China’s intangible heritage protection work is stable and far-reaching

Since Kunqu Opera was selected into UNESCO’s "Representative Works of Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity" in 2001, the government-led protection of intangible heritage in China has gone through 17 years. Although China’s intangible cultural heritage protection has not been carried out for a long time from an international perspective, with the great attention of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, and the joint efforts of cultural administrative departments at all levels and all walks of life, China’s intangible cultural heritage protection has made rapid progress and achieved fruitful results, which not only created a vivid situation for the inheritance and development of intangible cultural heritage in the contemporary era, but also provided many methods and measures for the international community with China experience.

Establish rules and regulations, and build an intangible cultural heritage protection system.

In order to comprehensively understand and master the species, quantity, distribution, survival and inheritance of intangible resources in various regions and ethnic groups, from 2005 to 2009, China launched the first nationwide survey of intangible resources, and the total number of intangible resources was nearly 870,000. On this basis, China has established a national, provincial, municipal and county-level intangible cultural heritage list system. Up to now, the State Council has approved and published 4 batches of 1,372 national representative projects, and 15,550 provincial and municipal representative projects have been approved and published by various provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities. The former Ministry of Culture identified 4 batches of 1,986 national representative inheritors, and 14,928 provincial and municipal representative inheritors were identified by all provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities. China has been selected into UNESCO’s list of intangible cultural heritage projects, reaching 39, ranking first in the world.

In 2011, China promulgated and implemented the Intangible Cultural Heritage Law of People’s Republic of China (PRC). The promulgation of this law is a milestone, which provides a solid legal guarantee for the protection of intangible cultural heritage in China. The former Ministry of Culture has successively issued regulations on the protection and management of non-legacy representative projects, the identification and management of representative inheritors, the management of special funds, and the construction and management of cultural and ecological protection zones. By the end of 2017, 26 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities across the country had promulgated regulations on the protection of intangible assets.

With the deepening of understanding, China proposes to protect the intangible cultural heritage and the environment where it breeds and develops. Since the establishment of Minnan Cultural and Ecological Protection Experimental Zone in 2007, China has successively set up 21 national cultural and ecological protection experimental zones in areas with concentrated non-legacy projects, distinctive features and complete contents and forms, and strived to promote each experimental zone to become a cultural and ecological zone with rich heritage, strong atmosphere, distinctive features and benefits for the people.

Carry forward and improve the practical ability of inheritance.

On the basis of continuous improvement of the intangible cultural heritage protection system, in recent years, the former Ministry of Culture put forward three important concepts: "protection in improvement", "intangible cultural heritage entering modern life" and "seeing people, seeing things and seeing life". A series of work focusing on the protection of inheritance practice, inheritance ability and inheritance environment has been carried out, which has brought intangible cultural heritage back to life and revived its vitality in contemporary production and life.

The work of intangible cultural heritage records is a basic work of intangible cultural heritage protection. Since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China, the former Ministry of Culture has carried out non-legacy rescue records on the basis of previous investigation records, and gradually summed up experience and expanded and established the non-legacy record project. By the end of 2017, the central government had supported the rescue recording of 839 national representative inheritors, and the unique skills and cultural memories carried by a group of representative inheritors were recorded and preserved.

Traditional arts, traditional skills and traditional medicine and drug processing are intangible items, which are originally produced in production practice, and their cultural connotation and technical value are reflected by the production process, and the general public share their charm by owning and consuming materialized products or works of traditional skills. In view of this type of intangible cultural heritage projects, China puts forward the concept of "productive protection" to encourage and support the inheritors to actively resume production and truly realize live transmission.

In order to further promote the inheritance and revitalization of traditional crafts and expand the contingent of non-genetic inheritors, in 2015, the former Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Education launched the training program for non-genetic inheritors in China. By the end of 2017, a total of 48,000 people had established self-confidence, been inspired and enhanced their abilities through research and training; The excellent works and rich products created and produced by the students fully show the great energy that can be generated after the creativity and imagination of the vast number of people are released.

