本論文以後現代文學角度探討北美原住民作家路易斯‧歐文斯在小說《暗河》中所關懷的混血原民議題。全文分為四部。序論回顧後現代文學理論，並探討弱勢族裔作家如何運用後現代文學的去中心特質解構殖民論述的霸權。此外，序論也檢視北美原住民文學中的後現代轉向，企圖以「原民後現代敘事」(Native American postmodern narratives)文類閱讀《暗河》。第一章討論歐文斯對混血原民屬性的展望。此章探究作者如何運用後現代戲擬(postmodern parody)策略改寫約翰‧福特的西部經典名片《搜索者》。歐文斯一方面嘲諷並批判歐美主流論述對混血原民屬性的狹隘刻板印象，一方面更進一步轉化主流論述脈絡(trans-contextualize)，重新釋放混血原民屬性的雜揉潛能。第二章則聚焦在混血原民作家的跨界書寫實踐(crosswriting)。此章析論歐文斯如何在《暗河》中挪用殖民者語言，以北美原住民口述傳統(Native American oral tradition)雜化歐美後現代文學。歐文斯藉由置放《暗河》於多元文化之間的中介位置，不僅抵抗強調中心與邊陲二元劃分的殖民論述，更肯定文化不斷流變與相互溝通的重要。結論重申本文論點，並以《暗河》展演維茲諾所言的「文化抗存」(survivance)作結。歐文斯的《暗河》以文字想像為混血原民論述開啟新契機。

This thesis puts forward a postmodern reading of Louis Owens's Dark River (1999) to address the author's concern with Native American mixedblood discourse. The thesis consists of four parts. Introduction reviews the development of postmodern literature and examines how minority writers use postmodern literature as a tool to subvert the colonial authority. Introduction also discerns the long-lasting presence of Native American postmodern narratives in Native American literatures and attempts to read Dark River as one of the examples. Chapter One investigates Owens's envision of Native American mixedblood identity. By parodying John Ford's Searchers in Dark River, Owens on the one hand mocks and criticizes the essentialized stereotypes of “Indians” in the mainstream representations. On the other hand, he trans-contextualizes the mainstream representations and brings the hybridized potential of Native American mixedblood identity into full play. Chapter Two inquires the crosswriting of Native American mixedblood writers. In Dark River, Owens appropriates the colonizer's language and hybridizes Euramerican postmodern literature with Native American oral tradition. Placing Dark River at the transitional site of mixedblood frontiers, Owens not only disrupts the rigid boundary between the center and the margin, but also affirms the values of cultural transformation and openness. Conclusion asserts that Dark River exemplifies the cultural “survivance” in Gerald Vizenor's term. With his literary imagination in Dark River, Owens has opened up a new possibility for Native American mixedblood discourse.

Works Cited
Allen, Paula Gunn. Studies in American Indian
Literature:Critical Essays and Course Designs. New York:
MLA, 1983.
Ashcroft, Bill, Gareth Griffiths, and Helen Tiffin. The
Empire Writes Back: Theory and Practice in Post-colonial
Literatures. London: Routledge, 1989
Astrov, Margot. The Winged Serpent: American Indian Prose
and Poetry. Ed. Margot Astrov. Boston: A Fawcett Premier
Book, 1946.
Barth, John. “The Literature of Exhaustion.” 1967.
Metafiction. Ed. Mark Currie. London: Longman, 1995. 161-
71.
Bataille, Gretchen. “American Indian Literature:
Traditions and Translations.” Multi-Ethnic Literature of
the United States 6 (1979): 17-26.
Bernardin, Susan. “Moving in Place: Dark River and
the ‘New’ Indian Novel.” Louis Owens: Reflections on
His Life and Work. Ed. Jacquelyn Kilpatrick. Norman: The U
of Oklahoma P, 2004. 109-118.
Bertens, Hans. “The Postmodern Weltanschauung and Its
Relation to Modernism: an Introductory Survey.” A
Postmodern Reader. Eds. Joseph Natoli and Linda Hutcheon.
Albany: State U of New York P, 1993. 25-70.
