“We can’t stick to the echo chamber and refuse to change the status quo. We indigenous people, a minority group that accounts for only 2.4% of the total number of Taiwan, must take the initiative to open dialogue with the other 97.6% of the majority. Only by doing so will there be possibilities for changes to happen.”
Having witnessed the oppression of Taiwan’s indigenous peoples by external powers and as a victim of historical traumas as well as the microaggression, Ciwang Teyra believes that there must be a platform established for facilitating cross-cultural communication to prevent this undetected subtle trauma from recurring from generation to generation.
“The reason I choose to work on microaggression is that it constitutes an important part of my life experience.” Ciwang remembers clearly that on the day the Truku name rectification was officially approved, an elder was surprised by her appearance and asked her, “Are you Truku? You don’t look like us at all!” Although she did her best to explain, the elder did not trust her and kept nagging, “You just don’t look like us. I won’t trust you unless you cut the heart out to prove it!”
“Cut your heart out to prove it!” Although it was just a joke, Ciwang could not help but feel hurt upon hearing that. Later, as she looked back on how she grew up, she discovered that the idea of “striving to be a Truku” is like a lingering curse that has shackled her life. It is for this reason that she chooses to focus her research on indigenous microaggression.
MICROAGGRESSION
Microaggression originally refers to the disparagement of African Americans by the Caucasian American society expressed in the form of speech and behavior. Now it has been extended to mean the harm caused by prejudice against the oppressed groups by the unconscious and ignorant mainstream society.
Microaggression does not suggest that discrimination is insignificant or that the harm is minimal. Instead, it emphasizes the fact that discrimination is often hidden in the details of everyday life and taken for granted.
Name Rectification:
the Importance of Gaining the Right of a Say
Ciwang’s sense of ethnicity is inspired and cultivated by her father Teyra Yudaw, who is a junior high school principal. Having been a keen enthusiast committed to ethnicity and cultural issues, Teyra is an active promoter of name rectification for the Truku. He would bring his wife and the young Ciwang along to the meetings with other community members. “I was too young to understand what the adults were talking about. There was nothing I could do but play with myself by the side. But up to now, I can still recall from time to time the scene of my father having meetings with those elders and their solemn faces,” says Ciwang. With her father as a role model, Ciwang grows up immersed in the consciousness and understanding of ethnicity, which has been gradually internalized in her life.
Her last year in senior high school saw the final stage of the Truku name rectification movement. The discussions were often tense due to people holding different views about how the name should be rectified. This process awakened Ciwang to the importance of “the right to having a say.” That is, they must construct a coherent and systematic discourse of their ethnicity to open dialogue with mainstream society. “This experience is an important factor behind my decision to take the academic path,” says Ciwang.
TRUKU and SEDIQ: separating from Atayal and finding their names
Originally classified as a branch of the Atayal, the Truku people began seeking to rectify its name in 1996. The community comprised three major dialect groups: Truku, Tgdaya, and Toda. Despite their shared appeal for separation from the Atayal, these groups came to split internally into two sides holding different opinions about their names. Those based in Nantou County proposed the ethnic group be renamed as Sediq, while those in Hualien preferred Truku. Although the two communities belonged to the same lineage and language family, they nonetheless decided to take on different names. Later, the Truku and the Sediq obtained their official recognition from the government in 2004 and 2007, respectively. Since then, the two have become two separate ethnic groups by law.
When studying at National Taiwan University, Ciwang joined the Taiwan Indigenous Association of Truku Youth, where she worked with like-minded compatriots to push for name rectification and autonomy for the Truku people. During this period, she had not only to juggle studies and club affairs at the same time but also to deal with the impact of her indigenous identity.
Back in Hualien, where indigenous peoples are not a minority, Ciwang has never felt it strange to be indigenous. It is not until she comes to Taipei that her indigenous identity becomes unique in the Chinese-dominated society. Some of her classmates would approach her and ask such questions with curiosity as: “Is it true that you indigenous people ride wild boars to school every day? You must be good at drinking, right?”