In order to explore effective measures to revitalize traditional crafts, since March 2016, the former Ministry of Culture has supported relevant enterprises, universities and institutions to set up 10 traditional craft workstations in traditional craft gathering places, involving embroidery, wood carving, lacquer art, metal forging, traditional residential building skills and other categories. Up to now, Hami Station in Xinjiang, Xiangxi Station in Hunan, Leishan Station in Guizhou, Guoluo Station in Qinghai and Huangshan Station in Anhui have developed more than 1,000 kinds of practical products that have entered modern life, effectively promoting the creative transformation and innovative development of traditional crafts.

Accurate poverty alleviation, from "fingertip skill" to "fingertip economy"

Through productive protection, on the one hand, traditional crafts are carried forward, on the other hand, the income of the masses is increased and the poor people are helped out of poverty. Some inheritors said that "fingertip skill" has really been transformed into "fingertip economy".

In 2017, the former Ministry of Culture focused on supporting non-hereditary people in ethnic areas, remote areas and poverty-stricken areas to participate in the research and training program. Through training, the trainees not only improved their ability to inherit and practice, but also played a leading role in radiation. Take Qiandongnan Miao and Dong Autonomous Prefecture of Guizhou Province as an example. According to incomplete statistics, in the first half of 2017, only 225 students in this state participated in the research and training program, with the mode of "inheritor+cooperative/company+farmer", achieving an annual sales income of more than 750 million yuan. Excellent students returned to the local area to train new students and drive about 9,500 people to obtain employment, of which the poor accounted for 58% of the total employment, and each enterprise drove 47% on average.

Traditional process workstations have also played an important role in promoting precision poverty alleviation. In Hami, Xinjiang, 231 cooperatives and embroidery associations have been established, and more than 17,000 orders have been received. Nearly 1,000 embroidered mothers directly participated in the production of orders, with an average monthly income of 1,500 yuan per person. Hunan Xiangxi Workstation launched the "Let Mom Go Home" program to attract migrant women to return to their families by increasing the income of embroidered mothers. The workstation also negotiated 2,800 sets (pieces) of Miao embroidery orders with companies in Jinan, Shenzhen and other places, amounting to 500,000 yuan, which led to more than 160 rural women’s employment at home.

Spread communication and let excellent traditional culture shine on the world stage.

This year’s government work report proposes to carry forward Chinese excellent traditional culture and deepen cultural exchanges between China and foreign countries. As an important part of Chinese excellent traditional culture and a "living" heritage, intangible cultural heritage plays an important role in strengthening national cohesion and centripetal force and promoting exchanges and mutual learning between Chinese and foreign civilizations.

According to statistics, in the past five years, 320,000 exhibitions of intangible cultural heritage have been held nationwide, with 540 million people participating. A variety of intangible cultural heritage publicity and exhibition activities have comprehensively demonstrated the outstanding practical achievements of intangible cultural heritage protection in recent years, creating an atmosphere for the whole society to inherit and develop excellent traditional culture. The former Ministry of Culture made great efforts to promote the protection, inheritance and revitalization of intangible cultural heritage projects, and supported various localities to carry out a series of performance activities through activity guidance, repertoire mobilization, financial subsidies, dissemination and promotion, which improved the exhibition degree of intangible cultural heritage projects, increased the frequency of practice, and maintained and expanded the survival and development space of intangible cultural heritage projects.

In recent years, international exchanges and cooperation in the field of intangible cultural heritage have been deepening. China actively participates in the meetings of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Protection of Intangible Heritage and the formulation of relevant international rules, and draws on the theoretical methods and successful practices of other countries to provide China’s plan and China’s experience for the protection of intangible heritage in the world. UNESCO has established the Asia-Pacific World Heritage Training and Research Center and the International Training Center for Intangible Cultural Heritage in China. Through international training and exchange activities, these institutions have made important contributions to promoting the capacity building of relevant countries in the Asia-Pacific region for the protection of intangible cultural heritage.

China and Mongolia jointly declared Mongolian long-tune folk songs as masterpieces of human intangible cultural heritage, and cooperated in field investigation and protection of Mongolian long-tune folk songs; Carry out relevant exchange activities with Thailand, Japan and Britain on traditional crafts and intangible cultural heritage protection, laying a solid foundation for strengthening cooperation with foreign institutions in the field of intangible cultural heritage. In China, 35 overseas China cultural centers and 512 Confucius Institutes have been built, and intangible trainings such as Tai Chi and calligraphy have been well received, and traditional festivals and folk activities in China have been widely spread. (Reporter Wang Xuesi)