接觸場域

Abstract

本計畫從「接觸場域」(the contact zone)的角度，鎖定梅爾維爾的海洋小說，以南太平洋為場域，探討白人與原住民的「相遇」(encounter)。梅爾維爾在美國文學的經典地位固然無庸置疑，我們對他的了解似乎局限於《白鯨記》，不知其南太平洋小說乃《白鯨記》的暖身之作。本案從狹義而言，為梅爾維爾海洋小說的研究，然從廣義而言，可視為後殖民原住民「接觸場域」的延伸研究。

The 3-year project aims to further transnational indigenous studies by adopting Mary Louise Pratt’s concept of the ’contact zone’ and by centering on Herman Melville’s encounter narratives in the South Pacific. I argue that the encounter triggers Melville’s Pacific encounter narratives on the one hand, it forms the ’contact zone’ between the United States and the Polynesian indigenous islanders on the other—a ’contact zone’ between the whites and the indigenous, the US and the foreign, the civilized and the savage, the continental and the insular, the North American continent and the South Pacific—which develops into a network of trans-relational encounters that overturn the ’contact zone’ of Enlightenment colonial encounter. The first year will study the Polynesian trilogy—Typee, Omoo, and Mardi, and I argue that Melville seems to follow a sensational pattern of ’cross-cultural romance’ by featuring the savage and innocent Polynesian islanders.