親屬、族群性與地景：從中國雲南普米族人的「根骨（?u35）」談起

Abstract

本文由中國雲南寧蒗彝族自治縣永寧鄉普米族人的「根骨／?u35」的觀念為例，呈現人與空間如何互相構成的理解在滇川西部藏地邊緣人群的「親屬」關係、社會單位構成以至族群身分的區辨等關係形式中扮演的角色。我在文中介紹永寧普米族人述說村落人群構成的語彙，人在家的空間中完成生命使家延續的過程，以及家屋與村落的空間安排與日常實踐所形構的地景，以說明「?u35」所表徵的身分與關係形式所建基的本體及其所存在的脈絡，實建立在承載了人們的實踐與生命而具有特定意義與過去的地景之上，並且體現了具有生殖力的人和周遭持久的物理空間各自形構社會關係的力量。我認為藏地邊緣許多土著人群用以表達「親屬」或群體關係「骨」的概念，即蘊含這種經由人與物理空間相互構成的地景與身分所建立的本體基礎，並構成當地人與不同人群區別與互動的憑藉。而相對於當地普米族人依據「?u35」而認定的自稱範疇建立在人的身體與外在物理世界互相構成參與的本體預設之上，官方認定的「普米族」範疇則是建基在生物學式本體論以及個人之間的關係構成與空間相分隔的空間觀念。由此我提議族群範疇不能只被視作是區辨人群的名字，而應當看作是存在不同本體形式的標誌，不同語言的族群範疇即表徵著以不同方式連結人與周遭物理空間並由此界定社會身分的不同本體與關係構成的機制。

Through discussing the concept of “?u35” of the Pumi speaking people living in Yongning Township of Ninglang Yi Autonomous County in Yunnan, China, this paper illustrates how the mutual engagement of humans and their physical surroundings contributes to the forming and understanding of “kinship” relation, social grouping and ethnic identity of the local people in the Tibetan borderlands. I introduce how Pumi people understand the relations between houses in their local community with the idea of “?u35”, how individuals realize the continuity of the house by accomplishing one’s life in the space of the house with one’s ashes(?u35) buried in the mountains that exhibits the specific identity of the house and its endurance, and how the ritual practices and arrangement of the house and village space form the configuration and understanding of the landscape that composed the context of this process. Thus, I explain how the ‘bone’ concept in Pumi, the idiom of “?u35”, expresses the relation and identity generated through the interaction and mutual engagement between the reproductive gendered human bodies and the durable physical surroundings people inhabit, and I argue that the concept of “?u35” implies an identity and form of relations which build upon the meaningful landscape loaded with human practices and past lives as its ontological basis. I suggest that this relational and ontological form generated by the mutual formation of human and physical surroundings may be shared by other native peoples who use the concept of ‘bone’ to express the relation of their essential social groupings in the Tibetan borderlands, and that this ontological form is the basis of the interaction and mutual understanding between different peoples in the region. Compared with the self-designated ethnic category of the Pumi speaking people that represents an identity unified by the “?u35” and embodies an ontology that assumes the continuity of social identity with the human body, physical house and the surrounding landscape, the official category of “Pumi Zu” rests upon a biological ontology with a spatial scheme assuming that the formation of social relation is independent from the physical surroundings. Therefore, I suggest that an ethnic name should not be seen as solely a name for categorizing peoples, but rather as the reification of an ontological process that implies specific ways of connecting human and physical surroundings and through which social relations and identities are defined.