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Imagining the state

An ethnographic study

Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica, Taiwan

Following a recent theoretical shift to view the state as a powerful site of symbolic and cultural production that is in itself always culturally represented and understood in particular ways, this article is concerned with how the Bunun, an Austronesian-speaking indigenous people of Taiwan, perceive and imagine the state. I point out that the Bunun use their own idioms of kinship and political leadership to understand and construct their relationship with the state, in order to transform the state from an external and potentially dangerous force into a positive and benevolent provider. In attempting to oblige the state to deliver material and social goods, the Bunun place emphasis on their compliance rather than their resistance to the state. However, I argue that compliance, rather than being passive accommodation, can be a kind of ‘quite effective agency’ in Ortner's (1997: 148) terms, and challenge the recent theoretical preoccupation with resistance.

Key Words: the Bunun • thestate • kinship • political leadership • election • the symbolism of money

Ethnography, Vol. 6, No. 4, 487-516 (2005)
DOI: 10.1177/1466138105062474


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