Women in Cyakang Village, Taiwan

This thesis examines the 'status of women' among the Taroko, an indigenous people of Taiwan. I situate the Taroko within the broader literature on indigenous peoples worldwide, their histories of dispossession and conquest, and the more recent emergence of a potent political force, the international indigenous peoples' rights movement. I also situate my discussion of the Taroko within Taiwan's history and political economy as well as within the existing ethnographic literature on Taiwan's indigenous peoples. The thesis is based on three months fieldwork in Cyakang village, spent mainly speaking and interacting with the women of the village. Following from the observation that there is no single unitary phenomenon such as 'the status of women' in any particular society, I focus on both positive and negative aspects of women's lives in Cyakang. The negative aspects centre on drinking and violence; the positive aspects centre on women's roles in politics, the economy, and ritual. This thesis is a contribution to the literature on the Taroko. It is also an original contribution to the literature on indigenous peoples in Taiwan, especially on indigenous women in Taiwan. It is also a contribution to the literature on the emergence of a political agenda among Taiwan's indigenous peoples in recent years.