Interest And Significance

This paper is a case study about ethnic group identity. The fieldwork point is located in the hometown of this author, a village in Shanghang County, Fujian Province. In consideration of the privacy of my interviewee, this author names it as Zhongcun which means a village with Zhong as surname for all families. The people in this village didn't know which ethnic group they belong to. Then they thought that they were Hakkas and was identified as Han people. In the end, they declared and were confirmed as She People by concerning department in 1988. With regard to ethnic culture, Zhongcun is neither primitive Hakka village nor She village. In consideration of agency of ethnic identity, the identity change of this village located in Hakkas flcal area is a perfect example to study ethnic identity.The research is an attempt of hometown anthropology. With anthropologic theory, the author tries to observe and understand their world from local visual angle, to comprehend why WE make different identity in different situation, different time. And this author describes and analyzes the day to day activity, ritual in Zhongcun with hermeneutic method. The main purpose is to study the characteristic of ethnic identity and its significance.In regard to research methods, this author applies anthropologic fieldwork research and literature study. This author has been to Zhongcun three times and stayed there for three months all together to participate their activities such as joss pageant, wedding ceremony, secondary funeral, fete and so on. This author interviewed the villagers to understand their feelings and interpretation about these activities and ritual. At the same time, this author reads concerning literature such as local chronicles and pedigree of their clan to comprehend local history and culture.This paper describes local activities such as production activities, festival ceremony, life ritual and analyzes their cosmic view and philosophy. Then, this paper focuses on the identity of Zhongcun both in structure and agency to comprehend the meanings of their double identity and the interests of this choice.Base on previous ethnic study, this paper put forward some new idea. Firstly, identity is a classification system. The essence of identity is to classify the people around via similarity and difference. The mix of self-identity and group-identity contributes to the rising of several ethnic theories. Secondly, although ethnic group was mainly regarded as social cultural lineage, economic activity and territorial scope play very important role in this case. Identity is situational, but some structural factors shall not be neglected. The groups of weak ethnic group in ethnicboundary often weaken their ethic cultural traits to obtain favorablesurvival conditions.