Becoming marginal: A fluid community and Shamanism in the Pearl River Delta of South China.

摘要

This thesis focuses on the development of an immigrant settlement in an isolated area of the Hong Kong New Territories. When the immigrants began to settle in the region in the early 1950s, members of a local lineage had already occupied the best land and monopolized all political positions. Indigenous social and religious institutions had existed for centuries. The immigrants on the margins of this established lineage's territory with only limited resources. In a subordinate position, the immigrants had to rely on the lineage's religious institutions and security apparatus. They could not compete with the indigenous people nor could they challenge their authority; their residences were granted by the tolerance of the lineage.;The immigrants were sensitive to the market, they adjusted their production to meet the changing market demands. They developed their own farming techniques and tried to manipulate their religious settings for supernatural support. The competitive nature of production contributed to the cellularization of immigrant households.;In the political domain, the immigrants had their representatives in the local political arena, but effective leadership was almost absent. Neither the local leaders nor the religious institution created by the shaman could unite the immigrants into a collective whole. The immigrant community was maintained only by a series of short term cooperative efforts, resulting in a fluid society with limited social obligations. This thesis explores the social history of the community in comparative context, drawing on earlier studies of similar fluid systems in other societies.;Although the immigrants were in an impoverished environment, new opportunities were sometimes generated by factional conflicts within the lineage and by changes in the local and the world market. The rival factions in the lineage would pay the immigrants off when they needed votes in elections. New demands on vegetables, poultry, and pond-fish turned their once infertile land into a productive zone. Needs of shamanic ritual and curing services fostered the emergence of a shaman in the immigrant settlement.