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Paper short abstract:

I focus on a graveyard constituted during the White Terror Period in Taiwan. This graveyard is currently conserved to memorialize the deceased political victims. However, the constitution of the graveyard has changed under religious practices, reflecting different viewpoints about the graves.

Paper long abstract:

This paper focuses on how ruins of historical tragedies are embedded in the reflections on political trauma and diverse religious practices. I concentrate on the Thirteen Squad on Green Isalnd, a graveyard that many political victims and activists annually visit to show their respects to the deceased—especially to the political inmates who died when being confined on the off-shore Island during the White Terror Period. However, the remains in the graveyard are not limited to victims but include the representations of the state, such as soldiers and wardens. Furthermore, some political inmates' remains are already removed from the graveyard and reburied elsewhere by their family members. In general, fewer remains of the political victims result in more salient existences of the graves and monuments belonging to the warden and soldiers. Besides, local residents on Green Island often convey their discomfort about the existence of these deceased outsiders.

By conducting interviews and participant observations in 8 months of fieldwork, I argue that the political victims, activists, and local residents bear ambivalent attitudes toward the Thirteen Squad due to different political and cultural backgrounds. The political victims and the activist groups continue their commemoration and expand the definition of "political victims" to encompass the graves of wardens and soldiers. Meanwhile, local residents' strong opposition against the graveyard can also reflect their religious practices about the boundary between locals and outsiders. Their different attitudes connote the complexity and difficulties on conserving heritage related to death in a post-authoritarian era.