Abstract
In this thesis, I discuss the survival strategy of the Thao, an indigenous group in central Taiwan, and the relationships between the Thao and the government reaching from the Japanese colonial period through the current DPP government. Although the Thao are a very small and highly Sinicized group, they were officially recognized as a separate indigenous group by the Taiwan government in 2001. This thesis is divided into two parts. Following the introduction, I first present the historical contexts of how different governments have treated or ignored Thao people. In particular, the policies toward the indigenous population during the Japanese colonial period seriously affected the position of the Thao later in the Taiwanese classification of indigenes. In this part, I also show how the Thao were successfully able to achieve government recognition. In part two, I discuss the culture and social structure of the Thao by utilizing ethnographic materials. In Taiwan, the indigenous populations are economically and politically underprivileged people. The Thao, being small in number and highly Sinicized, are probably the most underprivileged among these indigenous groups. In other words, Thao people are the subaltern class in Taiwan. Generally speaking, “the subaltern” refers to people who are oppressed by an elite or dominant class to the point of leaving them powerless. However, through the fieldwork, I found that the Thao were powerful and that they did not seem to suffer the extreme oppression typical of other subaltern groups. On the contrary, they have transformed their subalternity into a strategy for survival; a strategy has proved to be quite successful. The main discussion becomes, what is their subalternity actually, and how has it been transformed into an advantage. Government policies toward them, and especially since the 9/21 Earthquake in 1999, the Thao have strategically emphasized a “discourse of survival.” In addition, Thao people still maintain their traditional religion (shamanism) and social structure (patrilineal clan society) as important markers of ethnic boundary. Their shamanism and ulalaluan, a symbol of Thao ancestor spirits, also play an important role in their discourse. Therefore, my aim in this thesis is to elicit the meaning of being subaltern in both historical and contemporary contexts. The government policies and their “traditional” culture are closely related to the Thao strategy for survival. This makes the Thao the first and also the special case in Taiwan’s indigenous history.