RSS

#11 Dec 14 - Gender ＆ Translation

張貼者： NTNU GITI BLOG on 2009年10月27日 星期二
標籤：
#11 Dec 14 Inderpal Grewal, Transnational America

6 意見:

明哲 提到...

Characterized as a discourse of the postcolonialism, “hybridity” rejects cultural hegemony, challenges “settled” values and identifies itself with “difference.” During the past few decades the Asian-American identity has experienced an upheaval pendulum between “claiming America” and “ethnic nationalism,” but in neither way could it effectively usher the acceptance of the ethnic Asians by the mainstream American society. The patriarchal eurocentrism presumes that America is intrinsically composed of its European ancestors, thus the minority ethnic groups are usually marginalized and victimized as receiver of the “kindness” granted by so-called American multiculturalism. That is why Mukherjee argues to be called American rather than Asian-American, because multiculturalism, as can be observed, could be dangerous and hazardous to the very idea of racial egalitarianism. For example, although Amy Tan and Maxine Hong Kingston tried in their novels to recognize their American identity, they finally ended up making the ethnic Chinese more “American” only.
My personal experience of watching the movie “The Joy Luck Club” reinforces my hypothesis about the awkward situation encountered by the ethnic minorities in the United States. This movie shows the journey of those pathetic Chinese women who suffered in the plights of traditional China to modern America rendered as the paradise of liberal freedom. The gendered characters are seen as the conveyor of conflicting struggles between the nostalgia of the “past” and the longing for the “modernity.” I really felt gross when such a highly exoticized (of course not the kind of orientalized fantacy as shown in the magic spices of The Mistress of Spices, but rather a monotonous typified helpless Chinese female image) movie came to be a successful “transnational connectivity” as many reviews had argued. I wonder if those Americans of European origins have ever doubted their “American” identity? How has the cultural hegemony of the West continued to haunt the realization of universal values highlighted in postcolonial cosmopolitanism?

2009年12月11日 下午5:54
Craig 提到...

I enjoyed reading Inderpal Grewal's extremely well researched essay about how to market a Barbie Doll in India. Advertising manipulates people's desires so they buy things, this we have known for a long time. In today's globalized consumer culture, identity is often constructed by what is bought, and the fact of existence has become “I shop, therefore I am,” a variation of Descarte's famous dictum. The dangers of Barbie as body image for young girls has been well documented, and unfortunately, the health of young girls continues to be negatively impacted. Just another example of why capitalism as a system of social organization is deeply flawed. Watching the world adopt consumerism while often maintaining an ambivalent relationship to democratic ideals is tragic and heart wrenching. People around the world flock to greed and materialism, while more difficult to adapt morals are ignored, or even worse, actively suppressed by fascistic governments.

Advertising and localization are interesting areas of the translation field, and not easy to do well. The downside, of course, is that these activities make us as translators complicit in what is often life destroying capitalist greed.

2009年12月13日 上午8:04
素勳 提到...

I guess it may serve to ask, what defines a “cosmopolitan subject”? Is “mobility” the only defining factor? What about those transnational workers? Are “cosmopolitans” the elite group, like those privileged, traveling Europeans/Americans in the 19 and 20 centuries, naming themselves “the world citizens” yet protected by imperialism and “nationalism” all the time? While cosmopolitanism was once afraid to be a force of leveling out differences, it does not seem to be the case now. As the author tried to argue, most of time, cosmopolitanism is indeed built on the standpoint of nationalism. Also, nation-state ( e.g. America) is a heterogeneity with no “origins”?

Yet, as the author points out, an implied concept of a universalized aethetics seems to be at the working in the awarding of Nobel Prizes of Literature. And the collection of Nobel Prize has become one’s placement or insertion into international literature-- like Ghosh and his grandfather. (I guess it is the same in Taiwan. Many have displayed their hard-covered collection of Nobel Prize on the book-shelf. Is this also a good example of identity-shaping consumption, just like purchasing the Indian Barbie?) The author points out his(Ghosh) grandfather’s bookcase is a gendered heritage—to the male child only. I guess that may not always be the case. For it is known that girls like to read—except that she is forbidden to enter the study?

Ghosh’s “ In the Antique Land” is an interesting book, trying to tell a “dual” story on the other side of “West”, both in the ancient and the modern time. Despite of the criticism it receives in the book, I think it is a good effort to try. The interaction between the “traveling” Indian and the local Egyptian villagers is worth a lot of thoughts-- like the Iman being the “imaginary” traveler, or the immigrant worker who may become the archive’s source in the future just like the Indian slave “ MSH 6” in the Antique Land whose voice was overshadowed by the slave owner despite that “he” is the one that activate the whole story?

In contrast, the two books written by Indian women seem only to strengthen the stereotypes of the division between the East /tradition/ oppression and the West /modern/liberal. Does the “worlding” of women by Indian women writers/ or Chinese women writers living in America (e.g. Amy Tan) share the same problem?

2009年12月13日 上午9:31
加真 提到...

The concept of cosmopolitanism contained contradictory connotations. Often used in opposition to nationalism, cosmopolitanism, from its etymology, excludes many other elements that making up an individual’s/ a subject’s identity. Other than nationality, an individual/ a subject is different in race, gender, social class, and etc. When in a time of war, such cosmopolitan ideas might be appealing to the struggling public. For example, Sun Yat-san’s 世界大同 idea. However, in peace time, the homogenizing forces cosmopolitanism implies can be scary. As William Barbieri claims, cosmopolitan logic can lead “ultimately to a sort of overall human homogeneity and to the destruction of the cultural diversity that many take to be an essential human good” (43).

