鲁迅先生1934年4月19日在《致陈烟桥》的信中有这样一段话：“现在的文学也一样，有地方色彩的，倒容易成为世界的，即为别国所注意。打出世界去，即于中国之活动有利。”后来，也不知是谁将鲁迅这段话的意思简述为“越是民族的，越是世界”。
On 19 April 1934, Lu Xun wrote in a letter to Chen Yanqiao: “The same is true of literature today. Works with local colour are more likely to become world literature, that is, to attract attention abroad. Going out into the world is beneficial to China’s activities.” Later, someone condensed the spirit of these words into the well-known saying: “The more national, the more universal.”
1993年2月8日，我在《中国文化报》上发表一篇3000字左右的短文，其题目是《侗族文化三样宝——鼓楼、大歌、风雨桥》。从此，侗族文化有“三宝”的说法就到处传开了。其实，侗族文化宝贝很多，不止“三宝”。如侗款、侗戏、侗药以及软田糯稻等等，都是侗乡经济文化的宝贝。
On 8 February 1993, I published a short essay of about 3,000 characters in China Culture Daily entitled “Three Treasures of Dong Culture: Drum Towers, Grand Songs, and Wind-and-Rain Bridges.” From that moment the idea that Dong culture has “three treasures” spread widely. In reality Dong culture contains many more treasures than three: Dong customary law (kuan), Dong opera, Dong medicine, and soft-field glutinous rice, among others, are all precious assets of the Dong homeland’s economy and culture.
如今，侗族大歌已经被公认为世界级的“人类非物质文化遗产代表作”，而且这个“代表作”正在以她独有的魅力征服和影响着国内外一些人类的子孙，也正在以她独有的魅力给侗乡各族人民的子孙带来不大不小的实惠。但是，仅仅依靠侗族大歌带来的实惠很难彻底改变侗乡贫穷落后的现状，因为侗族大歌毕竟是属于上层建筑领域中的一种艺术形态。
Today the Dong Grand Song has been recognised as a Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity. This masterpiece is conquering and influencing descendants of humanity both at home and abroad with its unique charm, and is bringing tangible benefits, large and small, to the people of the Dong homeland. Yet relying solely on the benefits brought by the Grand Song is unlikely to fundamentally transform the poverty and backwardness of the Dong regions, because the Grand Song ultimately belongs to the superstructure—an artistic form.
政治经济学的常识告诉我们：任何上层建筑领域中的艺术形态，都要建筑在与之相适应的经济基础之上。侗族大歌的生存，就是建筑在侗乡软田糯稻农业经济基础之上的。具体地说，就是建筑在以耕种软田糯稻为主的生产方式和生活方式的基础之上。不信？你可以去深入考察一下。历史上的侗族大歌主要流行于侗语南部方言第二土语区，即今黎平东南部、从江西北部及榕江东部和三江西北部的一些侗族村寨里。这一地区的侗族人民，在历史上主要是经营软田并种植糯稻，食用糯米，其民风民俗大多也和软田糯稻有关。
A basic principle of political economy tells us that any artistic form in the superstructure must rest upon a corresponding economic base. The survival of the Dong Grand Song is built upon the soft-field glutinous-rice agricultural economy of the Dong homeland. More precisely, it is built upon a mode of production and way of life centred on the cultivation of soft-field glutinous rice. If you doubt this, go and investigate thoroughly. Historically, the Dong Grand Song was mainly popular in the second sub-dialect area of the southern Dong dialect—today’s southeastern Liping, northwestern Congjiang, eastern Rongjiang, and northwestern Sanjiang. In these areas the Dong people traditionally managed soft fields, planted glutinous rice, and ate sticky rice; most of their customs and folklore were also connected with soft-field glutinous rice.
大家知道，任何生物都离不开水。人类可以几天不吃饭，但不能几天不喝水！月球、木星、火星有无生物？关键在于那里有没有水！所以说“水是生命的源泉”！传统糯稻一般都种植在一年四季都蓄水的稻田里，侗语称之为Yav Mas（软田）。软田一般都不用犁田、耙田。秋收后人们把剩余的糯稻秆踩进泥里，稻秆腐烂后就是上好的底肥，来年就可以直接在软田里插秧。1958年以前，软田约占南部侗乡稻田总面积80%以上。
Everyone knows that no living thing can exist without water. Humans can go several days without food, but not without water. Whether the Moon, Jupiter or Mars has life depends above all on whether water is present. Hence the saying “water is the source of life.” Traditional glutinous rice was generally grown in fields that held water all year round; in Dong these are called Yav Mas (soft fields). Soft fields usually required neither ploughing nor harrowing. After the autumn harvest people trampled the remaining rice stalks into the mud; once the stalks rotted they became excellent base fertiliser, and seedlings could be transplanted directly the following year. Before 1958, soft fields accounted for more than 80 percent of the total rice-field area in the southern Dong regions.
