Paelabang Danapan (Pinuyumayan)

介紹卑南族作家孫大川的三本散文集。

(paelabang danapan, second from left)

Calling himself a 'stage builder for Formosans',  paelabang danapan (Puyuma Nation) as far as I see indeed deserves this epithet. I feel it from our encounters, his endeavors; and I see it from the following three books that collect his various pieces of writing from 1985 until 2010.

Professionally speaking, paelabang danapan is a professor of Formosan history, literature and political development; Chinese and western philosophies have also since been his research interests. He taught at various places including Soochow, National Dong Hwa and National Chengchi universities.

Although he personally witnessed and believed in the silent power of an ivory tower like Oxford and Cambridge as well as that of a European monastery during his MA study in Belgium — "I truly believe my contemporary intellectuals should take building the ivory tower [of knowledge] as their mission of the time. Only by standing above reality can we come to a true understanding of reality! " (The World of Sea and Mountain, p. 77)—, his deep concerns for fellow indigenous Formosans, 'the Peoples of the Dusk", prevented him from building one, let alone hiding in one.

Instead, he has created a long and outstanding career in politics, serving twice in the Council of Indigenous Peoples (CIP), first as its very 1st Deputy Minister, then as its 7th Minister. Now he is the Deputy President of the Control Yuan. I think for him, only by standing 'entangled in reality' rather than above or away, can he lay the foundation for indigenous development in perspective. Entangled until the end of his day.

Rimuy Aki (Atayal)

介紹泰雅族女作家里慕依•阿紀的兩本長篇小說：山櫻花之戀及懷鄉。

(Rimuy Aki, first from left)

Rimuy Aki (Atayal Nation) is one of the few indigenous female writers in Taiwan. She works as a Atayal language teachers at elementary schools; writing, a very lonely business as she once told me, is something else for her. 

I think Rimuy actually prefers telling stories to writing them. When I read her novels, I always feel she is just right there on every page reading every line to my ear. That is how 'smooth' her story line goes; I can easily finish seventy or a hundred pages in some hours. 

Unlike Syaman Rapongan who writes about Tao men and their sea with  a hard soul, Rimuy's tone is soft, very feminine, and sometimes excessively romantic for a reader being trained as a historian like me, even when she deals with Atayal hunters struggling with wild boars in deep mountains. Nevertheless, she soothes the soul. 

The other day at the release conference of her second novel, Missing Home, I heard people calling her 'A writer that heals the soul'. Despite the fact how I do complain she simplifies life and colonial reality in her novels, I couldn't agree more with the comment. That is  one of the values of her writing. 

A Preliminary Study of Loanwords in Formosan Languages

介紹我在2014年12月27日2014年台灣原住民族語言國際研討會發表的「台灣原住民族語借詞初探」。

On 27th December 2014, ILRDC (Indigenous Languages Research and Development Center) hosted its first international conference in Taipei, Taiwan. 

(Photo from left to right: Te Haumihiata Mason, Amy Pei-Jung Lee, Poia Rewi, former ILRDC Director Wen-Chung Kao, Feng-Fu Tsao, Paul Jen-Kuei Li, Yedda Palemeq, Joy Jing-Lan Wu, CIP Director Kun-Sheng Chen, Tiun Hak-khiam and Tukung Sra)

The theme of the conference was 'Loanwords, New Words and Indigenous Revitalization Policies'. Thirteen specialists and junior researchers of the Austronesian languages attended to share their knowledge; eight of them are indigenous. 

Taiwan Indigenous TV covered the conference with 原民外來新詞調查成果 學者交流. My colleague, ilong moto, and I myself were interviewed for our individual research, while Deputy Minister of Council of Indigenous Peoples, Tunkan Tansikian, talked about the purposes and prospects of ILRDC. 

Syaman Rapongan (Tao): Part II

介紹達悟族作家夏曼•藍波安2014年最新長篇小說：大海浮夢。

How can I translate Syaman Rapongan's (Tao Nation) latest book 大海浮夢 (2014. 09), an autobiography and biography of a pretty man and a pretty people on their continuing journey towards keeping the beauty of native science and native way of life? 

I still don't know, but I know I need more than knowledge of the English language to deliver that. 

Four chapters; four hundred and seventy three pages. I follow Syaman through his childhood, adolescence, self-exile across islands of the South Pacific and pirate-haunted Moluccas Strait; at last we return to the almost empty beach by his village on Pongso no Tao since nowadays, only very few of them care about the tradition of tatala (plank boat) building. 

With the introduction of motor-driven boats comes the decline of interest in traditional Tao canoes. So gradually disappear the native knowledge of trees, fishes and, most of all, the reciprocity between nature and people through labor.