2724 E-Renlai Magazine - Ersu people in Southwest Sichuan (I)

E-Renlai Magazine - Ersu people in Southwest Sichuan (I)

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Spiritual Computing: Looking at the world from the Other’s eye:
Ersu people in Southwest Sichuan (I)

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Liang Zhun

Liang Zhun
Chengdu 2006-08-26

Villagers from Shimian county, southwest Sichuan, sing an Ersu song. Ersu people today number around 20,000. They have not been officially recognized as an ethnic minority and have been attached to the Tibetans. They are very close to their Yi neighbors. Depending on location, they sometimes call themselves “Lusu”, “Lisu”, or Buersi… Their disappearing writing system, used almost exclusively for religious purposes, is pictographic, and makes use of colors to indicate degrees of expressivity.
In the wake of modernization, despite often expressing the wish to see their traditional culture protected and revived, Ersu people are rapidly losing their language, rituals and other ethnic markers. In Shimian county, though there has been an officially sponsored program for learning the traditional diviner-priest skills, finally none of the ten selected youth has been willing to enter the time-consuming formation with an elder. Music has been better preserved, and a group dedicates itself to Ersu repertory.