(1) How do traditional festivals in China reflect the basic characteristics of China culture? (2) How do you view the significance of defending traditional cultural festivals?

The first is the quality characteristics. The emergence, development and spread of custom culture is the result of people's long-term production and life practice. If the custom culture is regarded as a kind of creation, then its author is not an individual genius, but all members of society. Because of this, when people study festival culture, it is impossible to determine its founder and founding date. As an external form of festival culture, festival activities are more obviously manifested in the spontaneous participation of the broad masses. "Old Stories of Wulin" records the grand occasion of Lin 'an's spring outing in the Qingming period of the Southern Song Dynasty: "On the tenth day before and after the Qingming period, the ladies in the city put on bright makeup and gold, danced side by side and enjoyed themselves; Painting drums, all day long. " Song and Wu have a poem saying: "Pear blossoms, the wind is clear, and wanderers are half out of town looking for spring." The Lantern Festival on the fifteenth day of the first month is said to have started in Qin and flourished in Tang. Bai Juyi wrote in "Lantern Festival in Hangzhou on the fifteenth night of the first month": "Old friends know each other and enjoy each other at night." The breeze comes to the sea, and the moon is by the river. Lights are everywhere, and music is everywhere. I think Dili is ok, but I don't like Hangzhou. "The activities of the Lantern Festival in the Song Dynasty reached its peak, and the time for the masses to light lamps increased from the previous three days to five days. Cities and market towns, large and small, are full of fire trees and silver flowers. People are playing flutes and singing and dancing. All people gather in the street to watch lanterns and have fun. This grand occasion is vividly described in China's ancient literary works. In addition, the inheritance and evolution of folk festival cultural activities from content to form is always decided by the masses according to their own wishes and needs, and any interference from political forces cannot produce permanent effects.

Followed by the rhythm characteristics. Traditional folk festivals in China are based on agricultural civilization, and the creation of ancient calendars is also based on closely related farming and phenology. There are 24 solar terms in a year, and with the preparation of moistening the moon, farming and phenology are consistent. Therefore, farming, calendar and solar terms run synchronously in a one-year cycle, showing a strict rhythm. "Erzheng" says: "Teenagers are called ripe crops, which are ripe every year." Spring planting, summer sowing, autumn harvest and winter storage are repeated. Nodes originally refer to bamboo nodes, that is, the joints between bamboo branches and branches, and the distance between nodes is roughly similar. The word "festival" means solar terms and even intervals. There is a folk saying of "four seasons and eight festivals", "Historical Records? "Preface to Taishi Gongxu" says: "There are decrees in four o'clock, eight places, twelve degrees and twenty-four days. The festival represented by "solar terms" was born out of solar terms. Although they have experienced historical evolution, their rhythm characteristics are still faintly visible. As time goes on, there will be corresponding festivals. The annual festival has been divorced from farming, but for the sake of fixed thinking and convenient operation, the annual cycle operation mode is still adopted, but the solar calendar year is adopted. Strictly speaking, some folk celebrations in recent years have no rhythmic characteristics and should not be regarded as folk festivals.

Third, national characteristics. The so-called nation is the unity of people who have the same language, the same region, the same economic life and the same cultural and psychological quality in history. On the East Asian continent, the creator endowed us with a unique geographical environment. Clockwise from southwest to northeast, mountains and Gobi constitute a natural barrier, with four distinct seasons and suitable for farming. The land of nearly10 million square kilometers is not only rich in natural resources, but also gives people enough room for manoeuvre, so it does not pay much attention to the development of the ocean. Therefore, the self-reliant agricultural economy based on the mainland has slowly grown up. People work at sunrise, rest in the morning, young and old are orderly, love each other, are warm and harmonious, work pragmatically, and live and work in peace and contentment. Rural life has created our nation's unique psychological quality, which is completely different from western marine commercial civilization. The most prominent thing is the extraordinarily deep kinship, the love of compatriots, the love of the countryside, and the strong national cohesion resulting from it. In China's folk festival culture, expressing farmers' harvest joy and homesickness has become the most common theme, which lies in this. In Europe, April Fool's Day creates sensational false news to get the pleasure of pranksters. Such a festival custom can never be formed in China.

