Communications in Humanities Research
- The Open Access Proceedings Series for Conferences
Communications in Humanities Research
Vol. 25, 03 January 2024
Open
Access | Article
The Changing Functions of the Door Gods in China
* Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Abstract
This article illuminates the evolving functions of the door gods in Chinese culture, detailing China's medieval, premodern, and modern periods in relation to how these door gods were viewed, which changed from exorcism to prayer and then to political propaganda. Mary Douglas’s grid and group theory is applied to examine the type of the society and the symbol systme poduced. This article points out the significant transformation of the door god paintings during the Great Cultural Revolution period and proposes a hypothesis about changes of possible subjects on the paintings. All of the evidence of the metamorphosis underscores the dynamism and distinctiveness of local beliefs in China.
Keywords
culture study, door gods, folk religion study, ethnography, Grid and Group
References
1. Wang Chong. Chapter of seizing ghosts. Discourses in the Balance (Lun heng). Retrieved from https://ctext.org/zhs
2. Chang Jincang. (2000). The Classic of Mountains and Seas and the Divine Creation Movement during the Warring States Period. Social Science in China Press (SSCP) (6), 11.
3. Koshiba Yuko. (2012). Comparative Study on “New Year” Customs between China and Japan——Taking Kaifeng in China and Kansai in Japan as Cases. (Doctoral dissertation, Henan University).
4. Ichisada Miyazaki. (1971). Ichisada Miyazaki, The Chinese Civil Service Exam System
5. West Lake Old Man (Xihu Laoren). The Numerous Records of West Lake Old Man (Xihu Laoren Fansheng Lu) by Xihu Laoren. Xihu laoren fansheng lu 124
6. Meng Yuanlao, In The Eastern Capital: A Dream of Splendor (Dongjing Menghua Lu) ,10.61
7. Wu Zimu. Meng liang lu (6), 181-182
8. Mary Douglas. (1970). Natural symbol. 89-92
9. Shu Fei. (1946). Summary of Mudanjiang Spring Festival Yangko Activity,People’s Theatre(3), 2
10. Shi Qun. (1939). How to celebrate the Chinese New Year, Xinhua Daily (North China Edition) (2)
11. Xue Yun. (2010), Discussion on the phenomenon of worshipping Mao Zedong during the Spring Festival in the liberated areas of North China, History Teaching (14), 40
12. Li Junquan. (2018). The Folk Custom Transformation of the North China Base Area, 176-177
Data Availability
The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study will be available from the authors upon reasonable request.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. Authors who publish this series agree to the following terms:
1. Authors retain copyright and grant the series right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgment of the work's authorship and initial publication in this series.
2. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the series's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgment of its initial publication in this series.
3. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See Open Access Instruction).
- Volume Title
- Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Interdisciplinary Humanities and Communication Studies
- ISBN (Print)
- 978-1-83558-253-4
- ISBN (Online)
- 978-1-83558-254-1
- Published Date
- 03 January 2024
- Series
- Communications in Humanities Research
- ISSN (Print)
- 2753-7064
- ISSN (Online)
- 2753-7072
- DOI
- 10.54254/2753-7064/25/20231820
- Copyright
- 03 January 2024
- Open Access
- This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited