Jérôme Soldani (吳傑弘), 人類學博士, 中研院台史所博士後研究
Research Associate at the Taipei office (at Academia Sinica) of the French Center for Research on Contemporary China, the Lyon Institute of East Asian Studies and the Institute of mediterranean, european and comparative ethnology (CNRS, France)
During the Japanese era, baseball was a channel for integrating Austronesians into the new state system. After World War II, baseball became a tool used in the construction of a national identity. During the history, indigenous people performances have largely contributed to the promotion of the sport throughout the country and enhancing national pride in international tournaments, especially in junior categories. Today, indigenous people constitute about a third of the players in the Taiwanese professional baseball league, while they represent 2% of total population. An image of a specifically “indigenous baseball” has been gradually formed in social representations, characterised by a more aggressive and intuitive playing style, confirming ethnic and/or racial stereotypes. However, this perception, even if it abounds in official historiography, does not necessarily correspond with that of the people involved and their daily reality.
In this paper, I will observe the interplay between: the political and social implications of indigenous people’s participation in baseball; how the sport has been taken over by the indigenous peoples; and the issues involved in the construction of a sporting community which transcends ethnicity. How does historiography account for the way that Austronesians have adhered to baseball in Taiwan? How do indigenous people deal with discrimination from non-indigenous people, who see them as intellectually inferior but physically superior? How do the players who make up the so-called “indigenous baseball” teams deal with their identity? I will attempt to provide some answers based on an ethnographic study carried out over twenty months between 2006 and 2010, and from recent observations, mostly of the Brother Elephants professional team and of several school teams in Taitung County.