Such microaggression occurs not only in different ethnic communities but also in her in-groups whose members are mostly indigenous. For most indigenous people, drinking serves as an important means of communication on the occasion of gatherings. Given her low alcohol tolerance, Ciwang is subject to teasing by other peers: “How come an indigenous person like you is so bad at drinking?” Depressed by such microaggression of her compatriots, she cannot help but wonder, “Am I really ‘qualified’ to be called indigenous?”
“Half and Half”:
Transgenerational Historical Traumas
In the words of indigenous people, the term “half and half” refers to mixed descents of the indigenous and non-indigenous. “I have been often dubbed as ‘half and half’ as a child, so I had to work very hard to prove my Truku identity,” recalls Ciwang. She was born into a mixed family with a Truku father and a Minnan Chinese mother. Unlike her father, who has sharply outlined features, she is fair-skinned, which makes her Truku blood hard to be identified.
Such a “sense of being different” gradually accumulates and keeps bothering her, ending up as a kind of identity anxiety. To Ciwang, it seems like a sin not being a genuine Truku nor having a standard look. “I have to struggle to prove that as a Truku, I do identify with my ethnicity and culture,” admits Ciwang.
The origins of such oppression she feels are twofold from both the outside and inside. The former is the lack of understanding by mainstream society, while the latter the doubts of indigenous communities. Growing up as “half and half” leaves many “less-than-pure” individuals having to undergo a long process of struggle for self-identity.
While studying for her doctorate at the University of Washington in Seattle, Ciwang touched on the theories of microaggression and historical trauma, through which she finally found an explanation for how in-group oppression is developed within indigenous communities. This enabled her to let go of the subtle “sense of being different” that had been troubling her since she was a child. “Having understood how the oppression is formed, I feel relieved and become better able to deal with it, because I’ve got to know what kind of historical traumas my elders have suffered and what they are afraid of,” explains Ciwang.
Taiwanese society’s microaggression towards indigenous communities originates from the “historical trauma” caused by the colonial rule in the past. Today’s indigenous people in their fifties or more are the generation that has lived through the authoritarian era when they were forbidden to speak their native languages, had their cultures and traditional beliefs corrupted, and were forced to conceal their identities. With the absolute power of discourse held in the hands of the dominant Non-indigenous community, indigenous peoples tend to be marginalized and become disadvantaged. By contrast, those “half-and-half” individuals—those considered to be “more Sinicized,” “more fluent in Mandarin Chinese,” and “do not look like indigenous”—have less difficulty integrating into the mainstream society. This results in indigenous peoples’ severe lack of trust in mainstream society or those with less pure bloodlines or appearances. Such traumas caused by history do not heal over time, but rather are passed on from generation to generation, resulting in an ethnicity complex that is more difficult to deal with.
Embracing Who You are
to Open Up for Dialogue
In her childhood, Ciwang once thought of abandoning her Truku identity because of being mocked as an “uncivilized barbarian.” “My father speaks Chinese with an accent, so I once said to him deliberately, ‘Dad, will correct your pronunciations?’” she recalls. Upon hearing this, her mother admonished her solemnly, “Your dad works very hard to prove to society that as a Truku, he is no less outstanding than anyone else, and so is the entire community. No one will recognize you if you do not identify who you are and where you are from.” The lesson from her mother is engraved in Ciwang’s mind to this day, becoming a driving force that motivates her to reconcile with her identity and further to resolve the historical traumas that have persisted across generations.
“We must seek to open dialogue with mainstream society to bring about change,” concludes Ciwang. She strives to unveil the historical traumas that have been inflicted on indigenous communities to find the origins of oppression. She believes that only by connecting and interacting with different communities can we resolve these traumas, stop microaggression from recurring, and bring better mental and physical health to the indigenous.
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