風水作為一種空間的實踐：一個人類學的反思

有別於過去多數的著作將風水視為一種文本現象，本文主張風水應當首先被視為一種空間實踐。它應用漢人傳統的宇宙觀的概念與框架，來建構一套擇址的技術。但是風水本身不應被視為一種宇宙觀。它的運作牽涉到宅位的主體與格局的規模，因此與社會權力的作用及心理層面的效果有關。過去人類學有關風水是機械論或人格論的討論，其實是混淆了風水術的理論與風水的實踐。在實踐的層次，風水師面臨的是平衡漢人多元的世界觀的要求。而風水術的理論處理的只是其中有關自然的面向。
風水實踐具有零碎、分散及自我中心的性質，但是不應該因而被視為一種有別於國家理性主義或道德主義的另類傳統。本文以十九世紀宜蘭官府運用風水建城的例證來論證：風水展現出來的雙元性是在視覺與認識取向的層次，不是在政治、社會結構的層次。因此，不論官方或民間都可以挪用風水來中介權力關係。
其後本文用當代臺灣三個風水師的例證，來看風水如何在物質與社會條件都不同的城鎮與都市中，繼續轉換與適應。在這樣的脈絡中，風水實踐的主體與空間政治，都變得更為個人化與抽象化。最後，本文對風水的持續存在與跨文化傳播這樣的現象，提出一些初步的解釋。

Unlike the majority of recent studies on fengshui, I argue in this paper that it should not be treated simply as a textual phenomenon. Fengshui is foremost a spatial practice with an intention to produce a dwelling site for the living or the deceased. It employs complicated symbols and schemes from classical Chinese cosmological thought, but itself is not a Chinese cosmology or conception of nature. Its operations include setting boundaries and centering subjectivities, and thus it is subjected to political maneuvering and involves the personal psychological dynamics of the parties involved.
The debate within Chinese anthropology over whether the treatment of ancestral bodies in fengshui is mechanical or personal has confused fengshui practice with fengshui theory. Fengshui theory deals only with the world of ’nature,’ but a fengshui master needs to operate with a multi-dimensional view of the world in practice.
Fengshui practices are often fragmentary, dispersed and self-centered, and thus potentially subversive. However, they should not be interpreted as an alternative tradition of knowledge parallel to state rationalism or monolithic moralism. I use the example of the city building of Kavalan in nineteenth century Taiwan to illustrate how both local government and local people deployed fengshui to organize and re-organize colonial space. The dualistic dynamic between domination and subversion in the fengshui practices was manifest at the level of consciousness and visual orientation, not at the level of social and political structure.
Using fengshui practices from three contemporary fengshui masters in urban Taiwan as examples, I demonstrate how the forms of fengshui continue to adapt and transform in a fast-growing and land-scarce environment. As new spatial arrangements and diversified subjectivities emerge within the household, fengshui has become more personalized and more abstract. Finally, I offer some reflections on the continuous popularity of fengshui and its emergence as a cross-cultural phenomenon.