The Folkloric Study Of Zhaozhou Bridge Legend

In this paper, Chinese people's cultural concept and folkloric feelings reflected by Zhaozhou Bridge during its development as well as its folkloric value are highly valued. Moreover, the study of Zhaozhou bridge will be beneficial not only to build the history of folk thought but also to inherit and spread the folklore culture.The paper aims at analyzing and exploring the narrative characteristics of Zhaozhou Bridge, the theories related to Storiology and Folkloristics as well as the materials of ancient books and the text materials gathered and sorted out by folklore scholar and the writer himself through field work are applied to explore the Zhaozhou Bridge legend. Besides, according to the content, it consists of such four parts as Jiaohe legend,construction legend, myth legend and the legend of historical figures, and which make up the system of Zhaozhou Bridge legend. Through analyzing these four parts, the narrative characteristic and folkloric meanings of Zhaozhou Bridge legend are simplely explored. Compared with other local legends, Zhaozhou Bridge legend also abides by the 3-paragraph style, and the creation methods like imagination,exaggeration etc. are also used. Therefore, in Zhaozhou Bridge legend, many stories especially the story of Luban's building bridge and the story of the Eight Fairies'crossing bridge are more popular and impressive, and finally the spreading circle of Zhaozhou Bridge legend was formed. Furthermore, due to the local people's participation in the development of Zhaozhou Bridge legend, some ancient famous figures like Luban, Zhang Guolao etc. were closely related to the Zhaozhou Bridge, which to some degree reflects people's cultural concept and folkloric feelings, and simultaneously, the concept of Chinese"dragon"was embodied here and there in Zhaozhou Bridge legend. At last, Zhaozhou Bridge plays a very important role in sustaining the people's feelings and increasing the cohesion of villages around it.The paper is composed of 5 parts including 4 chapters, introduction, references etc., with a total words of 45,000.