Sustainable Cultural Innovation Practice: Heritage Education in Universities and Creative Inheritance of Intangible Cultural Heritage Craft

Abstract

The scientific management and protection of intangible cultural heritage (ICH) cannot be separated from continuous innovation and the public’s active participation. The evolution of the value of local cultural heritage can help prevent the loss of valuable cultural identity and cultural heritage. This study is divided into two stages. In the first stage, the innovative practice of heritage education in colleges and universities is explored through the case studies of “She costumes culture” and “Quanzhou traditional embroidery skills”. In the second stage, a questionnaire survey on creative products and activities of technical, intangible cultural heritage is conducted. SPSS and AMOS are used for statistical analysis of the questionnaire results, and a total of 26 indicators are obtained, as well as six dimensions: heritage education, the local value of heritage, cultural participation, cultural identity, cultural and tourism integration, and cultural reflection. Among these are a covariant relationship between cultural tourism integration and heritage education, which shows that they play an equally significant role. Sustainable ICH education requires the government and local communities to make corresponding adjustments upon clarifying their own roles and functions in preserving cultural heritage. Ultimately, practical innovation in ICH requires more citizens to change their inherited cultural values. In particular, inheritors achieve sustainable protection of ICH through self-management.

1. Introduction

UNESCO’s Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage (2003) established the first international treaty to protect intangible cultural heritage (ICH), demonstrating that ICH is a vital component of sustainable cultural development. Article 14 of the Convention states that ICH can be enhanced through specific education and training programs [1]. Given the importance of safeguarding ICH, UNESCO seeks to protect ICH in formal and informal education. The Declaration on Intangible Cultural Heritage Education [2] was launched in 2015 as an ICH education and teaching seminar in Chinese colleges and universities, focusing on the context and development trends in Chinese cultural inheritance in education. The Declaration aims to make the university a place for the inheritance of human culture (i.e., heritage), with the goals of supporting world cultural integration, competition and innovation vitality, advancing cultural pluralism in the knowledge dissemination system, strengthening the consciousness of local cultural gene cognition, and using the current educational knowledge system of universities to reflect the richness and cultural value of local ICH. In other words, through China’s ICH education, a sustainable cultural inheritance knowledge system with Chinese cultural genetic characteristics is to be created.

This study used CITESPACE to search the databases (SCI source journals, EI source journals, Peking University Core, CSSCI, CSCD) in the China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) from 2013 to 2022. The search conditions fell under the following topics: ‘cultural industry’ or ‘creative industry’ or ‘creative economy’, and ‘cultural heritage’. A total of 222 relevant sources were retrieved. Keyword cluster analysis was used to obtain seven large clusters, namely: “# 0 cultural industry”, “# 1 industrialization”, “# 2 inheritance”, “# 3 culture”, “# 6 inheritor”, “# 9 cultural creativity”, and “# 13 cultural inheritance” (Figure 1). Cluster ID 6 focuses on “art colleges”, “training mode”, “traditional handicrafts”, “inheritors”, and “creative activation”, which is an educational exploration stage of training inheritors of traditional handicrafts by art colleges. Cluster ID 13 focuses on “cultural heritage”, “intangible cultural heritage archives”, “digital construction”, “theme evolution”, and “intangible cultural heritage”. The 13 cluster analyses show that the trend in cultural heritage protection is towards “theme innovation” and the mission of universities.

This study uses article visualization tools to retrieve the subject words of ‘Intangible Cultural Heritage’, ‘Local Intangible Cultural Heritage’, ‘Intangible Cultural Heritage Education’, and ‘Intangible Cultural Heritage Inheritance Education’ within the Chinese database of China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) from 2018 to 2022 (retrieval date: 6 July 2022). The theme of ‘education of intangible cultural heritage’ presents problems in the following three aspects (Appendix A) (Figure 2): (1) China’s knowledge system, as “[the] knowledge system of ICH is a kind of knowledge system without words and texts; the spread and inheritance of such knowledge system requires personal experience and participation of individuals or groups” [3]; (2) the coupling between the role of vocational colleges and the inheritance of ICH; and (3) cultural heritage and reflection on ICH education practices.

Nations appeal to the historical, social, cultural and economic value [4] of ICH to support a strong collective cultural identity. The perceived weakness of some social members, especially the youngest generations, in supporting ICH and cultural identity is a prominent problem in ICH inheritance and protection. For this reason, it is urgent to explore social activities aimed at cultivating ICH cultural identity. Of particular interest are the subjective factors of education that shape the active cultural identity of a culture’s social members and carry out the educational protection practice of ICH. Accordingly, this study takes the social identity of culture as its theoretical basis and uses mixed research methods to analyze the practical effects of cultural innovation in ICH education, ultimately proposing strategies for local ICH education and cultural inheritance in China.

