A Cultural Route Perspective on Rural Revitalization of Traditional Villages: A Case Study from Chishui, China

Traditional villages along rivers have contributed significantly to local–regional development by transporting production and spreading culture through certain routes. To date, the cultural continuity of traditional villages has been underestimated in sustainable development with regard to practical dilemmas between conservation and development. This study explores an integrated approach to traditional villages in river basins that considers historic relics, locality, and spatial form. The cultural routes concept is introduced from the field of cultural heritage to link geographically scattered villages that shared the same cultural values and purposes in the past and to stimulate their potential as dynamic routes for further rural revitalization. In this context, the following subtopics are defined for a specific analysis of the lower Chishui River in Guizhou: an evolving framework of cultural routes and the spatial-temporal route of “Sichuan salt into Guizhou”, including its contemporary transformation. The findings of cultural and spatial coherence in historical texts, maps, morphological structures, and rural landscapes support a multi-cultural route model for sustainable development. The study extends the prevailing knowledge on cultural sustainability in rural revitalization and it provides novel insights into spatial development in basin environments.