The role of traditional festivals in social life

First of all, the festival culture carries the rhythm of life in agricultural society, which is in a relaxed and timely manner. China's traditional festivals, is the historical product of agricultural civilization, the festival selection itself is closely related to agricultural production and life. With spring planting, summer hoeing, autumn harvest, the productive rhythms of winter, and thus folk festivals, there is also a spring prayer, autumn newspaper, summer, winter waxing of the age of the rhythms of life: the new year in the spring, the revival of all things, people sacrificing to God and ancestor, whipping the spring to persuade the farmers; into the summer, the agricultural work is busy, with little leisure, and the heat of the summer, the disease prone to, so the Dragon Boat Festival to drive away evil spirits to avoid the plague, in addition to the evil and eliminate the poison is based on; the golden autumn, the new cereal fields, melons and fruits ripe, people with the new grain, the new cereal fields, the new grain fields, melons and fruits ripe, and people with the new grain, the new grain fields, the new grain fields In the golden autumn, new grains come on the scene, fruits and melons ripen, people with the joy of harvest, reunion to enjoy the moon, drinking and climbing high; fall and winter, the end of the agricultural work, abundant government stores, people whole rice and grinding flour, killing pigs and slaughtering goats, began to "busy year". Year after year, week after week, people in this rhythm of natural life, generation after generation, reproduction, inheritance of Chinese civilization.

Secondly, festival culture plays a role in uniting families and regulating interpersonal relationships. Traditional society is a patriarchal society bound by blood relations. This society has a strong ethical concept, focusing on kinship. The many rituals and customs in traditional festivals profoundly reflect this. Ancestor worship is an indispensable part of almost all festivals, such as New Year's Day, Lantern Festival, Cold Snacks, Ching Ming Festival, Dragon Boat Festival, Mid-Autumn Festival, Chung Yeung Festival, Winter Solstice Festival, and so on, in which people make offerings at temples or tombs, burn incense, or look into the sky to wish for their ancestors. People through a variety of festivals to worship activities, expressed the filial piety and remembrance of future generations; in turn, this continuous, week after week of ancestral customs, and constantly strengthen and consolidate the people's sense of family, blood affinity. At the same time, relatives, friends, neighbors, in the holiday season gifts to each other (such as lanterns of the Lantern Festival, Dragon Boat Festival dumplings, Mid-Autumn Moon Cake, Chung Yeung flower cake), etiquette, but also deep feelings. For thousands of years, traditional festivals have become an important emotional bond that maintains interpersonal relationships in Chinese society. As long as the Chinese people, they can experience a kind of blood thicker than water, so as to produce a strong sense of identity, affinity.

Again, the festival culture plays a role in enhancing national integration and unity. The traditional festivals of the Han Chinese people have had a significant impact on the ethnic minorities in China and even neighboring countries. For example, some Miao people celebrate the New Year at the same time as the Chinese New Year; Miao, Zhuang, Manchu, Dong, Li, She, Buyei, Hezhe, Ewenke and other nationalities also celebrate the Green Dragon Festival; Miao, Yi, Zhuang, Dong, Yao, Bai, Shui, Mongolia, Buyei and other nationalities celebrate the Ching Ming, Dragon Boat Festival, Mid-Yuan, Mid-Autumn Festival; Tian Kuang Festival, Chung Yeung Festival, Buyei and other dozens of ethnic minority areas during the festival are also celebrated grandly. In this way, the festival culture increases the centripetal force of the nation.

Finally, festival culture also bears the function of historical memory and era inheritance. The production of festival culture is directly related to the early primitive beliefs of mankind, and in the later development process, this trace is increasingly fading, but some forms are still preserved. For example, the festival customs such as sacrificing to the earth on the day of the community, worshipping the moon in the Mid-Autumn Festival, and worshipping the star on the eve of the seventh day of the seventh month are still preserving the historical memory of the concept of nature worship of the forefathers. At the same time, the festival culture in the process of development and change, but also into the new era of content, the development of new features and meaning of the times. For example, the increase in the commemorative content of historical figures, the embedding of religious festivals, the integration of foreign national festivals and customs, and so on.

Mr. Lu Xun once said, "Only the soul of the people is the most valuable, and only when it is carried forward can China make real progress." Indeed, in today's globalization, "the more national is the more global". With a history of more than 5,000 years of inheritance, carrying countless Chinese people complexes and memories of the festival culture, for the manifestation of the characteristics of the times, enhance cultural self-confidence, carry forward the spirit of the nation has an important historical and practical significance.

The history of China is almost a history of the development of an agrarian civilization, which makes traditional Chinese festivals closely related to ancient rituals and festivals.

Ancient rituals originated from reverence for nature and admiration for prominent chiefs and figures, and gradually evolved into the worship of personified gods and goddesses. Compliance with the seasons, on the other hand, was for agricultural production and obtaining food for survival.

Whether it is a ritual activity, or productive labor have their own functions, especially in the summer solstice, winter solstice and spring and other festivals come, in the natural world of yin and yang alternation of the node, it is the season of epidemics and diseases, and by dividing the Dragon Boat Festival, Winter Festival and New Year's Day and other festivals, the formation of the insertion of the Ai, medicinal baths, in addition to the five poisons, exorcism, sweeping, playing vinegar and charcoal, hang the peach charms (Spring Festival couplets, the God of the Door), firecrackers and other festivals. The festival custom of setting off firecrackers was formed during the festival. As the gunpowder inside the firecrackers contain nitrate, sulfur and other substances, so there is a certain effect of killing poisonous bacteria and strong anti-epidemic effect.

With the development of the times and ecological changes, coupled with the lack of awareness of some people of traditional customs, generalized traditional customs to limit, deny is questionable, in this regard we have had lessons.

In the 1950s, there was a one-sided view that sparrows eat crops, then food production, simple sparrows included in one of the four pests, a large number of killing, resulting in the occurrence of pests, the production of a sharp decline, and had to be re-localized to sparrows, excluded from the four pests.