在過去十年左右，「全球」一詞在各種論述裏頭的呼聲不絕，這些聲音普遍出現在中國大陸出版的、有關「中國境外的華文文學」的某些批評文字──這裏我只是「姑且」稱之為「中國境外的華文文學」，乃因如何名之，自一九八〇年代以來就眾說紛紜，而這也是下文將詳細探討的課題。這裏我用「全球視野」這個統稱來指出這些詞語所表達的核心意義：它們皆顯示了關注、瞭解、體驗中國以外的世界，並與之互動的興趣。本文分為結構稍為鬆散的四節。首節以寓言式閱讀王瑞芸的短篇小說〈巴黎來客〉。然後我在第二節提出三個概念──心懷故土的「本源中心主義」、行腳天下的「跨地域主義」、及靈根自植的「扎根主義」。第三節用這三個概念來討論〈巴黎來客〉中的人物，他們可說體現了各種形式、各種組合的三種心態。我認為所謂「全球視野」可能實際上蒙著一層濃厚的本源中心色彩。在第四節，我分析了某些中文評論家或中國以外的華裔作家，在批評華裔美國華文文學中對「全球視野」的看法。藉由我的探索，我想要處理石靜遠與王德威所提出的若干重要問題。他們在《全球華文文學論文集》緒論開宗明義所指出這本書所聚焦的術語「全球華文文學」裏頭的三個詞彙頗有令人不安之處，並質疑道：「為甚麼是全球？為甚麼是現在？」此外，分析世界各地所生產的（種種）華文文學，是否必須總是預設一個「中央」或「中心」的存在。從我的立場看來，美國所生產的華文文學提供了一批豐富的作品，讓我們在思考「中心」的問題時有所根據。

This essay consists four loosely articulated parts. Part I is a parabolic reading of a short story, ＂Bali laike＂(The Visitor from Paris), by a mainland-origin writer now resident in the United States, Wang Ruiyun. I move on in Part II to three concepts- genocentrism, translocationism, and racinationism. In Part III, I link the three concepts to the characters in ＂The Visitor from Paris,＂ who may be said to enact various forms and combinations of genocentrism, translocationism, and racinationism. I argue that what appears to be ＂local vision＂ may in fact be colored heavily by genocentric concerns. In Part IV, I analyze the notion of ＂global vision＂ as seen in certain literary criticism on Sinophone Chinese American literature produced in Chinese or by Chinese-ancestry writers outside China proper. Through my inquiry, I attempt to address some of the key questions raised by editors Jing Tsu and David Wang in Global Chinese Literature: Critical Essays. Foremost is the one they raise at the beginning of their introduction. Noting the fraught nature of all three words in their focal term, ＂global Chinese literature,＂ they ask: ＂Why global? Why now?＂ The second key question concerns whether analysis of Chinese literature(s) produced around the world must always presuppose a ＂center.＂ From my location of intellectual and institutional affiliation with minority discourses, Sinophone writing produced in the United States offers a rich body of work for pondering the question of ＂the center＂ in a grounded manner.