Graduate Institute of Taiwanese Literature, NCCU

Title The “Author” of Minzoku Taiwan? : Toshio Ikeda’s Editorial Style and Folkloric Writing Author Chiu, Ya-Fang Professor, Department of Taiwan Languages and Communication, National United University Abstract Prior to the publication of Minzoku Taiwan, Toshio Ikeda entered the realm of magazine editing and began engaging in folkloric writing due to his acquaintance with Mitsuru Nishikawa. Following the launch of Minzoku Taiwan, Ikeda emerged as the most prolific editor among his peers, particularly recognized for his comprehensive documentation of various folk customs in the Manka (Wanhua) region. Based on his contributions to this magazine, Ikeda’s distinctive characteristics, particularly in comparison to other editors, become evident. Beyond his meticulous documentary writing style, Ikeda’s content notably focuses on customs related to families, women, and the spectral. Another notable feature of his work is his extensive use of pseudonyms, many of which were female names. This perspective allowed him to delve into the “inner side” (naimen) of Taiwanese family folk customs, moving beyond a mere observation of their “external surface” (hyōmen) and revealing aspects that are obscured or unknown. Despite his significant contributions to Minzoku Taiwan, Ikeda’s work has long been underappreciated, overshadowed by a figure deemed more representative of the magazine’s legacy—Takeo Kanaseki. Given Toshio Ikeda’s notable contributions to Minzoku Taiwan, this paper seeks to provide a framework for reassessing his editorial contributions. By juxtaposing the distinct editorial styles and works of Toshio Ikeda and Takeo Kanaseki, this study aims to re-examine Ikeda’s role as an editor and explore how his folkloric writing reveals his self-identity and cultural positioning.  

Title Shamanism as Method: Siraya Ong-I as National Allegory and Cultural Heritage Author Chen, Chih-Fan Associate Professor, Institute of Taiwan Literature, National Tsing Hua University Abstract This article examines the Siraya Ong-I (female medium) as a critical lens for understanding how relational formations generated through Shamanism practices contribute to the making of Taiwanese subjectivity. Historically, Indigenous shamanic traditions were marginalized as primitive or superstitious under shifting political regimes, and archival representations of the Ong-I exemplify this devaluation. Since the 1990s, however, the ritual knowledge and spiritual agency associated with the Ong-I have been revalorized within cultural-revitalization efforts. Their spiritual power fosters alternative relational imaginaries that increasingly inform contemporary articulations of Taiwanese identity. Literary works draw on this relationality to construct reconciliatory narratives, amplifying the metaphoric of possession and generating tensions that function as national allegory. The study pursues two main lines of inquiry. First, it analyzes the Ong-I's post-1990s transformation into an object of "heritage-making." Through reviewing documentary materials and cultural programs, the article traces how an ethnic-specific ritual figure becomes incorporated into state-defined cultural-heritage frameworks, revealing how heritage discourse selectively appropriates Indigenous practices in service of national cultural identity. Second, it examines the national-allegorical implications that arise from this process. The Ong-I's spiritual efficacy overlays personal, familial, and collective memories, linking disparate histories through reconciliatory narrative structures. In doing so, the Ong-I becomes both an ethnographic figure and an allegorical medium through which contested histories, cultural imaginaries, and notions of nationhood are negotiated.  

Title A Gaze Toward the Peninsula: Growth, Memory, and Multiple Homelands in the Postwar Writings of Female Writer Zhao Yun Author Lo, Shih-Yun Associate Professor, Graduate Institute of Taiwanese Literature, National Chengchi University Abstract Zhao Yun (1933-2014), a postwar female writer originally from Guangdong and born in Vietnam, demonstrated a sophisticated command of language and excelled in exploring inner consciousness and philosophical reflection. Her writing style was notably experimental. Having grown up amid the turbulence of Asia before and after World War II, her narratives frequently center on childhood memories and trauma, with her diasporic experiences across China, Vietnam, and Taiwan profoundly shaping her literary creations. This study focuses on Zhao Yun's essays and fiction published after her relocation to Taiwan in 1957, examining how her work constructs the concept of "homeland," alongside the movement and reconstruction of the body and identity. Specifically, it explores how the author, while living in postwar Taiwan, retrospectively engages with Vietnam—the place where she was raised—and China, her ancestral homeland, and how this retrospective gaze informs her literary subjectivity. Zhao Yun's case provides valuable insight into the diasporic trajectories of postwar writers who left China but did not fully assimilate into Taiwanese society. At the same time, it exemplifies an alternative aesthetic within the corpus of postwar Taiwanese women's essays, presenting multiple perspectives and aesthetic paradigms within diasporic narratives. This study is significant in two primary respects: first, it seeks to illuminate the often-overlooked memories of the rear front, revealing how wartime trauma contributes to the identity formation of exiled subjects; second, it extends the research scope beyond the island of Taiwan to include Vietnam on the Indochinese Peninsula, thereby foregrounding a cross-regional narrative framework for the wartime generation.  

