of this project throughout southwest Chi-na, but also show the individual particularities caused by geographical location, school level, and main tasks. Moreover, when investigating these is-sues more deeply, four ‘hidden’ features can be summarized as follows:First, there are structural differences between ordinary elementary and middle schools and voca-tional schools. Vocational schools emphasize more on the transmission of ethnic cultures. Second, the traditional culture of local ethnic minorities has been inherited more naturally in the marginal regions than those more urbanized re-gions. Third, although they are all recognized as in-tangible heritage, different types of traditional cul-ture have an unequal development. The performing type such as singing and dancing shows the most superior transmission ability in ethnic culture; the second superior type is traditional handicraft while ethnic language is obviously the most difficult one in terms of the transmission of ethnic culture. Fourth, the ‘Ethnic Culture Entering School Activities ’ project in different ethnic minority groups has the unbalanced development even in the same region. In the Aba Tibetan and Qiang Auton-omous Prefecture, the Qiang elites generally com-plain that their minority groups have received far less favorable national preferential policies and are viewed with less importance than Tibetan people. The compiling of Tibetan textbooks, Tibetan lan-guage curriculum, and bilingual examination sys-tem are more conducive to the transmission of Ti-betan culture. Concerning the above mentioned problems, this article puts forward the following suggestions:first, the relevant administration should further in-crease the capital investment, and promote the training of teaching staff and school-based text-books;second, local education departments should set up an efficient assessment and incentive mecha-nism, and promote the formation of a social envi-ronment wherein ethnic cultural study has useful applications;finally, schools in ethnic minority re-gions should strengthen cooperation and exchanges among themselves, and build connections with rel-evant education administrations and research insti-tutions. The fundamental difficulty in implementing the ‘Ethnic Culture Entering School Activities ’ project lies in the fact that traditional culture has not been included in the examination content of the modern education system. Therefore, in the ele-mentary and middle school education, the primary goal is to increase the enrollment rate of students, while the transmission of traditional culture is noth-ing more than a slogan. In order to achieve the goal of integrating traditional ethnic culture into the modern education system, we must rely on the co-operation among education administrations, schools, families, and society as a whole, and constantly improve corresponding assessment and incentive mechanisms, thus jointly creating a so-cial environment that ethnic culture has useful ap-plications. Meanwhile, intangible cultural carri-ers, intellectuals who desire to disseminate their ethnic culture, and the parents of the students should all be encouraged to participate; by doing so, we can accelerate the spread of ethnic culture into local schools step by step.     

地方感何以可能——兼评段义孚“Space and Place: The Perspectives of Experience”一书

In the first century of Anthropology (1870-1970), almost all social sciences studies focused on“objective”,“rational”,“collective”, and “universal” socio-cultural facts. This orien-tation excluded and marginalized those “subjec-tive”,“individual” and “non-rational” fields in the discourse system of the discipline. “Sense”was such a field, refused by the gatekeepers of tra-ditional anthropology. Since 1980s, more and more anthropologists have paid attention to the study of sense. laying the foundations for an “anthropology of the sen-ses”. With the gradual influence of Western An-thropology of the senses, “sense of place” is be-coming a current academic phrase in Chinese An-thropology. Meanwhile, a fundamental question has to be asked:how is sense of place possible? In order to explore this question, we must go back to Yi-Fu Tuan, a renowned humanistic geographer and his master work, Space and Place. Space and Place contains a total of fourteen chapters and can be divided into three parts. The first part, chapters 1 to 3, discusses three key words:experience, space, and place. Meanwhile, this part identifies the fundamental question of the book:how do human beings understand and expe-rience the world? The second part, ranging from chapters 4 to 9 , and introduces the relationship be-tween sense and space. The third part,chapters 10 to 14 , interprets the relationship between place and sense. Although the latter two parts introduce
the relationship between the “Sense and Space”and “Place and Sense”, the interrelation of space-sense-place runs through the whole book. The three key words ( experience, space and place ) are fully reflected in the title of the book ( Space and Place—the Perspective of Experience. What, then, is the nature of experience? Tuan holds that the essentiality of experience is how a person knows and constructs reality, ran-ging from inchoate feelings to explicit conceptions. Essentially,experience equals feeling plus thought. It is generally argued that feeling and thought are opposites. Feeling is subjective and non-rational. Thought is objective and rational. Tuan however argues that both of them belong to different poles of an experiential continuum and are ways of knowing the world. Through a new understanding of experi-ence, Tuan puts feelings to the study of “space-place”. Tuan considers space as a geometrical unit ( area or volume ) , it is a measurable and unam-biguous quantity. More loosely speaking, space means “room”; Space “is given by the ability to move”. However, sense is the sense of a lived body or man, and the relationship between sense and space is the relationship between a body and space, or essentially, the world. When a man ( or lived body ) moves in the world or space, the movement in turn gives him a sense of space. Place, in Tuan’s view, is a type of object,an object in which one can dwell (p. 12),a stable ob-
ject that catches our attention ( p. 161 );a focus of value, of nurture and support (p. 29). If we have a sense of space because we can move, then we have a sense of place because of a pause in move-ment. The pause makes it possible for a locality to become a center of felt value ( p. 138 ) . Sense of place is mind at work ( p. 198 ) , while sense of space is body at work. The most typical sense of place is topophilia, which is the feeling-link be-tween person and place ( Tuan, 1974 ) , and be-comes mixed with the sense of cultural identity a-mong certain peoples and a love of certain aspects of such a place. Actually, place has a lot of similarities with the character of space. For example, one place in-cludes several spaces while it contains another lar-ger space. Nevertheless, the difference between the two is also obvious. Tuan argues that“Place is security, space is freedom” ( p. 3 ) , and Space lies open as a common symbol of freedom in the Western world. On the negative side, space and freedom are a threat. A root meaning of the word“bad” is“open”. To be open and free is to be ex-posed and vulnerable. Compared to space, place is a calm center of established values ( p. 54 ) . While space and place is not a duality, according to Tuan, space can transform into place. In a word, the key factor of the transformation is culture,or more concretely, human experience. Based on this, we further propose that space and place is a continuum, just like Tuan’s understand-ing of experience as a continuum, and sense is a significant link to it. To summarize, Yi-Fu Tuan argues that ex-perience is a compound of feeling and thought in Space and Place:The Perspective of Experience. Tu-
an focuses on feeling and sense, which is the con-junction of space and place. We believe that Tuan’s research is based on a set of views: People have a sense of space from the body, as well as a sense of place from the function of the mind. From sense of space to sense of place, space and place become a continuum for the sake of sense. Nowa-days, historical anthropology still has problems in dealing with the relationship between space and place, so Tuan’s research, which has already bro-ken boundaries between the disciplines of geogra-phy and anthropology, is worthy of closer atten-tion.