Jia Bazize

01 · Lineage & Regional School

Jia Bazize, Female, Yi, from Zhaojue, Sichuan, is a fifth-batch national representative bearer of Yi Costume (Ⅹ-156). The tradition is documented in Zhaojue, Sichuan. Within the regional tradition and school record of Yi Costume in Zhaojue, Sichuan: The Yi have numerous branches, which have produced rich regional styles; the Yi costume of the Zhaojue area of Liangshan is an important component of them. Yi costume culture in Zhaojue County, Sichuan Province, has deep roots; it brings together the costume styles of the three major dialect areas of Yinuo, Shengzha, and Suodi, and has long been known as the "hometown of Yi costume culture." Within Zhaojue County in Liangshan, costumes of the three major dialect areas — Shengzha, Yinuo, and Suodi — are distributed; as a rule their differences can be told from the width of the trouser legs worn by Yi men. The emergence and development of Yi costume are closely bound up with the history and beliefs of the Yi people. It was not created in a single act, but accumulated layer upon layer as Yi society divided and migrated: the felt cape, the sheepskin jacket, the fire-steel-flame patterned armor, and the retrospective patterns embroidered on the chest — each one corresponds to a stretch of life or a sacrificial rite. Hence the saying that it is like a history worn on the body: to read its patterns and accessories is to read through the routes by which the Yi migrated and split apart.

02 · Mastery & Signature Works

Female, of the Yi ethnic group, born in November 1966, a native of Xichang City, Sichuan Province. She learned Yi costume making from her mother from early childhood and by the age of fourteen had a basic command of the fundamental techniques. She has successively opened a Yi costume workshop, founded a shop and a factory for traditional Yi dress, and made Yi costumes for the song and dance troupe of the Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture. She has a complete command of the Yi traditional costume techniques of spinning, weaving, dyeing, cutting, sewing and embroidery, is familiar with and observes the customary uses of traditional dress, and can design and produce patterns with fine workmanship. She has devoted herself to teaching Yi costume making and has taken more than two hundred apprentices, many of whom have been rated as prefectural or county-level transmitters. She has also established a training institute for Yi costume skills that trains rural women of the prefecture, helping them to find work and increase their incomes while transmitting Yi costume techniques. Within the documented technical tradition of Yi Costume in Zhaojue, Sichuan: The Yinuo costume custom area, also called the wide-trouser-leg region, is typically represented by Qingheng Township and others; the Shengzha costume custom area, that is, the medium-trouser-leg region, is represented by Bi'er Township and others; the Suodi costume custom area, in other words the narrow-trouser-leg region, is represented by Dimo Township. By style, Yi costume divides into headwear, upper garments, trousers, skirts, and outerwear. From a functional standpoint it divides into everyday dress, work dress, the rite of changing the child's skirt, wedding dress, funeral dress, sacrificial dress, and festive ceremonial dress. Taking occupation as the criterion, there is the dress of the bimo (ritual specialist), the suni (shaman), the degu (mediator), and the warrior. By sex it comprises men's garments and women's garments; by age it comprises garments for the elderly, for the middle-aged and young, and for children. Zhaojue Yi men's dress includes headwear, an upper garment, trousers, and accessories such as the duta and a sword. Women's dress consists of headwear, an upper garment, a skirt, and accessories of gold, silver, and jewelry. Traditional Yi dress for both men and women is predominantly white, black, and blue. Both men and women wear the jiashi and the wala. Ornament is mostly made up of patterns based on fern tendril, fire-steel flame, and sheep-horn motifs. Ornamentation is commonly worked on the chest, shoulders, cuffs, and front edges of upper garments. The workmanship relies mainly on embroidery, using picked floral, appliqué, and patchwork techniques. The emergence and development of Yi costume are closely bound up with the history and beliefs of the Yi people; like a history worn on the body, it carries the Yi people's past years. Once apprentices have completed their training, they usually set up on their own and then pass the craft on to new apprentices, and so the cycle repeats. Yi costume is an important vehicle of Yi culture: a materialized spiritual product and a living folk culture. The crafts associated with this heritage item — plant dyeing and printing, wool felting and weaving, embroidery, lacquer work in the making of leather armor and leather bracers, and gold and silver ornament making — fully demonstrate the outstanding wisdom and rich creativity of the Yi people, and are of reference value for research in folklore studies, ethnology, and the applied arts. Representative repertoire, works and technical entries recorded for the project include: "The great-trouser style of Yino": The Yino area is also called the big-trouser region, typified by villages such as Qingheng; the wide trousers are lifted for walking and carry both ease of movement and dignity. "The middle-trouser style of Shengzha": The Shengzha area, the middle-trouser region, is represented by villages such as Bier; its cut is moderate and its decoration more restrained. "The narrow-trouser style of Suodi": The Suodi area, the narrow-trouser region, is represented by Dimo; between the three areas the size of a man’s trouser hem alone identifies the wearer. "Daily wear of jia-shi and wa-la": Both men and women wear jia-shi and wa-la in plain white, black and blue, the sturdiest working dress of the mountains and the base beneath festive attire.

03 · Transmission & Safeguarding Status

She is a representative bearer of Yi Costume, a fifth-batch national intangible cultural heritage project.

04 · Associated Heritage Item Dossier

05 · Fellow National Bearers Lineage

National representative bearers recorded under the same item code, ordered from the first to the sixth batch. Batch order is not a teacher–student relationship.

06 · Archival Sources & Bibliography

1. Jia Bazize · National Representative Bearer Archive