Taiwan under Japanese colonial rule, 1895-1945: History, culture, memory, 2006
In the fall of 1945-after the announcement of Japan's surrender to the Allied Forces but prior to... more In the fall of 1945-after the announcement of Japan's surrender to the Allied Forces but prior to the formal takeover of Taiwan-some two or three hundred incidents of assault and theft in Taiwan were reported by the colonial police bu• reau. 1 Although contemporary newspapers, as well as latter-day memoirs and oral histories, briefly mention these incidents, few historians have given them much attention. Contemporary and historical accounts provide various explanations for this unlawful activity. A leaflet distributed in September 1945 in mid-Taiwan (with the intent of curtailing this activity) stated: Ignorant and stupid brothers, watching for the chance to commit wrongs and tak• ing advantage of circumstances to act like brutes, have disrupted social order, en• croachcd upon personal liberty, and damaged public construction matcricl. 2 In contrast, a November 1945 police bureau report that targeted areas for im• mediate attention inferred that postsurrender violence and plunder had been instigated by suppressed bandits who had reemerged in 1945 to incite the cultur• ally deprived populace to commit crimes against the state.J More recent explana• tions, on the other hand, tend lo favor circumstantial (e.g., a political vacuum) or Nationalistic (e.g., anti-Japanese sentiment) explanations.• This essay offers an alternative theory.
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Papers by Douglas Fix
Abstract: This article attempts to analyze the 19th-century "Formosan landscapes" sketched by Charles Wm. Le Gendre (U.S. consul for Amoy) in his consular reports and illustsrated manuscript entitled Notes of travel in Formosa. Although Le Gendre provided detailed descriptions of Taiwan's territorial space, agricultural production, and commercial potential in his writings, this was only one aspect of his larger perspective. By focusing on Le Gendre's portrayals of northern, central and extreme southern Taiwan, I attempt to understand the entirety of Le Gendre's "Formosan landscapes." This perspective includes detailed analyses of Le Gendre's textual landscapes, as well as his maps, topgraphical sketches, geological sections, and photographic prints. From this broader analysis, we are able to better apprehend Le Gendre's multiple (and sometimes contradictory) perspectives of a single landscape, and to fully understand the techniques and discourses he employed to render his "faithful representations of such places."
本論文探索了美國前駐廈門領事李仙得（Charles Le Gendre）所敘述、繪製的「福爾摩沙風景」是如何幫助他「忠實再現」此島嶼在1860–1870年代的自然環境。李仙得對台灣的領土觀點、商／農產品的資訊或戰略上的興趣僅是他更廣泛的福爾摩沙風景描述上的一小部分而以。在處理李仙得對三個地區（即台灣北部、台灣中南部以及恆春半島）的風景描述時，我嘗試擴大檢視的焦點，而將其以文字敘述、地圖、地質截面、地形略圖及拍攝照片等來描述風景的模式也加入一併討論。李仙得對同一個地點所採取的多重觀點（例如由海港凝望或親自量測地形、查考岩石與土壤等），以及其多重描述模式產生了複雜（有時互相矛盾）且拼湊組合的風景。此研究也發現李氏既然對恆春半島如此熟悉，但是關於該地自然風景的紀錄卻非常少。
staff of the British Admiralty catalogued, cross-referenced, and summarized that information. Subsequently, Admiralty cartographers retrieved the stored data to create a series of official maps that transformed the maritime space surrounding Taiwan and the off-shore islands into the flat surface of numbered Admiralty maps. With time, these cartographic representations became the standard authority used by foreign ship captains, merchants, explorers, and consular agents attempting to navigate "Formosan waters."
Using this surveying of Taiwan as a case study, I seek to test claims regarding the roles played by British field agents in the development of "comprehensive knowledge of the peoples and territories" of the Qing empire. In particular, I examine the investigative practices and the epistemological objects of British surveyors, artists, and cartographers who produced the basic knowledge of Taiwan's maritime spaces. Secondly, I probe the impact of local knowledge, gained from fishermen, pilots, sailors, interpreters, officials, etc., in determining the content of the cartographic representations penned by British field agents.
