The Communication Of Tea Art From A Ritual View Of CommunicatioN

Xinyang area,where produces Xinyang Maojian tea in Henan province, is a tea producing area with long histories and high reputation in the Central Plains. As an important part of regional culture, tea culture in Xinyang has been developing a ritualized communication of poetry and shared significance through tea houses in the area as the medium and the field.The thesis firstly analyzes contemporary tea houses and the current situation of the communication of tea culture from a macro perspective. It strives to define the concept of tea culture, summarize the means, characteristics and significance of tea culture communication through tea houses, which paves the way for the details and background of the research.The thesis regards the communication of tea culture as a poetic ritual of cultural communication and concretely analyzes the constitution, the process and the features of ritual from a micro-perspective. It holds the point that as a medium and a field of ritual, the tea house is a cold medium that can extend the senses of audiences in accordance with the constitution of ritual. In a tea house, the new melodies mixed with ancient rhymes of tea culture can be found in every scene and the poetic atmosphere with tea can be savored in every detail. The performances of ritual, including the tea set, commentary, body languages, the costume, the music and environment decoration, are all filled with tea culture and served for the ritual as forms or methods. The rules of ritual are based on the performance pattern and the tea etiquette. According to the process of ritual, the performances, the content of Xinyang Maojian tea art, embodies the poetry of ritual. In terms of the features of ritual, this kind of ritual has three concrete features, that is, stylized controlling, cultural interestingness and cultural performing.From the angle of analysis of symbols, the thesis also considers the ritual as a symbolic system with poetic symbols. Through the analysis of three different dimensions including the messages of symbolic Information, symbolic interaction and interpretation of significance, the thesis draws a conclusion that with respect to the ideographical expression of symbols of tea culture and regional culture, a ritual of tea culture communication does exists in the tea house in Xinyang. In such an interactive mode with edutainment the ritual conducts a tea culture communication which has the cultural identity based on an imaginary regional cultural community. Moreover, the ritual also shares the significance of the ritual of tea culture communication that is full of Xinyang characteristics under the influence of regional cultural psychology.