The fourth is regional characteristics. China has a vast territory, and the geographical environment varies greatly from place to place. Folk festival culture always adapts to the local geographical environment and shows distinctive regional characteristics. There are many stories about Guan Gong in the Three Kingdoms circulating along the coast of Zhejiang and Fujian, especially in rural areas, where Guandi temples are spread all over the country. Legend has it that May 13 is Guan Gong's birthday, which becomes an annual commemorative festival. The villagers want to kill pigs and sheep for sacrifice. In Guandi Temple, cigarettes are around, candles are bright, firecrackers are ringing, and there is a festive scene. After dinner, people gather in front of the temple, look up at the sky and wait for a light rain, and often get what they want. It has been confirmed that Master Guan has been to "Dragon Palace Temple" and grinded the dragon crescent moon knife, and light rain is the water for sharpening the knife. In fact, a light rain is a common weather phenomenon in the coastal areas of Zhejiang and Fujian in May and June of the lunar calendar, commonly known as "surfing". There is no such phenomenon in places a little far from the sea, so the custom of worshipping Guan Yu on May 13th can only prevail in a small area along the southeast coast. It is a national custom to row dragon boats on the Dragon Boat Festival. But there are no rivers in mountainous areas, and people have evolved into "dragon-pushing boats" according to the characteristics of geographical environment in mountainous areas. This replaced the "dragon boat race" and added a new meaning. This is the custom of Dragon Boat Festival in Wuyi County, Zhejiang Province. According to the Records of Wuyi County in the Republic of China, folk craftsmen "take bamboo as a dragon boat shape, decorated with paper paste outside, and regarded grass paste paper as a god inside." The gong driver circled the boat three times and then pushed the dragon boat to the stream outside the city. There is a local proverb: "If you don't push the dragon boat on the Dragon Boat Festival, the plague will happen", so pushing the dragon boat is to exorcise evil spirits.

The fifth is the characteristics of inheritance. Folk festivals handed down from generation to generation contain variation and development in their inheritance. History, legend and religion are the three sources of the formation of folk festivals. Tracing back to the source of every folk festival, we can find a vivid and interesting story. Only by constantly processing, enriching and transforming these stories can we have a conventional cultural connotation. This "culture" is insensitive to regime change and political situation. It is worth noting that traditional festivals and customs often develop from a single theme to multiple themes in inheritance. Tomb-Sweeping Day, for example, was originally a festival to worship ancestors, but later it added fitness and entertainment contents such as climbing mountains, swinging, inserting willows and eating Qingming pulp, which became a compound festival. According to Mr Wen Yiduo's textual research, the Dragon Boat Festival was originally a day for Wuyue people to worship the dragon totem. People put all kinds of food into bamboo tubes or wrapped in leaves, throw them into the water for the dragon gods to enjoy, and then play with drums and canoes on the water. This custom existed long before Qu Yuan. After the tragedy that the poet Qu Yuan died in Guluo River for Chu, people attached him to the primitive custom of Dragon Boat Festival out of reverence for this patriotic poet, usurped the role of master and came from behind. Then there is the meaning of detoxification and health care such as drinking realgar wine and inserting calamus. We can understand this phenomenon from the following two aspects: on the one hand, festival culture is the creation of people in different times, and the author always permeates his feelings, understanding and wishes into his creation. On the other hand, according to the principle of reception aesthetics, the audience always interprets and evaluates festival culture with different motives, emotions and purposes. The diversification trend of festival cultural themes is conducive to enhancing the festival atmosphere and has positive significance for the development of festival culture.

Finally, the folk festival culture in China also has the characteristics of "worshipping Yang". Folk festivals in China are usually a single day, which can be explained from the Book of Changes. The Book of Changes says, "Yang hexagrams are odd and Yin hexagrams are even." Odd numbers belong to yang and even numbers belong to yin. In the natural sequence, the yang number "one" begins and the yang number "nine" ends, so yang is more important than yin. Festivals are more valued than ordinary days, so they are positive numbers. The Lantern Festival on the fifteenth day of the first month, the Dragon Boat Festival on the fifth day of May, the Mid-Autumn Festival on the fifteenth day of July, the Mid-Autumn Festival on the fifteenth day of August, the Double Ninth Festival in September and other important ancient festivals are all like this. There are exceptions in some local festivals, and a reasonable explanation can be found from the origin, but it does not affect the overall recognition of the phenomenon of "Yang worship" in folk festivals.

On the Significance of Protecting Cultural Festivals

1, which has the function of cultivating thoughts and sentiments, pays attention to the affinity between man and nature in traditional festivals, such as climbing on the Double Ninth Festival and dragon boat racing on the Dragon Boat Festival.

2. It has the function of inheriting traditional virtues, and traditional festivals contain traditional spirits, such as respecting the elderly, being honest and trustworthy.

It has the function of regulating people's life and entertaining people through festivals.

4. It has the function of carrying forward the national spirit, such as the Cold Food Festival, to commemorate the loyalty and fame of Jiezitui; The Dragon Boat Festival commemorates Qu Yuan's loyalty and integrity in patriotism and concern for the country and people.

5. It can promote economic development. Holidays can stimulate holiday consumption and promote economic prosperity.