移民の想像力――渡米言説と文学テクストのビジョン――

『JunCture』第1号、2010年1月1日、pp.48-63

［要旨］
　明治期の渡米言説を、渡米奨励本や文学テクストの分析を通じ、想像力という観点から分析した。隣接する言説領域であった成功ブーム、苦学論などにも言及しつつ、テクストの読解からアメリカに渡るという行為に向けられた想像力の形を考える。取り扱った文学テクストは、天涯帰客『立志冒険　北米無銭渡航』、星野徳治『苦学独歩　異郷之客』、内田魯庵「くれの廿八日」、石川啄木「鳥影」、真山青果「馬盗人」、永井荷風「船室夜話」
などである。

[Summary]
Imaging Migrations: Literary Texts and the Discourses of Meiji-Era Emigration Guides to America

HIBI Yoshitaka

From the late nineteenth century to the early twentieth century, dozens of guides for emigrating to the United States were published in Japan. These books and magazines provided detailed instructions on how to emigrate to America and ideological frameworks of why we, the Japanese, needed emigration. The boom of the emigration guide was directly caused by growing Japanese emigration to the US, but it had close ties with other trends in the discourse of colonial policies, the “success-boom,” and “self-education (kugaku).”
This paper offers an analysis on the discourses of emigration to America by focusing upon the imagination toward the emigrants represented in the narratives of literary texts in the middle and the late Meiji novels such as Traveling to North America without Money (Risshi Boken, Hokubei Musen Toko) by Tengai-kikyaku, A Stranger in a Different Land (Kugaku Doppo, Ikyou no Kyaku) by HOSHINO Tokuji, “December 28th (Kure no Niju-hachi nichi)” by UCHIDA Roan, Shadow of a Bird (Cho-ei) by ISHIKAWA Takuboku, “Horse Stealer (Uma Nusubito)” by MAYAMA Seika and “Night Talk in a Cabin (Kyabin Yawa)” by NAGAI Kafu. By analyzing these narratives and imaginative texts about the emigrants, we can explore not only overlooked parts of Japanese emigration which historical, sociological or anthropological approaches have not treated but also complex processes between territorialization and deterritorialization that emerged in marginal areas of nation-state-building of the Meiji period.