1.1. Research on Methodology of ICH Educational Protection

The Convention on the Protection of Intangible Cultural Heritage promulgated by UNESCO proposes to protect and inherit intangible cultural heritage through formal and informal education and has formulated an education plan to promote and disseminate cultural heritage to young people. Education has been increasingly recognized among scholars of cultural heritage as the leading force of ICH inheritance and has been studied from multiple perspectives [5]. South Korean scholars Zheng and Pang [6] divide the ICH discipline education implemented in their own countries into three aspects: skill inheritor education, specialized personnel education and social popularization education. This forms a dual-track model of teaching education and discipline education. Ma and Chang [7] emphasize that training general and professional ICH education talent through the ICH educator community and ICH discipline community is the best way to build China’s local ICH safeguarding. Song [8] analyses the practice of ICH education in Hong Kong and proposes that introducing critical thinking into ICH education could provide a solid foundation for students to think rationally about ICH, construct their self-identity and promote cultural identity.

1.2. Heritage Education Promotes Cultural Evolution

Intangible cultural heritage is an important measure of cultural heritage in the field of education, where it plays a role as a source of creativity and innovation. Ma and Chang [9] reflect on the work experience of ICH research and training in colleges and universities and propose a model of subject selection and group restoration to enhance the creativity of ICH research and the influence of ICH as living inheritance. Huang [10] takes Banggu Dong of rap music in Putian area as an example. Adopting the perspective of the inheritor, Huang develops an all-round curriculum based on ‘work process systemization’, combined with the fields of higher education, basic education and continuing education, and forms a hierarchical inheritance system centered on school inheritance. The purpose is to promote ICH inheritance through the cultivation of local talent. Zheng and Lu [11] summarize the models that have been developed for cultural heritage research, inheritance and innovative talent cultivation, and propose the following teaching problems to be solved: deep cognition of the practical significance of cultural heritage education, integration of curriculum resources, and knowledge construction in an open and interactive process. Addressing these problems is necessary to establish an effective mechanism for combining research, development, dissemination and experimental innovation regarding cultural heritage, with the goal of combining ‘production, education and research’. He and Ma [12] explore changes in Japanese cultural enrichment from undergraduate education to high-level talent education and conclude that there is growing social demand for an ICH education curriculum with high standards across multiple subjects. Yang and Chen [13] emphasize the ‘consensus innovation’ dimension of intangible cultural heritage in the case of Fujian Province’s ‘lacquer art+’ innovation practice. They put forward the development trends, socio-economic value and cultural value of ICH, which together constitute the discourse of ICH innovation.

1.3. The Mechanism and Path of Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection

How to disseminate, activate and utilize the ICH inheritance mechanism remains an issue of paramount concern in this field. Xiao and Wang [14] believe that the path of ICH integration into contemporary life can be alternately carried out from the individual or from public life. On the one hand, ICH can be integrated into the whole process of education and popular aesthetic life. On the other hand, ICH can fit into the contemporary social production pattern and reconstruct the relationship between the local elite authority system and popular ethical life. Strengthening regional cultural identity is one important goal of the construction of cultural ecological space, which is of great significance to the living inheritance of ICH. Ji and Gao [15] discuss the construction strategy of cultural identity from the aspects of cultural consciousness, cultural needs and cultural memory. To wit, the local ICH originated from the people can be used as an effective resource to construct regional cultural identity. Local ICH should also avoid and be alert to the exclusiveness of local consciousness, which would entail a ‘cultural autism’. Wang [16], from the perspective of cultural identity, proposes four characteristics of ICH’s traditional cultural identity path, namely the generation mechanism (a mechanism of meaning production and reproduction), the rheological mechanism (a diversified and discontinuous continuity mechanism), the integration mechanism (a public choice mechanism for the integration of cultural space and social significance) and the maintenance mechanism (a mechanism arising from people’s isomorphic adjustment of cultural meaning structure and collective cultural psychology). These four characteristics carry out social production practices synchronously.

2. Materials and Methods

2.1. Study Design

The research process was divided into two stages. In the first stage, ICH trainees were interviewed to understand their motivation and the demand for embroidery skills. The focus of the first stage was for the participants (students) to complete the design and production of works through actual experience in ICH and embroidery skills as a dimension of cultural heritage. In the second stage, a questionnaire survey was conducted to evaluate respondents’ awareness of ICH and their intent to participate in ICH protection. The interview data were interpreted using a grounded theory approach. SPSS and AMOS statistical software were used for data analysis and theoretical model construction (Figure 3).

2.2. Innovative Practice Project for College Students in Summer Vacation: Investigate She Township and Inherit She Nationality Craft

An innovative practice project conducted by college students, which aimed to investigate the She Township and inherit the crafts of the She ethnic group, was organized and completed between July and August 2022. In all, 11 students completed 13 pieces of embroidery work of an innovative design. The project schedule is shown in

Table 1. Innovative practice project route for college students.

