This thesis is organized into ten distinct chapters. In chapter two, I will explore the social organization of Paiwanese society, including the geographic distribution, sub- groups division, and the kinship system. In chapter three, I will explore the formation of a particular chiefly family – the Pakedavai – in terms of its historical development, based on oral histories provided by various family members. I use this as a means of introducing Paiwanese social structure, and how it has been influenced by a history of colonization. Certain material objects, which are meaningful to this chiefly family as well as in wider Paiwanese culture, are discussed in this chapter. I include a summary of general aspects of Paiwanese society, including geographical distribution, the nature of sub-groups, social organization, and the kinship system.
In chapter four, I will discuss the cultural meanings which are conveyed in the motifs on the wooden eave beams of the Pakedavai family house. I will examine the ways in which these motifs convey cultural meanings by means of a particular representational system, by focusing mainly on those eave beams. I will also analyse one symbolic motif with encompassing cultural significance – the Deinagkistrodon acutus viper. In
20 In chapter five, I will discuss the motifs applied on the traditional Paiwanese costumes worn by members of the Pakedavai family. These motifs carry great social significance, representing distinctions between classes as well as bilateral kinship relations. The representational systems inherent in the motifs on the Pakedavai costumes will also be explored. In this chapter, I will also outline the linkage of motifs wooden eave beams and traditional costumes to their social functions. I will discuss the aesthetic principles reflected in the use of adornments costumes, and illustrate the ways they influence and are reflected in the structure of the motifs.
In chapter six, I will explore the way in which the visual patterns on Paiwanese glass beads encode social meanings. In a formal analysis, the patterns on the beads are viewed as a representational system encoding social meanings. I also relate the meanings of the beads to their social functions, finding that certain traditions have survived to the present day.
In chapter seven, I will analyse the patterns on Paiwanese glass beads, and explain how they convey a wide range of cultural values and also compose a part of the Paiwanese cosmological belief system. I will also investigate a particular necklace composed of glass beads, finding that the structure of this necklace reflects the structure of Paiwanese society.
In chapter eight, I will explore the relationship between the internal and external
demands for Paiwanese beadwork in the context of a changing society. I will discuss the re-creation of this cultural product under the Taiwanese government’s policy of cultural product promotion. The glass beads produced today also reflect different aesthetic pursuits emerging from both within and beyond Paiwanese society. The variety of
21 manufactured glass beads also represents the various internal and external ethnic
identities of the consumers.
In chapter nine, this thesis concludes by focusing on the properties of Paiwanese aesthetic expression and their relations to the creation of a system of social values. The analysis is based on the rituals and the accoutrement of aristocratic wedding
ceremonies, which generate the most exquisite aesthetic expression in this culture. The generation of Paiwanese aesthetic properties is related to the hierarchical social system as well as the ancestral past. Aesthetic expression both strengthens the social status inherited from ancestors as well as memorializing the ancestral past. Certain artefacts manifesting aesthetic attributes will be discussed in this chapter.
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Chapter Two: The social organization of Paiwanese society
IntroductionIn this chapter, I examine aspects of Paiwanese society in general, including
geographical distribution, sub-groups, social organization, the kinship system, and the traditional Paiwanese socio-political unit – a tribe. The influence of colonial historical developments outside Paiwanese society will also be considered. As well as presenting an outline of the structure of Paiwanese society, I will describe the natal-derivative relationships2 onwhich social organization and genealogical connections are based.
This organization is based on a ramage-like system, which people trace their lineage from either parents through the house lines and normally identify their lineage with the side which has the higher hierarchical status.
The argument in this chapter is: the establishment of a political unit – A tribe – reflects natal-derivative relationships based on the Paiwanese rule of primogenitary succession. This rule is the dominant ordering system throughout Paiwanese society, ranging from single households to the entire social organization.
2 This term is used by Bien Chiang (1993) in his PhD thesis, House and Social Hierarchy of the Paiwan,
to describe that the Paiwanese social organization is based on ambilateral lineages. Fig. 2-1: The distribution of the indigenous groups in Taiwan.