Finally, I analyze both the modalities and the networks by which this field-level information was communicated to "centers of calculation" in England, where it was processed as part of
the larger epistemological complex of the British Empire.
constructed by British, American, Russian, French, and Prussian visitors.
of foreign intrusion. It analyzes shifts in the boundaries of lived communities, and it studies the changing contours of social, political and economic pressures and processes that contributed to the evolution of human activity on the Hengchun peninsula. Ethnic communities boundaries, marriage networks, defense associations, and military alliances were examined to understand the major society-making effects on the peninsula during this historical period.
Drafts by Douglas Fix
Abstract: This article attempts to analyze the 19th-century "Formosan landscapes" sketched by Charles Wm. Le Gendre (U.S. consul for Amoy) in his consular reports and illustsrated manuscript entitled Notes of travel in Formosa. Although Le Gendre provided detailed descriptions of Taiwan's territorial space, agricultural production, and commercial potential in his writings, this was only one aspect of his larger perspective. By focusing on Le Gendre's portrayals of northern, central and extreme southern Taiwan, I attempt to understand the entirety of Le Gendre's "Formosan landscapes." This perspective includes detailed analyses of Le Gendre's textual landscapes, as well as his maps, topgraphical sketches, geological sections, and photographic prints. From this broader analysis, we are able to better apprehend Le Gendre's multiple (and sometimes contradictory) perspectives of a single landscape, and to fully understand the techniques and discourses he employed to render his "faithful representations of such places."
本論文探索了美國前駐廈門領事李仙得（Charles Le Gendre）所敘述、繪製的「福爾摩沙風景」是如何幫助他「忠實再現」此島嶼在1860–1870年代的自然環境。李仙得對台灣的領土觀點、商／農產品的資訊或戰略上的興趣僅是他更廣泛的福爾摩沙風景描述上的一小部分而以。在處理李仙得對三個地區（即台灣北部、台灣中南部以及恆春半島）的風景描述時，我嘗試擴大檢視的焦點，而將其以文字敘述、地圖、地質截面、地形略圖及拍攝照片等來描述風景的模式也加入一併討論。李仙得對同一個地點所採取的多重觀點（例如由海港凝望或親自量測地形、查考岩石與土壤等），以及其多重描述模式產生了複雜（有時互相矛盾）且拼湊組合的風景。此研究也發現李氏既然對恆春半島如此熟悉，但是關於該地自然風景的紀錄卻非常少。
staff of the British Admiralty catalogued, cross-referenced, and summarized that information. Subsequently, Admiralty cartographers retrieved the stored data to create a series of official maps that transformed the maritime space surrounding Taiwan and the off-shore islands into the flat surface of numbered Admiralty maps. With time, these cartographic representations became the standard authority used by foreign ship captains, merchants, explorers, and consular agents attempting to navigate "Formosan waters."
Using this surveying of Taiwan as a case study, I seek to test claims regarding the roles played by British field agents in the development of "comprehensive knowledge of the peoples and territories" of the Qing empire. In particular, I examine the investigative practices and the epistemological objects of British surveyors, artists, and cartographers who produced the basic knowledge of Taiwan's maritime spaces. Secondly, I probe the impact of local knowledge, gained from fishermen, pilots, sailors, interpreters, officials, etc., in determining the content of the cartographic representations penned by British field agents.
Finally, I analyze both the modalities and the networks by which this field-level information was communicated to "centers of calculation" in England, where it was processed as part of
the larger epistemological complex of the British Empire.
constructed by British, American, Russian, French, and Prussian visitors.
of foreign intrusion. It analyzes shifts in the boundaries of lived communities, and it studies the changing contours of social, political and economic pressures and processes that contributed to the evolution of human activity on the Hengchun peninsula. Ethnic communities boundaries, marriage networks, defense associations, and military alliances were examined to understand the major society-making effects on the peninsula during this historical period.