由于传统糯稻植株较高，一般都在1.5米以上，有的高达1.8米甚至两米，所以不怕水淹，不用晒田，便于在稻田里积蓄深水养鱼养鸭，所以侗人称糯稻田为 Daeml Yav（田塘）。稻田养鱼养鸭好处很多。如稻田里的鱼可以把稻苗根部的害虫吃掉；稻田里的鸭子可以吃掉稻苗中部和上部的害虫。鱼和鸭子还可以吃掉稻田里的杂草；可以疏松稻苗根部的土壤；可以使稻田里的水温得到上下搅拌调节等等。这种耕作制度不但可以大大提高土地的利用率，还可以实现自然资源的综合利用和生态平衡。如鸭子的粪便可成为鱼的饲料，鱼的粪便可成为糯稻的肥料等等。这种耕作制度，为现代生态循环农业提供了广阔的发展前景。
Because traditional glutinous-rice plants are tall—generally over 1.5 metres, sometimes reaching 1.8 or even 2 metres—they are not afraid of flooding and do not need to be drained for sunning. This makes it easy to keep deep water in the fields for raising fish and ducks. The Dong therefore call glutinous-rice fields Daeml Yav (field-ponds). Raising fish and ducks in the paddies has many advantages. Fish eat pests at the roots of the rice seedlings; ducks eat pests in the middle and upper parts of the plants. Both also consume weeds, loosen the soil around the roots, and stir and regulate water temperature. This farming system not only greatly increases land-use efficiency but also realises the comprehensive utilisation of natural resources and ecological balance: duck droppings become fish feed, fish droppings become fertiliser for the rice, and so on. Such a system offers broad prospects for modern circular ecological agriculture.
由于传统糯稻田四季蓄水，天下雨了，糯稻田把雨水积蓄起来，相当于无数个微型水库。由于软田的蓄水不同于一般水库蓄水，它不是人为地将水集中起来大量积蓄，而是就地将雨水分散积蓄起来，所以避免了像大中型水库那样对自然生态和人文生态的人为破坏，即便有天灾人祸，如地震、战争等等，也不会造成重大灾难。
Because traditional glutinous-rice fields hold water year-round, when it rains they store the rainfall, functioning as countless miniature reservoirs. Unlike ordinary reservoirs, which concentrate large volumes of water by artificial means, soft fields store rainwater in a dispersed manner on the spot. This avoids the artificial damage to natural and human ecology that large and medium-sized reservoirs often cause. Even in the event of natural disasters or human calamities—earthquakes, wars, and so on—they do not produce major catastrophes.
四季蓄水的糯稻田也不像普通水库那样把雨水集中堆积起来，而是就地广布于广阔的原野或山野之中。这种广阔的分布格局，既可以不断地将水渗透到地底，不断地补充“地下水”；又可以不断地气化升腾，不断地补充“天上水”。“天上水”变成雨雪，降落到软田里；“地下水”变成泉水，流进软田里。殊途同归，来回往复，形成侗族地区所特有的自然水循环系统。
Year-round water-holding glutinous-rice fields do not pile rainwater into concentrated masses like ordinary reservoirs; instead they are widely distributed across plains and hills. This broad distribution pattern allows water to percolate continuously into the ground, replenishing groundwater, and also to evaporate and rise, replenishing atmospheric moisture. Atmospheric water falls as rain or snow into the soft fields; groundwater emerges as springs and flows into them. The two paths converge and circulate, forming a distinctive natural water-cycle system of the Dong areas.