Date	Place	Research Contents
3 July 2022	She Nationality Cultural Museum, Three quarters and Seven lanes, Fuzhou, China	Field Research on She Nationality Costume Culture
4 July 2022	She Nationality Costume Inheritance Demonstration, Luoyuan County, Fuzhou, China	Field Research on She Nationality Costume Culture
5 July 2022–9 July 2022	Quanzhou Pearl Embroidery Handicraft Inheritance Base, Quanzhou, China	Fujian Intangible Cultural Heritage Jincang Embroidery Technique, Fujian Intangible Cultural Heritage Quanzhou Bead Embroidery Technique

, and the student works are shown in Figure 4. The project emphasized field investigation and participation in social services and invited local inheritors of intangible cultural heritage to interact with students. Through practice, students would obtain a close understanding of local culture, experience the manufacturing process of She costumes, and learn the embroidery skills of Fujian’s intangible cultural heritage to enhance their recognition of Fujian’s ICH.

2.3. Questionnaire Survey on Cultural Heritage Consumption

Questionnaires are a structured technique for data collection, used to produce a targeted quantitative study of the research objective. In this study, the questionnaire divided the factors affecting the inheritance of ICH education into six dimensions: heritage value perception, cultural participation intention, cultural identity, heritage education, cultural reflection, and cultural and tourism integration. These factors were taken as independent variables to explore their mutual influence. Refer to

Table 2. Data sources for questionnaire items.

Indicators	Data Sources
Cultural identity, cultural continuity, cultural community	[1,2,15]
Cultural participation	[3,4,17,18]
Culture sharing	[4,19,20]
Cultural sense of belonging and local cultural perception	[21,22,23]
Practical value, economic value	[1,4,24,25,26]
Civic culture education	[21,27,28,29,30]
The formal beauty of design	[30,31,32]
Innovation in product design	[11,24,33,34,35,36]

for the data sources of the questionnaire items and to

Table 3. Summary of questionnaire.

No.	Content of Questionnaire Items	Number of Items
0	Definition of professional terms	/
1	Evaluation of the design value of Chinese cultural and creative products	5
2	Value recognition evaluation of traditional technology	5
3	The viewpoint and attitude of the traditional craft cultural creation product development	5
4	Evaluation of traditional craft inheritance and protection practices	9
5	Expression of value identity attitude of cultural heritage	6
6	Attitudes and views on the protection of cultural heritage	6
7	The behavioral tendency to protect and inherit traditional crafts	5
8	Gender	1
9	Age	1

for the brief questionnaire design.

A total of 50 pre-test questionnaires were distributed through an online survey platform; these were modified according to respondents’ feedback to produce the formal questionnaire. All the questions were answered in closed form with a single choice. A five-level Likert scale was used to assign points from strong (5) to weak (1). Four of the questions (CR1, CR2, CR3, CR4) are reverse questions, so the resulting data were processed in a positive way.

Scholars have conducted extensive discussions on the value of cultural heritage, including its ‘economic value, social value, historical, artistic, academic, appreciative value, authenticity of heritage, local value, and overall value’ [1,4,33]. This study adds the dimensions of ‘cultural and tourism integration’ to interpret social and economic values and ‘heritage education’ to interpret the social and cultural identity of ICH traditional knowledge. These additions distinguish this study from previous research into ICH, applying the dimensions of cultural tourism integration and heritage education to explore further nuances in intangible cultural heritage. Accordingly, this study designs a prediction model (Figure 5) by testing the following eight hypotheses:

H1: 

“local of heritage value” has a positive and significant effect on “cultural identity”.

H2: 

“cultural identity” has a positive and significant effect on “cultural participation”.

H3: 

“Heritage education” has a positive and significant effect on “cultural identity”.

H4: 

“integration of culture and tourism” has a positive and significant effect on “local of heritage value”.

H5: 

“integration of culture and tourism” has a positive and significant effect on “cultural identity”.

H6: 

“cultural identity” has a positive and significant effect on “cultural reflection”.

3. Results

3.1. Descriptive Statistics of the Questionnaire

The pre-test questionnaire was distributed on 7 June 2022. In all, 60 responses were collected, of which 50 were valid. The official test date was 7 August 2022. As of 11 August 2022, the response quantity was 556, and the effective recovery quantity was 450. After manual screening, the actual number of questionnaires collected was 500, with 41 variables obtained. Of the respondents surveyed, 309 were women and 178 were men. The gender structure distribution of the sample conforms to the structural characteristics of Chinese intangible cultural heritage consumers [31]. All age group responses were authorized by the respondents. The distribution channel was the Credamo data mart. In terms of data quality control, the questionnaire restricted repeated answers with the same IP address; only one person was allowed to answer within a range of five kilometers; users who had already answered were filtered out; and the author was required to authorize each IP location.

Table 4. Questionnaire Distribution and Recovery.

