Contemporary Northeast Chinese Shamanism in the Interaction Between Public Heritage and Private Belief

Since China joined the UNESCO intangible heritage convention in 2004, private shamanism—centered on the belief in connecting heaven and earth—has been legally incorporated into the national heritage management system as regulated public heritage, provided it avoids religious attributes. Fieldwork and historical analysis show a new symbiotic relationship between public heritage and private belief in Northeast Chinese shamanism. This takes two forms: the emergence of public heritage from private practices, and the expansion of private belief's existence through public heritage support. This bidirectional model challenges the idea that heritagization weakens faith, offering a new framework for understanding ritual systems today.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Since China’s accession to the UNESCO Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2004, private shamanism, centered around the sacred belief of “connecting heaven and earth”, has for the first time been incorporated into the national heritage management system with legal legitimacy, becoming regulated public heritage on the condition of avoiding religious attributes. Through fieldwork and historical analysis, this paper examines the interaction between public heritage and private belief in contemporary Northeast Chinese shamanism. The research reveals the mutual influence between the public and private domains of shamanic ritual practices, with a new synthesis or symbiotic relationship emerging across these domains, which is manifested in two main aspects: first, the “generation of the public from the private”, exemplified by the emergence of the public heritage associated with shamanism, and second, the “promotion of the private by the public”, where the sacred private belief expands its existential space with the assistance of newly recognized public heritage. This bidirectional interaction model challenges the conventional notion that “heritagization leads to the decline of faith”, offering a novel interpretive framework for understanding the contemporary transformation of ritual systems.