Textual Analysis Of Songs Of Sacrificial Rituals In Hongfeng Gelao

The Gelao people have a rich culture of sacrifice.During the sacrifice,songs of sacrificial rituals are chanted by sacrificial masters in Gelao language to worship the ancestors and deities.However,these songs can only be passed down orally through generations,due to the lack of a writing system matching the Gelao language in the history of the Gelao people.Nowadays,with the rapid development of economic globalization,the Gelao language,like many other minority languages,is going through a drastic decline in the number of native speakers and is even on the verge of extinction.As an important part of the language and culture of Gelao,these songs of sacrificial rituals are about to be lost.Therefore,documentation and conservation of these songs have positive practical significance and important academic value.At present,previous work and research on the songs of sacrificial rituals are centered around their collection and classification,with more attention given to related external factors such as social,cultural and psychological aspects,than to their internal linguistic features.In light of this,taking the songs of sacrificial rituals in Hongfeng Village,Pudi Township,One Hundred Li Azalea Precinct,Guizhou Province as the research object,this thesis aims to first analyze the reiteration device,co-occurrence device and formulaic structures of these songs of sacrificial rituals,and then to investigate the features of textual organization of these songs,so as to provide a case of linguistic research on the features of songs of sacrificial rituals as oral traditional texts.Specifically,the following research questions are aimed to be answered:(1)what kind of cohesive devices are mainly used in the songs of sacrificial rituals in Hongfeng Gelao?(2)What kind of formulaic structures are used?(3)What kind of features are presented in textual organization?Study reveals that two major cohesive devices are used in the songs of sacrificial rituals in Hongfeng Gelao,namely lexical reiteration and lexical co-occurrence.Lexical reiteration includes repetition of the same word,of a synonym and of a general word.Lexical co-occurrence includes co-occurrence of antonyms and co-occurrence of collocation.As for formulaic structures,there are two major types of construction,namely,topic construction and mood construction.The topic construction shows an obvious feature of topic chain construction,and the mood construction mainly includes indicative mood and imperative mood.The alternate use of these two mood reflects the distinctive features of these songs of sacrificial rituals,that is,by instructing ghosts and spirits to drive away evil spirits and avoid harm to seek good luck and pray for good fortune,these songs highlight the function to provide information,command,request,reminder and persuasion.With respect to textual organization,distinct structural features are represented in these songs,namely,coherence,similarity,intensity and symmetry.Among them,coherence shows that several cohesive chains that run through the whole or a part of a text,interweave and interact with each other,and together form the main body network of these songs of sacrificial rituals.All these features make the songs of sacrificial rituals easy to be recited and remembered,which characterize textual organization of these songs as oral texts.This research deepens the understanding of features of songs of sacrificial rituals in Hongfeng Gelao and also provides a case of research on songs of sacrificial rituals from the perspective of text linguistics.