自然、族群与性别——迟子建《额尔古纳河右岸》的启示

Nature, Ethnic Groups and Gender:Implications of Chi Zijian’s The Right Bank of the Argun River

自然生态、族群身份与性别是进入21世纪以来中国文学非常重要的三个议题,而迟子建《额尔古纳河右岸》的独特性正在于对自然生态、族群身份与性别三者间错综复杂关系的书写。小说写出了保护自然生态与维护族群文化身份之间的两难,以及与此密切相关的驯鹿鄂温克弱小族群坚守古老生存方式与现代转型间的两难。而小说对女性与族群、自然关系的想象,特别值得注意。它将性别身份与族群身份重叠编码,凝固、本质化的性别身份与凝固、本质化的族群身份互相表达、彼此支持。这一叙事策略有两大思想资源:其一,中国文化现代转型的内在逻辑,本质化的女性形象可以作为不被现代性侵蚀、污染的本质化原乡的象征,以抚慰本土文化身份的焦虑;其二,对女性与自然关系的本质化理解,而这种理解既受到生态女性主义思想的影响,又植根于20世纪80年代以来中国社会特殊的性别文化语境。

Natural ecology,ethnic identities and gender are three significant topics of 21 st century Chinese literature,and the uniqueness of Chi Zijian’s The Right Bank of the Argun River is found in the writing about the complex relationship between natural ecology,ethnic identities and gender.The novel describes the dilemma between the protection of natural ecology and the maintenance of the cultural identities of ethnic groups,as well as the closely related dilemma between the insistence on the old way of life and the modern transformation of the small Reindeer Ewenki ethnic group.The imagination about the relations between ethnic group,nature and females in the novel is particularly noteworthy.The novel decoded the overlapping identities of gender and ethnicity.Likewise,the solidified and essentialized identities of gender and ethnicity are mutually expressed in support of each other in the novel.This narrative strategy comes from two sources of ideas:1)the internal logic of the modern transformation in Chinese culture–the essentialized female figures could become symbols of essentialized nostalgia which cannot be eroded and contaminated by modernity;2)the essential understanding about the relationship between females and nature–this understanding was rooted in the special gender discourse in Chinese society since the 1980s.