民族主义与现代化的变奏:菲律宾国语形成中的民族身份建构

Variations on Nationalism and Modernization:The Construction of National Identity in the Formation of the Philippine National Language

本文梳理了西班牙殖民以来菲律宾国语的形成过程,将之与菲律宾的社会、政治、族群实践相勾连,以呈现语言问题表征的菲律宾社会现实的错综复杂性,以及菲律宾民族国家建构过程中面临的民族主义与现代化的冲突。在此基础上,本文对本尼迪克特·安德森关于菲律宾语言与民族主义起源的几个论述进行反思。从结果上看,有关国语的争议的持续存在似乎意味着菲律宾塑造统一民族符号的努力是失败的。但本文试图澄清的是,国语作为民族身份或者国家统一的象征,恰恰是在对其赋予实在内容的权力争夺过程中,诸方力量认可了彼此同处一个“共同体”。由此看来,国语争议的“战场”更是一个谈判的场域。正是通过持续的对峙,一个共同的民族身份被建构出来。

This paper charts the formation of the Philippine national language since the Spanish colonial period and relates it to the social,political and ethnic practices of the Philippines in order to present the intricacies of the Philippine social reality as represented by the language issue and the conflict between nationalism and modernization in the construction of the Philippine nation.On this basis,the paper reflects on several of Benedict Anderson's arguments on the origins of Filipino language and nationalism.In terms of results,the persistent controversies over the national language seems to imply that the efforts to shape a unified national symbol in the Philippines have been a failure.But what this paper seeks to clarify is that,it is precisely in the process of struggle for the power to give a concrete content to the language as a symbol that the various forces have recognized their copresence in a same“community”.Thus,the battleground for the national language dispute is more a field of negotiation.It is through this ongoing dispute that a common national identity is negotiated.