想像文化混種的女職人：日本新維多利亞漫畫和小說中維多利亞女僕和女裁縫師的跨文化再現

Abstract

本論文藉由探討日本傳統文化中的職人精神和新維多利亞主義理論的應用，分析維多利亞女僕和女裁縫師在日本新維多利亞漫畫和小說中形象的再現，探討的核心文本為森薰的《艾瑪》（2006）和青木佑子的《維多利亞薔薇色》（2010），認為作品中新維多利亞女裁縫師和女僕的角色值得學界關注，並試圖以不同的角度詮釋此類角色。研究者主張：上述作品當中的女性角色，不同於以往主流日本ACGN（動畫、漫畫、遊戲、小說）流行文化中的可愛女僕，以及西方後女性主義視角批判的漂亮消極家庭主婦或「互動式機器人」形象，而是同時具備維多利亞女性工作者的傳統元素，並納入日本「職人」精神，形塑出文化混種肖像。本論文挑戰先前學者對於此類角色的分析，試圖證明在《艾瑪》和《維多利亞薔薇色》中對於維多利亞女性工作者的混種再現，展現了日本新維多利亞作品將日本職人精神巧妙置入西方維多利亞英國社會的設定背景，並反映不同時空背景之下，維多利亞英國及日本現代女性讀者對於階級流動的共同渴望。此外在上述的文化混種再現當中，新維多利亞女職人看似灰姑娘童話的邂逅與戀情，不僅重現致敬維多利亞愛情小說中低階勞動階級女性和中產階級雇主之間的跨階級愛情故事，同時也再度審視十九世紀英國社會中「家中天使」和「新女性」形象的二元對立。

This thesis examines the image of Victorian female maids and seamstresses represented in Japanese neo-Victorian manga and fiction, with special references to shokunin (しょくにん; 職人; professional craftsmen) in Japanese culture and neo-Victorianism. The core texts studied are Kaoru Mori (森薰)’s Emma (2006) and Yuko Aoki (青木佑子)’s Victorian Rose Tailor (2010). The characters of neo-Victorian needlewomen and housemaids, I argue, deserve scholarly attention and can be treated in ways that differ from those kawaii maids in mainstream Japanese ACGN (Anime, Comics, Games, Novels) or simply beautiful passive housewives and “interactive personal robots” from the perspective of certain Western post-feminists. Instead, I see them as hybridized cultural icons that retain the conventional characteristics of Victorian working women, while simultaneously containing the essence of the Japanese “shokunin spirit.” Contesting previous scholars’ readings, the thesis demonstrates that the hybridized representations of Victorian female workers in Emma and Victorian Rose Tailor exemplify the ways in which Japanese neo-Victorian works ingeniously embed the Japanese shokunin spirit into the Western settings of Victorian England and further reflect the shared mentality of class fluidity in different contexts. In addition, the seemingly “Cinderella-esque” romance that these neo-Victorian shokunin encounter also revisits the cross-class Victorian romance between lower working-class females and middle or upper-class employers, and disrupts the dichotomies between “Angel in the House” and “New Woman” in nineteenth-century England.