The New Territories of Hong Kong has faced the drastic change since the 20th century. As concluded by the Lockhart Report in 1899, the landscape and village setting in the New Territories were much the same in few hundred years before 1900. However, with the social and economic developments, the natural and cultural landscapes of the New Territories have been shaped and evolved obviously. Being one of the witnesses of these changes is because that my family live at Tai Tseng Wai of Wang Chau in Yuen Long, I have my personal attachment and memory to my home village. The precious tangible and intangible heritage is required to record before it will be gone by the threads of development.
There is no comprehensive and systematic research on the heritage resources at Tai Tseng of Wang Chau. As Tai Tseng is far from Yuen Long, there is no published research or study in this area. Most of heritage resources, especially the intangible heritage has been neglected. Most of the reports which are prepared by the Government or consultants are related to the natural environment and historic fabrics for the requirement of planning application and the Environmental Impact Assessment Ordinance (EIAO) such as the construction of sewerage and sewage disposal facilities in Yuen Long. However, the concept of cultural landscape, cultural mapping and intangible heritage are ignored. This research is expected to serve as the documentation and inventory study of heritage resources of Tai Tseng. The natural and cultural heritage will be evaluated and the driven forces will be studied. It is also expected that this study will help us learning more about the current condition of heritage resources in the traditional villages in Hong Kong.
As Tai Tseng is one of Hong Kong surviving living village in the New Territories, it is expected that the research results could be the reference and resources for the challenges and future developments. The research results will also provide the direction and insight for the heritage conservation policy in Hong Kong such as applying the concept of cultural landscape, assessment of intangible heritage and cultural mapping skills to the traditional village in the New Territories.
The study area is Tai Tseng of Wang Chau where is located in the north of Yuen Long. Although there are about ten villages in Wang Chau, only three villages which are located in the north of Wang Chau, including Shing Uk Tsuen, Tai Tseng Wai and Ng Uk Tsuen as labeled in Fig. 1.1 will be studied. Tai Tseng is the collective name which includes Three Villages in the north of Wang Chau.
Tai Tseng is selected because of my personal attachment and connections. As my family is rooted at Tai Tseng Wai, many interesting stories about their cultural practices and ritual customs can be shared with my professional views and theories which I have learnt from the Architectural Conservation Programme (ACP) in The University of Hong Kong. As I am one of the witnesses, its conditions and changes could be assessed. With my family connections, the oral interviews can be conducted with the indigenous villagers to understand their views to Tai Tseng. Their experienced stories can be shared in the research.
Tai Tseng is a good example for the cultural landscape study. Although Tai Tseng is not the oldest village in Wang Chau (the oldest village is Sau Tau Wai), many tangible and intangible heritage resources are still well-preserved. This project also is the example to apply some new conservation concepts and methods such as the concept of cultural landscape and application of cultural mapping. This research is the pilot study to capture the indigenous villagers’ views on the heritage resources through the cultural mapping techniques. Their views to heritage resources will be analyzed and visualized by the form of cultural map. As the landscape and setting of Tai Tseng have been evolved in the 20th century, many precious traditional customs and ritual practices should be recorded before it would be gone. The temporal changes and the driven forces over the last century also provide the insight to us for studying the evolution in the natural and cultural landscapes. This site is a good example to study the development of cultural landscape in the New Territories of Hong Kong. / published_or_final_version / Conservation / Master / Master of Science in Conservation
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:HKU/oai:hub.hku.hk:10722/208061 |
| Date | January 2014 |
| Creators | Lui, Kin-pui, 呂鍵培 |
| Publisher | The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong) |
| Source Sets | Hong Kong University Theses |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | PG_Thesis |
| Rights | The author retains all proprietary rights, (such as patent rights) and the right to use in future works., Creative Commons: Attribution 3.0 Hong Kong License |
| Relation | HKU Theses Online (HKUTO) |
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