RECONSTRUCTION OF WOODEN HOUSE IN RONGSHUI FOR 18 YEARS:REFLECTION ON RECONSTRUCTION OF TRADITIONAL SETTLEMENT IN CHINA'S WESTERN POVERTY-STRICKEN AREA

This article reviews the reconstruction of traditional wooden houses in Zhengduo Village,Antai Country,Rongshui of Guangxi Province,which was performed by the research group (Human beings and living environment-Chinese Residences) of School of Architecture,Tsinghua University in 1991. At that time,the research group helped the villagers reconstruct all 31 wooden houses and public buildings in two years,improving the public environment and living conditions and promoting the protection of the ecological environment. Eighteen years later,in the reflection of the practice,the authors point out that the key point of reconstruction of traditional settlement in China’s western poverty-stricken area is notto reconstruct,butto relieve poverty . Only if we take the reconstruction as a social system engineering and gradually investigate in it for a long time with the aid of local economic and political resources as well as the effects of local villagers,we can actually carry forward the most important inherent character of traditional settlements and develop the modern ones with Chinese characteristics.