House and Conceptual Metaphor -A Social Boundary Study of The Kuskus Village in Pingdong County
Date Issued
2005
Date
2005
Author(s)
Liu, Jung-Hua
DOI
zh-TW
Abstract
This thesis includes three sources of information to study social boundaries: (1) ethnography;
(2) archaeological sites; and (3) literature.
The field in this thesis is Kuskus Village, Mudan Township, Pingdong County in Taiwan.
The most villagers are one of Taiwanese aborigines-the Paiwan. According to the studies
of Paiwan, they point out that the house is the important material culture for them, especially
for constructing the identity. They have two names to identify their identity. First is their personal
name, the other is the house name. The personal name comes from the name of the relatives
of the family. The house name is the name of the house they live in, and they use the
name to identify their position in the social network.
For the Paiwanese, they belong to different houses in different period of their lives. Before
they marry, they belong to the natal house; after marrying, they belong to the house
which they lived; when they die, the corpse should be buried in the natal house belong to the
natal house forever. They also have the different house names according to the house they live
in.
The importance of the house is the same for the Paiwanese in Kuskus. Unlike the house
name of other Paiwanese, Kuskus's is not the name of the house, then it is the name of the
household. The difference maybe produced in the change of material culture concerning with
the house and frequent migration. The result from the material changes and frequent migra-
House and Conceptual Metaphor! 1
tion, the concrete house cannot offer the history of the family to identify the relationship
among the houses in the settlement. So the name of the household can last and reserves the
long-time history of the family rather than the name of the house.
Meanwhile, the settlement also has the longer history, then the settlement replaces the
house to be a longtime identity. The history of the settlement marks the source of the community
and connects the ancestors and descendants. Because of the same root, the villagers construct
the identity for the settlement.
Subjects
家屋
排灣族
社群邊界
石板屋
隱喻
墓葬
婚姻
house
Paiwan
social boundary
stone house
metaphor
Type
other