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UM E-Theses Collection (澳門大學電子學位論文庫)

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Title

The Hanfu Movement and intangible cultural heritage : considering the past to know the future

English Abstract

The so-called “Hanfu Movement” is a newly arising transnational youth culture reinterpreting hanfu as the Chinese traditional costume based upon historical and cultural roots from the imperial China. The movement has also caused a national debate on its authenticity, consuming identity and status as a virtual community-based subculture. From a postmodernist perspective, an argument can be that hanfu constitutes an intangible subcultural heritage, which adds new meaning of identity to the style. The 2003 UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (ICHC) demonstrates a paradigm shift to the global interdisciplinary approach to the meta-cultural nature of intangible cultural heritage (ICH), which lies in a combination of the community-based approach and the human rights-based approach. The community-based approach provides a third way of thinking about intangible cultural heritage. Although culture has become a new pillar to the sustainable development debate, cultural rights remain the least developed aspects of human rights. In this regard, it is proposed to broaden the understanding and strengthen the importance of cultural rights in the context of human rights. Instead of cultural rights, UNESCO uses human rights as the principal concept in the legal discourse. UNESCO does not adopt the human rights norms nor directly protect cultural rights yet defends the weak cultural relativism on human rights. An argument is that intangible human rights associated with emotional attachments can bridge the gap within the fragmented international human rights framework. China has ratified the 2003 CHC and promulgated the 2011 Intangible Cultural Heritage Law of People's Republic of China, which has a strong taste of administrative law and adopts a narrow perspective in conformity with the UNESCO approach. Additionally, the current legal debate is characterized by the private-or-public law approach issue, while the mainstream is in favor of the intellectual property protection approach yet ignores the human rights dimension associated with the Constitution and other legal sources. Possibly some of the difficulties of the human rights protection rest either in shortcomings of constitutional law, or changing but centralized cultural and ethnic policies. In the long run, however, the community-based human rights approach can contribute to a more sustainable development and greater cultural diversity of a multi-ethnic and multi-cultural China as well as strengthen the cultural links. emotions and sentiments between China and the Chinese diaspora and its many overseas communities. Key Words: Hanfu Movement, Youth Subculture, Intangible Subcultural Heritage, Identity Crisis, Cultural Community, Cultural Diversity, Sustainable Development, Transnationalism, Multiculturalism, Unity-in-Diversity, Human Rights, Cultural Rights, Intangible Rights.

Issue date

2017.

Author

Mo, Zhi Ying,

Faculty
Faculty of Law
Degree

LL.M.

Subject

Culture and law

Cultural pluralism

Group identity

Supervisor

Neuwirth Rostam J.

Files In This Item

Full-text (Internet)

Location
1/F Zone C
Library URL
991005818389706306