The Mobility And Cultural Changes Of Traditional Batik Craftsmakers In Ethnic Minority Areas

Against the backdrop of globalization,rural-to-urban migration,and new policies aimed at ethnic minority culture development,ethnic minority villagers with traditional handcraft skills areas are gradually leaving agricultural as their primary form of labor.Consumers' growing desire for ‘mysterious' and ‘exotic' traditional ethnic minority culture and cultural products have indirectly contributed to the labor mobility of ethnic minority craftspeople and socio-cultural changes in their communities.At the same time,government officials and professionals from various fields are working together with craftspeople to create handcraft workshops,cooperatives,and social enterprises to revive and reinvigorate ethnic minority handcrafts.These trends have created the conditions for the mobility of ethnic minority craftspeople to different geographic and cultural environments.Such mobility has brought implicit and explicit cultural changes to ethnic minority craftspeople,as well as changes to the inheritance of ethnic minority handcraft traditions.This paper explores changes in ethnic minority culture and batik handcrafts from the perspective of labor mobility.Applying globalization and cultural change theories,this analysis seeks to understand how the inheritance of indigenous handcraft traditions simultaneously conflicts with and is reinvigorated by rapid development and changing consumer demands.Anthropological field research,literature analysis,text analysis,in-depth interviews,comparative methods,and participant observation were utilized to understand:(1)changes in the material and socio-cultural outcomes of labor mobility among batik artisans in Danzhai County,Guizhou;and(2)changes in the perceptions of ethnic minority culture and craftwork,both by flexible others and among batik artisans themselves.In drawing linkages between labor mobility and cultural changes among batik artisans,this study contributes to the understanding of cultural change in ethnic minority areas,and offers new insights for the protection of cultural heritage and folk artists amid cultural development in ethnic minority areas.