启蒙运动时期德波对美洲全面“退化”的想象

The Imagination of Cornelius de Pauw regarding the Comprehensive American Degeneration during the Enlightenment

德波是欧洲启蒙时代研究美洲问题的专家之一,他撰写的多卷本《关于美洲人的哲学研究》出版后在欧洲学界引起很大反响,赞扬之声和批评之声迭起。德波接受了布丰的美洲退化论,但比布丰走得更远,成为"美洲退化论"更加完善的不可或缺环节。德波研究的重点是美洲人的退化,其中包括生活在美洲的欧洲白人移民后裔,后者的退化更能说明"恶劣"的自然环境如何使"优越种族"的生理机能或创新能力向着"低劣"方向蜕变。德波对克里奥尔人退化的阐述是他与布丰在退化观上的最大区别,给其全面否定美洲画上了一个圆满的句号。德波对美洲的全面否定显然走到了极端,却满足了欧洲很多人的种族或文化优越心态,向欧洲人展现出一幅令人恐怖的美洲图景。德波的美洲退化观虽不是"昙花一现",但想象毕竟代替不了事实。随着美洲之真相不断地展现在世人面前,德波的美洲退化观走到尽头乃为历史发展的必然。

Cornelius de Pauw was one of the experts studying on the American issues in the Enlightenment era.His multi-volumes of The Philosophical Research about the Americans aroused the great repercussions in the European academia after its publication,and the praise and criticism on his work have never disappeared in the age in which he lived.Pauw accepted Buffon’s theory of the American degeneration,but he was more radical than Buffon,becoming one of the major figures who developed the proposition of the American degeneration.Pauw kept his research focus on the degradation of the Americans,including the descendants of the European white immigrants living in America.From Pauw’s point of view,the latter’s degradation can better explain how a hostile natural environment made the physiological function or innovation ability of a superior race degrade tending to inferior direction.The Creole’s degeneration was the big difference between Pauw and Buffon in the view of their degeneration.Pauw obviously went to the extreme in his view of America,but this perspective satisfied the racial or cultural superiority of most Europeans,revealing a terrifying American picture to them.Pauw’s view of the American degeneration was not a passing fad,but the imagination could not replace the reality.With the truth that America constantly unfolded in front of the world,it is inevitable that Pauw’s view of the American degeneration would come to an end.