NO.	Date	Name of Questionnaire	Distribution Channels	Number of Releases	Total Answers
1	11 August	Formal questionnaire	Credamo data mart	100	122
2	11 August	Formal questionnaire	Credamo data mart	50	61
3	11 August	Formal questionnaire	Credamo data mart	50	65
4	10 August	Formal questionnaire	Credamo data mart	100	129
5	9 August	Formal questionnaire	Credamo data mart	70	83
6	9 August	Formal questionnaire	Credamo data mart	80	96
7	7 August	Formal questionnaire	Credamo data mart	50	60
8	7 July	Pre-test questionnaire	Credamo data mart	50	60

records the distribution and recovery of questionnaires.

The paper has been adjusted using the Varimax with Kaiser Normalization method of factor analysis, with factor rotation to exclude factor coefficients less than or less than 0.4. The Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) value was 0.904, and the significance index was 0.000. As this is less than 0.05, the questionnaire was found to be suitable for factor analysis, with good reliability and validity (

Table 5. Reliability Statistics.

Cronbach’s Alpha	Cronbach’s Alpha Based on Standardized Items	N of Items
0.899	0.864	41

and

Table 6. KMO and Bartlett’s Test.

Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin Measure of Sampling Adequacy.		0.904
Bartlett’s Test of Sphericity	Approx. Chi-Square	6788.560
	df	325
	Sig.	0.000

).

Through multiple factor convergence, a total of six dimensions and 30 indicators were obtained after six times of factor rotation. The overall explained variation was found to be 68.593% (

Table 7. Rotated component matrix and total variance explained.

Component	Variance	Factor 1	Factor 2	Factor 3	Factor 4	Factor 5	Factor 6
11 Cultural participation (CP)	CP1	0.89
	CP2	0.76
	CP3	0.75
	CP4	0.74
	CP5	0.67
2 Cultural identity (CI)	CI1		0.84
	CI2		0.72
	CI3		0.70
	CI4		0.69
	CI5		0.64
3 Local value of heritage (HV)	HV1			0.88
	HV2			0.78
	HV3			0.77
	HV4			0.74
4 Heritage education (HE)	HE1				0.89
	HE2				0.80
	HE3				0.77
	HE4				0.75
5 Cultural reflection (CR)	CR1					0.88
	CR2					0.77
	CR3					0.74
	CR4					0.74
6 Integration of culture and tourism (ICT)	ICT1						0.88
	ICT2						0.76
	ICT3						0.75
	ICT4						0.73
Initial Eigenvalues
Total		8.56	2.27	1.97	1.91	1.68	1.45
% of Variance		32.94	8.71	7.57	7.333	6.45	5.59
Cumulative %		32.94	41.65	49.22	56.55	63.00	68.59
Extraction Sums of Squared Loadings
Total		8.56	2.27	1.97	1.91	1.68	1.45
% of Variance		32.94	8.71	7.57	7.333	6.45	5.59
Cumulative %		32.94	41.65	49.22	56.55	63.00	68.59
Rotation Sums of Squared Loadings
Total		3.35	3.18	2.89	2.86	2.79	2.77
% of Variance		12.86	12.21	11.11	11.02	10.72	10.67
Cumulative %		12.86	25.08	36.19	47.20	57.92	68.59

Extraction method: Principal component analysis. Rotation method: Varimax with Kaiser Normalization. a. Rotation converged in six iterations.

).

In this study, 26 variables in six dimensions after factor convergence were tested by independent sample t-test and grouped according to gender. The results show that the research hypothesis H0: μ 1 ≠ μ 2. (If it is not tenable, accept the null hypothesis, that is, H0: μ 1 = μ 2.) See Appendix B for the detailed results of the independent sample t-test. The six dimensions are named according to the content, as shown in

Table 8. Variable and dimension naming.

Item	Variable	Dimension
CP1	Intention of practice	Cultural participation
CP2	Receive activities information
CP3	Attend course training
CP4	Civic cultural participation
CP5	Watch cultural exhibitions
CI1	Formal beauty of design	Cultural identity
CI2	Strengthening of cultural identity
CI3	Economic subsidies for artistic creation
CI4	Place attachment
CI5	Cultural autonomy of communities
HV1	Cultural belonging	Local value of heritage
HV2	Historical continuity
HV3	Utility value
HV4	Cultural uniqueness
HE1	Cultivation of community inheritance groups	Heritage education
HE2	Citizenship education
HE3	Handicraft inheritance
HE4	Construction of ICH courses on Campus
CR1	The overreach of legacy politics	Cultural reflection
CR2	Challenges to the authenticity of cultural heritage
CR3	Cultural and creative goods eliminate cultural uniqueness
CR4	Cultural and creative goods affect the value perception of cultural heritage
ICT1	Cultural sharing	Integration of culture and tourism
ICT2	A sense of common identity
ICT3	Cultural heritage themes boost tourism development
ICT4	Product innovation design and iteration

.

