外 國 語 文國 學 立 系 中 山 大 學 ， 博士論文 國立中山大學外國語文學系 博士論文 自「家」書寫：當代美國原住民女性的生命敘事 Department of Foreign Languages and Literature National Sun Yat-sen University Doctorate Dissertation 自「家」書寫：當代美國原住民女性的生命敘事 Writing from Home: Contemporary Native American Women’s Life Narratives 研究生：張淑君 Clara Shu-Chun Chang 研究生：張淑君 指導教授：黃心雅 博士 Dr. Hsinya Huang 中華民國102年1月 101 January 2013 學年度 國立中山大學外國語文學系 博士論文 Department of Foreign Languages and Literature National Sun Yat-sen University Doctorate Dissertation 自「家」書寫：當代美國原住民女性的生命敘事 Writing from Home: Contemporary Native American Women’s Life Narratives 研究生：張淑君 Clara Shu-Chun Chang 指導教授：黃心雅 博士 Dr. Hsinya Huang 中華民國 102 年 1 月 January 2013 i Acknowledgements It is with inexpressible appreciation to acknowledge the encouragement, help and suggestions received during the process of writing a dissertation and completing the Ph.D. program. I feel exceedingly fortunate in having professional guidance and generous support from my advisor, mentors, friends, and family; all of them contributed to this work. Without them, this dissertation would not have been possible. The completion of my dissertation was aided by 2011 Doctoral Dissertation Award from the National Science Council, Taiwan. With its generous financial assistance, I could concentrate on writing up the dissertation. I feel really honored to express my profound gratitude and deep regards to my advisor, Dr. Hsinya Huang. I have been greatly helped by her advice and expertise. I sincerely appreciate her unfaltering perseverance through my fragmented ideas and rugged language. I am also indebted to Dr. Joni Adamson for her hearty encouragement and stimulating suggestions. She has been a great mentor to me for years, providing invaluable comments on my works and steadfast support for my research. Moreover, I would like to thank my oral examiners, Dr. Kai-Ling Liu, Dr. Jade Tsui-yu Lee, Dr. Min-hsiou Rachel Hung, and Dr. Shiuh-huah Serena Chou, for their ii expert advice to improve this dissertation. Their keen critical perceptions allow me to fortify this dissertation with more substantial arguments. I especially thank to Dr. Min-hsiou Rachel Hung for her inspiring conversations which enable me to formulate the idea about “home writing.” Lastly, my gratitude also goes to my fellow graduates and friends, Roy, Jeff, Ruby, Hui Chun, Lisa, Siao-Jing, Rosa, Maggie, and Shiang-hui, whose warmhearted friendship helps me overcome the difficulties in writing this dissertation. Moreover, my parents and my husband are always great supporters during my graduate studies. With their unconditional assistance and sacrifices, I could focus on dissertation writing while taking care of my beloved children, Yu-Cheng and I-Chen. I also want to thank to my children for their understanding of their fully occupied mother. It is with love and support I can accomplish my responsibilities as a Ph.D. student, a mother, and a wife during these years. Given the fact, I dedicate this dissertation to my professors, beloved family and cherished friends whose encouragement and companionship become a driving force to see the light at the end of the tunnel. iii 摘要 本論文檢視當代美國原住民女性作家的生命書寫如何形塑當代美國原住民 女性對於「家園」的概念。 論者王荷莎以自我、生命、與書寫切入美國原住民 自傳的閱讀，本論文計畫以王荷莎的論點為經，繼之以「家」的論述為緯，爬梳 「自我」、「生命」、「家園」與「書寫」如何在原住民女性生命敘事中相互形塑觀 照，以原民自我與女性經驗將生命書寫轉化成原鄉想像建構的場域，藉以銘刻當 代原住民女性的歸家之路。「家園」是美國原住民女性自我形塑與自我表徵最重 要的指涉位置；失落家園的殖民歷史與女性家居生命經驗形塑原住民女性對「家 園」的想念、想望與想像，因此本論文從當代美國原住民女性的「家園」經驗切 入其生命敘事文本的閱讀，探討原住民女性自我、家居日常生活與原鄉文化想像 如何巧妙交織出當代原住民女性別有興味的「家園書寫」。當代原住民女性透過 生命故事，書寫她們對「家園」的想念與想望，以文化想像成就「家園」的建構， 以文字實踐其歸鄉之旅。總結，本論文以「自家書寫」為引，探究以「家」為研 究方法切入當代美國原住民女性生命敘事文本閱讀的可行性與可能性，透過論述 與文本反覆參照，辯證「家」如何成為美國原住民女性生命與文化實踐的動機、 途徑、與願景。本論文選讀四位當代美國首屈一指的原住民女性作家的生命書寫 作品，包含琳達･荷根回憶錄《觀照世界的女人：原住民回憶錄》、黛安．葛蘭西 回憶錄《掌握呼息》、路薏絲．鄂翠曲回憶錄《藍樫鳥之舞：初為人母的一年》 與萊絲里．席爾柯回憶錄《綠松石岩層：回憶錄》。 關鍵字：美國原住民文學、生命書寫、家、原鄉、文化創傷、文化想像、群落感 iv Abstract This dissertation examines how contemporary Native American women conceptualize home in their life writings. As Hertha Wong understands Native American autobiography in terms of the tribal sense of self, life, and language, I extend her reading by shifting the focus to the sense of home as represented in Native women’s life narratives. With far-reaching implications, home constitutes a defining point of reference for Native women’s self-recognition and self-portrait. Native women’s sense of home is largely guided by their loss of and imagination for their home places. Native life writings thus convey an emotional longing for an imaginary or physical reunion with their homeland. Native women’s specific experience of home thus provides a cutting edge for this project. I argue that, in Native women’s life narrative, the sense of home implicates the awareness of a female self, the practice of everyday life in domestic sphere, and cultural attachment to their home places. I intend to demonstrate Native women’s everlasting quest for and construction of home in their life narratives and explore the possibility of using home as a critical approach. Overall, the project explore how