Chinese Folklore Studies Today

Chao Gejin is Senior Research Fellow and Director of the Institute of Ethic Literature at Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. He is the author of Oral Poetics: Formulaic Diction of Arimpil's Jangar Singing and the editor of Annual Review of China Folkloristics. Levi S. Gibbs is Assistant Professor of Chinese language and literature at Dartmouth College. He is author of Song King: Connecting People, Places, and Past in Contemporary China. Wenyuan Shao is a Doctoral Candidate in East Asian Languages and Literatures at The Ohio State University, with a Graduate Interdisciplinary Specialization in Folklore. Junxia Wang is Associate Professor of Folklore at East China Normal University. Currently she focuses on the history of women's folklore studies in China and the individual life history of craftswomen. Ziying You is Associate Professor of Chinese Studies at the College of Wooster. She is co-editor of a special issue for the journal Asian Ethnology, titled Intangible Cultural Heritage in Asia: Traditions in Transition. Yongyi Yue is Professor of Folklore at the Institute of Folk Literature at Beijing Normal University. He has published eight books, including his most recent titles, The Rural Voice of Urban China: Folklore, Quyi, and the Mind and Spiritual Mountain. He is also associate editor of the Cambridge Journal of China Studies. Lijun Zhang is Assistant Professor of Folklore at George Mason University. She previously served as Research Curator at the Anthropology Museum of Guangxi in China. She is author of Chinese Folk Art and Crafts and coeditor (with Marsha MacDowell) of Quilts of Southwest China.

Foreword / Chao Gejin


Acknowledgments


Introduction: History and Trends of Chinese Folklore Studies / Lijun Zhang and Ziying You


1. Disciplinary Tradition, Everyday Life, and Childbirth Negotiation: The Past and Present of Chinese Urban Folklore Studies / Yongyi Yue, Translated by Wenyuan Shao and Yuanhao Zhao


2. From "Women" to "Female Folklore Practitioners": The History and Current Trend of Women's Folklore Studies in China / Junxia Wang


3. A Semiotics of Song: Fusing Lyrical and Social Narratives in Contemporary China / Levi S. Gibbs


4. Contested Myth, History, and Beliefs: Remaking Yao and Shun's Stories in Hongtong, Shanxi / Ziying You


5. Institutional Practice of Heritage-Making: The Transformation of Tulou from Residential Home to UNESCO World Heritage / Lijun Zhang


Index