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2-1. Distribution of the Paiwanese
The Paiwanese are one of the fourteen Austronesian-speaking indigenous groups in Taiwan and are mostly located in the southern part of the central mountain ranges of the island. A prominent reference point in Paiwanese ethno-historical accounts is Mt. Djakalaus/ Tjagaraus(Mount Ta-wu in Chinese). Djakalaus is the name of a god of creation. Where the god lives is the highest, as well as the most sacred place. Therefore, Mt. Tawu is named Djakalaus by the Paiwanese because it is the highest mountain around this area and it is believed to the place to which the spirits of the Paiwanese
ancestors return. This mountain stands 3,090 meters above sea level in the north of present-day Paiwanese territory. The majority of Paiwanese communities believe that the
mountain is the place from which their ancestors came, and to which all the deceased return. A major rite, the “leve-leveg-an” (Five-year-rite), used to be held periodically in the majority of Paiwanese villages in order to reinforce this connection with Mt. Djakalaus/Tjagaraus, the sacred “homeland” (Chiang, 1993, P55). Paiwanese territory extends from the northern area around Mt. Djakalaus to the southern and eastern parts of Taiwan. It is bordered by a number of Fig. 2-2: The Paiwanese distributed map.
http://www.knowlegde.ipc.gov.taipei/ct.asp?xItem=660182&CtNod e=7438&mp=cb01
The north Paiwan (The Ravar area)
The middle Paiwan (Paumaumaq) The east Pawain (Paqaluqalu)
The south Paiwan (Caupupulj
& Paljizawin)
25 minority groups, such as the Rukai, Puyuma and Amis, and all these cultural groups tend to have influenced each other in various ways.
2-2. Sub-groups
The Paiwanese are divided into two sub-groups, according to their original homelands. Those from the upper north in the region of Mt. Tavuvu called themselves the Ravar. The people of this group believe that their ancestors came from a place named the Parilaiyan, consisting of three old tribes named Tavaran, Djuvuen, and Djelau, located on Mt. Tavuvvu. The succession rule of this Ravar group is primogeniture and they do not observe the five-year rite (Chiang, 1993, p. 55).
The other sub-group is the Vutsulj, or Butsul. It is more widely distributed than the Ravar group. Its sacred homeland is Mt. Djakalaus mentioned above. The Vutsulj/ Butsul group can be divided in turn into four further divisions distributed around the south central mountain range in Taiwan. These divisions are based on their regional separation rather than any cultural differences. The four groups are the Paumaumaq in the north, the Caupupulj/Chaobobool in the northern part of the south and the
Paljizaljizawin/Palilalilaw in the southern most part, and the Paqaluqalu in the east (Mesegseg Zengror Gadu, 2011, pp. 14-15). The people of the Paumaumaq group mainly come from the areas named Padain, Caljisiand su-Paiwan, which are believed to be the original homelands of the Vutsulj/ Butsul sub-group (Mesegseg Zengror Gadu, 2011, p. 14). The other three sub-groups are believed to have migrated from their original homelands to southern and eastern parts of Taiwan3.
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“Paiwanese” is now a term which all people in the large area of traditional Paiwanese territory use to refer to themselves. There are two villages named “Paiwan”. One is located in Ravar and is called “ka-Paiwan”, meaning old Paiwan. The other, in Butsul territory, is called “su-Paiwan”: “su” is a prefix used for the name of any village. The ethnic name “Paiwan” was presumably derived from the village names and may originally have been applied to these people by other ethnic groups in the plains (Matsuzawa, 1989, p. 36)4. According to a Paiwanese acknowledged linguist and
historical scholar, Mesegseg Zengror Gadu, the Paiwanese did not have a collective term to refer to themselves as a group before the Japanese colonial period. The people’s concept of group is based on regional (tribal) differences, instead of a whole group. Therefore, they used names of regions to refer to where they belong and came from. For instance, people came from the local area “Payuan” would call them “se-Payuan”, meaning “I am the person who comes from Payuan”5.
