筆者在本論文中，以十九世紀美國帝國西向擴張以及白人女性愛之規訓為切入點，討論愛兒珂特筆下的叛逆男角丹。丹的重要性在於他複雜的多重身份：他既是支持帝國主義的白人拓荒者，又是遵奉親密規訓的「有色他者」；既是傷痕累累的內戰老兵，又是壯志凌雲的西部英雄；既是家庭小說中順從的好兒子，又是西部一角錢小說裡剽悍的男主角。但無論扮演何種角色，丹始終是胸懷西部之感性白女人的學徒。他的故事點出了白女人愛的規訓計畫之功效與限制，不但彰顯出規訓者與被規訓者之間的曖昧，更勾勒出繭居家內的白人女性和公領域的西向擴張之間的牽絲攀藤。

This paper discusses Louisa May Alcott’s character Dan, the unruly hero in Little Men (1871) and Jo’s Boys (1886), in terms of nineteenth-century U.S. imperial westward expansion and the white woman’s discipline of love. Dan’s importance lies in his multiple identities and positions molded by a variety of contemporary discourses: he is a white pioneer in support of westward expansion as well as a racialized “other” disciplined by the white woman’s love; a tired, injured Civil War veteran as well as an energetic, aspiring Western hero; an obedient son in the domestic novel as well as a wild man in the dime Western. These seemingly disparate, unrelated roles are in fact all connected with the white woman’s political vision of upholding westward expansion in the name of sentimental love. In this sense, Dan’s story reflects the uses and limitations of the white woman’s disciplinary project, not only highlighting the ambivalent negotiations between the discipliner and the disciplined, but also illustrating the tricky connections of the domestic white woman in the private sphere with nineteenth-century U.S. westward expansion in the public sphere.