Hmong Song Teng - Jingzhou Shovel Area Polyphonic Folk Songs Survey Research

"The Miao's Ge Teng", popular in the area of Qiaoli in Jingzhou Miao and Dong Autonomous County in Hunan Province, is a kind of multi-musical part folk songs sung by the local Miao and Dong people using "acid words" in folk activities related to marriage. Ge Teng, characterized by stable multi-musical texture, regular words structure, steady singing styles and rich theme and content, is a form of folk music with unique features and great maturity in Chinese multi-musical folk songs.Based on the field researches, the thesis makes a systematic investigation on "Ge Teng", a cultural phenomenon of music. After analyzing the musical modality of Ge Teng and the status quo of musical culture like the musical forms of Ge Teng and the folk activities involved, together with the historical and cultural background of the place where Ge Teng exists, and studying the strange fact that the Miao's Ge Teng is sung in "acid words" of Chinese local dialect but not language of Miao and Dong people, the history of its formation and development is probed into, and thus it is displayed as an example of the integration of national cultures.The thesis is composed of four chapters.The first chapter, survival background, introduces the natural geographical surroundings and cultural ecological background, esp. the soil where Ge Teng is nurtured --- the marriage-related activities, which helps with the study of Ge Teng in this thesis.The second chapter, an overview of Ge Teng, explores Ge Teng in detail both in a horizontal and vertical perspective. To start with, for the purpose of showing the uniqueness of Ge Teng, the thesis makes a particular survey of the details of each living state of Ge Teng, esp. the singing styles of Jiang, Ling, He and the orderliness of the corresponding words. Then, taking it as a clue that people sing Ge Teng using "acid words" of Chinese local dialect instead of Miao and Dong people's language, the thesis reviews its history, discovering that it is in the village of Fengchong in the town of Sanqiao in the area of Qiaoli that Ge Teng is originated. The above studies reveal that Ge Teng is a cultural phenomenon of music with rich characteristics of the area.The third chapter focuses on an analysis of musical ontology. Music theory is applied to analyze the musical modality of Ge Teng's airs and found that the type of multi-musical texture of airs of multi-musical part Ge Teng is heterphony; the structure of airs is non-regular structure of passages, and the general "fragmentary sentences" phenomenon in relations between words and music; and two types of melody singing:chanting and expressing feelings. All these phenomena of musical ontology, popular and stable, reflect the musical aesthetic orientation typical of people in the area of Qiaoli.The fourth chapter, the status and protection of Ge Teng, discusses the survival status of Ge Teng and analyzes the trend of its multi-development. It is highly recognized that the local people voluntarily attempt to protect Ge Teng out of their self-knowledge of national culture. Some suggestions are proposed to pass down and protect Ge Teng considering the evolution of the social functions of Ge Teng in today's society.