The Pearson correlation method was selected for correlation analysis of six dimensions to obtain descriptive statistics. The average value of each dimension was 3, as shown in

Table 9. Descriptive statistics.

Component	Mean	Std. Deviation	N
CP	3.10	0.92	500
CR	3.09	0.97	500
ICT	3.18	0.98	500
CI	3.00	0.89	500
HE	3.23	0.98	500
HV	3.07	0.98	500

. The Pearson correlation coefficient is shown in

Table 10. Correlations.

		CP	CR	ICT	CI	HE	HV
CP	Pearson Correlation	1	0.357 **	0.359 **	0.462 **	0.262 **	0.330 **
	Sig. (2-tailed)		0	0	0	0	0
	N	500	500	500	500	500	500
CR	Pearson Correlation	0.357 **	1	0.391 **	0.452 **	0.309 **	0.318 **
	Sig. (2-tailed)	0.000		0	0	0	0
	N	500	500	500	500	500	500
ICT	Pearson Correlation	0.359 **	0.391 **	1	0.446 **	0.279 **	0.336 **
	Sig. (2-tailed)	0	0		0	0	0
	N	500	500	500	500	500	500
CI	Pearson Correlation	0.462 **	0.452 **	0.446 **	1	0.420 **	0.461 **
	Sig. (2-tailed)	0	0	0		0	0
	N	500	500	500	500	500	500
HE	Pearson Correlation	0.262 **	0.309 **	0.279 **	0.420 **	1	0.317 **
	Sig. (2-tailed)	0	0	0	0		0
	N	500	500	500	500	500	500
HV	Pearson Correlation	0.330 **	0.318 **	0.336 **	0.461 **	0.317 **	1
	Sig. (2-tailed)	0	0	0	0	0
	N	500	500	500	500	500	500

**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).

. The p-value was less than 0.05, indicating that the correlation between dimensions was significant.

3.2. AMOS Model Fitness Analysis

The indicators obtained from factor analysis were placed into AMOS software for model fitting design. The overall model fitness test results are shown in

Table 11. Model fit summary.

Statistical Test Quantity	Criterion or Threshold for Adaptation	Test Result Data	Model Fit Judgement
Absolute Fit Measures
RMSEA (Root Mean Square Residual)	<0.05	0.045	√
GFI (Goodness-of-Fit Index)	>0.90	0.918	√
Baseline Comparisons
NFI (Normed Fit Index)	>0.90	0.915	√
RFI (Relative Fit Index)	>0.90	0.905	√
IFI (Incremental Fit Index)	>0.90	0.955	√
TLI (Tucker–Lewis Coefficient)	>0.90	0.950	√
CFI (Comparative Fit Index)	>0.90	0.955	√
Parsimony-Adjusted
PGFI (Parsimony Goodness-of-Fit Index)	>0.50	0.764	√
PNFI (Parsimony-Adjusted NFI)	>0.50	0.822	√
PCFI (Parsimony-Adjusted CFI)	>0.50	0.858	√
CN (Critical N)	>200	597.956	√
CMIN/DF (Chi-Square/Degrees of Freedom)	<3.00	2.014	√
CAIC (Consistent Akaike’s Information Criterion)	The theoretical model value is less than the independent model value, and at the same time less than the saturated model value.	1013.636 < 2532.327 1013.636 < 7107.889	√
Absolute Fit Measures
X2 (Chi-Square)	p > 0.05	p = 0.000 < 0.05 Df = 288	√
RMSEA (root mean square residual)	<0.05	0.04	√
GFI (goodness-of-fit index)	>0.90	0.92	√
AGFI (adjust goodness-of-fit index)	>0.90	0.91	√
Baseline Comparisons
NFI (Normed fit index)	>0.90	0.92	√
RFI (Relative Fit Index)	>0.90	0.91	√
IFI (incremental fit index)	>0.90	0.96	√
TLI (Tucker–Lewis Coefficient)	>0.90	0.95	√
CFI (Comparative Fit Index)	>0.90	0.96	√
Parsimony-Adjusted
PGFI (parsimony goodness-of-fit index)	>0.50	0.755	√
PNFI (parsimony-adjusted NFI)	>0.50	0.811	√
PCFI (parsimony-adjusted CFI)	>0.50	0.846	√
CN (Critical N)	>200	586.47	√
CMIN/DF (Chi-Square/degrees of freedom)	<3.00	2.036	√
CAIC (Consistent Akaike’s Information Criterion)	The theoretical model value is less than the independent model value, and at the same time less than the saturated model value	1040.98 < 2532.33 1040.98 < 7107.89	√

. The CN value = 587.97 > 200, meeting the model adaptation standard. From other overall fitness indexes, the chi-square degree of freedom ratio is 2.01 < 3.00, and the root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) value is 0.04 < 0.05; GFI value is 0.918, NFI value is 0.915, RFI value is 0.905, IFI value is 0.955, TLI value is 0.95, CFI value is 0.955, which are all greater than 0.09. The fitness of the overall model is therefore very ideal. The Consistent Akaike’s Information Criterion (CAIC) value of the theoretical model is equal to 1013.636, less than that of the independent model value (2532.327), and less than the Expected Cross-Validation Index (ECVI) value of the saturated model (7107.889), indicating that the model is acceptable. The relationship and path coefficient value of each dimension in the model are shown in Figure 6.

