What is the boundary of China folk culture?

Folk culture refers to folk customs and life culture. It also refers to the customs and habits created, enjoyed and passed down by people living together in a country, nationality or region. It is a series of material and spiritual cultural phenomena formed by ordinary people (relative to officials) in their production and life. It has universality, inheritance and variability.

Folk custom is not only a social ideology, but also a cultural heritage with a long history. As early as "Biography of Wang Shu of Han Shu", there was a record of "different winds in a hundred miles, different customs in a thousand miles". The Book of Rites Wang Zhi said, "In February, I patrolled the East. As for Daizong, Chai Wang worships mountains and rivers. Worship a vassal and ask him to see him in a hundred years. Chen Shi was ordered to observe the folk customs. " The ceremony of the king's tour here is that the monarch goes deep into the people and makes some investigations and studies on the customs and habits of rural society. Taishi is an official in charge of music and collecting folk songs. He dedicated the popular folk songs (national style) to the monarch. Through these folk songs, the monarch formulated or adjusted the country's principles and policies by "observing customs and knowing gains and losses". The wind in The Book of Songs, a collection of China's ancient poems, is a folk song spread among ancient nationalities. These folk songs reflect the customs of ancient people and contain a large number of ancient folk customs, which are of great value to the study of ancient folk customs in China. For example, the Jianghu culture and chivalrous culture in Water Margin belong to the category of folk cultural consciousness.

The definition of academic concept is a complex problem. The development of folklore has been 120 years. There are dozens of definitions of "folk custom", which one do we insist on? It is necessary to define the concept, but the research should not only start from the concept, but also from the reality.

folk culture

Folklore is a culture that depends on people's life, habits, feelings and beliefs. Due to the collectivity of folk culture, in the final analysis, folk culture promotes social consistency. Folk culture strengthens national identity, strengthens national spirit and shapes national character, which is the core element of folk custom formation.

Folklore involves a lot of content, and its research field is still expanding until today. As far as the categories recognized by folklore scholars today are concerned, folklore includes the following major parts:

Folk custom of productive labor

Folk custom of daily life

Social organization folk custom

18 year old festival folk custom

Life etiquette

Entertainment folk custom

Folk concept

folklore

Religion and witchcraft

Weddings and funerals