Feeling “Superstitious”: Affect and the Land in the Marquesas Islands

For many Indigenous peoples, ancestral lands are a source of nourishment, strength, and sovereignty that counteracts colonial legacies of violence and hegemony. However, the feelings associated with place and the land can also be complicated by embodied fear and ambivalence. What happens when the remnants of colonialism feed feelings of ambivalence, shame, or fear of the land? How do these lasting emotional scars on Indigenous minds and bodies impact Native place-making, today? This paper problematizes the role of ancestral lands and affective place-making in shaping Indigenous identity, sovereignty, resource management, and sustainability. In the Marquesas Islands of French Polynesia, ancestral places are felt as much as seen, and the spirits that dwell there can be dangerous. The active concealment of these Marquesan reactions and relationships to place illustrates the blending of colonial and Indigenous histories and values in ambivalent, affective experiences on the land. Thus, even as islanders work to revitalize their traditional culture and build a sustainable future based on ancestral places, reticence complicates local relationships to the land and the vital hopes they represent. As global sustainability efforts emphasize the conservation of lands inhabited by Indigenous communities, recognizing the conflicted, emplaced emotions and experiences of local peoples will be a key part of understanding such areas and how to preserve them.

感受“迷信”：马克萨斯群岛的情感与土地

关键词：情感，矛盾心理，殖民主义, 主权, 原住民, 资源管理, 大洋洲。

对很多原住民来说，祖先的土地是滋养、力量和主权的源泉，能抵消暴力和具有说服力的支配性的意识形态的殖民遗产。然而，与地方和土地相关联的感受也会受到恐惧和矛盾心理的具体表现的影响而复杂化。当殖民主义的残余影响培养了对土地的矛盾心理、羞耻以及恐惧的情感时会发生什么？原住民心灵和身体上的这些持久的情感性伤痕今日是如何影响到本土地方营造的？ 本论文对祖先土地和情感性地方营造在塑造原住民身份、主权、资源管理和可持续性中的作用提出问题。在法属波利尼西亚的马克萨斯群岛，祖先的地方既是亲眼可见，也同样随时被体验着，那里栖居的灵魂也会是危险的。对这些马克萨斯人对地方的反应和与它的关系的积极隐瞒表明在这块土地上殖民地和原住民的历史和价值观交融在了矛盾心理下的情感性的体验中。 因此，即便当岛民努力复兴传统文化，以祖先的地方为基础建设具有可持续性的未来，有所保留的缄默不语还是致使与土地的本土关系以及其所代表的至关重要的希望被复杂化。 既然全球可持续性发展工作强调对原住民社区居住的土地的保护， 承认本地人民对地方场景的矛盾性的情感和经历对于理解和保存这些区域将会是关键的一部分。

Translated from English by Li Guo