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Showing posts with label cultural. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cultural. Show all posts

Jul 23, 2015

Bhutan’s saving unique written culture


Traditional calligraphy and xylography in the country are on terminal decline with increasing population being exposed to computers and electronic gadgets, researchers said.
In an attempt to preserve the traditional calligraphic, xyllographic and print culture in the country, experts from around the country are working on the National Library and Archives of Bhutan’s (NLAB) three-year project. German Bhutan Himalaya Society is funding the first phase with Nu 2.16 million.
They are conducting a research on historical significance of ancient calligraphy and xylographic print culture, and making videos of the calligraphic skills. The national library would also have a small museum with various exhibits collected during their research.
The project is divided in to two phases of 18 months each. In the first phase that ends in December 2016, besides collecting initial samples, the researchers would compile and produce a draft book.
One of the researchers and the project consultant, Gregor Verhufen said that the country has a unique written script, a vast and great tradition now threatened by the explosion of technology.
Gregor Verhufen is a German researcher on Tibetan language and culture including its neighbours and has helped create a digital catalogue of the 140,000 texts in the national library in a 10-year project in the early 2000.
Mgyogs yig (jo-yig), a script introduced to Bhutan by a disciple of Guru Padmasambhawa, Denma Tsemang during the Guru’s second visit is unique to this country,” Gregor said.
However, an English explorer in 1907 discovered a sample of the script in a monastery now called Dunhuang, on the old silk route, in China.
“So the question is how did the script reach thousand of miles away from here, which is interesting to research,” he said. “This is not just significant from a religious point but also from the cultural side.”
Chief research officer of NLAB, (Dr) Yonten Dargye said the project could not lose any more time. “There are still few experts on the writing culture and we would document every aspect of it for preservation,” he said.
“Few years down the line, we may not be able to achieve what we can today.”
Researchers said that without proper research and documentation, the significance of this heritage that forefathers valued may not be properly understood and appreciated by future generations.
Given that great Buddhist masters introduced the preponderance of this heritage to establish national identity, it is important that the most accurate information possible is gathered, analysed, and documented for posterity, researchers said.
The book has eight chapters on topics including traditional paper-making, ink, pen, origin of the Bhutanese script (Mgyogs-yig), xylography, and printing texts, among others.\
Source: Kuenselonline.com

May 24, 2011

Appreciate traditional cultural aspects of Bhutan

By the last session, the audience had thinned significantly. Only a few seats remained occupied.

Despite the poor attendance, the last two speakers of the Mountain Echoes literary festival got their small audience singing and clapping along to some traditional Bhutanese songs.

Kencho Lham, a farmer from Paro, and Chang Dorji, a local author, ended their session on oral traditions, with a plea to the youth to appreciate traditional cultural aspects of Bhutan and continue its practices. They expressed the worry that Bhutanese youth are today more appreciative of foreign cultures. Perhaps, reflecting their concern, only a few young Bhutanese were seated in the audience, almost all of them media personnel.

The last day of the literary festival also saw a lively exchange of opinions between eminent Indian literalist Shobhaa De, Lily Wangchuk, the executive director of the Bhutan Media Foundation, and the Indian ambassador to Bhutan, Pavan Varma. They were speaking on empowerment and representation of women in decision-making positions.

Lily Wangchuk said that, while the position of women in Bhutan is better, when compared to other countries in the region, there are still wide gender gaps. “Till now we’ve never had a single woman minister, we’ve never had a single woman dzongda, we’ve never a single female ambassador, at the grassroots level, the representation of woman is 0.5 percent against 99.5 male.”

She attributed the wide gender gaps to social, cultural, and religious barriers. She said, as a GNH country, all policies should be looked at with a “gender lens” rather than a gender neutral approach. “It’s very crucial for us to have more women in governance.”

Shobhaa De said that, based on her experience, creating such filters or ‘gender lens’ instead created barriers. “Any kind of quota system eventually backfires, any policy based on a bias, in the case of women of course, the counter argument is we require that leg up, but at what cost?”

She said she preferred gender become a non-issue and that only merit is taken into account. “If we’re going to get women in parliament, who are actually going to be contributing, I’d rather have someone who’s in parliament representing not just women but men,” she said, “and doing so, because that person deserves to be there, not because that person happens to be born a woman.

Ambassador Pavan Varma disagreed with Shobhaa De. He said that saying that affirmative action or the quota system means an absence of merit is a “false assumption”. He added, “The fact that there was reservation and affirmative action for scheduled castes and scheduled tribes, who for 2000 years had suffered kinds of oppression, which has not been seen by most societies in the world, has helped in their empowerment.” He pointed out that in the first constituent assembly the two groups had only 4 percent representation. As a result of affirmative action, he said the groups had more seats than they had reserved for them today.

“Affirmative action has given India Mayawati,” said Shobhaa De, referring to the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh. She added, “That’s one of the offshoots of the reservation system we have.” Mayawati, a product of the Indian reservation system, faces allegations of using her status to amass personal wealth. Lily Wangchuk said that, in Bhutan, situations, where financially challenged families keep their daughters at home to work, rather than educating them still occurred.

The literary festival also presented the opportunity for book launches by local authors. Kunzang Choden, the author of Folk tales of Bhutan, launched two story books for children: Aunty Mouse and Room in your Heart. Gopilal Acharya launched a collection of poems, Dancing to Death.

Source: Kuenselonline

Jul 14, 2009

Culture and Religion

Cradled in the folds of the Himalayas, Bhutan has relied on its geographic isolation to protect itself from outside cultural influences. A sparsely populated country bordered by India to the south and China to the north, Bhutan has long maintained a policy of strict isolationism, both culturally and economically, with the goal of preserving its cultural heritage and independence. Only in the last decades of the 20th century were foreigners allowed to visit the country, and only then in limited numbers. In this way, Bhutan has successfully preserved many aspects of a culture which dates directly back to the mid-17th century.

Bhutanese culture derives from ancient Tibetan culture. Dzongkha and Sharchop, the principal Bhutanese languages, are closely related to Tibetan, and Bhutanese monks read and write the ancient variant of the Tibetan language known as chhokey. Bhutanese are physically similar to the Tibetans but history does not record when they crossed over the Himalayas and settled in the south-draining valleys of Bhutan. Both Tibetans and Bhutanese revere the tantric Guru Padmasambhava the founder of Himalayan Buddhism in the 8th century.

Religion - Tantric Buddhism

Bhutanese society is centered around the practice of Tantric Buddhism. Religious beliefs are evidenced in all aspects of life. Prayer flags flutter on hillsides offering up prayers to benefit all nearby sentient beings. Houses each fly a small white flag on the roof indicating the owner has made his offering payments to appease the local god. Each valley or district is dominated by a huge dzong, or high-walled fortresses, which serves the religious and administrative center of the district.