Bhabha, Homi K. The Location of Culture. New York:
Routledge, 1994.
Blaeser, Kimberly M. Gerald Vizenor: Writing in the Oral
Tradition. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1996.
Bruhac, Joseph. “Remembering: a Few Words on the Work and
the Life of Louis Owens.” World Literature Today: A
Literary Quarterly of the University of Oklahoma 77
(2003): 45-47.
Capps, Walter Holden. Seeing with a Native Eye: Essays on
Native American Religion. New York: Harper and Row, 1976.
Cheyfitz, Eric. “The (Post)Colonial Construction of Indian
Country: U.S. American Indian Literatures and Federal
Indian Law.” The Columbia Guide to American Indian
Literatures of the United States since 1945. Ed. Eric
Cheyfitz. New York: Columbia UP, 2006. 1-126.
Christie, Stuart. “Crossing the Frontier: Hollow Men,
Modernist Militias, and Mixedblood Mimesis in Louis
Owens’s Dark River.” Western American Literature 40
(2005): 1-20.
De Ramirez, Susan Berry Brill. Contemporary American Indian
Literatures and the Oral Tradition. Tucson: University of
Arizona Press, 1999.
Dentith, Smith. Parody. London: Routledge, 2000.
Fiedler, Leslie. “Cross the Border – Close the Gap.”
1972. Postmodernism: A Reader. Ed. Patricia Waugh. London:
Edward Arnold, 1992. 31-48.
Geyh, Paula, Fred S. Leebron, and Andrew Levy, eds.
Postmodern American Fiction: A Norton Anthology. New York:
Norton, 1997.
Harjo, Joy, and Gloria Bird. Reinventing the Enemy’s
language: Contemporary Native Women’s Writing of North
America. Eds. Joy Harjo and Gloria Bird. New York: Norton,
1997.
Hassan, Ihab. “Toward a Concept of Postmodernism.” 1987.
Postmodern American Fiction: A Norton Anthology. Eds.
Paula Geyh, Fred S. Leebron and Andrew Levy. New York:
Norton, 1997. 586-95.
Hilger, Michael. From Savage to Nobleman: Images of Native
Americans in Film. Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2002.
The Holy Bible, New International Version. Colorado
Springs: International Bible Society, 1984.
Hutcheon, Linda. The Poetics of Postmodernism. London:
Routledge, 1988.
---. The Politics of Postmodernism. London: Routledge, 1989.
---. Parody: The Teachings of Twentieth-Century Art Forms.
1985. New York: Routledge, 1991.
---. “Circling the Downspout of Empire: Post-colonialism
and Postmodernism.” The Post-colonial Studies Reader.
Eds. Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin.
London: Routledge, 1995. 130-35.
Krupat, Arnold. “The Dialogic of Silko’s Storyteller.”
Narrative Chance: Postmodern Discourse on Native American
Indian Literatures. Norman: The U of Oklahoma P, 1993. 55-
68.
---. The Turn to the Native: Studies in Criticism and
Culture. Lincoln: U of Nebraska P, 1996.
LaLonde, Chris. “Seeing (from) the Treeline.”
Introduction. Grave Concerns, Trickster Turns: The Novels
of Louis Owens. Norman: The U of Oklahoma P, 2002. 3-19.
Leitch, Vincent B. et al. “Gerald Vizenor.” The Norton
Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Ed. Leitch, Vincent B.
et al. New York: Norton, 2001. 1975-77.
McHale, Brian. Postmodernist Fiction. New York: Methuen,
1987.
Momaday, N. Scott. House Made of Dawn. 1968. New York:
Perennial Library, 1989
---. The Way to Rainy Mountain. Albuquerque, New Mexico: U
of New Mexico P, 1969.
Murry, David. “Translation and Mediation.” The Cambridge
Companion to Native American Literature. Eds. Joy Porter
and Kenneth M. Roemer. New York: Cambridge UP, 2005. 69-83.
---. “Sovereignty and the Struggle for Representation in
American Indian Nonfiction.” The Columbia Guide to
American Indian Literatures of the United States since
1945. Ed. Eric Cheyfitz. New York: Columbia UP, 2006. 319-
56.
