Imagining the Prostitute: a Genealogy of Cinematic Representations of Power
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National Chiao Tung University Institute of Social Research and Cultural Studies Thesis Imagining the Prostitute: A Genealogy of Cinematic Representations of Power Student: Nicholas Barkdull Advisor: Prof. Joyce C.H. Liu June, 2014 Imagining the Prostitute: A Genealogy of Cinematic Representations of Power 研究生：白洛克 Student: Nicholas Barkdull 指導教授：劉紀蕙 Advisor: Joyce C.H. Liu 國 立 交 通 大 學 社 會 與 文 化 研 究 所 碩 士 論 文 A Thesis Submitted to the Institute of Social Research and Cultural Studies College of Humanity and Social Science National Chiao Tung University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master in Social Research and Cultural Studies June 2014 Hsinchu, Taiwan, Republic of China 中華民國一零三年六月 Imagining the Prostitute: A Genealogy of Cinematic Representations of Power Student: Nicholas Barkdull Advisor: Prof. Joyce C.H. Liu Institute of Social Research and Cultural Studies National Chiao Tung University ABSTRACT This research will attempt to find Taiwanese cinematic uses of the ‘sex worker,’ and the implications contained within those uses in order to offer a nuanced alternative to common dichotomies which render discussions of the sex worker reductive. I will offer this alternative by tracing back cultural symbols which are rooted in history and society. Contemporary (mainly post-2000) Taiwanese cinema will be used as a frame for a genealogical analysis of these images of the sex worker. This genealogy will find threads connecting a complex network of ever- changing power relationships surrounding sex work through the metaphors of sex worker roles within films, which tell of a latticework of power that takes place along the axes of history, culture, and political economics. i Acknowledgements I owe my deepest gratitude to many individuals, but first and foremost my advisor, Professor Joyce C.H. Liu, who carefully read every draft of this thesis and worked with me closely every step of the way. The amount of effort she put into guiding me is staggering, and this thesis would certainly not have been possible without her help. I would also like to thank my committee members. Thank you to Professor Earl Jackson, for helping me form my initial ideas and for working with me throughout the entire process. Thank you to Professor Shie Shizong for the wealth of useful and honest suggestions during my proposal. In addition, I would like to thank Professor Ding Naifei for meeting with me and sharing her views in the initial stage of this process. I would like to thank Professor Chu Yuan-Horng for providing me with a wealth of ethnographical research and meeting with me to discuss it. I would like to thank Matthew Borgard for his help in editing. Finally, my thanks goes to National Chiao-Tung University for allowing me the resources and environment to study as well as the scholarship that allowed me to complete this process. ii Table of Contents ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................................ i Acknowledgements .........................................................................................................................ii Table of Contents ........................................................................................................................ ..iii Introduction: A New Way of Looking ........................................................................................ - 1 - The Problem ............................................................................................................................ - 1 - Background ............................................................................................................................. - 2 - The Feminist Schism ........................................................................................................... - 2 - The Violent Male Gaze ........................................................................................................ - 4 - Methodology ........................................................................................................................... - 6 - Structure of the Research ................................................................................................. - 10 - Chapter 2: Commodity and Power .......................................................................................... - 17 - A Time of Freedom: The Sex Worker as Literal Commodity Object ..................................... - 20 - A Time of Love: A Lack of Certainty in Cold War Taiwan ...................................................... - 27 - A Time of Youth: A Complex Subjectivity Requiring Complex Resistances .......................... - 34 - Conclusions: A Semiosis Overlaid on the Topology of Taiwan ............................................. - 44 - Chapter 3: The Brothel Prostitutes of Monga and Days Looking at the Sea: Fundamental Shifts in Power Through Modernity .................................................................................................. - 49 - Echoing the Past, Contextualizing the Future ....................................................................... - 51 - Days Looking at the Sea: The Powers of Adoption, Family Law, and Patrilineality.............. - 53 - Monga: Gangster Norms Coping with Femininity ................................................................ - 64 - Conclusions: Power Resistances Evolving with Society ........................................................ - 77 - Chapter 4: Location on the Margins: Migrants and Sex Workers in The Fourth Portrait and Stilt ................................................... - 83 - Migrant Wives and Imagined Borders .................................................................................. - 83 - Concubines, Wives, Prostitutes ............................................................................................ - 86 - Migrant Chinese Brides: Mothering Across the Impassable Strait ....................................... - 89 - Mail-Order Brides from Vietnam: Commodities, Laws, and In-Laws ................................. - 102 - Conclusions: Taiwan as the Location of Legitimacy ............................................................ - 114 - Conclusion: Redefining the Grids, Redefining Power ........................................................... - 119 - Taking Back the Body .......................................................................................................... - 122 - Shifting Centers of Power ................................................................................................... - 124 - iii What Can Be Concluded, and What Cannot ....................................................................... - 129 - Appendix 1: Figures ................................................................................................................. - 130 - Appendix 2: Films Analyzed in this Thesis .............................................................................. - 137 - Bibliography ............................................................................................................................ - 139 - Chinese Sources: ............................................................................................................. - 139 - English Sources: .............................................................................................................. - 139 - iv Introduction: A New Way of Looking The Problem Taiwanese law currently defines penalties for sex work (according to the current law existing since the 1991, and especially after the presidency of Chen Shui-Bian starting in 2000, before which licensed prostitution existed in small numbers).1 Likewise, feminists, activists, and academics are locked in a battle either advocating the abolishment of prostitution or the establishment of sex work as a legitimate form of work (or some slight variations, such as decriminalization). However, for all of these opinions there seems to be a lack of satisfactory definitions (many literally never define what sex work is), research (there is much speculation about sex workers but few interviews and ethnographies outside of government care facilities), and humanity (the sex worker becomes a concept in these debates, rather than a person). The first task of this research, therefore, is to briefly read between the lines of these sources for a Taiwanese institutional answer to the question: “What is sex work?” Since these (law, academics, and activists) are the major cultural institutions that define the deviancy or legitimacy of sex workers, it is worthwhile to use their discussions to supplement the discussion of film sources. The mirror on the other side of these institutions is cinema, which reacts to the former’s definitions of sex work and in turn redefines them. The representations by film are not simply a reflection of sexual deviance, but are instead a web of societal and historical influences that combine to send a message. The second question of this research is therefore: “How are sex workers represented in Taiwanese films, and why?” and the third question is “What are the 1 Hung (2009: 21-22) points out that licensed prostitution existed for around 40 years since the KMT left China, and that Chen began a campaign against the practice as mayor of Taipei in 1997. By that time there were only 128 licensed prostitutes in the city (page 35). 1 Chou (2007) points out that licensed prostitution may technically still exist, but the Taipei