What is the westward migration festival?

Xibo people's westward migration festival is popular in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region on the anniversary of Xibo people's westward migration, and it is one of the national intangible cultural heritages.

The celebration activities of the westward migration festival are colorful, including picnics, archery, competitions, songs and dances. In particular, there are seven kinds of songs that are sung in the form of solo and chorus, and the process of moving westward is the main content. There are more than 400 lines of lyrics, three paragraphs and one phrase, and the whole song has twelve bars. After more than 200 years of concentration, processing and creation, it has become the most unique cultural expression of the westward migration festival.

On the day of the Westward Migration Festival, Xibe people, men, women and children all put on costumes and got together to play "Dhombre", "Mock Tune" and "Belem", and the dance was vigorous and lively. Girls' "shoulders shaking" and boys' "duck steps" are all vivid, expressing their yearning for their hometown and longing for a better life in the future.

This festival shows the splendid and long-standing cultural traditions, national psychology, national feelings, folk beliefs, folk customs, and various artistic dances of Xibo nationality, with rich cultural connotations and priceless value.

Inherit the status quo

Due to various reasons, the original literary form of folk art in the westward migration festival is in danger of being lost. For example, the ancient fishing and hunting customs and their oral and written literary products are gradually disappearing and seriously lost. The ancient shaman culture has a dating crisis that no one has passed on. There are fewer and fewer people proficient in Manchu.

Most Xibo people around 50 years old don't understand Xibo people, and this main tool of inheritance has been marginalized. Most of the few folk artists are older. The individual characteristics of folk art in the westward migration festival are weakening or decreasing year by year, which needs to be protected and rescued.

Refer to the above? China People's Congress Network-Xibe Nationality's Westward Migration Festival