A Problematic Appropriation of the Mulan Folklore in the Woman Warrior

《女戰士》中挪用花木蘭民間傳說的問題

張剛琿(Brett Kang-hun Chang)

湯婷婷 ； 《女戰士》 ； 木蘭民間傳說 ； 雷蒙．威廉斯 ； 收編 ； 顛覆與包容 ； Maxine Hong Kingston ； The Woman Warrior ； Mulan Folklore ； Raymond Williams ； incorporation ； the production and containment of subversion and disorder

興大人文學報

54期（2015 / 03 / 01）

29 - 46

英文

英國批評家雷蒙．威廉斯曾經說過：抵抗的議題即是收編的問題。如果我們以他的論點切入來看華裔美籍女作家湯婷婷帶有自傳性色彩的《女戰士》，這本小說無庸置疑地表達出對於女性遭遇性別不平等待遇或歧視的對抗和無法苟同的姿態。這種對抗的姿態開始顯現在這本出版於1976年小說裏第二部分「白虎山學道」中。湯婷婷在此篇中挪用並改寫了中國歷史上的花木蘭民間傳說，代父出征沙場，勇敢殺敵的花木蘭和她的故事，是正面地反擊作者從小開始聽到對女性歧視與貶低的措辭如：「米蟲」、「奴」、「鳩」的利器。然而借用花木蘭民間傳說來創作，可以說是反而陷入父權社會既定的框架中。因為花木蘭民間傳說即有遭收編的含意，或可以視為史蒂芬．葛林布萊陳述：文化霸權的「顛覆與包容」理論的典型例子。事實上，中國社會裏的統治階級早已將花木蘭民間傳說收編在其政治正確言論中，1998年美商華德．迪士尼公司動畫改編版本又重新宣傳此一政治正確的女戰士故事。或許，當眾多讀者不質疑「白虎山學道」文中，女將軍故事充滿爭議的結尾時，此舉就可視為世界父權秩序的勝利，或可視為女性主義遭主流文化收編的例子。本文旨在探討湯婷婷《女戰士》裏的女將軍和花木蘭民間傳說之間微妙的關係，以及權力和文本間的複雜聯繫。

Raymond Williams, one of the leading Left thinkers in Great Britain during the twentieth century, once said that the question of resistance is the problem of incorporation. If we judge Maxine Hong Kingston’s feminist ideas as expressed in The Woman Warrior in light of this perspective, it is without doubt that hers amount to a resistant or oppositional stance against any gender inequality a maligned weaker sex has suffered. This resistance starts to manifest itself in ＂White Tigers (「白虎山學道」) ,＂ the first section of her so-called memoir published in 1976, when the famous Mulan Folklore was rewritten and appropriated. Fa Mulan (花木蘭), the girl who substituted for her aged father to fight bravely in the battlefield, and her tale, positively confront derogatory remarks, like ＂cowbirds,＂ ＂maggots in the rice,＂ and ＂slave,＂ which Maxine Hong Kingston heard during her childhood, as well as gender discrimination in general. Nonetheless, this appropriation of Mulan Folklore is problematic because it is also a problem of incorporation- or, in Stephen Greenblatt's words, a typical example of ＂the production and containment of subversion and disorder＂ by hegemony. In fact, the dominant class in Chinese society had already incorporated the folklore in its politically correct language, not to mention Mulan, the 1998 animated Walt Disney film version. Perhaps the popularity of The Woman Warrior could be viewed as the triumph of a global patriarchal order when most of its readers have accepted Kingston's controversial treatment of her heroine in ＂White Tigers.＂; or, it is probably an example of the incorporation of feminism by mainstream commercialism. The purpose of this paper is to examine the tricky relationship between Mulan Folklore and Maxine Hong Kingston's version about a female general in The Woman Warrior, and subsequently the complicated ties between power and literary texts.

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