Table 11 shows a positive initial model data fit; all evaluation indicators are within an acceptable range, so there is no need to modify through the MI index.

Table 12. Results of structural equation modelling analysis.

Hypothesis	Standardized Path Coefficient	Standard Error	Bias-Corrected 95%CI		p Value	Support
			Lower	Upper
H1: CI←HV	0.309	0.065	0.234	0.400	0.002	Yes
H2: CP←CI	0.51	0.038	0.432	0.590	0.003	Yes
H3: CI←HE	0.276	0.061	0.187	0.361	0.004	Yes
H4: HV←ICT	0.367	0.051	0.280	0.466	0.002	Yes
H5: CI←ICT	0.333	0.067	0.246	0.415	0.006	Yes
H6: CR←CI	0.516	0.052	0.447	0.591	0.004	Yes

Note: The data listed are standard coefficients.

shows the values of standardized regional weights. Although the path coefficient values are low, the p-values are less than 0.01, indicating that the data results are significant and support the assumptions of H1, H2, H3, H4, H5, and H6.

4. Discussion

4.1. The Mediating Effect of ‘Local of Heritage Value’ on ‘Cultural Identity’

In this study, the Bootstrap method was used to repeatedly sample the original data to form a new sample with a capacity of 500 to evaluate the relationship between the paths. The test results are as follows:

From

Table 13. Summary table of mediation effects.

	95% Confidence Interval
	Estimate	BC/PC p Value	BC	PC
Total Effect
CI←ICT	0.367	0.002/0.004	0.280~0.466	0.267~0.460
ICT→HV	0.458	0.018/0.010	0.360~0.555	0.373~0.566
HE→CI	0.276	0.004/0.004	0.187~0.361	0.188~0.364
ICT→CI	0.446	0.005/0.004	0.363~0.522	0.365~0.524
HV→CI	0.309	0.002/0.004	0.234~0.400	0.229~0.393
HE→CR	0.143	0.004/0.004	0.094~0.192	0.094~0.192
ICT→CR	0.231	0.004/0.004	0.177~0.289	0.177~0.291
HV→CR	0.160	0.003/0.004	0.114~0.212	0.113~0.211
CI→CR	0.516	0.004/0.004	0.447~0.591	0.447~0.591
HE→CP	0.141	0.002/0.004	0.094~0.196	0.091~0.193
ICT→CP	0.228	0.004/0.004	0.172~0.289	0.172~0.291
HV→CP	0.158	0.003/0.004	0.110~0.217	0.109~0.214
CI→CP	0.510	0.003/0.004	0.432~0.590	0.429~0.580
Direct Effect
ICT→HV	0.367	0.002/0.004	0.280~0.466	0.267~0.460
HE→CI	0.276	0.004/0.004	0.187~0.361	0.188~0.364
ICT→CI	0.333	0.006/0.004	0.246~0.415	0.253~0.419
HV→CI	0.309	0.002/0.004	0.234~0.400	0.229~0.393
CI→CR	0.516	0.004/0.004	0.447~0.591	0.447~0.591
CI→CP	0.510	0.003/0.004	0.432~0.590	0.429~0.580
Indirect Effect
ICT→CI	0.114	0.002/0.004	0.076~0.164	0.270~0.157
HE→CR	0.143	0.004/0.004	0.094~0.192	0.094~0.192
ICT→CR	0.231	0.004/0.004	0.177~0.289	0.177~0.291
HV→CR	0.16	0.003/0.004	0.114~0.212	0.113~0.211
HE→CP	0.141	0.002/0.004	0.094~0.196	0.091~0.193
ICT→CP	0.228	0.004/0.004	0.172~0.289	0.172~0.291
HV→CP	0.158	0.003/0.004	0.110~0.217	0.109~0.214

BC: Bias-corrected percentile method. PC: Percentile method.

, it can be concluded that:

(1)

The total effect value of ICT on CI was 0.446, the indirect effect value was 0.114, the mediating interval [0.246,0.415] did not include 0, the p-value was 0.006, and the mediating effect was established.

(2)

The total effect value of HV on CI was 0.309, the mediating interval [0.234,0.400] did not include 0, the p-value was 0.002, p < 0.05, and the mediating effect was established.

(3)

The direct effect of ICT on HV is 0.367, and the direct effect of HV on CI is 0.309, indicating that the direct effect is significant. ICT→HV→CI has a partial mediating effect.

