Meaning And Function:Cultural Implications Of Weifang Kites

Weifang has a long history and brilliant culture in which kite representatively plays a very important part. It is a bright pearl of Chinese folk art. Being worthy of the name’Kite City’, Weifang has a unique geographical and cultural environment which is also beneficial to the fame and the formation of the special local characteristic.With the unique local characteristic, Weifang kite is definitely valuable for the anthropological studies. Its values mainly reflect on both the meanings and the functions.The meanings of kites contain the static meaning and the dynamic meaning. The static meaning indicates the kite’s own cultural meaning as a static folk-art article, including types and themes. The dynamic meaning of Weifang kite indicates the meaning of flying kites as a folk custom sport. In feudal society, flying kites was considered to get rid of whammy and bad luck. At that time, the people would cut the string after fly a kite for the purpose of getting the whammy away. So usually on Tomb Sweeping Day would the ancient people fly a kite to get rid of bad luck in the whole year. But in modern society, flying kites is mostly considered as an entertainment or a kind of sport. With more and more international kite festivals are held, it’s not just a kite we are flying but a business card communicating with the outside world.The functions of Weifang kite are changing with the history. Kite was firstly created for military. So the military function is the initial function. The Sui dynasty ended the chaos of Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms and unified the country. The people lived a gradually stabilized life peacefully. And the lower price of paper making made more and more paper used for kites. Then the function of Weifang kites changed from military to entertainment. Afterwards, with the prosperity of commodity economy and the development of small handicraft industries in Qing dynasty, the production of kites turned into specialization which made the kites more and more delicate. Additionally, the literati liked kites and rightly this made kite gain inside and outside accomplishment. At this period, Weifang kite was endowed with aesthetic function. The traditional functions of Weifang kites are fading away and replaced by the modern function except the military function. With the international kite festival successfully being held year by year, kite becomes a piece of name card of Weifang. As a result, promoting the national cohesion and communicating the outside world-the political function, and developing Weifang economy rapidly-economic function are the two main function of Weifang kite today.