As Taiwan’s only national university research institute focused on indigenous cultures, it is incredibly regrettable that students from National Dong Hwa University (NDHU) have continued the horrible history of Taichung Municipal Taichung First Senior High School and National Taiwan University by expressing harmful, discriminatory views and writing defamatory statements against an indigenous university department.
Hiding behind anonymous usernames, people have written online about indigenous students from the NDHU College of Indigenous Studies being allowed to light fires in a farmhouse next to the school’s experimental millet fields. The posters bemoan how students in other programs are somehow not permitted to light fires of their own.
Among the abhorrent comments were posts saying that “jellied indigenous meats are delicious.” Such comments are a reference to historical documents from the Qing Dynasty that said ethnic Han Chinese settlers who enslaved or captured indigenous people would sometimes butcher them, consume their flesh and boil their bones to be pulverized into a “medicinal” paste.
NDHU has more than 800 indigenous students enrolled at the school, as well as about 1,000 foreign students. Reason would have it that the university’s students and staff would be much more cognizant and respectful of the diversity of languages, ethnicities, backgrounds and skin colors of students on campus, and would be accustomed to people from different cultures — not struggling to swim in a gulf of miscommunication and interaction blunders.
In principle, students and staff should be considered highly circumspect in their thinking, yet a small minority of paranoid attackers with insular and myopic views have forsaken Taiwanese society, its numerous groups and values systems.
They have stirred up interethnic conflict and opposition. They must receive severe condemnation for their actions.
During the Japanese colonial era, Hakka were resettled from the western half of Taiwan to work in rice paddies and sugarcane fields in the east. Other Taiwanese were also gradually settled in the east. After World War II, waishengren (外省人) from China also settled in the east. A social structure formed in the “rear mountains” area comprising just one-quarter of Taiwan proper’s landmass, with all three Han ethnic groups living alongside indigenous peoples such as the Amis, Sakizaya, Kavalan, Bunun and Truku.
Compared with the western part of Taiwan, the east had more of an ethnic balance. This diversity prevented people in their daily lives and in politics from becoming so diametrically opposed to one another based on ethnicity. It allowed for frequent exchange and interplay. Marriages between different peoples gave rise to further understanding and tacit cooperation between peoples.
In such an environment, university students are arbitrarily pushing the boundaries of what is acceptable between cultures. The students who posted the comments online acted out of total ignorance and abject malice.
In indigenous communities, fire is a necessity for cultural activities such as in rites and ceremonies. The Kuba house used by Tsou men incorporates a hearth in the center with a fire constantly maintained, as the flames are not allowed to die out. Men from each family in the community take turns tending the fire, protecting it. Paiwan burn millet roots, allowing the smoke to waft away. It is intended as a means to communicate with spirits and deities.
Students at the College of Indigenous Studies did not just set up a fireplace within the structure, they built a traditional three-stone hearth for use by classmates hailing from communities that practiced facial tattoo art, such as Atayal and Truku.
The intent was for the fires of these communities across Taiwan to continue burning brightly. The college wanted all students — indigenous and non-indigenous alike — to experience the significance of fire, as well as its uses and the means of controlling it.
It was not done simply for the sake of setting things on fire.
Han Chinese’s ancient relationship with fire is a distant memory. Most families only use gas or electric stoves at home. Occasionally, if a Han Taiwanese goes hiking or camping, they might bring along a small propane canister and portable cookware for a campfire meal. Few are likely to know how to use kindling to light a fire from scratch.
Over the past few years, there have been terrible forest fires in the mountains caused by inattentive campers who left campfires unattended. This is yet another example of urbanites having left their flames to perish long ago.
In Greek mythology, Prometheus stole fire from the gods, as humans were left feeble and defenseless, created without sharp claws, talons or teeth, lacking warm pelts with fur or feathers, and wingless.
Many phenomena cannot be viewed with a surface-level, skin-deep understanding. In a Taiwan where the public is diverse, each person being able to express their views is a worthy endeavor, but when we drag in the barbarous indignity of “jellied indigenous meats,” there is no good faith conversation to be had.
Pasuya Poiconx is a retired university professor.
Translated by Tim Smith
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