The creation, preservation and transmission of Shuishu archives in China
| Pages | 1192-1208 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JD-11-2016-0143 |
| Published date | 09 October 2017 |
| Date | 09 October 2017 |
| Author | Zhiying Lian |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Records management & preservation,Document management,Classification & cataloguing,Information behaviour & retrieval,Collection building & management,Scholarly communications/publishing,Information & knowledge management,Information management & governance,Information management,Information & communications technology,Internet |
The creation, preservation
and transmission of Shuishu
archives in China
Zhiying Lian
School of Library, Information and Archival Studies,
Shanghai University, Shanghai, China
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to report the results of a qualitative study exploring the conditions
associated with the creation, preservation and transmission of Shuishu archives in China, and the crises today
in their preservation and transmission and the reasons behind them. It also proposes activation mechanisms
to shift Shuishu archives from jeopardized collective memory to preservable cultural memory.
Design/methodology/approach –Semi-structured interviews and ethnographic fieldwork were conducted
over the course of a month in 2015.
Findings –The creation, preservation and transmission of Shuishu archives in the community of the
Shui rely upon the community’s closed system. But this system has been broken as a result of modernization
and wide use of new media in China. To preserve and transmit Shuishu archives to future generations, there
needs to be mutual trust and equitable cooperation between government archives and the Shuishushi.
The “cultural consciousness”of the Shui needs to be stimulated, and more members of the Shuiand the whole
of society need to participate in the preservation and transmission of this distinctive memory.
Practical implications –The study can provide a provocative example for education in preservation and
LIS about community culture and archiving, and the preservation of social memory, identity and culture.
The activation mechanisms seek to aid in the preservation and transmission of Shuishu archives and other
similar community memory.
Originality/value –The study uses semi-structured interviews and ethnographic methodology to develop a
rich understanding of the history and the status quo of the preservation and transmission of Shuishu
archives. It redefines Shuishu archives and sheds light on the roles government archives should play in the
preservation and transmission of Shuishu archives.
Keywords Cultural memory, Community archives, Cultural consciousness, Shuishu,
Shuishu archives, Shuishushi
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
Shuishu archives are created by the community of the Shui, the ethnic minority living in the
remote and poorly accessible mountain areas of Southwest China. The Shui used the
Shuishu, a kind of ancient hieroglyphic script, to document their astronomical, geographical
and religious knowledge and understandings, as well as their folkways and philosophy.
Shuishu archives serve as the collective memory of the Shui, but at the same time they are
also a significant part of Chinese and even the world’s social memory. They also have high
value for research and education in many disciplines including LIS (library and information
science, documentation, and archival science), linguistics, philology, meteorology,
astronomy, ethnology, folklore, philosophy, indigenous and ethnic studies and religion.
Today, however, the younger generations of the Shui as well as wider society know little
about Shuishu archives. Only the Shuishushi, a small group of professionals in the Shui who
are thought by their community to be able to communicate with gods and ghosts can
Journal of Documentation
Vol. 73 No. 6, 2017
pp. 1192-1208
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0022-0418
DOI 10.1108/JD-11-2016-0143
Received 28 November 2016
Revised 16 March 2017
Accepted 15 April 2017
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0022-0418.htm
The author is particularly grateful for the assistance given by the archivists at Sandu County Archives
and Libo County Archives, and Linxi Meng,Ling Wei, and the Shuishushi at Zenlei village and Shuiyao
village. The author would also like to thank Professor Anne Gilliland at UCLA and the two referees of this
paper for their insightful comments which were very helpful to improve the manuscript. This study is
supported by theKey Project of the National Social Science Foundation (Project No. 15ATQ009).
1192
JD
73,6
understand and interpret the texts of Shuishu archives, but most of them are elderly and
more and more are dying. Some scholars have paid attention to this crisis in the
preservation and transmission of Shuishu archives (e.g. Tang and Ren, 2008; Wei and
Wang, 2009; Ouyang, 2008; Wang and Zhang, 2009; Hua et al., 2015), but existing studies
failed to adopt robust methodological approaches that could comprehensively explore the
history and the status quo of the preservation and transmission of Shuishu archives.
The definitions of Shuishu archives and the measures or strategies suggested for the
preservation and transmission of Shuishu archives that have been proposed by such
studies, therefore, are far too reductive.
The goal of this paper is to stimulate the cultural consciousness of more members of the
Shui, and to promotethe preservation and transmissionof Shuishu archives. It also attempts
to present Shuishu archives as a lens through which the preservation and LIS communities
can learn more about the landscape of community archiving in China, and then to promote
their cooperation tackling issuesconcerning the preservationand transmission of community
memory. This paper, therefore, mainly focuses on the following research questions:
RQ1. What is Shuishu archives, and how were Shuishu archives created, preserved and
transmitted in the community of the Shui?
RQ2. What influences do the current social structures in China have on the preservation
and transmission of Shuishu archives?
RQ3. How should Shuishu archives be preserved and transmitted to future generations,
and what roles should memory or cultural institutions such as archives, libraries,
and museums play in such preservation and transmission?
Defining Shuishu archives appropriately is the prerequisite for studying other questions.
The answers to the questions 1 and 2 provide the bases to study the question 3. To answer
all these questions, semi-structured interviews with six archivists at Sandu County
Archives and Libo County Archives[1], and ethnographic fieldwork in two villages of the
Shui –Zenlei and Shuiyao[2], comprising in-depth interviews with five Shuishushi and
five young members of the Shui, as well as participant observations were conducted
between July 12 and August 10, 2015.
Based on the interviews and ethnographic fieldwork, this paper first clarifies the
definition of Shuishu archives. Next, this paper explores the conditions of the creation,
preservation and transmission of Shuishu archives in the community of the Shui, and then
analyses the crises today in their preservation and transmission and the reasons behind
them. Finally, this paper proposes activation mechanisms to shift Shuishu archives from
jeopardized collective memory to preservable cultural memory, and sheds light on the roles
government archives should play.
Some background information on this study
In recent years, community archives have become a focus of scholarly research in many
countries. A growing body of literature has discussed the definition of community
archives, explored the development of certain community archives, especially of
marginalized or vulnerable communities, and reflected on the impact of community
archives on the traditional definitions of “records”and “archives,”the model of archiving,
the archival paradigm, and the principle of provenance (e.g. Flinn, 2007; Flinn et al., 2009;
Stevens et al., 2010; Bastian and Alexander, 2009; Shilton and Srinivasan, 2007;
McKemmish and Faulkhead, 2011; Gilliland, 2012; Cook, 2013; Wurl, 2005). Although
definitions of community and community archives may be contextually contingent, UK
Archival Scholar Andrew Flinn provides broad working definitions (Caswell, 2014) that
are also accepted by this study[3]. Flinn (2007) defines community as “agroupwhodefine
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Shuishu
archives
in China
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