The Spring Festival is approaching. Wearing traditional clothes, feeling traditional musical instruments, and checking in on cultural relics and historic sites... These traditional cultures that were once labeled as "outdated" are popular among contemporary Chinese people, including the young people of Generation Z, and they are likely to become the New Year's Day. vulgar trends.
In the audiovisual field, the number of traditional cultural programs at the China Central Radio and Television Station’s Spring Festival Gala continues to increase, with a series of “hits”. Cultural variety shows broadcast during the Spring Festival such as “Chinese Poetry Conference” have also become the annual expectations of many viewers. .
As a young group of new and new humans, what we are passionately pursuing is precisely the rituals, customs, works and products with traditional cultural elements that we originally mistakenly thought were "old". This kind of "extremely new" falls in love with the "extremely old" and has a lot of charm. The rise of the "sense of collision" phenomenon is closely related to the launch of a series of cultural audio-visual media art works. After "Hundred Forums" created the first on-screen revival of traditional culture in the new century, a large number of high-quality variety shows, documentaries, dramas, short and medium videos, online animations and other media art works that mainly express China's excellent traditional culture have appeared on In the past ten years, they have emerged intensively and have begun to embark on a continuous development stage with continuous innovation in content forms and continuous enhancement of communication and influence.
A large number of traditional cultural audio-visual contents such as "If National Treasures Could Talk", "Poetry and Painting of China", "Night Banquet at the Tang Palace", "New Thousand Miles of Rivers and Mountains", etc. have become "hot hits" with their own traffic, not only entering the market claimed by young groups, The subcultural field that is separated from the mainstream of society by a "dimension wall" has inspired their active spontaneous dissemination and extensive participation.
The reason why traditional cultural audio-visual content has gradually grown from a "clear stream" on the screen to a "mainstream" in viewing, and continues to set off a wave of cultural co-creation at a broader social level, is because the mainstream media has found the right target in the vigorous communication practice. The "road" to effectively promote the contemporary presentation and transformation of excellent traditional culture lies in the creators tapping the right "points" of this spiritual rich mine based on an in-depth understanding and understanding of the connotation of excellent traditional culture. In the exploration of promoting the creative transformation and innovative development of China's excellent traditional culture, mainstream media have found the "password" that truly attracts young people by exploring the spiritual connotation of excellent traditional culture. These ideas, traditional virtues and humanistic spirits, which are embedded in traditional culture and still maintain strong vitality across thousands of years, have established spiritual exchanges and value resonance between China's excellent traditional culture and contemporary young groups.
Five keywords realize the combination of "extremely new" and "extremely old"
The connecting point between "extremely new" and "extremely old" is first of all "nationality" - the unique national charm constitutes a natural link to arouse the emotional identification of young groups.
The vast and complex territory has created the diversity and breadth of Chinese civilization. At the same time, the long historical trajectory has enabled the excellent traditional culture to be developed in depth and finely in many dimensions of civilization evolution. For example, the dazzling array of colorful cultural elements such as jade buildings, colorful clothes, gold, stone, silk and bamboo, ink paintings, delicacies on jade plates, all intuitively show the exquisiteness of excellent traditional culture, and amaze the audience from the perspective of visual experience.
When we carefully observe the comments or comments about traditional cultural audio-visual content on online platforms, we will find that keywords such as "beautiful", "beautiful" and "treasure" are the most common, and are often associated with " Users’ clear positive emotional expressions such as “Wow”, “Like” and “Praise” are a direct reflection of the natural emotional connection between China’s excellent traditional culture and contemporary youth.
The second is "continuity" - the continuous and timeless cultural characteristics bring a sense of high spirits to the young group.
The Chinese civilization has a long history. It has gone through thousands of years of gestation and hundreds of modern times and continues to this day. It is the only uninterrupted civilization among the world's nations. More importantly, Chinese civilization is an open system. In the face of progressive modern culture and excellent foreign culture, excellent traditional culture can maintain an inclusive mind and embrace all rivers, and constantly absorb new cultural qualities to achieve self-renewal and development. It is precisely because of this that China's excellent traditional culture can be organically connected with contemporary values and the spirit of the times as the latest development results of the Sinicization of Marxism.
The continuous and enduring vitality demonstrated by China's excellent traditional culture has significantly enhanced individuals' sense of national pride and cultural identity. The popularity of cultural audio-visual programs such as "National Treasures", "China in Classics", "Chinese Rites and Chinese Music" is not only due to the introduction of theater mode to concretely tell the stories of excellent traditional culture, but also because they focus on integrating the excellent Chinese culture. The past and present of culture are related, and the roots and continuity of excellent traditional culture are explored through thousands of years of circulation through time and space, effectively hitting the spiritual resonance point of audio-visual users.
