Earthwatch Award Recipient Summary
Awardee: Anrong Dang, Ph.D.
Affiliation: Tsinghua University
Project: Chinese Village Traditions
Award: 2007 Principal Investigator of the Year
Project Synopsis
Working with colleagues both in China and the United States, Dr Jin Feng (Iowa State University), Jiang Lu (Eastern Michigan University), and Yanfeng Liu (Yulin College), Dr. Dang is documenting the life and environment of a remote mountain village in Shaanxi Province. Traditional culture is still very alive in Dang Jiashan (or "mountain of the Dangs") village, where people live in cave dwellings built into the cliffs. These traditional cliff dwellings demonstrate many elements of sustainable design, such as their efficient use of materials and land and the thermal mass of their solid loess walls. However, the sustainable lifestyle of villagers is threatened by the pressures of rapid economic development, including modern housing developments. Dang and his colleagues are collecting data on the environment, architecture, and culture of the villagers to develop a integrated digital model of folk life for comparative studies and to monitor future changes. They hope that the database will be valuable for future decisions on environmental policy and cultural preservation, and for scholars advancing a holistic understanding of the human-environment relationship.
Award Outcomes
The Principal Investigator of the Year Award allowed Dr. Dang to purchase a high-quality digital camera expressly for villagers to record their own lifestyles year-round, even when Earthwatch teams are not in the field. This one purchase will allow a more intimate approach to studying the folk traditions of the village. Dang also purchased thermometers so that villagers could record the temperatures both inside and outside their cave dwellings throughout the year, to support data on the thermal efficiency of the dwellings. The award will allow Dang to attend two conferences, one national and one international. Finally, he will also help to support improvements to the village drinking water system.
Publications and Papers
"Application of GIS and RS for Local Cultural Conservation." To be presented at the International Conference on Heritage and Tourism in Guangzhou, China, July 2007.
"Conservation of Chinese Village Traditions supported by Spatial Information Technology." To be presented at the Joint Annual Meeting of American Folklore Society and Folklore Studies Association of Canada in Quebec, Canada, October 2007.
Quotes
"The award made me realize that our research is important to not only for the conservation of Chinese village traditions, but also to some extent for culture protection world wide. I hope that our efforts could make contributions to the building of a global conscience of environmental conservation and a universal culture of sustainability."
"Earthwatch volunteers from diverse backgrounds have been able to offer many valuable suggestions to PIs, villagers, and local government. In the past two years, the local government has solicited advice and suggestions for local social development and culture conservation, and the volunteers have done a great job advocating the values of the traditional culture."
"I grew up in the small village of Dang Jiashan, and although I left the village for almost 30 years I could never forget it. I loved the village just because it was my hometown, and most of my relatives were there. The more our research findings accumulate, the more my feelings for the village grow. Finding a sustainable future for the village is engaging me to conserve the village traditions and encourage the younger generation to keep this sustainable lifestyle. Even I am thinking about returning back to the village when I retire in 20 years. At the same time, I hope our research findings will benefit not only locally, but nationally and even globally."