本研究以2000年以來台灣本土言情小說中的次類型「沙漠羅曼史」為研究對象，探討羅曼史如何複製與改寫薩依德之東方主義。「沙漠羅曼史」又稱「酋長羅曼史」，為英美羅曼史的次文類；故事主軸為西方白人女主角來到中東沙漠，被當地阿拉伯酋長挾持而最後兩人陷入熱戀。台灣羅曼史作者將女主角換成台灣女孩，除此之外仍然保留英美沙漠羅曼史的主要元素：例如挾持、酋長、暴力、後宮、性挑逗、情色化的中東想像、阿拉伯社會女性地位低落。薩依德指出東方主義乃是西方為了界定自我與控制東方而發展出對阿拉伯／伊斯蘭教東方之負面刻板印象。本研究一方面延續東方主義的批判，另一方面探討由女性生產與消費的沙漠羅曼史，以哪些方式複製或顛覆西方對東方的刻板印象？台灣身為「東亞」之東方，相對於西方及中東，又如何處理自身定位進行呢？經由跨文化流動的觀點，本研究企圖勾勒出西方、東方自身（台灣）、東亞他者（阿拉伯伊斯蘭教徒）的三角關係。最後，本研究也從文化翻譯的角度，檢視本土羅曼史對翻譯自英文之西方羅曼史的挪用與轉換。

This study intends to examine and explore ＂Desert romance＂ published in Taiwan since 2000. As a sub-genre of English romance, desert romance is also called ＂Sheik romance.＂ The storyline begins with a white girl who travels to a Middle-East desert, is abducted by an Arab sheik, and the two of them fall in love. I aim to explore in what ways desert romance reproduces and in the meantime transforms Oriental ism as defined by Said. Desert romance in Taiwan figures a Taiwan girl as the heroine, and keeps the major narrative elements intact, such as abduction, the sheik, violence, harem, sexual seduction, the eroticized imagination about the Middle-East, and the low status of women in Arab society. Said argues that Orientalism is developed by the West as a discursive formation in order to define the self of the West and to control the Orient. This research continues the critique of Oriental ism on the one hand, and on the other hand discusses in what ways desert romance produced and consumed by women repeats and subverts the negative stereotype of the Middle-East. As part of East Asia, how Taiwan defines herself in contrast to the West and the Middle-East? Through the perspective of transcultural flow, I intend to reconfigure the triangle relationship between the West, the Self as the East (Taiwan), and the Other as the Orient (the Islamic Arabs). Finally, by using the perspective of cultural translation, I want to examine how Taiwan romance appropriates and transforms romance translated from the West, mainly England.