Nelson, Robert M. “Leslie Marmon Silko: Storyteller.” The
Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature. Eds.
Joy Porter and Keeneth M. Roemer. Cambridge: Cambridge UP,
2005. 245-56.
Ortiz, Simon J. A Good Journey. Tucson: U of Arizona P,
1977.
---. Woven Stone. Tucson: The U of Arizona P, 1992.
Owens, Louis. Preface. American Indian Novelists: An
Annotated Critical Bibliography. Ed. Louis Owens and Tom
Colonnese. New York: Garland, 1985.
---. Wolfsong. 1991. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1995.
---. The Sharpest Sight. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1992.
---. Other Destinies: Understanding the American Indian
Novel. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1992.
---. Mixedblood Messages: Literature, Film, Family, Place.
Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1998.
---. Dark River: A Novel. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 1999.
---. I Hear the Train: Reflections, Inventions,
Refractions. Norman: U of Oklahoma P, 2001.
Padget, Martin. “Native American Fiction.” Beginning
Ethnic American Literatures. Manchester: Manchester UP,
2001. 10-63.
Porter, Joy. “Historical and Cultural Contexts to Native
American Literature.” The Cambridge Companion to Native
American Literature. Eds. Joy Porter and Keeneth M.
Roemer. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2005. 39-68.
Purdy, John. “Clear Waters: a Conversation with Louis
Owens.” Studies in American Indian Literatures: The
Journal of the Association for the Study of American
Indian Literatures 10 (1998): 6-22.
Ronnow, Gretchen. “Secularizing Mythological Space in
Louis Owens’s Dark River.” Louis Owen: Reflections on
His Life and Work. Ed. Jacquelyn Kilpatrick. Norman: The U
of Oklahoma P, 2004. 139-53.
Rose, Margaret A. Parody: Ancient, Modern, and Post-modern.
Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993.
Ruoff, A. LaVonne Brown. American Indian Literatures: An
Introduction, Bibliographic Review, and Selected
Bibliography. New York: MLA, 1990.
Ruppert, James. “Mediation in Contemporary Native Ameircan
Writing.” Native American Perspectives on Literature and
History. Ed. Alan. R. Velie. Norman: U of Oklahoma P,
1995. 7-24.
The Searchers. Dir. John Ford. DVD. Warner Bros. Pictures,
1991.
Silko, Leslie Marmon. Ceremony. 1977. New York: Penguin,
1986.
Smith, Carlton. Coyote Kills John Wayne: Postmodernism and
Contemporary Fictions of the Transcultural Frontier.
Hanover: UP of New England, 2000.
Sontag, Susan. Against Interpretation. 1966. Postmodernism:
A Reader. Ed. Patricia Waugh. London: Edward Arnold, 1992.
48-56.
Swann, Brian. Smoothing the Ground: Essays on Native
American Oral Literature. Ed. Brian Swann. Berkeley: U of
California P, 1983.
Turner, Frederick Jackson. “The Significance of the
Frontier in American History.” Rereading Frederick
Jackson Turner:“The Significance of the Frontier in
American History” and Other Essays. New Haven: Yale UP,
1998. 31-60.
Velie, Alan R. Four American Indian Literary Masters: N.
Scott Momaday, James Welch, Leslie Marmon Silko, and
Gerald Vizenor. Norman: The U of Oklahoma P, 1982.
Vizenor, Gerald. Preface. Narrative Chance: Postmodern
Discourse on Native American Indian Literatures. Norman:
The U of Oklahoma P, 1993. ix-xiii.
---. “A Postmodern Introduction.” Narrative Chance:
Postmodern Discourse on Native American Indian
Literatures. Norman: The U of Oklahoma P, 1993. 3-16.
---. Manifest Manners: Postindian Warriors of Survivance.
Hanover: Wesleyan UP, 1994.
Waugh, Patricia. Metafiction: The Theory and Practice of
Self-Conscious Fiction. London: Routledge, 1984.
Weaver, Jace. That the People Might Live: Native American
Literatures and Native American Community. New York:
Oxford UP, 1997.