Live-streaming a new way to promote Chinese traditional culture: newspaper

Online live-streaming has helped attract more young people to Chinese traditional culture and created new forms of cultural performance, which is considered conducive to popularizing and keeping traditional culture alive, Guangming Daily reported.

The newspaper said live-streaming has rekindled young people's interests in Chinese traditional culture. Guangming Online rolled out more than 30 series of online live streams about intangible cultural heritage in 2017 and received around 30 million views, it said.

It has offered a brand new stage for traditional culture performers and brought different experiences to its audience, according to the newspaper.

An online anchor, once a Cantonese Opera actor, got popular by performing traditional opera on the live-streaming platform Kugou in an innovative way -- by rapping in Cantonese, it said.

Bai Jin, a Beijing Opera actor from a Beijing-based theater, was quoted as saying that live-streaming has changed the content and forms of traditional culture, which previously did not meet the diversified aesthetic demands of modern society.

"It feels like talking with the heroine face to face," a netizen was quoted as saying about a live-streaming performance of "The Peony Pavilion," a well-known Kunqu Opera by China's ancient playwright Tang Xianzu.

In addition to traditional opera, Chinese traditional culture of various kinds such as ancient garments and folk handicrafts have also found their way to live-streaming platforms.

It has not only boosted the popularity of traditional culture but also improved the environment of online live-streaming, according to the newspaper.

"Live-streaming of traditional culture means more than shouldering social responsibility and has increased the popularity of our platform," Jia Wei, director of the live-streaming business of social media Momo, was quoted as saying.

Meanwhile, the newspaper suggested young professionals in this field learn more from veteran artists and raise their performance levels, and integrate traditional Chinese culture into daily life.

(CGTN)