重思赞米亚区域的稻作与社会——物种间民族志角度的观察

Rethinking the Relationship between Rice Farming and Society in Zomia——Observation from Interspecies Ethnography

在被斯科特重新界定后包含了中国西南和东南亚大陆山地的“赞米亚”地区,不仅人群之间界限模糊、不断混杂,稻作也表现与常见的集约型水田农业明显不同的一面。本文通过水稻、陆稻和块根类作物的比较,对本区域农业生产逻辑的内在理路进行重新梳理,发现以往认为分属两种生产体系的稻作农业和山地游耕农业存在某种一致性:缺少田间管理,不提倡用增加劳动投入的方式追求高产,都看重从周围环境中获取多样性的食物。不仅是从事游耕的居民在逃离统治,赞米亚地区经营稻作的农民也有与低地政权关系疏远的一面。斯科特对于边陲地区农业社会的复杂性与多样性的理解还有不足,本研究可以对其将稻作和块根种植分别视为“服从农业”和“逃跑农业”的基础论断构成某种程度上的挑战。

After being redefined by Prof.James Scott,the Zomia area,which includes the mountainous regions of southwestern China and Southeast Asia,not only are the boundaries between people blurred and mixed,but rice farming is also significantly different from the common intensive paddy farming.By comparing the planting activities of rice,upland rice and root crops,this paper reorganizes the internal logic of the agricultural production in the region and finds that rice farming and shifting agriculture,which were previously considered to belong to two production systems,have the same connotations:lack of field management and do not advocate the pursuit of high yield by increasing labor input,and both focus on the diversity of food from the surrounding environment.Not only are the residents who are engaged in nomadic farming fleeing the rule,but many rice farmers in Zomia are also alienated from the lowland regime.Professor Scott s explanation has insufficient understanding of the complexity and diversity of the farming society in the border areas.James Scott believes that rice farming is a kind of“obedience agriculture”and root planting is“escape agriculture”.This paper hopes to put forward some challenges and amendments to his proposition.