The Frontier of Sinophone Literature in Syaman Rapongan’s Translational Writing

Using the Taiwanese indigenous writer Syaman Rapongan’s translational writing as an example, this chapter describes a frontier that exists within Sinophone literature. First, it notes the encounter between sound and script in Syaman’s writing. Furthermore, as Syaman’s writing demonstrates, the tension between sound and script exists not only within the domain of Sinophone articulation, but it also extends outside its specific territory. While addressing the issues related to Syaman’s translational writing in terms of Sinophone studies, this chapter also introduces the supplementary concept of Sinoglossia to the paradigm of the Sinophone. Referencing the Bakhtinian idea of heterogolssia, Sinoglossia underscores multilingualism and multiculturalism in the Sinophone practice. Since Syaman’s Chinese writing offers an unusual mode of translational writing, the problematics of translation thus are one of the primary inquiries of this chapter. This chapter argues that Syaman’s translational writing embodies a minor articulation that inaugurates a linguistic transformation that is immanent within Sinophone articulation. More importantly, it contends that Syaman actually discovers or invents an “orality” that is prior to his written scripts and can be considered an uncharted field that is intersected by both articulation and signification. This uncharted field is what we term the “frontier” of Sinophone literature, as it actually exists within and inside of Sinophone articulation rather outside it. More significantly, with the discovery of this uncharged frontier, Syaman is able to envision a possible territory of existence for himself as well as the entire tribe.