Narrative, Orality, and Native-American Historical Consciousness: The Critique of Logocentrism in Louise Erdrich’s Tracks

• Main Author: Butler, Jonathan
• Language: English
• Published: 淡江大學出版中心 2015
• Subjects: 敘述;口說;美國原住民的歷史意識;理性中心論;《蹤跡》;鄂萃曲;narrative;orality;Native-American historical consciousness;logocentrism;Tracks;Erdrich; anishina*
• Online Access: http://tkuir.lib.tku.edu.tw:8080/dspace/handle/987654321/109163; http://tkuir.lib.tku.edu.tw:8080/dspace/bitstream/987654321/109163/2/index.html

鑒於對被遺忘和未受重視的原住民論述日益關注，本人認為應適時地回到傳統西方歷史論述與原住民的歷史意識之間辯論的核心文本。南西．彼德森在1994年的《現代語言學會會刊》(PMLA)上，刊登了一篇名為「歷史、敘述、路薏絲•鄂萃曲的《蹤跡》」一文，讚揚鄂萃曲的小說平衡於兩個極端：一方是傳統記錄性歷史的再現思考，另一方是由後結構主義反再現所提出的語言深淵。彼德森對鄂萃曲小說的評價是細心且恰當。然而，我所關注的是彼德森低估了鄂萃曲賦予小說中主角納納布許的重要性。納納布許拒絕屈服於西方書寫典範，且讚揚美國原住民阿尼許納比族的口說傳統，並反抗殖民書寫霸權影響。彼德森似乎未察覺鄂萃曲削弱寶琳（小說第二敘述者）敘述聲音。彼德森宣稱「鄂萃曲的小說掌握了納納布許和寶琳緊張對立的觀點」。表面上的確如此，但是進一步探討卻有兩個關鍵問題：首先，她敘述記錄的奇譎與疏離本質；再者，納納布許的口述優點在互為主體的矩陣中茁壯，皆由他的社群和自然世界培養而成。因此，我認為《蹤跡》並非如彼德森所宣稱的「兩派並行」。更深入閱讀反而可以探索納納布許根植於人類與動物多元相互滋養中，發展認同感與敘述聲音，一種從當代物質生態論述而言，深具生命力的民主。 In view of the rising interest in resurrecting forgotten or invalidated modalities of aboriginal discourse, it seems timely to return to a pivotal text in the debate between traditional Western historical narrative and Native-American historical consciousness. Nancy J. Peterson, in a 1994 PMLA article titled ＂History, Narrative, and Louise Erdrich’s Tracks,＂ champions Erdrich’s novel as a praiseworthy compromise between two extremes: the representational claims of conventional documentary history on the one hand, and the linguistic abyss proffered by poststructuralist anti-representationalism on the other. Such an assessment is both meticulous and apt. My contention, however, is that Peterson underestimates the strength Erdrich gives one of the novel’s narrators, Nanapush, who refuses to capitulate to the Western paradigm of written discourse and instead celebrates the oral tradition of the Anishinabe Native Americans, giving it a place both outside and impervious to the hegemony of colonial written discourse. Peterson also seems to miss the extent to which Erdrich undercuts the validity of the narrative voice of Pauline (the novel’s second narrator). Peterson’s claim that ＂Erdrich’s novel holds Nanapush’s and Pauline’s antithetical views in tension,＂ while certainly true on a formal level, is questionable in light of two key issues: first, the deceitful and alienating nature of her narratival recordings; second, the strength with which Nanapush’s narrative flourishes within an intersubjective matrix fostered by those within his community as well as the natural world itself. Consequently, Tracks may not be as bipartisan in its compromise as Peterson claims it to be. A richer reading of the text, proffered here, proposes exploring the embeddedness of Nanapush’s sense of identity and narrative voice within a sustaining and ever-nourishing multiplicity of human and animal life forms, a kind of democracy of animate life, to borrow and modify a phrase from contemporary material ecocriticism.