This thesis attempts to examine how fictionality in life writing and light writing forges a liberating space to read the self-making in Gerald Vizenor¡¦s Interior Landscape: Autobiographical Myths and Metaphors. The feasibility of setting a dialogue between life writing and light writing derives from Timothy Adam¡¦s discussion in Light Writing and Life Writing: Photography in Autobiography. Adams demonstrates how autobiography and photography, inherently thought as referential, actually possess the indeterminate characteristic of language; hence their juxtaposition displays an intriguing effect of dissolving the artificial distinction of the two media and their interplay presents the writer¡¦s fictive impulse of making himself. Chapter One provides a survey on how life writing and light writing can be productive media to present a self-making process. The residence in language of the two media deprives the presumed referential masks they wear and the constructed ideology disguised as truth behind, primarily the illusion of the unity of the self and the identification through lineage found in photographic representation. Chapter Two explores how the verbal narrative and visual images complete each other in Vizenor¡¦s Interior Landscapes. Photography in an autobiography forms an interesting dialectics between image and text: photography serves not only as a mnemonic device but as the material base for imagination and creation to thrive in words, and the autobiographical text rewrites what has been put in the photocopy of a historical document. Chapter Three discusses the trickster discourse that Vizenor incorporates in his life writing and light writing and analyzes how the writer associates his autobiographical self with trickster figures from the tribal myth and hence creates a trickster mixedblood identity. The dialogue between Vizenor¡¦s life writing and light writing reveals the possibility that both autobiography and photography could be not only the site of memory but also that of imagination and creation in self-life-making.

