Ritual Performance and the Construction of Local Order in Gaozhou Puppetry

Abstract

The Gaozhou puppet theater is not only an important traditional performing art in the western Guangdong region, but also a ritualized cultural practice deeply embedded in local customary activities such as annual festivals (nianli) and temple fairs. Existing studies have mainly focused on its artistic form, performance techniques, and heritage preservation, while paying insufficient attention to how it participates in the construction of local social order through ritual performance.Based on fieldwork, interview records, and related survey materials, this study draws on Erving Goffman’s dramaturgical approach and Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of practice to analyze the subject from three dimensions: skill training, ritual performance, and order maintenance. The study finds that during long-term apprenticeship, Gaozhou puppet theater performers internalize norms through bodily training, occupational taboos, and disciplinary mechanisms. In public ritual contexts such as annual festivals, stage spatial arrangements, opening ceremonies, and procedural movements visually enact the sacred authority, ethical relations, and hierarchical order within local society. Through cyclical performances, intervillage dissemination, audience–performer interaction, and ongoing industry negotiation, these norms are repeatedly performed, accepted, and gradually transformed into a shared experiential framework among community members. Therefore, Gaozhou puppet theater is not merely an aesthetic performance form, but a socio-cultural mechanism that, through embodied practice, participates in the affirmation and reproduction of local social order.