Performing culture and change in a volcanic village in Hainan Island: the rongtang village

This paper focuses on the Rongtang Village ((sic)(sic)(sic)) in Shishan Town ((sic)(sic)(sic)), Haikou, Hainan Province, China. A volcanic stone village with a history of over 800 years. The study examines the evolution of this southern China's volcano village from its social, cultural and spatial configuration, particularly looking at the changes occurring as a result of the urbanization process and as the target of a weak heritage protection policy that is nonetheless transforming the sense of place of the village as well as the community's collective imagination. Through immersive ethnographic fieldwork in the Rongtang Village, we observed the villagers' living conditions, the geographical environment of the village, the long-standing cultural relics and their usage in the village's daily life, as well as during festivities and celebrations. We have conducted in-depth interviews with villagers to listen to their village stories, understand their lifestyles, and perspectives on the Village's occurring changes. The result is a preliminary descriptive cultural network that aspires to gather together the cultural expressions of a way of life that is mostly ignored by contemporary scholarships, especially in English language. This study provides the foundation for supplementary anthropological work on volcano villages.