論文名稱：非典型原住民活力：傑偌•維森諾《熱線療者》中的 後印地安、喜劇與移動力 指導教授：梁一萍 教授 研究生：尤吟文 論文提要內容： 傑偌•維森諾（Gerald Vizenor）認為所謂的「印地安」（indian）是一個沒有指涉目標的空集合（absence without reference），而「原住民」（native）才是指這個文化所代表的真正的意涵。相較於其他原住民作家的作品，維森諾的寫作方式可說是獨樹一幟。在原住民文學中，許多的主題不外乎是尋找身分認同（identity）的過程、強調人與自然之間的和諧關係、表現白人社會與原住民文化之間的隔閡等等。這種思鄉式（nostalgia）的描寫方式對於維森諾來說不只是種老掉牙的（stereotypical）表現方式，更是主流文學（literature of dominance）加諸在原住民文化上的表現方式（manifest manners）。為了與主流文學抗衡，維森諾以搗蛋鬼論述（trickster discourse）的寫作技巧來顛覆原住民文學的傳統，以天馬行空的想像力及奇異怪誕的內容來表現另類的原住民作品。 《熱線療者》是維森諾在1997年的作品，書中的主人翁－－差不多部朗（Almost Browne）是本書中的搗蛋鬼，他穿越時空的限制，帶給讀者一個又一個的故事，這些故事不具有教導意義，而是表現出想像力的無限。差不多部朗曾經在許多維森諾的小說故事中呈現，在《熱線療者》一書中，他與他的姪子，也就是小說的敘述者，以插訶打諢、嘻笑怒罵的方式與政治界和學術界有了第一線接觸，他們也回到過去，目睹了原住民傳說的起源。每個小故事，不管時間地點為何，差不多部朗和他的姪子總是在場。這些故事也搭著原住民第一列火車－－納那波佐快車（Naanabozho Express），隨著列車的移動傳出去。 本文的第一章為總論，簡述維森諾生平、《熱線療者》的故事情節與維森諾自成一格的批評理論。為了表現出原住民文化以及生活的生命力、多樣性和複雜性，維森諾提出所謂的「後印地安」的觀念，指出「印地安」是一種虛擬的再現（simulated representation），只有具有想像力和生命力的「後印地安」才是真正的存在（presence），這也是第二章所討論的部分。第三章則是從喜劇出發，檢討原住民文學的悲劇犧牲性（tragic victimry）實為主流文學的表現方式，只有透過全喜劇論述（comic holotrope）才能真正了解原住民文學。第四章則聚焦於移動力（motion），直指原住民文學的不可限制性，唯有透過對於移動力的了解，原住民文學才能表現出其生命力及想像力，就像差不多部朗或是納那波佐列車一樣，永遠在宇宙間移動（always in motion）。第五章為結論，《熱線療者》是維森諾寫的最後一本有關差不多部朗的小說，在這本小說中，維森諾以另類的筆調及呈現方式將原住民文學帶到一個充滿創造力的世界，經由他的喜劇效果，《熱線療者》提供了另一個檢視原住民文學的角度（alternative, alter-native）。 / Indian, as Gerald Vizenor points out, is the absence of natives without reference to real native cultures while native is the presence of the native survivance. In the field of Native American Literature, the most common themes are the quest for identity, the harmony between nature and people and the conflict between native and white cultures. The nostalgic representation of natives depicted in these common themes, for Vizenor, is not only a stereotypical clich□ but also the manifest manners imposed on Native American Literature by the literature of dominance. In order to resist the burden imposed on Native American Literature, Vizenor, with his unique writing style, applies trickster discourse to subvert the stereotypes brought forth by the literature of dominance. With creativity and imagination, Vizenor presents alternative aspects for Native American Literature. Fascinated by the extraordinary writing style and narrative strategy, I find that the novel, Hotline Healers, illustrates Vizenor’s comprehensive viewpoints on Native American literature. Hotline Healers is Vizenor’s most recent novel which was published in 1997. In the novel, Almost Browne is a protagonist trickster who travels beyond the spatial and temporal limitations. The stories he tells with his travels are not intended to provide lessons; on the contrary, they are the true representation of native imagination. Almost Browne and his cousin, the narrator in the novel, take the first Native train, the Naanabozho Express, to give lectures in several occasions and result in several funny and hilarious encounters with politicians as well as academia. They also return to the past and witness the origins of the native folklores. Almost Browne and his cousin are omnipresent in the stories. With the moving of the Naanabozho Express, more and more stories disseminate native imagination and creativity. There are five chapters in my thesis. The first chapter, “Introduction,” summarizes the life and works of Gerald Vizenor, gives a plot summary of Hotline Healers, and introduces Vizenor’s critical conceptions on Native American Literature. In Chapter Two, I illustrate Vizenor’s view on postindian. Postindian, as Vizenor indicates, absolves the burden of stereotypical indian representations. With the idea of postindian, Vizenor focuses on the presence of natives as well as native vitality and imagination and thus subverts the culturalist stereotypical portraita of indian which is the simulated representation without reference. In Chapter Three, I concentrate on the comic effect employed by Vizenor in Hotline Healers. Comic holotrope is one of Vizenor’s writing techniques which is different from the themes of tragic victimry found in most Native American literary works. Comic holotrope presents the vitality of native culture while tragic victimry burdens Native American Literature with “manifest manners.” In Chapter Four, I explore the concept of motion in the novel. The idea of motion is not only the demonstration of the bounderlessness of Native American literary imaginatinos but also the representation of the transformative native wisdom. In the fifth chapter, I conclude that the novel, being Vizenor’s latest novel on Almost Browne, incorporates his alternative vision of tribal survivance and critical concepts of postindian, comic holotrope, and motion to elevate Native American Literature to a creative and imaginative world. The novel provides readers with an alternative point of view toward Native American Literature.

<p>In my dissertation, I interrogate the ways blood influences identity construction and how it shifts into a paradigmatic story, known as a blood narrative, that further determines belonging. In five chapters, I argue that the use of a blood narrative undermines sovereignty as well as the creative evolution of nations. I move from an examination of a blood narrative throughout American literature (chapter 1), through a study of legislation and science (chapters 2 and 3). In these latter two chapters, I turn to the Cherokee Nation's expulsion of Freedmen and the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians' new membership requirement of DNA testing, which demonstrate influences of a blood narrative upon policy and legislation, and how biotechnology maintains this narrative through DNA and genomics. Finally, I explore novels from Gerald Vizenor (White Earth Anishinaabe) and Thomas King (Cherokee) that offer alternatives to a blood narrative (chapters 4 and 5). I use the term alternarrative here instead of counternarrative to focus on original alternatives, particularly from the alter position of the Native, not on reactionary or countering stories. The alternatives to this blood narrative emerge in both the modern and traditional stories of Native American peoples, providing recourse to understanding identity in ways other than blood. This new sense of belonging is especially important in a world where so many identities are determined by national boundaries, and limited by blood. These alternative narratives provide a new way of moving forward by embracing a survivance for the future, not just reacting to the past.</p> / Dissertation

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Oklahoma, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references. Also available on the Internet.