Miao kids play in Xijiang, in a region of Guizhou province where the majority of the population is Miao. Miao children have traditionally learned Miao songs, stories, embroidery and other customs by staying close to home and learning from their elders as they grew up. Now, more Miao are literate, educated and able to function in the rest of China. The trade-off is that learning and working in Mandarin Chinese leaves Miao with less time to focus on their own culture and traditions.
Miao primary school teacher Long Shaofen is one of just three or four people in the Xijiang area who can read and write the Miao language. Traditionally, the Miao had no written language. The one Long can read and write is a transliteration, created in China soon after the Communist Party came to power. It was taught briefly in schools then, and again in the 1980s. But then it was dropped from the curriculum because Mandarin Chinese was considered more useful for Miao who might be migrating to cities or trading or doing business with the Chinese majority. Long believes Miao should still make an effort to learn the transliterated Miao written language, because it's the only one that can accurately record all the sounds of the Miao stories and songs that have recorded Miao history through the generations.
Young Miao girl in a village in northeastern Guizhou.
2 comments:
Interesting! Such beautiful people!
That was really interesting. Thanks for posting about it.
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