软田实际上是一种人工湿地，但又与普通的沼泽湿地有所不同。侗家人的软田不是平铺在一个水平面上，而是沿着山坡逐级提升，层层叠叠，形成立体式的湿地分布格局，侗语称之为 Yav Janc（塝田或梯田）。这种分布格局十分重要，它不仅保证了山有多高水有多高的自然水供水系统运行正常，也保证了不同海拔高度动植物对水的需求，保护了生物的多样性。软田的梯级分布，不仅大大降低了人类对自然生态环境的破坏，也保证了地表水的清洁卫生及防洪防涝。如天下大雨，雨水经过层层梯田的积蓄，沉淀，渗透，避免了泥沙俱下水土流失的情况发生，减少了流域内江河湖海水源的含沙量，也减少了水灾的频繁出现。最后流到河里去的雨水既清澈、又干净。湘、黔、桂边界侗人聚居区的青山绿水就是这样来的。
Soft fields are in fact a kind of artificial wetland, yet they differ from ordinary marsh wetlands. Dong soft fields are not laid out on a single horizontal plane; they ascend step by step along the hillsides, layer upon layer, forming a three-dimensional wetland pattern called Yav Janc (terraced or slope fields) in Dong. This distribution is extremely important: it ensures that “where the mountain is high, the water is high,” keeping the natural water-supply system functioning normally; it also meets the water needs of plants and animals at different altitudes and protects biodiversity. The terraced arrangement of soft fields greatly reduces human damage to the natural environment and guarantees the cleanliness of surface water as well as flood and waterlogging control. When heavy rain falls, the water is stored, settled and infiltrated through successive terraces, preventing the wholesale washing away of soil and silt, reducing sediment loads in rivers, lakes and seas within the watershed, and decreasing the frequency of floods. The water that finally reaches the rivers is clear and clean. This is how the green mountains and clear waters of the Dong settlements on the borders of Hunan, Guizhou and Guangxi came to be.
遗憾的是如今我们却只记得或青睐优美的侗族大歌，而忘记或冷落了产生侗族大歌的生产方式和生活方式，忘记了产生侗族大歌的经济基础！忘记了侗族祖先们谆谆教导我们的“Oux sangx soh , kgal sangx sais”（饭养命，歌养心）。没有“饭养命”？哪来“歌养心”？为了“饭养命”，许多侗乡青壮年男女纷纷背井离乡，留在侗乡的老弱病残者也不得不改变他们原本熟悉和喜爱的生产方式和生活方式，致使我们的侗族大歌面临人亡歌息、后继无人的尴尬局面。要让优美的侗族大歌继续生存并活得更好，我们必须在生产方式和生活方式方面寻找出路！
Regrettably, today we remember and favour only the beautiful Dong Grand Song, while forgetting or neglecting the mode of production and way of life that gave birth to it, and forgetting the economic base that produced it. We have forgotten the ancestral teaching “Oux sangx soh, kgal sangx sais” (Rice feeds life; song feeds the heart). Without “rice feeds life,” how can there be “song feeds the heart”? In order to feed life, many young and able-bodied Dong men and women have left their homeland; those who remain—the old, the weak, the sick and the disabled—have been forced to change the modes of production and ways of life they once knew and loved. As a result the Dong Grand Song faces the awkward situation of “people die, songs cease” and a lack of successors. If we want the beautiful Grand Song to continue to live and to thrive, we must seek a way forward in the sphere of production and livelihood!
路在何方？路在脚下！2011年6月，侗乡稻鱼鸭复合系统已经被联合国粮农组织列为全球重要农业文化遗产保护试点。这是继侗族大歌之后又一项世界级的侗族经济文化遗产。也是侗乡经济文化飞向世界的又一只翅膀！可惜目前我们对这只翅膀还认识不足，保护不够，宣传不够，利用不够。所以我在这里还要再次疾呼：侗族大歌和软田糯稻是侗乡经济文化飞向世界的两只翅膀，让侗乡经济文化张开双翅朝着美好的未来远走高飞！
Where is the way? The way is under our feet! In June 2011 the Dong rice–fish–duck complex system was listed by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations as a pilot site for the Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS). This is another world-class Dong economic and cultural heritage after the Grand Song, and another wing for the Dong homeland’s economy and culture to soar into the world. Unfortunately, at present we still lack sufficient understanding, protection, publicity and utilisation of this wing. Therefore I once again call out: the Dong Grand Song and soft-field glutinous rice are the two wings that will carry the Dong homeland’s economy and culture into the world. Let the Dong homeland’s economy and culture spread both wings and fly far toward a bright future!