2-3. The original homeland--Padain6
The two Paiwanese sub-groups, today identify themselves as having separate places of origin. However there is an underlying belief that in the distant past both groups originated from the same place: the Padain region7. The Padain is associated with Mt.
Djakalausand is where the Vutsulj/Butsul subgroup originated (Mesegseg Zengror Gadu, 2011, p. 104). The people of the Vutsulj/Butsul sub-group personify Mt.
4 According to Gadu, the Japanese researchers believed that su-Paiwan is one of the original places of
Paiwanese culture, and therefore, the used “Paiwan” to refer to the entire Paiwanese group (Personal communication with M. Z. Gadu, 18, August, 2014).
5 Personal communication with M. Z. Gadu, 18, August, 2014
6 The translation of “Padain” is the place to create human life in Paiwanese.
7As Tung states that some Paiwanese elders believe that Paiwan group was separated from Padain and
some encountered with other groups to form different sub-groups. However, the Ravar sub-group may have different statement.
27 Djakalaus: they believe that the top of the mountain is the head of the life-creating god, Sa-Djakalaus. They also believe that the place where human life originated, Padain Kiniveqacan, was located at mountain’s heart (Mesegseg Zengror Gadu, 2011, p. 104). The central Padain area contained the sacred place where life was generated, Padain Kiniveqacan; and the tribes of the Kalicekuan, the Tjulinaulj, and the Caljisi. Two other tribes the Piuma, and the Payuan were located near central Padain. These tribes were considered to be among the oldest tribes of the Vutsulj/Butsul sub-group8.
According to oral tradition, an earthquake occurred a thousand years or more near the central Padain area, and the people fled to places around Mt. Djakalaus and to the plain regions. However the Padain area has been memorialised as their sacred homeland by the people of the Vutsulj/Butsul sub-group, because most of the original myths came from there. The myths include those of the life creating god, and of the relationship between god and human beings. They also tell of the relationship between ancestors and living people. When talking about the genesis myth, the people of the Vutsulj/Butsul sub-group will say: “Saljaran i Padain”, which means that the Padain is the area where the life creating god turned an embryo into life (Tung, 2001, p. 14). The Padain region, is therefore the most sacred area for the Vutsulj/Butsul sub-group, and its significance is connected with the people’s genesis myths, as well as their identity, historical
development, social organization and cultural knowledge9. The cultural system of this
Vutsulj/Butsul sub-group is thus called the Padain system by the Paiwanese. The other cultural system belonging to the Ravar sub-group is the Parilaiyan system10. It should be
8 Personal communication with M. Z. Gadu, 26 April, 2014 9 Personal communication with M. Z. Gadu, 26 April, 2014
10The Parilaiyan is the oldest tribe in Ravar sub-group (Personal communication with M. Z. Gadu, 26 April, 2014).
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noted here that the Sandimen area has been influenced by both these systems because of its location is close to both central part of these sub-groups. In this thesis, the exegesis of the meanings of various artefacts, including motifs on wooden eave beams and costumes, glass beads and legends belonging to a particular chiefly family are all influenced by these systems.
2-4. The formation of a tribe
In this section, I will outline the theory of the development of Paiwanese tribe by the formation of an original tribe and its organization. In interviews Masegeseg Zengror Gadu, he explained to me his understanding of the historical process out of which the present system of tribal organization evolved. As a Paiwanese scholar he provides a perspective on, and insight into, the ways in which contemporary Paiwanese see their own society in the light of their oral traditions. According to him, there were several households clustered together in the sacred Padainhomeland areas thousands of years ago11. Each household had its own appointed heir, called the “vusam”. The vusam was,
and still is, the first born of each generation in a family, regardless of gender12. In the
Paiwanese language, the term “vusam” means “eldest brother or sister who remains at the natal house” and “seed millet” – the bundles of best millet from a harvest that are selected and stored away to be used as seed for the next growing season (Chiang, 1993, p.133). In theory, a “vusam” is the real “owner” of a house, the one who remains in that house and takes care of it (Chiang, 1993, p125). The vusam child thus inherits all the property belonging to the family including the family name, the most significant family artefacts, and the social status belonging to the family.
