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"Globally important agricultural heritage transmitters? Not my son" - Shiitake farmers speak about experiences with heritagization and their loss in rural China
Author(s)
Date Issued
2023
Citation
The 24th Annual Conference of the Hong Kong Sociological Association, 2023.
Type
Conference Paper
Abstract
A growing number of traditional agricultural systems around the world have been
designated Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS), as they are exemplars of the
accumulated wisdom of human communities and their close relationship with the local ecology.
Heritage inscription is a strategy used to conserve and increase awareness of this inheritance. For
centuries, traditional farmers have developed diverse and locally adapted agricultural systems,
managing them with ingenious practices that often result in both community food security and the
conservation of agrobiodiversity. This strategy of minimizing risk stabilizes yields, promotes dietary
diversity, and maximizes returns using low levels of technology and limited resources. However, in
China, most of the younger generation from the agricultural heritage site has no intention to return to
the farm, even after their home town has been listed as GIAHS. Drawing on actor-network theory and
based on the experience of shiitake farmers in Qingyuan, Zhejiang who specialize in traditional shiitake
farming, this study demonstrates how the authorized heritage discourse, dominated by the
science-aesthetic expertise, affects the process and impact of heritagization. My study shows that most
of the agricultural transmitters have been excluded from the heritage actor-network. On one hand, the
heritage inscription process of shiitake farming in Qingyuan has created a new form of identity and
economic, culture and moral capital for the scientists, government officers, cultural elite, and shiitake
processing and trading merchants. On the other hand, the shiitake agricultural heritage transmitters
(farmers) have been structurally and socially discriminated against in the urbanization,
industrialization and heritagization process, leading to destabilization of the heritage network and thus
putting the heritage sustainability at risk.
Availability at HKSYU Library
