Museum as Empowerment? A Study of Ink-stone Industry in Ershui, Taiwan

• Main Authors: Li-Yu Hsiao, 蕭立妤
• Other Authors: Shaw-Wu Jung
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2014
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/xna6n7

碩士 === 國立暨南國際大學 === 人類學研究所 === 102 === Museums of earlier days in Taiwan were established mostly for exhibiting government policy and the colonial image. Things have changed. Since 1990s, a new wave of “from ground up” has seen a boom of local museums with special local character. Ershui is a farming village near Jhuoshuei River (Ro-hsie) in Changhua County, in central Taiwan. In older time, villagers found stones in river perfectly suited for making ink-stones (yan tai) an indispensible part of the traditional Chinese calligraphy. About twenty years ago, villagers made up “The Association of Sculptured Ink-stone in Changhua County”, rode the train of local museum and then built a “The Street of Sculptured Ink-stone Art” and “Ro-hsie Lapidary Museum”, turning the once livelihood means to an artifact of local flavor, a representative of Ershui. With the museum, the government is especially aiming for a new locality, and also using it as a public sphere to create the sense of place and identity for villagers. “Building a local museum” became a famous policy of Comprehensive Community Development, and in this article, I focus on the history and the process of building local culture industry by the museum. I also discuss how the building was affected by local politics, provincial economy and interpersonal relationship. The questions I want particularly examine are: how the industry of ink-stone in Ershui has turned itself into the cultural activity and did the building a local museum empower villagers and also developed their the sense of place and Ershui identity?