王右君

Yow-Jiun Wang

在場、社群媒體、身分認同、移住者、敘事記憶、腳本

presence, social media, identity, migrant, narrative memory, script

本文以在臺越南女性移民的雙語臉書敘事為研究對象，探討移民女性如何經由社群媒體建構移住記憶與協商跨國身分。研究指出，臉書上的跨境敘事平臺有助移民女性同時與母國和接待國親友分享日常生活記憶，建立社會連帶與跨國在場性。然而，雙重對話脈絡的存在，意味雙重感知他者的預設和期待，左右了敘事者建構記憶所依循的敘事腳本。無論是與母國或接待國的閱聽人對話，研究參與者傾向再現移居生活的美好事蹟，突顯在臺生活的幸福時光以及不忘母國文化的移民情懷，負面的生命記憶則在理想化的腳本中選擇性地遺漏、修飾或轉化。至於誇示移民生活或批評接待國社會的話語，可能在觀感考量和人際關係的前提下隱而未顯或低調呈現。保持正面但不張揚的敘事傾向不僅出於告慰家人和尋求他者認同之心，亦來自移民女性力求克服劣勢、找尋快樂與自我價值的意念。移住記憶的理想腳本體現，肯認了敘事者的跨國存在，亦維繫了幸福和尊嚴的感受。臉書上的雙語敘事記憶反映與建構敘事者所實踐或嚮往的生活腳本，也銘記了在臺越南女性協商移民身分時的處境與歷程。

This research explores the experiences of bilingual Vietnamese female migrants in Taiwan, investigating how they construct migrant memories and negotiate transnational identities through Facebook narratives. Based on the theories of narrative memory and life script, it examines the verbal, visual, and auditory texts on Facebook that represent these women’s daily lives as self-narratives, looking into how they build up memories and identities and how they carve out life scripts accordingly in the online dialogic space. Concepts of presence and imagined audience are adopted for explicating the negotiated aspect of the female migrants’ transnational identities. It is argued that, when constructing and sharing memories across national borders on social media, the migrant women negotiate their dual identities as emigrants and immigrants as well as their mediated transnational presence. Eleven Vietnamese female migrants from different walks of life participate in the study. All of them speak fluent Mandarin Chinese, the official language of Taiwan. In-depth interviews and observations of Facebook postings were conducted, focusing on how the participants actively created and shared micro-records of their daily life on Facebook - the most popular social networking site among Vietnamese migrants in Taiwan.

Emphasis is placed on how the female migrants represent their lives and develop dual dialogues in connection with the home and receiving countries. The addressees from both countries are viewed as the imagined audience and perceiving others to whom the migrant women represent themselves and with whom they negotiate their transnational identities. How the imagined audience and perceiving others make assumptions about and impose expectations on the female migrants’ lives often affect how these women create their online narrative scripts for memory and identity construction. Building a well-acknowledged transnational identity suggests the fulfillment of double life scripts: one as an emigrant and the other as an immigrant. As emigrants, they are expected to be dutiful Vietnamese daughters who are pious, resilient, responsible, and willing to sacrifice for families. As immigrants, they are constantly subjected to prescribed family roles, including mothers, caretakers, and income earners. On top of that, they often suffer from stereotypes and discriminations, because of the history of commercialized marriages between Taiwanese men and Southeast Asian women.

The research participants ultimately are inclined to represent the bright side of their migrant lives, accentuating delightful moments in Taiwan and their attachments to the homeland, no matter which audience is addressed. The participants’ narrative memories on Facebook that embody their ideal scripts of migrant life are marked by joyful motherhood, family or friend gatherings, work or life achievements, and trips around Taiwan or journeys to Vietnam. Stories carrying negative experiences are generally omitted, modified, or transformed into more agreeable versions in line with the idealized scripts. Carefully maintaining their transnational presence, the female migrants avoid adding emotional burdens to their original families who are usually unable to provide substantial supports. For the sake of self-esteem, they tend not to disclose unfavorable aspects of their migrant lives in front of their Vietnamese addresses who may be skeptical of their transnational marriages and living circumstances. While staying optimistic and confident is a common practice, the participants are cautious about showing off or bragging about their life in Taiwan out of concern for potential doubts of their loyalty to the home country. To build better immigrant images and social relations, they refrain from revealing discontent with or criticisms of the receiving society on Facebook. Nevertheless, in seeking self-worth and public recognition, they may move away from the tempered immigrant scripts and try to make their voice heard.

The pleasant memories and dignified identities represented as such reflect overall the Vietnamese migrant women’s efforts to construct and fulfill their own migrant life scripts. The all-positive narrative scripts not only arise from their wishes to comfort their family and to seek recognition, but also from their determination to lead a happy, decent life. Self-narratives mirror both the life scripts embodied and those anticipated by the narrators. To survive adversities and find meanings in their transnational lives, the participants opt for self-affirming scripts in interpreting and shaping their daily experiences. Victimhood, suffering, or fragile scripts are thenceforth disfavored. Choosing positive narrative scripts over negative ones, they strive to lead their everyday lives in alignment with their ideal scripts. Social media as platforms for self-narration are actively employed to build connections and presence as well as idealized scripts for both personal memories and daily situations.

The fulfillment of ideal scripts for migrant memories on Facebook affirms the narrators’ transnational identities and helps sustain their sense of bliss and self-appreciation, in turn spurring them to write and perform their own scripts of lives that are considered worth having. In so doing, they wrestle with everyday situations that are possibly less palatable, leaving out or reinterpreting memories that do not fit into the idealized scripts. The positions in which the narrating migrants ground themselves conclude the final versions of their scripts, instead of the perspectives from the imagined audience and perceiving others.

This paper delves into bilingual Vietnamese female migrants’ Facebook use, shedding light on the dual dialogues and double life scripts of transnational migrants in a highly digitalized and globally wired world. Expounding the online identity negotiation and memory construction of Vietnamese women in Taiwan, the study indicates how self-narration on social media works in surviving the hardships of migrant life, especially for those who are more disadvantaged than others. It also highlights the cultural capital and autonomy needed for constructing a self-defined transnational identity as well as for a narrative script that serves to empower the connected migrant.