self, life, and home are intertwined and inscribed in Native women’s life narratives and how each writer launches and paves her way home through the life stories. The focal texts in this project include Native American women’s life narratives composed at the turn of the century, specifically Linda v Hogan’s The Woman Who Watches over the World: A Native Memoir (2001), Diane Glancy’s Claiming Breath (1992), Louise Erdrich’s The Blue Jay’s Dance: A Birth Year (1995), and Leslie Marmon Silko’s The Turquoise Ledge: A Memoir (2010). Keywords: Native American literature, life writing, home, home place, cultural trauma, cultural imagination, sense of community vi TABLE OF CONTENTS: 論文審定書 i Acknowledgements ii 摘要 iv Abstract v Chapter One Introduction: Writing from Home 1 Chapter Two This I Call Home 33 Chapter Three Home Lost in Linda Hogan’s The Woman’s Who 65 Watches over the World: A Native Memoir Chapter Four The Road Home in Diane Glancy’s Claiming Breath 109 Chapter Five Homesick at Home in Louise Erdrich’s The Blue Jays’ 145 Dance: A Birth Year Chapter Six At Home on Earth in Leslie Marmon Silko’s 185 The Turquoise Ledge: A Memoir Chapter Seven Conclusion: Writing My Way Home 225 Works Cited 243 vii Chapter One Writing from Home Perhaps the World Ends Here The world begins at a kitchen table. No matter what we must eat to live. The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on. (3) --Joy Harjo, “Perhaps the World Ends Here” Joy Harjo in her poem, “Perhaps the World Ends Here,” beautifully describes the living life around the kitchen table and elaborates on the significance of the table to a sustainable life at home. She describes how the kitchen table holds together the emotions that form the dramatic fabric of everyday life. Happiness and sorrow, hope and disappointment, remembrance and forgetting get entangled in the exact spot. The table where “the gifts of earth” are served to feed her family provides the metaphor of life. More than just the metaphor of life, the kitchen table is also a metaphor for a sustainable culture. Harjo and Gloria Bird, in the Introduction to Reinventing the Enemy’s Language, describe how a group of native women turn a kitchen table into a desk, where intellectual thoughts are inspired and circulated: “No matter, the kitchen table is ever present in its place at the center of being. It has often been the desk after the dishes are cleared, the children put to bed” (19). The artistic ideas are stimulated 1 and realized in the book, Reinventing the Enemy’s Language, after multiple meetings around the kitchen table. The talks among this group of women writers and critics have continued for years from their teenage years to the birth of their grandchildren. They gather around kitchen tables, preparing food for their children and grandchildren, telling stories of their family and communities, writing notes after reading manuscripts, and circulating their inspirations for tribal survival. The kitchen table is considered to be not only the heart of a home but also the mind of a house. Harjo’s perception of the kitchen table reveals the importance of the domestic sphere to her as a Native woman writer. Home, as represented through the kitchen table in the poem, carries the ideologies both for the domestic life and for artistic writings. This dissertation examines how contemporary Native American women conceptualize home in their life writings. As Hertha Wong understands Native American autobiography in terms of the tribal sense of self, life, and language, I extend her reading by shifting the focus to the sense of home as represented in Native women’s life narratives. With far-reaching implications, home constitutes a defining point of reference for Native women’s self-recognition and self-portrait. Native women’s sense of home is largely guided by their loss of and imagination for their home places. Native life writings thus convey an emotional longing for an imaginary or physical reunion with their homeland. Native women’s specific experience of home 2 thus provides a cutting edge for this project. I argue that, in Native women’s life narrative, the sense of home implicates the awareness of a female self, the practice of everyday life in domestic sphere, and cultural attachment to their home places. I intend to demonstrate Native women’s everlasting quest for and construction of home in their life narratives and explore the possibility of using home as a critical approach. Overall, the project explore how self, life, and home are intertwined and inscribed in Native women’s life narratives and how each writer launches and paves her way home through the life stories. The focal texts in this project include Native American women’s life narratives composed at the turn of the century, specifically Linda Hogan’s The Woman Who Watches over the World: A Native Memoir (2001), Diane Glancy’s Claiming Breath (1992), Louise Erdrich’s The Blue Jay’s Dance: A Birth Year (1995), and Leslie Marmon Silko’s The Turquoise Ledge (2010).