For the protection and reconstruction of ancient villages and towns, drum and shout
[Bright book]
Mr.Feng Jicai, director of the Expert Committee on the Protection of Chinese Traditional Villages, once said, ” Whether the rescue of folk cultural heritage or the protection of traditional villages are in a dynamic environment, they are changing at any time and may be lost or extinct at any time.”In recent years, more and more people of insight into the protection of ancient villages and towns, they worry about the development and management of ancient villages and towns chaos, heartache the decline of ancient villages and towns, they race against time, for the protection of ancient villages and towns and local reconstruction drum and call.
Wang Xigen, a member of the Chinese Folklore Society and a member of the Jiangsu Provincial Writers Association, is one of them. Recently, his new book, “Visiting Ancient Chinese Villages,” was published, which is full with dirt. At his own expense, the author visited 100 ancient villages and towns to conduct field investigations, excavating the cultural genes behind the ancient villages and towns, pointed to the difficulties and contradictions in the development and governance, and summarized the successful experience in the protection and reconstruction of ancient villages and towns. In the author’s words, this book aims to clear the source of ancient villages and towns and offer suggestions to protect them. Reading this book and following the beautiful words along the way, the author leads us to think about a common question: what on earth to save our ancient towns and villages? Around this question, the author plays the following three roles in the article:
One is the narrator of the ancient village culture. The body part of the book consists of 100 articles, each of which visits an ancient village. The author uses prose style, supplemented by full-color reality photos, and strives to have a solid, simple and true content.”Taishun Corridor Bridge, Unique Cultural Symbol”, “Quzhou Ancient City, Let the South Kong Culture Fall”, “Lu Xiang, reproduce the Dongting Business Gang Culture”… “Culture” is the most mentioned word by the author in the title. In Wang xigen’s opinion, the ancient villages and towns preserve the most abundant cultural heritage, and these bright cultural heritage not only contain the diligence and wisdom of the ancestors, but also highlight the roots of Chinese traditional culture. The author uses a lot of space to record the history and culture of ancient villages and towns, and connects the people and things, feelings and relationships behind the culture with easy to understand and highly story words. Therefore, reading “Visiting Chinese Ancient Villages and Towns” will make people feel a feeling of traveling between paper and ink. When you enter an ancient town, the author seems to be a local cultural guide, slowly telling readers the local conditions and customs on the soil in this area. At the same time, a large number of real photos taken by the authors in the book truly present rich and diversified ancient villages and town buildings and traditional cultural elements, so that readers can “travel” through the ancient villages and towns in the text at any time, experience the scene, and stir up cultural resonance.
Second, the evaluation of the development of ancient villages and towns. While the reader is still immersed in the past, the author immediately pulls back to the present: what about these ancient towns and villages that were once prosperous times? Wang Xigen will focus on the development status of ancient villages and towns, he will.Thinking, highlights and problems and out, not only to those reasonable development, proper protection of the ancient villages and towns to express their joy and relief, but also for the development of imbalance, improper protection of the ancient villages and towns difficult to hide the heart of anxiety and sadness. Such as in scientific planning, precise ShiCe liyang mountain cattle pond village created “village of Chinese sweet potato” brand fame, the author heartfelt admiration: ” the pond people with industrious, honest, strong, friendly, kind, upward, dedicated seven notes combination into rural rural theme, believe that the pond in the near future days will be more and more prosperous.”While in the ancient village of Chengkan, which has the destruction of space environment and improper planning implementation, he lamented:” Chengkan, how to overcome this ‘kan’?”It can be said that the author consciously acted as the evaluator of the development of ancient villages and towns. As an external observer of ancient villages and towns, he gave his own impartial, objective and true evaluation based on the local local culture and development facts, which is not an important reference for the local government.
Third, the appeal of the protection of ancient villages and towns. The author of the book believes that the primary and core problem facing ancient towns and villages in China is the problem of protection. He put forward that the protection of the original source is the real protection, the ancient villages and towns to pursue economic benefits for development is beyond reproach, but can not to destroy culture or even distort history as the premise. Therefore, in the field investigation, he was very vigilant about the mode of using culture to develop the economy, and often traced the origin of history and clarified the context of cultural development. Facing the face of ancient villages in the development and utilization and inheritance protection of the common problem, he spare no effort to promote in the field survey found a scientific, balanced and effective protection mode, and loudly called for familiar with the local history and culture, have financial strength of “cultural businessman” and the government actively into the ancient rescue and protection work, explore and discover the financing of the ancient villages protection, let more ancient village “live”, in ancient villages found in the future, create the future, really let the ancient village “retain nostalgia, remember the nostalgia”.
It is worth mentioning that as a former fight in a line of senior journalist, more than 10 years, in order to further MoPai, master, record the declining Chinese ancient villages and towns, Wang Xigen footprint has traveled through more than 300 ancient villages and towns, wrote more than 60 words, take and save the tens of thousands of precious photos. This spirit of dedication, to protect the ancient villages as its own responsibility is touching and admirable..The publication of “Visiting Chinese Ancient Villages and Towns” is not the most perfect interpretation of the practice of “four forces”.
(Fan Haichao is a researcher at the Research Center for Public Opinion and Social Governance, Nanjing Normal University)