East West Festive Cultures

London

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Ming-Ai (London) Institute

How do traditional Chinese festivals differ from their British counterparts and why?  This project was studying the similarities and differences between festivals by comparing, for example, Hallowe'en with the Chinese Ghost Month, and St. Valentine's Day with the Chinese Lantern Festival.  The research looked back to the 1950s to see how Chinese people have practised their cultural festivals while living in London and how those practices change as time goes by. 

We interviewed three different groups of people.  The first group was those Chinese who moved to the UK at an early age and have been living in the UK for a long time.  The second group was those mixed marriage Chinese who have shared with us how they celebrate those East and West festivals with their western partners: we can see the effect of mixed marriages on celebrating two cultures.  The third group was those Chinese or half-Chinese born or brought up in the UK.  They had lots of interesting experiences to share with us.

The project website was created to keep the oral history archives, research findings and also education materials.