英文摘要:Paiwanese calls the glass bead “ata” or “gata”. Some said the word “ata” was derived from “maloata”, which in language of Paiwan means the formation of fruit, figuratively meaning that a colorful glass bead is the fruit of mind. Colorful glass beads are only found in the Paiwan tribe, they are nowhere to be seen in other tribes around Taiwan. Where it came from remains a mystery; however, the Paiwanese do believe that it came from their ancestors. As a result of a long term of administration, these traditional glass beads have been internalized as the Glass Bead Culture, a rich culture among the Paiwanese, though the cultural differences do exist among different tribal territories. This study will mainly focus on the region of Raval, another branch of Paiwan. The glass bead is a part of the Paiwan material culture. The culture is embodied in the people’s lives and can be seen as an evidence of the whole culture. It is also presented as a sign and symbol by the particular thoughts of the human mind. The glass bead is not only used by the people on the costumes as decorations, but the colorful and painted glass bead is also stung together and worn on the chest and the neck, which poses meaningful and functional symbolizing features among the society. Consequently, it can be deciphered only on the condition that it be realized under an societal and cultural scope. Therefore, it is reasonable that this study explores the Raval Glass Bead Culture based on the tribe’s social environment, lifeline, the glass bead itself, and the technique of the production of the glass bead, and that it records the continuity and the change of its function among the people. Fortunately, the culture does not die out in the wake of time changing and foreign cultural impact; on the contrary, the people produced the “modern glass bead” in 1976 adopting new techniques, as a reflection of the intra-tribes’ feeling that not let the erosion of the tradition could have a chance to lay a hand on this treasure. The debut of the creation of the modern glass bead surely is the turning point in terms of the development of the glass bead culture. We definitely should have to add up the corruption of the tribal hierarchy, the influence of free trade and currency-using economical lifestyle, and the people’s recognition and the renaissance of their heritages to the history of the production of the glass bead from when there was no record of it to the days it is homemade by the tribe itself, and to the truth that the glass bead is now commonly understood and worn by the tribe as a symbol of the cultural heritage, but not as a status that could only have belonged to the noble classes. Nowadays, thanks to the cultural industry, “novel glass beads” have been created and developed as opposed to what it looked like in the past. Also, the combination of the novel glass bead and current glass bead-related products has brought the glass bead world into a brand-new future.