“The folk culture of the sea and islands of Thanh Hoa is like an intoxicating liquor that permeates my life”...

(Baothanhhoa.vn) - After many efforts, persistent efforts, drawing from experiences, research, and accumulation, Dr. Hoang Ba Tuong has introduced to readers the elaborate, thick book "Folklore of the sea and islands of Thanh land" as the crystallization of love, dedication, and intelligence.

Nghi Son island commune (now Nghi Son ward). Photo: Dang Khoa

Dr. Hoang Ba Tuong was born in the ancient fishing village named Ke Kha, now Doan Hung residential group, Hai Binh ward, Thanh Hoa province. In his first breath, there was the salty taste of the sea. His childhood gradually grew up in lullabies, legends, and myths associated with mysterious and sacred gods sea. The sea in him is the boundless love for family, relatives, friends and is also the place to keep precious memories. The folk culture of the sea and islands is like an intoxicating yeast that has permeated his life.

From ancient times to the present, the sea has always played a particularly important role and significance in human life. Along with deep international integration, turning towards the sea and sustainable development from the sea coordinates opens up new spaces and areas, becoming the strategic orientation of many countries, territories and localities with sea.

Thanh Hoa province is blessed by nature with a 102km long coastline. This is not only a place with beautiful natural scenery, abundant marine resources that have nourished many generations of people, but also an area with an important strategic position in terms of national defense and security, a driving force for economic development and a place where historical values ​​​​and diverse and unique cultural quintessence are preserved.

As a person born and raised on the sea, from a young age, Dr. Hoang Ba Tuong had the opportunity to travel along the coast of Thanh Hoa to exploit, record, and collect folk materials provided by the people of the coastal villages. In his introduction to readers, Dr. Hoang Ba Tuong confided: “When I was still in university, every summer vacation, I went to the coastal villages, to Nghi Son Island, where my aunt married a man from Bien Island, to ask questions, record, and collect stories, rhymes, folk songs, and songs of the coastal people with great interest and passion, and until today, I still remind myself: learning from folk, learning from books, learning from teachers, asking friends... is never enough”.

Along with that, Dr. Hoang Ba Tuong has worked hard to learn, absorb, and supplement knowledge from documents and materials of prestigious scientists and researchers on marine culture in and outside the province. Then, after many efforts, persistent efforts, drawing from experiences, research, and accumulation, Dr. Hoang Ba Tuong has introduced to readers the elaborate, thick book "Folklore of the sea and islands of Thanh land" as the crystallization of love, dedication, and intelligence.

With a capacity of about 1,000 pages, the book "Folklore of the sea and islands of Thanh land" is composed of 5 parts: Stories of the sea of ​​Thanh land; Proverbs, idioms, folk songs, folk verses, folk songs; Beliefs, festivals; Traditional occupations and culinary culture; Folk culture of coastal villages and coastal island communes of Thanh land. Each part is presented in the form of many different chapters. Through each part, each chapter, Dr. Hoang Ba Tuong is like a tour guide, an ambassador who takes tourists "diving" deep into the rich and impressive space of folklore of the sea and islands of Thanh land, which both converges the common features of the sea in the Northern region and carries the unique features of the culture of the sea in North Central Vietnam.

Dr. and cultural researcher Hoang Ba Tuong (right in the photo) conducted a field survey at Nghi Son island commune (now Nghi Son ward).

The ancient Vietnamese people in the coastal areas of Thanh Hoa have been attached to the sea since quite early. For many generations, generations of people here with open minds and rich intelligence have created and passed on many traditional cultural heritages, deeply imprinted in the folk consciousness from generation to generation. These are customs, practices, beliefs, proverbs, folk songs, folk songs or a treasure trove of legends and myths about human gods, natural gods, giants with the ability to dig the sea, carry mountains, dig rivers, fill seas and the life of production and labor associated with people who are used to "eating waves, talking to the wind", with the mindset of "only those who are strong can stand against the wind" but have a gentle and open soul... The cultural heritage of Thanh Hoa's sea and islands over time has crystallized into values, reflecting the soul, determination and temperament of each person at the forefront of the waves and winds, becoming the luggage and motivation to help the people of Thanh Hoa's sea and islands strive to build an increasingly better life.

The vast treasure of knowledge about the folk culture of the sea and islands presented in this book is the result of years of hard work traveling to all the sea areas of Thanh Hoa, meeting many people to delve into each layer and layer of history and culture, filtering through the treasure of folk knowledge to see the sparkling "gold dust". The "weight" and value of the book does not lie in its volume but in the amount of information, knowledge and clear interpretations of the author in his efforts to collect and research the culture of the sea and islands of Thanh Hoa, a vast, comprehensive, multi-layered and multi-faceted topic.

Associate ProfessorDr. Mai Van Tung affirmed: "This is the largest scientific work ever on the sea and island culture of Thanh land, with the nature of research, collection, exploitation and good inheritance of a rich system of documents, with high scientific reliability. Therefore, I consider this the most important work on the sea and islands of Thanh land, which can be used to look up the folk culture of the sea and islands of Thanh land, contributing to the overall picture of the culture of the sea and islands of Vietnam".

“Thanh Hoa's sea and island folk culture” is one of the bright and bold colors in the overall picture of the rich and unique Vietnamese sea and island culture. In the trend of increasingly strong integration, cultural exchange and development, the values ​​of Thanh Hoa's sea and island folk culture need to be respected, promoted more actively and effectively in the period of industrialization, modernization and deep international integration.

Associate ProfessorDr. Lam Ba Nam, President of the Vietnam Association of Ethnology and Anthropology, said: "The book is a collection of works, a hot topic today in politics, science and law... This will be a useful document not only for science but also demonstrates the thinking and vision that connects tradition with the present, while predicting the future context."

Dang Khoa

Source: https://baothanhhoa.vn/van-hoa-dan-gian-bien-dao-xu-thanh-nbsp-nhu-chat-men-say-ngam-vao-doi-toi-254104.htm