Title Regeneration and Annihilation: A Preliminary Study of Left-Wing Poetry in Early Postwar Taiwan Author Chang, Shih-Chin Adjunct Assistant Professor, Department of Language and Creative Writing, National Taipei University of Education Abstract In the 1930s, left-wing political movements in Taiwan were suppressed by the colonial authorities, rendering sustained political activism impossible. As a result, cultural production and literary creation became new arenas for left-wing intellectuals. Left-wing literature thus emerged, and left-wing poetry came to occupy a visible position within the literary field. However, from the outbreak of the Sino-Japanese War to the end of World War II, the wartime censorship regime left virtually no space for the survival of left-wing thought. After 1949, when the Nationalist government retreated to Taiwan, left-wing ideas were likewise excluded under anti-communist cultural policies. What has received relatively little attention in previous scholarship is the interstitial period of the early postwar years (1945-1949). During this brief interval, left-wing poetry reappeared in Taiwan in significant quantity alongside the resurgence of left-wing intellectual currents — what this article terms the "regeneration" of left-wing poetry. The postwar "regeneration" of Taiwanese left-wing poetry can be broadly understood through three trajectories: first, the continuation of the left-wing poetic tradition established during the Japanese colonial period; second, the extension of the transnational networks of East Asian left-wing poetry formed before the war; and third, the emergence of a new generation of poets who developed postwar social critiques in response to new political, social, and economic conditions. Drawing on largely unexamined primary materials from the early postwar period, this article offers a preliminary exploration of how these poems inherited prewar Taiwanese or East Asian left-wing poetic lineages, and how they reflected postwar Taiwanese social realities while articulating visions of critique and reform. Under the shadow of the February 28 Incident and the White Terror, as left-wing writers — regardless of provincial background or generational affiliation — were imprisoned or forced to leave Taiwan, left-wing poetry that spoke from the standpoint of socially marginalized groups, sharply criticized social injustices, sought to eliminate inequality, and attempted to challenge the existing order was no longer tolerated, effectively marking its "annihilation."  

Title Cold War Cultural Politics in the Circulation and Reception of Wu Zhuoliu's Literature in the United States Author Wang, Hui-Zhen Professor, Institute of Taiwan Literature, National Tsing Hua University Abstract During the Cold War, Wu Zhuoliu's Wuhuaguo (Fig Tree, the "Lin Bai edition") was banned in Taiwan, prompting the author to search for publication opportunities abroad. Through intermediaries in Japan, the work entered Taiwanese American communities in the United States and appeared — either in full or in excerpted form — in a range of diasporic periodicals. These outlets included the "Formosa Series" Formosa Weekly, the Baodiao movement publication Diaoyutai Bulletin, the pro-independence journal Independent Taiwan, the hometown-association newsletter Wang Chun-Feng, and the self-determination-oriented Grassroots. Despite their divergent ideological orientations and publishing aims — including unification-leaning, independence-focused, and self-determination platforms — all of these periodicals successively featured or reprinted Wu's literary works. Drawing on press and periodical studies, this paper examines how Taiwanese readers in the United States interpreted Wu Zhuoliu's literature within two shifting political contexts: the diplomatic crises of the 1970s — most notably the Republic of China's withdrawal from the United Nations — and the island's burgeoning dangwai (non-KMT opposition) movements in the 1980s. By reconstructing the media landscape in which Wu's works circulated, the study clarifies the cultural politics that shaped the publication, transmission, and reception of Wu Zhuoliu's literature in the United States.