The Naxi people, one of China’s 55 officially recognized ethnic minority groups, speak a Sino-Tibetan language, also called Naxi. The Ethnologue categorizes the language as “Developing” which means that it is fairly stable, however it is unstandardized and currently has no widespread written usage. However, since the 7th century (or earlier) a pictographic system called Dongba/Tomba has been used by dongba (religious leaders) as textual aides during religious rituals. Today very few people are literate in the Dongba script, few new documents are being created, and few traditional dongba remain.
Although Dongba script is rarely used by Naxi people, it is very much exploited for touristic purposes. Many tourist souvenirs and attractions make use of the script and it is used as a marketing tool to draw tourists to cities like Lijiang, the largest city in the Naxi area.
I can make no judgement about whether the use of Dongba script in tourism is helpful or harmful to the script’s preservation, or what the impact of the commodification of a religious script has on the local people. Whatever the implications, it is clear that the Dongba script is a fixture in the culture and economy of Lijiang and the Naxi areas.
