▲Cuba recently held a special exhibition of "Happy New Year: Celebrating the New Year in the Museum". Visitors admire the exhibits at the National Museum of Decorative Arts in Havana, Cuba. Photo by Joaquin Hernandez (Xinhua News Agency)
The Spring Festival is an important traditional festival in Chinese culture, and its influence is expanding around the world. The 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution by consensus to designate the Spring Festival (Lunar New Year) as a United Nations holiday. As the Spring Festival approaches, scholars and overseas Chinese had heated discussions and expressed their good expectations for promoting cultural dissemination and promoting exchanges and mutual learning among different civilizations.
Contains feelings of homesickness
Led by the year of 100 festivals. The Spring Festival is a festive day for thousands of families to reunite, say goodbye to the old and welcome the new. According to incomplete statistics, nearly 20 countries regard the Spring Festival as a legal holiday, about 1/5 of the world's population celebrates the Lunar New Year in different forms, and Spring Festival folk activities have entered nearly 200 countries and regions, becoming a global cultural event, bringing joy to people from all over the world.
"The Spring Festival is an important festival. In the near future, the 34th Jonker Street Chinese New Year Carnival 2024 will be held in Malacca, Malaysia. This year, we will hang up 1,000 red lanterns and hold the 'China-Malaysia Friendship Lucky Dragon' dragon dance ceremony. Datuk Willa Yan Tianlu, vice president of the Malaysian Chinese Public Relations Association and chairman of the Malacca Historic City (Jonker Street) Working Committee, introduced that the "China-Malaysia Friendship Dragon" is about 190 meters long, and the dragon head alone weighs 60 kilograms. "Through a series of activities during the Spring Festival, the cultures of China and Malaysia have come closer and the hearts of the people have become more connected. Yan Tianlu said.
"The Spring Festival is a traditional festival, and the Spring Festival also has a long-term vitality overseas. Wang Wenchao, a lecturer at the Department of Philosophy and Culture Teaching and Research of the Party School of the Beijing Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China, said that many East and Southeast Asian countries regard the Spring Festival as a grand festival, and the Spring Festival inherits cultural connotations and folk psychology similar to China in these places.
Li Mu, associate professor and doctoral supervisor of the School of Arts of Nanjing University, believes that one of the important characteristics of overseas Spring Festival inheritance is that it is closely related to the cultural habits of local overseas Chinese. For example, in Southeast Asia, the local overseas Chinese group is dominated by Hokkien, Hakka and Cantonese, and the local Spring Festival celebration has strong Fujian or Guangdong regional characteristics. At the same time, in the process of integrating with local culture, the overseas Spring Festival shows the characteristics of unified cultural connotation but diverse celebration methods. "For overseas Chinese, celebrating the Spring Festival is a kind of inheritance, and it is also the pursuit and expression of their own culture in a multicultural atmosphere. The celebration of the 'Spring Festival' is not only festive, but also contains the homesickness of overseas Chinese. Li Mu said.
Promote people-to-people bonds
The 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution by consensus to designate the Spring Festival (Lunar New Year) as a United Nations holiday. As a "floating holiday", the resolution proposes that United Nations agencies at United Nations Headquarters and other duty stations celebrating the holiday avoid meeting on the day of the Chinese New Year, and encourages that this holiday be taken into account in the drafting of the schedule of meetings in the future.
"The United Nations officially recognized the Spring Festival as a 'floating holiday' for the United Nations, and overseas Chinese feel rejoicing. Zong Jinbo, honorary chairman of the Swedish Chinese Association and president of the Nordic Chinese newspaper, said, "The recognition of the Spring Festival by the world is a manifestation of China's influence and comprehensive strength. Although the Spring Festival is not celebrated in Western countries, people in many countries know about it. On the occasion of the Chinese New Year, overseas Chinese from all over the world hold celebrations and often invite locals to join in. For more than ten consecutive years, overseas Chinese and international students in Sweden have held cultural and artistic activities to celebrate the Spring Festival at the East Asian Museum in Stockholm, the capital of Sweden, and celebrate the New Year with the locals. ”
Wang Wenchao believes that the establishment of the Spring Festival holiday by the United Nations is in line with the purpose of the United Nations to advocate the protection of the diversity of world civilizations. He said: "The international influence of the Spring Festival is increasing, at least three reasons: first, the Spring Festival has a wide audience, a large number of people celebrating the festival, coupled with the cultural consumption and festival economy formed by large-scale population movements, the Spring Festival has attracted international attention; Third, the Chinese government has long attached great importance to the protection and inheritance of Spring Festival customs, emphasizing the importance of protecting and inheriting history and culture, and has listed the Spring Festival as the first batch of national intangible cultural heritage, and actively applied for the 2024 UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, enhancing the influence of the Spring Festival. ”
Write Spring Festival couplets, cut window flowers, hang lanterns, and set off fireworks...... No matter how long or far away from home, overseas Chinese living all over the world still retain their traditional customs, and the Spring Festival has become an important "window" to show Chinese culture to the world. "Overseas, the Spring Festival has become a cultural bond. The Spring Festival is a comprehensive carrier of Chinese culture, which includes multiple dimensions such as literature and art, food, and faith, and is a platform for cultural exchanges and mutual learning. Li Mu said that the United Nations has designated the Spring Festival as a United Nations holiday, which reflects the United Nations' respect for multiculturalism and also shows that Chinese culture is recognized by more countries and regions.
Contribute to the spread of culture
The Spring Festival celebrations of overseas Chinese often refresh the local people. Foreign friends were attracted by the excitement and "flavor of the Chinese New Year" and became interested in Chinese culture.
"The fact that the Spring Festival has become a United Nations holiday has attracted attention from all parties, and we can see the importance of the festival to the spread of culture. Li Mu said, "Actively promote the Spring Festival as a statutory holiday, expand the space for the cultural inheritance of the Spring Festival in a multicultural environment, and promote exchanges and mutual learning among different civilizations in the world." ”
Yu Junwu, director of the China Overseas Friendship Association and head of the Sydney Huaxing Art Troupe, said: "I hope that Chinese culture will not only 'come out', but also 'blend in' and be loved and accepted by more overseas people." Overseas Chinese are the bearers and disseminators of Chinese culture overseas, and through the efforts of overseas Chinese, I believe that the influence of Chinese culture will become greater and greater. ”
In addition to the explicit holiday arrangements, festival atmosphere, festival activities, etc., the festival economy and consumption composed of implicit production and services can also witness the influence of festival culture. Wang Wenchao said, "Festival life opens up a new situation and provides new opportunities for the spread of Chinese culture." In the future, we can continue to strengthen the protection and inheritance of our own festival culture, actively declare festivals and customs as intangible cultural heritage, and strengthen the creative transformation and innovative development of traditional festival culture. Multinational enterprises and social organizations can also further enhance people-to-people exchanges, promote the improvement of the industrial chain and supply chain of the festival economy, and help enhance the breadth and depth of the overseas dissemination of festivals and customs. ”
Producer/Ren Shuai
Editor-in-Chief / Chen Weichun
Editor/Li Leilei, Yang Yuqi
Source/People's Daily Overseas Edition