11 The time period is uncertain among the Paiwanese people.
12 The Paiwanese terms vusam, “eldest child” and “seed millet”, are very close to the combined meanings
29 Clusters of households living together would gradually form a group, consisting of all of the vusams of those households, to deal with local issues. In one area like the Padain region, several “vusam groups” representing clustered households were formed. The “vusam groups” elected a representative vusam to be the leader of all the vusam groups, and then all those households, led by the representative vusam finally formed a tribe. The representative vusam of a tribe was called “ka-vusam”, which means “the principle vusam among all the vusams”. The term ka-vusam was replaced by “chief” after the Japanese colonial period13.
According to Gadu, the precise process of selecting the original ka-vusam in the first stage of tribal formation is unknown and
mysterious. He speculated that it might have been a person who had control over a sacred
Deinagkistrodon acutus viper (see page 89), and could act as a medium between humans and the spirits, or gods14. The status of ka-
vusam came to be inherited by the first-born child of the office holder. At the time of formation of the originating tribes in the Padain region, there
13Personal communication with M.Z. Gadu, April 05, 2014
14 Personal communication with M.Z. Gadu, April 05, 2014 Fig. 2-3: A chiefly member with a saulji at Pinhai village
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were five ka-vusams, and they formed the five “core” families of origin in the Vutsulj/Butsul sub-group. A traditional Paiwanese tribe15 was centred on a “core”
(chief) family. The marker of such a core family was that there was a stone pillar (saulji) in the courtyard in front of his or her house (see Fig. 2-3). The saulji sometimes has carved image (s)16 on it to represent the ancestor(s) of the tribe and thus it is an
intermediate monument between ancestors and the ka-vusam (chief) in a tribe. The saulji, which I discuss in the following chapter, is the symbol of the ka-vusam family in a tribe, and the people can communicate through it with the ancestral spirits residing at Mt. Djakalaus (Gadu, p.108).
2-5. Paiwanese social organization and genealogy
In this section, I will introduce the genealogical system, which, together with the
principle of primogeniture, is central to Paiwanese social organization. I will summarize the characteristics of
Paiwanese social
organization as it has been discussed and analysed by previous Japanese and Taiwanese researchers, including Wei (1960), Matsuzawa (1989), Chiang (1993) and Tung (2001).
15 “Tradition” refers to the era before the Japanese colonial period because the structure of Paiwanese
society and tribal organization hadn’t yet been destroyed.
16 A saulji normally has either an image of the first ancestor or a collective representation of ancestors of
a tribe.
Fig. 2-4: A typical sample Paiwanese house at Indigenous Cultural Park, Pintung County
31 According to Chiang (1993), Paiwanese society is a “house society”. The notion of this kind of society was first raised by Levi-Strauss. In her book, Susan D. Gillespie
(Gillespie, 2000) quoted Levi-Strauss’s notion of house as a “type of social structure” to be added alongside the familiar taxa of family, lineage, and clan, with the following definition: “ a corporate body [personne morale] holding an estate made up of both material and immaterial wealth, which perpetuates itself through the transformation of its name, its goods, and its titles down a real or imaginary line, considered legitimate as long as this continuity can express itself in the language of kinship or of affinity and, most often, of both” (Gillespie, 2000, p. 7). In the Paiwanese case, a “house” is a cultural entity which can be treated as independent from descent principles and is fully capable of providing a foundation for social continuity. A Paiwan house, “uma” or “umag”, is more than a familial dwelling on a plot of land. It represents a perpetual socio-cultural entity that is, in a sense, separable from the people who dwell in it (Chiang, 1993, p.173).
The typical Paiwanese dwelling in the homeland area is an asymmetrical, gabled building, made of slate and wood. Every dwelling has a name. The name refers to membership of a household; the people who dwell in the house have the house name as their family name. However, when people separate from their natal houses in order to marry, they cannot take the house name with them and will be given another house name according to where they have moved. Upon marriage, all the children of a
domestic group except the heir are expected to move out of their natal house to establish