Culture Politics and Linguistic Recognition in Taiwan
The consolidation of Taiwanese identity in recent years has been accompanied by two interrelated paradoxes: a continued language shift from local Taiwanese languages to Mandarin Chinese, and the increasing subordination of the Hoklo majority culture in ethnic policy and public identity discourses. A number of initiatives have been undertaken towards the revitalization and recognition of minority cultures. At the same time, however, the Hoklo majority culture has become akin to a political taboo.
This book examines how the interplay of ethnicity, national identity and party politics has shaped current debates on national culture and linguistic recognition in Taiwan. It suggests that the ethnolinguistic distribution of the electorate has led parties to adopt distinctive strategies in an attempt to broaden their ethnic support bases. On the one hand, the DPP and the KMT have strived to play down their respective de-Sinicization and Sinicization ideologies, as well as their Hoklo and Chinese ethnocultural cores. At the same time, the parties have competed to portray themselves as the legitimate protectors of minority interests by promoting Hakka and Aboriginal cultures. These concomitant logics have discouraged parties from appealing to ethnonationalist rhetoric, prompting them to express their antagonistic ideologies of Taiwanese and Chinese nationalism through more liberal conceptions of language rights. Therefore, the book argues that constraints to cultural and linguistic recognition in Taiwan are shaped by political rather than cultural and sociolinguistic factors.
Investigating Taiwans counterintuitive ethnolinguistic situation, this book makes an important theoretical contribution to the literature in many fields of study and will appeal to scholars of Taiwanese politics, sociolinguistics, culture and history.
Jean-Franois Dupr is SSHRC Postdoctoral Fellow at the School of Political Studies, University of Ottawa.
Routledge Research on Taiwan
Series Editor: Dafydd Fell
SOAS, UK
The Routledge Research on Taiwan Series seeks to publish quality research on all aspects of Taiwan studies. Taking an interdisciplinary approach, the books will cover topics such as politics, economic development, culture, society, anthropology and history.
This new book series will include the best possible scholarship from the social sciences and the humanities and welcomes submissions from established authors in the field as well as from younger authors. In addition to research monographs and edited volumes general works or textbooks with a broader appeal will be considered.
The Series is advised by an international Editorial Board and edited by Dafydd Fell of the Centre of Taiwan Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies.
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20 Culture Politics and Linguistic Recognition in Taiwan
Ethnicity, National Identity, and the Party System
Jean-Franois Dupr
First published 2017
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2017 Jean-Franois Dupr
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Names: Dupre, Jean-Francois.
Title: Culture politics and linguistic recognition in Taiwan : ethnicity,
national identity, and the party system / Jean-Francois Dupre.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2017. |
Series: Routledge research on Taiwan ; 20 | Includes bibliographical
references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016044143 | ISBN 9781138643178 (hardback) |
ISBN 9781315629490 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Political cultureTaiwan. | Culture and politicsTaiwan. |
EthnicityPolitical aspectsTaiwan. | Language policyTaiwan. |
TaiwanLanguagesPolitical aspects. | Political partiesTaiwan. |
National characteristics, TaiwanPolitical aspects. | TaiwanPolitics an
government2000
Classification: LCC JZ1536 .D87 2017 | DDC 323.1199/25dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016044143
ISBN: 978-1-138-64317-8 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-62949-0 (ebk)
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This book began as a PhD thesis submitted at the University of Hong Kong in 2014. I am indebted to the University of Hong Kong for providing the Postgraduate Studentship, and to the Department of Politics and Public Administration (PPA) for extra financial and logistic support. I would have been unable to complete this dissertation without the supervision of Elaine Chan, who patiently read many drafts and provided extensive comments on each of them. Dr Chan trusted and encouraged me in each of my endeavours, and I am truly grateful for her relentless support. Thanks to May Yim and Victoria Kwok from the general office, without whose invaluable administrative help I could not have made the most of my PhD experience. I also want to thank other faculty members (current and previous) from the PPA department who have provided me with academic advice and mentorship, or simply made my life in Hong Kong more enjoyable, in particular Joseph Chan, Lam Wai-man, Peter Cheung, Siegfried Van Duffel and Sara Jordan.
I could not have gained such knowledge about Taiwan without spending substantial amounts of time there. I am indebted to the Taiwan Economic and Cultural Office in Canada and the Taiwan Ministry of Education for funding my Mandarin Studies with the Huayu Enrichment Scholarship, and to the Academia Sinica Institute of Sociology (IOS) for accepting me as associate student and for providing me the Fellowship for Doctoral Candidates in the Humanities and Social Sciences. The Doctoral Fellowship at Academia Sinica gave me the opportunity to work under the guidance of Hsiau A-chin, a leading expert on cultural nationalism and language politics in Taiwan. This opportunity also enabled me to discuss my research with other distinguished sociologists and political scientists specializing in ethnic and national identity studies, such as Wu Nai-teh, Chang Mao-kuei, Wang Fu-chang and Wong Ting-hong. In addition to receiving extensive feedback from the IOS faculty, I also had the chance to interact with researchers from other institutes, such as the Institute of Linguistics and the French Centre for Research on Contemporary China (CEFC). I am grateful to Michael Hsiao Hsin-huang, who was then Head of the IOS, for giving me this research opportunity, and to all the staff who helped me during my tenure of the Fellowship. Tess Yeh Chun-chiao, research assistant at the IOS, has provided invaluable assistance with translation, interpretation and contacting interviewees. Ms Lee Su-Chuan, Executive Secretary at the IOS, has also been extremely kind and helpful during my stay. Special thanks to all my interviewees, and to Linda Arrigo, who generously shared her captivating experiences and unparalleled understanding of the Taiwanese democratization movement with me on numerous occasions.