The inevitable exchanges of people and capital characterize the cosmopolitanism. Cosmopolitans are usually linked with their somewhat privileged social status, so as to allow them to move from continents to continents. In Caren Kaplan’s argument, such nomadism is by no means “a loss of privilege”, but “an assertion of power” (43). Cosmopolitans are capable of escaping from the place of tradition to enter the land of modernity. In late Qing and the early Republican, the exchanges between China and other countries were quite active. Many women for the first time of Chinese history were able to gain mobility. They traveled with their male counterparts to Japan. Do they also share the cosmopolitan ideas with men? It seems that their traveling to Japan to study only make them very eager to built a strong nation. Their nationalism is strengthened. “吾且無國，安得有身，更安得有學” is what they feel and their sense of belonging is so intense.

2009年12月13日 上午10:03
譯想世界 提到...

讀這本書有一點困難，因為對南亞的移民與社會毫無了解。但仍然還是讀到有趣和新鮮的東西。例如說，南亞的女性書寫。例如，頁68的故事梗概，初初讀來，覺得很幼稚，就一部小說來說。然而，它是一部「成功」的小說（不然就不會有人討論它我們也不用這麼辛苦來讀別人對它的研究），不由得不讓我們想想其成功的原因。故事的橋段其實很簡單：一個在印度受壓迫的女主角，百般辛苦地來到美麗新世界，歷經萬苦之後，終於取得成功，在新世界裡重建身分，安家立業，得到自由。好了，這樣的故事是否聽來耳熟能詳？是的，許多迪斯尼電影，許多好萊塢電影就是這麼演的。我猜馬上可以讓人想到的就是〈灰姑娘〉，以及由「灰姑娘」這個故事「原型」衍變出來的許多通俗電影，如早期的〈窕窕淑女〉到幾年前的〈麻雀變鳳凰〉等等。說到這，我猜大家應該都想到了那道神奇配方:binary opposition between bad and good, tradition and modern, old and new.... 如此地從一端擺渡到另一端，如果可以用一個譬喻來說，就是「旅程」，這個「旅程」，對文明，個人，社會...等等都可適用，假如我們要探討其演變的話。然而寫到這裡，我忍不住想到上個禮拜談到的「細節」－－用張愛玲的話，即：「而中國的時裝的歷史，一言以蔽之，就是這些點綴品[細節]的逐漸減去。」把「中國」「時裝」設為可代換項，我想也適用於這裡或其他領域的討論，例如翻譯史的討論。然而作為一個「翻譯人」，我實在覺得「細節」實在太重要了，不論就理論，實際，或隱喻的層面。
話扯遠了，回到這部小說。我是說，一但小說如此建構，許多例如印度種族，文化，性別...等等細節全都遺落了。異地的生活是否都是美好的，不盡然，至少有一讀者看到美麗新世界的生活也是充滿掙扎（頁73）。
另外要說的的：二元對立真是一個可怕的區分。但是由於它是一種簡易的認識，認知，辨識的工具，它又是無所不在的。因為二元對立，印度，傳統，女性....被視為不好的，而美國，現代，男性...被視為好的。然而有時我們得停下來想一想：是誰在如此區分，區分的標準何在？為何如此區分？....等等。
又，「簡易」是一個良好的價值嗎？對誰良好？...
細節為何在現代遭受殲滅？因為某種神祕的universal agenda無法納入所有的differences嗎？
或者???

2009年12月13日 下午1:56
Lisa Liao 提到...

除了小說以外，印度的電影也在不斷複製或強化所謂「印度女人」的形象，這些女性大多美麗、順服、傳統，以「雨季的婚禮」(monsoon wedding)來說，這部片的編劇和導演都是印度籍，後來在好萊塢發展，片裡的女主角美麗可人，雖然跟有婦之夫來往，但最後還是順從父親意思，嫁給美國來的印度籍未婚夫。許多影評讚賞這部片，認為這部片「將古代和現代、傳統與反傳統、純真和性感兼容並蓄地冶於一處」，加上豪華的歌舞場景，沒有太大意外地，這部電影奪下威尼斯影展金獅獎，並獲得奧斯卡最佳外語片提名。某篇影評寫著：「透過一場華麗的印度婚禮的安排，我們不但看到了印度歌舞的異國風情，也看到了愛情的普世感動。」這部片有異國風情元素(印度華麗歌舞)，還有觀眾愛看的愛情元素在裡面，是一部很容易就可以討西方觀眾喜歡的電影，片尾的大雨戲更是全片「高潮」，不管之前發生什麼事，最後大雨一落下，男女主角就在雨中擁吻，皆大歡喜，正是所謂的「普世感動」；就我看來，這部片還是脫離不了二元對立的模式(新/舊，現代/傳統)，並無新意可言，然後對應到之前的閱讀，這裡的印度女性不只是女性而已，它還是整個印度的化身，受到西方觀眾的觀看(gaze)，再想到許多深受西方歡迎的「中國」電影，除了明哲提到的喜福會，融之堂也是一個例子，這部片導演為義大利人，拍攝中國女性和西方男性的愛情和生命故事，同樣地，這部片還是參雜了(想像的)東方異國情調，再加上美麗的中國女人無怨無悔地為愛付出並為愛走天涯(其實到了美國/西方)的故事，毫無疑問地依舊深得歐洲觀眾喜歡，這種一再複製的東方女性形象，可以想像，未來的電影裡面還是會一再出現，創作者是不是應該好好反思一下這其中的危險和偏頗呢?

2009年12月13日 下午6:37

張貼留言