Cold Food, Fire and Ancestral Production

Mid-spring Celebrations in Central China

Datos Bibliográficos

ID12557282
AutoresGöran Aijmer (University of Gothenburg, autor de correspondencia)
Año2010
Volumen20
Número3
Páginas319-344
Fecha de publicación2010-06-04
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaJournal of the Royal Asiatic Society (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1356-1863 • E-ISSN: 1474-0591
EditorialCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s1356186310000064
OpenAlexW2100408882
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas3
Referencias citadas14

This article seeks to explain the traditional celebration of Cold Food and some other springtime customs in the mid-Yangzi basin in central China. In these rituals the ancestors and their influence in the production of new rice were highlighted while, at the same time, social reproduction through women was temporarily suspended. Female generative energy was not allowed to compete with the creative force of the ancestors in the fields. Cold Food is seen as a trope on seasonal agricultural tasks. The myth of moral constancy, which accompanied the festival, was on another deeper level an iconic exploration of the preparation of the agricultural fields. Death was seen to propel life, ancestral energy being transferred to the living through rice

Agriculture · Ancient history · Archaeology · Art · Biology · China · Consumption (sociology · Geography · Literature · Mythology · Reproduction · Social science · Sociology · Spring (device · Trope (literature · Chinese history and philosophy · Culinary Culture and Tourism · History · Vietnamese History and Culture Studies · Ecology