2023 Volume 88 Issue 3 Pages 486-504
Authenticity in the context of today's indigenous arts and crafts is becoming more about the appropriateness of the creator and less about the legitimacy of the style and form of the work. This idea, which also assumes exclusive ownership of the work, is aligned with the globally pervasive notion of intellectual property rights. In this paper, I examine how Taiwanese indigenous peoples, who have begun to participate in the creative industries, accept, enact, and transform authenticity through their weaving and clothing production. Cognizant of the material and linguistic practices through which they make authenticity persuasive, I argue that the perspective of authenticity constructed as discourse needs to be shifted to authenticity "shaped" through the production of objects. In so doing, the creative practices of the local peoples who carry out "dominant classifications" by making particular objects and who attempt to remake those classifications and create new value can be better understood.
