Beyond victimization: the empowerment of 'foreign brides' in resisting capitalist globalization

摘要

Drawing on the author's direct participation in the empowerment of 'foreign brides,' this paper charts the gradual transformation of these highly stigmatized marriage immigrants from isolated and suppressed individuals to active participants in a growing immigrant movement in Taiwan. The 'double-bind structure' prevalent in mainstream media narratives has constructed 'foreign brides' as either 'passive victims' or 'materialist blood suckers,' two logically contrasted stereotypes that jointly construct 'foreign brides' as an inferior other. While sympathetic with 'foreign brides,' most feminist discourse also portrays them as passive victims. This paper highlights the agency of 'foreign brides,' who strive for better lives via transnational marriages and, more importantly, have transformed themselves first from personal subject to communal subject and then to historical subject. This process of subjectivation is the result of active grassroots empowerment, which has provided the impetus for the building of a social movement. : — ;