In contemporary Taiwan, Mandarin language proficiency and literacy in Han characters are not only key skills needed for success in academic institutions and employment markets, but they also carry meaning as symbolic markers of national and supranational Chinese identity. This study examines how Taiwanese-language medical studies curriculum planners are promoting alternative linguistic practices as a means of resisting the influence of Chinese nationalism in Taiwan and striving to replace it with a rival Taiwanese nationalism. I conducted research for this study during the 2010-2011 school year in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. I collected data for this study by engaging in participant observation research at Taiwanese-language curriculum-editing meetings; auditing Taiwanese-language courses at Kaohsiung Medical University; and conducting interviews with both curriculum planners and students at KMU. The role of official languages, literacy, and historical narratives are examined as symbolic components of a Chinese nationalist hegemony, which was constructed through the policies of the Kuomintang's Republic of China administration in post-war Taiwan. This study also examines the relationship between occupation, language skills, and national identification in the context of the contemporary Greater China regional economy. The curriculum planners who are the subjects of this study are employed in the field of medical care, where Taiwanese language skills are valued resources for communicating with patients from a variety of socioeconomic backgrounds. In addition, medical doctors have historically been vocal opponents of the Kuomintang administration's pro-Chinese nationalist policies. Therefore, this case study illustrates how the curriculum planners' occupations and language practices are utilized as resources in their efforts to foster Taiwanese autonomy in the Greater China region. This study also examines current limits to the effectiveness of language preservation and revitalization policies in Taiwan due to the importance of Mandarin-language literacy in the majority of high-status occupations in Greater China and to changing conceptions of the relationship between language practice and national identity. This study contributes to the fields of linguistic anthropology and Asian studies by examining relationships between nationalism, employment, language practice, and literacy in the context of Taiwan's ambiguous status as a national entity. It also analyzes ways in which language practices and literacy forms are created and modified as strategic acts to both identify people with competing nationalisms and allow them access to employment opportunities in the context of shifting administrative and economic power structures in the Greater China region.

This thesis illustrates a general sense of national identity within the Taiwanese people brought on by the Kuomintang (KMT) and existing throughout the KMT's reign over the island, and contrasts this with the new identity that came to exist in the post-KMT period. Comparisons are centered around two works of literature: Sayonara, Zaijian!, written in 1979 by Chunming Huang, and My Diary of Japanomania, written in 1999 by Hari Xingzi. Louis Althusser's view of history-based on structural materialism, complexity and overdetermination---will be employed to discuss and explain the contrast between Sayonara, Zaijian! and My Diary of Japanomania in order to discover how national subject is formed and how it interacts within ideology.

The core of the thesis is, taking Chinese and Taiwanese identities in the contemporary Taiwanese society as cases, to discover how people perceive, formulate, and interact with identities. The research implements the grounded theory and in-depth interview research method, conducting 108 interviews in different regions of Taiwan from 2010 to 2013. The main argument is that identity in and of itself is merely a generic label, which does not cause emotions or behaviours - people know they are ascribed to certain categories, but they lack of motivations to take actions for the categorical groups. Only those identities articulated with 'emotion- or value-oriented discourses' can gain the capacity of provoking people's feelings and mobilising people to act. My research identifies and gives explicit discussions on two types of emotion-oriented discourses - imagined nostalgia and ethical narrative (which is also a value-oriented discourse), and three kinds of value-oriented discourses. They are: (1) Ethical narrative sets moral values for its audience; (2) cultural hierarchy defines socio-cultural values in society; and (3) political ideology signifies core political values of its audience. By treating identity as emotion- or value- oriented discourse, the thesis challenges traditional stereotypes of Taiwanese and Chinese identities in the society - such as identifying as Taiwanese means desiring independence, or all waishengren group would claim Chinese identity - and offers adequate theories to explain why it is not the case. The thesis emphasises that there is no determinant identity in the society, and it is possible for people to have a certain degree of free will choosing to accept or to reject the operation of an identity. The thesis takes critical views on identity politics, deeming it as a risky, double-edged sword in the contemporary politics, which should be carefully examined and substituted with another ideology capable to achieve political emancipation.

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