In this study, through ‘heritage education’, college students conducted the innovative design of cultural and creative products and reconstructed the cultural value of She costumes after ‘identifying’ the local cultural elements of She nationality. In the face of the demand of the handicraft market and the design intervention of college teachers and students, the works of LAN Q-C, a national non-genetic inheritor, have changed from the early ‘stylization’ to the ‘diversity’ composition and application. This transformation points to the re-recognition of the value of their own cultural heritage (Figure 7). The data in

Table 14. The correlation between ICT and HE.

Parameter	Estimate	Lower	Upper	p
ICT←→HE	0.299	0.193	0.404	0.004

also show the collinearity between marketization (‘Integration of culture and tourism’) and ‘local heritage value’. The integration of culture and tourism means that intangible cultural heritage must face the market and move towards sustainable economic development. This has also prompted the subject of intangible cultural heritage to independently realize the endogenous power of self-existence and development.

4.2. ‘Culture Education’ Promotes Identification of ‘Heritage of Local Value’

Intangible cultural heritage includes cultural values, aesthetic characteristics, and historical spirit. These can never be separated from the specific and unique times, ethnic groups, and communities that nurtured and created these heritages. The Nara Document on Authenticity (1994) recognized the value of local heritage: “For the respect of all cultures, the assets of heritage must be considered and judged in the cultural context to which they belong”. Among them, “the cultural context to which they belong” refers to the recognition of the value of local heritage, as well as the relationship between heritage and local social life. The emphasis of residents on the understanding and identification of heritage should highlight the subjectivity of people in certain heritages’ birthplaces. Respecting this subjectivity, as well as the cultural diversity based on the recognition of local cultural values, is a synthesis and integration of multiple cultural values. This marks the starting point of a return to the historical original intention regarding heritage protection [33].

The management and protection of culture cannot be separated from the active participation and creativity of human beings. Someone who has no knowledge of specific rites can only passively participate in some activities at most. The emergence of a specific rite must also have a specific social situation as its premise. ‘Participation’ is not only the traditional sense of ‘appearing’ in a cultural activity, or watching culture and art, or cultural art creation; its deeper meaning is ‘empowerment, autonomy, democracy’. ICH safeguarding is not intended to create a kind of protected specimen that is isolated from other groups, but to realize the revitalization of traditions through safeguarding groups’ self-management, helping local citizens to clearly understand their traditional cultural identity. Under conditions of equality and diversity, cultural subjects are fully empowered to set up self-sustaining solutions for inheritance and development. Only when more citizens subjectively identify with their cultural inheritance can there be active citizen participation in cultural heritage. Reaffirming the value of crafts such as ICH will help to make cultural education take root, stimulate citizens’ enthusiastic participation, establish a sound and scientific protection system, and thus form a culturally and ecologically sustainable balance. Figure 8 shows the mutual relationship between the implementation of cultural heritage education and citizens’ cultural life.

4.3. Sustainable Intangible Cultural Heritage Education

In order to promote the sustainable development of ICH, the Chinese government has issued policies and regulations on ‘revitalizing traditional arts and crafts’, under which intangible cultural heritage has been practiced on campuses, in communities, and in cultural exhibitions and performances. The traditional skills and activities that allow people to experience Chinese intangible cultural heritage include paper-cutting, embroidery, color binding (lanterns), shadow puppets, kneading and molding, wood carving, and dough sculpture, among others. In this study’s questionnaire, ‘making colorful lanterns on campus’ and ‘traditional embroidery skills on campus’ were selected for evaluation. According to the first weight analysis of the questionnaire data by the SPSS software (

Table 15. ICH Handicrafts Sorted into the Campus Measurement Items.

Measurement Item	Initial	Extraction
Traditional crafts team training for local communities	1.00	0.82
Cultural heritage embodies social inclusion, is the medium of civic education, and has cultural and educational value	1.00	0.70
Inheritance of traditional production processes, methods and skills	1.00	0.69
Intangible cultural heritage enters the campus, and cultural education of schoolchildren and teenagers takes root	1.00	0.66
Professional, fair and transparent subsidy mechanism for artistic creation	1.00	0.67
Innovative design and continuous updating of product development	1.00	0.62
Scientifically plan local arts and cultural venues to facilitate public participation	1.00	0.62
Respect the intellectual property rights of craftsmen, protect the labour rights and interests of cultural workers, and improve the working environment of arts and culture	1.00	0.50
Rebuild the local art and cultural history, connect the historical memory of the land and people, and strengthen the local cultural influence	1.00	0.43

Extraction method: Principal component analysis. Data: Results of the first factor analysis using SPSS.

