Yi ethnic narrative long poem Ashima is spread in Shilin Yi Autonomous County, Kunming.

It was originally sung in Sani language. Before the 1950s, Ashima sung in Sani language was very popular in Sani Yi areas; later it was translated into Chinese and performed in other art forms, having good influence at home and abroad while the Ashima sung in Sani language became endangered in Sani Yi areas, and now very few artists can sing it in Sani language.

Ashima uses oral poetry language and narrative tune to tell the story of Ashima, describing Ahei and Ashima's story of their indomitable struggles against power and finally becoming “echo” in mountains and “peak” in stone forest to leave beauty to the world. It indicates that light will eventually defeat darkness, goodness will eventually defeat evil, and freedom will eventually defeat oppression, reflecting the ethnic character and spirit of Sani people that “can be destroyed but never defeated”. In Sani people's mind, Ahei and Ashima are symbols of heroes and beauty respectively.

Ashima is divided into two genres from north and south. The southern genre is distributed in Guishan Township, Muzhuqing Township, and Weize Township while the northern genre is distributed in Beidacun Village, Xijiekou Township, and Shilin Town. Both genres are similar. Ashima can be told and sung, and the latter accounts for more with singing patterns like solo, antiphony, and chorus led by one person. Tunes include Xidiao ("happy tune"), Laorendiao ("old man tune"), Beidiao ("sad tune"), Kudiao ("crying tune"), and Madiao ("scolding tune"), etc. corresponding to the singer’s age and gender. Ashima is sung in five-character sentences, using techniques such as foreshadowing, exaggeration, and irony as well as techniques such as homophone, anadiplosis, zeugma, and metaphor. It is sung and told mainly in festivals, marriages, sacrifices, burials, work, and life, especially during weddings.

Since the publication of the Chinese text in the early 1950s, Ashima has been translated into English, French, German, Spanish, Russian, Japanese, Korean and other languages abroad. It has also been adapted into a movie in China - China's first color widescreen stereo musical film. It has also been adapted into Peking Opera, Yunnan Opera, opera, dance drama, and Sani opera, etc. Its Chinese text was evaluated as one of the “100 Best Chinese Literature Books in the Past 100 Years” in China; dance drama was awarded “20th Century Dance Classic in China”; and the movie with the same name won the best dance film at the first Santander International Music and Dance Film Festival in Spain  in 1982. As a recognized outstanding masterpiece of Chinese folk literature, Ashima is included in “Folk Literature” textbook for colleges and universities, authoritative dictionary Ci Hai, and Chinese Encyclopedia: Chinese Literature, etc.

Ashima actress - Yang Likun

Ashima movie

Ashima book

Wang Yufang, representative inheritor of Ashima project