Dying Hunters, Poison Plants, and Mute Slaves-Nature and Tradition in Contemporary Nuosu Yi Poetry

Themes of nature and traditional culture are common in the works of ethnic poets from a subgroup of the large Yi ethnic group of southwest China known as the Nuosu. Nuosu culture is synonymous with the Liangshan Mountains of southern Sichuan Province. Since the 1980s several dozen Nuosu poets have emerged to form what can be called the 'Liangshan School' of contemporary Chinese poetry. Drawing on theory from Ethnopoetics, Ecoliterature, and Folkloristics the paper introduces major themes in the works of these Nuosu poets and introduces poems by three poets who distinctly utilize nature imagery from a common pool of Yi cultural traditions. These traditions include oral literature, ritual, folk costume, and traditional ideas about social hierarchy and gender relations. Much of the nature imagery is related to folk knowledge of native animals and plants. A major theme in the poetry is the response to changes in tradition and the local environment brought about by rapid growth and development in China.