The third is "fireworks" - the excellent lifestyle and concepts contained in traditional culture satisfy people's current yearning and pursuit of a better life.
China's excellent traditional culture is not only about spring and snow, but also has its life-oriented and popular side, which is also its most flexible part. The fireworks in the world are the most soothing to mortal hearts. As modernization moves toward a new stage of high-quality development, people's living standards have generally improved. Against this background, the post-90s and post-00s generations pay more attention to the fun and quality of personal life.
On the one hand, the culture and customs of food, clothing, housing and transportation are as deeply embedded in everyone's daily life as genes. With their practicality that has been accumulated and tested through history, they make life healthier, more convenient and more harmonious. On the other hand, in the eyes of young people, the elegant style of life and exquisite lifestyle bred by excellent traditional culture have a "high-end feel" at the same time, which is an ideal lifestyle that they yearn for and pursue in modern life. The rise of leisure methods such as making tea by the fire, Baduanjin, and Chinese flower arrangements all reflect the interest and enthusiasm of young people in seeking elegance and romance in life from the excellent traditional culture.
Equally important is "great wisdom" - profound and exquisite ideological culture that forms a useful reference for people to correctly understand the world and implement scientific actions.
Such valuable philosophical thinking as the unity of man and nature, the balance of yin and yang, and Tao following nature, excellent traditional culture can guide people to see the essence through phenomena, correctly grasp the inherent laws of things, and maintain concentration while being able to recognize changes and adapt to changes. In this era of information explosion and unpredictable changes, such insights and thinking are particularly important for young people. Through traditional thought and culture, young people not only master unique perspectives and effective ways to understand the world, but also learn the wisdom of daily life, work and life, and properly handle the relationship between individuals and the external world. For young people who are still in the process of socialization and have little experience, this undoubtedly provides important help for their rapid integration into society and harmonious interpersonal relationships.
Finally, there is "positive energy" - excellent traditional culture provides inexhaustible spiritual power for contemporary young people to cultivate their personality and work hard. A series of valuable qualities such as continuous self-improvement, virtuous conduct, innovation, keeping pace with the times, being down-to-earth, seeking truth from facts, loving others with benevolence, and establishing people with virtue provide useful benchmarks and value guidance for young people to sharpen their personality and improve their morality. The stories and allusions that carry these precious spiritual qualities in China’s excellent traditional culture can inspire young people’s fighting spirit and enthusiasm, set higher goals for their lives, and give them the spiritual motivation to work hard for them. In building a new era of socialism Realize your own life value and social value in the vast world of new miracles.
Two pairs of relationships promote the integration of "extremely new" and "extremely old"
These rays of light, which are deeply contained in the excellent traditional Chinese culture and are discovered and loved by young people, are essentially consistent with the spiritual pursuit of upward, good, good, and beauty by contemporary young people. This is a strong example that it still retains significant vitality and strong adaptability in the context of modern development.
At the same time, it can also be seen from this that although young people pursue individuality, like trendy things, and may not be mentally mature enough, they share the same value standards and values as the nation and society as a whole in terms of national rejuvenation, social responsibility, and personal cultivation. spiritual needs. Therefore, we should have confidence in China's excellent traditional culture and the younger generation.
To further promote the integration of "extremely new" and "extremely old", we must closely focus on the above-mentioned joint points for further exploration and expansion. Refined to the specific level of media practice, the following two pairs of contradictory relationships require attention and reflection.
The relationship between content and expression. In the process of modernizing excellent traditional culture, it is necessary to strike a balance between the connotation of traditional culture itself and the way it is presented. The fundamental starting point and goal of content innovation is to deeply explore and effectively convey the excellent traditional Chinese culture. We cannot excessively unilaterally pursue the ultimate splendor of presentation methods and ignore the basic content-oriented stance. Only by firmly grasping the excellent traditional Chinese culture itself, and based on this, can innovations in the production and dissemination of audio-visual content be meaningful.
The relationship between collection and fusion. We need to inject contemporary connotations into excellent traditional culture by integrating it with popular culture, but we should avoid being reduced to a simple "platter" or "one pot" of various popular cultures. For these popular and entertainment elements, we can neither make simple collections to cater to users, nor over-consume traditional culture in the style of "fishing for all", but should promote their integration with them on the basis of selective reference and absorption in production and dissemination. The effective integration of China's excellent traditional culture achieves effective leadership in culture and value through the self-generation of new mainstream voices that have both network communication characteristics and highlight the media landscape. (Wen Wei Po)
(The authors Liu Jun and Weng Xudong are respectively the deputy director, professor, doctoral supervisor, and postdoctoral co-supervisor of the Media Art and Culture Research Center of Communication University of China, and a lecturer and faculty postdoctoral fellow at Communication University of China)