ABSTRACT
WHAT is TAIWANESE CULTURE'?" ON A LATE AUTUMN DAY IN 1999, THIS question was raised in supposedly casual conversation with a friend as we rode a Metro bus in Seattle. My friend Catherine was a cosmopolitan law school student from Taiwan; neither her research interest in the Mainland Chinese legal system nor her personal choice of marrying an American indicated any nationalistic obsession. Yet, in a well-meaning manner she asked me: "Have you ever wondered what Taiwan' is? No one has formally taught us about our culture since elementary school. Hence I often found myself at a loss whenever asked by my foreign friends to show something unique and representative of Taiwan. Perhaps you, as an anthropologist, have a better idea than me?"