), the value of ‘community inheritance and team training’ is 0.817; the lowest value, for ‘cultural education taking root in the youth group’ is 0.664; the value of ‘core skill inheritance’ is 0.690; and the value of ‘civic cultural education value’ is 0.698. This indicates that the public perceives the obvious effects of community inheritance within a short time. However, it takes longer for teenagers’ cultural education to take root, and the effect cannot be shown in a short period.

5. Conclusions

5.1. Cultural Reflection: Handicraft and Memory

Tradition is passed down by learning handicrafts from ancestors and consciously collecting folk cultural knowledge in rural life. This creates a dual knowledge system of passing on people’s ‘handicraft’ and ‘memories’. However, today’ s cultural changes have a bigger effect on cultural inheritance and development. Inheritors’ mastery of ‘memory‘ has become lesser, and learning a single ‘skill‘ learning means that the integrity of inheritance is still missing. In consumer behavior, it is easy to forget about the deep meaning of culture and how it affects us. Works of intangible cultural heritage have similar creative themes and ways of using language. Some works make it hard to tell the difference between regions and images, and the trend of works becoming more similar is clear. By talking to teachers and students in colleges and universities, the inheritor can form a new cultural identity and keep changing their lifestyle to fit their living situation. In this real-life situation, the inheritor saw the real symbiosis with the cultural community, which helped the younger generation gain ‘cultural familiarity’.

5.2. University and Intangible Cultural Heritage

At the same time, cultural policies will all involve the sustainable reuse of cultural resources, which is the model for establishing cultural capital, cultural subjectivity, and cultural cohesion, as well as the strategy for linking cultural internationalization. This is based on the idea that maintaining economic growth and promoting social identity are important. Culture comes from technical training, formal education, abstract symbolic knowledge, and talents. On the one hand, they have power and influence, and on the other, they can improve the way the labor market is set up.

Participating in the ICH protection action has allowed colleges and universities to fulfil their missions of personnel training, scientific research, social service, and cultural inheritance and innovation [37]. This is not only an important way to promote innovative development and creative transformation but also an effective way to enhance the design professionals ‘creativity, artistic accomplishment, and cultural heritage’. In the training work for the ICH seminar, Qiao [38] proposed the teaching philosophy of ‘three knowing’, namely ‘knowledge of culture ‘, ‘knowledge of crafts ‘, and ‘know how to treat development dialectically ‘. ‘Be in know’ is derived from both theory and practice so that inheritors can recognize the specificity and significance of regional culture behind their own ICH categories and become the ‘insider ‘and ‘holder ‘of culture. ‘Knowing art’ entails advocating for inheritors to inherit the exquisite traditional skill level passed down from the previous generation, thereby preserving the representativeness of skill inheritance in this community. ‘Knowing dialectical’ refers to the dialectic treatment of the sustainable path of inheritance, and creation based on cultural holdings and exquisite skills, confronting the new era of ICH community inheritance and development. Reflecting the relationship between universities and ICH creative inheritance, the practical experience of ICH creative inheritance from universities in China serves as an invaluable guide. As in this research project, college students know and learn intangible cultural heritage in the community, apply their skills to their own design works, and disseminate intangible cultural heritage via technology and formal beauty. The inheritors will discuss their understanding of technology and folk-art quality with university students and break through the design thinking bottleneck in work production.

Although ICH courses in colleges and universities have improved the quality of university students’ ICH culture and played a certain role in ICH research and management talents, they are not suitable for the cultivation of non-genetic inheritors. It lacks the native environment where the skills are located because it is separated from folk life and folk culture environment. In the face of a new round of conflict and collision between modern civilization and traditional culture, non-genetic inheritance is the objective reality, and we need to face the reality of complementary symbiosis between tradition and modernity. Our unavoidable choice is creative inheritance (Figure 9).

5.3. Research Contribution

To supervise intangible cultural heritage projects, policymakers require a more elaborate system design, the mobilization of the initiative and enthusiasm of cultural departments, and the establishment of a dynamically adjusted protection and inheritance evaluation system. When evaluating the performance indicators of intangible cultural heritage protection, creative transformation, and innovative development, the government frequently disregards the evaluation dimensions of social public recognition, traditional knowledge systems, and cultural participation effects when standardizing the protection work and encouraging inheritors, inheritance bases, and other responsible subjects to fulfil their basic obligations. Therefore, the theoretical model and index design obtained in this study, which aimed at the research and exploration of intangible cultural heritage teaching practices in informal education and the investigation of the cultural consumption market, can reflect the actual impact of citizens’ cultural participation on the protection of intangible cultural heritage. The six dimensions proposed in this study are ‘heritage education‘, ‘cultural identity‘, ‘cultural reflection‘, ‘integration of culture and tourism‘, ‘cultural participation‘, and ‘local value of heritage ‘. Their index designs can be dynamically adjusted with the changes in policies and regulations and the situation of intangible cultural heritage protection, and classified evaluation can also be carried out by distinguishing the applicable scope and evaluation methods of some indexes, which are of universal applicability and more flexible.