Reconstruction Of Belief

This study tries to examine the practice in the revival of the belief of Cai lineage members in the north of Guangzhou Liwan District. Through the meaning of this practice, I want to understand the primary reason of belief revival in current communities in southern china, particularly which have the deep modernization such as Guangzhou.By backtracking folk belief evolution of Guangzhou over the past century, this view thinks that the local folk belief is based on the lineage-based organization and geo-centric organization with"fraternal villages"as centre. After the socialist reconstruction of the grass-roots community, the folk belief lost its basis for existence. The belief revival of local society in South China, is the external performance to cope with the disorder and build local self-organization space during the transition period. To illustrate this point, this paper introduces "symbolic capital" concept of P.Bourdieu, through detailed description of strategies that Cai lineage members used of belief revival and the different symbols used in the ceremony, I shows that folk belief is not only a psychological comfort, but also a set of flexible use of symbolic capital. In the historical practices of Villagers that seek for autonomy space, this round of revival is not simply replica of the original folk beliefs, but a symbol rebuilding in the dialogue with the national ideology.