Hau: The Journal of Ethnographic Theory, Mar 1, 2015
According to the received wisdom in Melanesian ethnography and elsewhere, Christianity is "unrele... more According to the received wisdom in Melanesian ethnography and elsewhere, Christianity is "unrelentingly individualistic" (e.g., Robbins 2004: 293). In this chapter, drawing upon the notion of "dividual" or "partible personhood" of the New Melanesian Ethnography and implicit in the classic Van Gennepian model of rites of passage, I revisit Louis Dumont's, Kenelm Burridge's, and Max Weber's authoritative conceptualizations of Christian personhood. I seek to demonstrate that in the early Christian church and the later Protestant Reformation of Luther and Calvin, the person, whether human or divine, qualifies instead as a dividual-a kind of agent radically distinct from the canonical "possessive individual" of Western political and economic discourse. Following Dumont, Burridge, and Weber on close reading, I argue that the seeming "individuality" of Christian persons consists merely in singular moments of overarching processes of elicitive detachment, gift-transfer, incorporation, and reciprocation whereby the constituent parts of total or overall dividual persons are transacted. Christian "individualism, " in short, is nothing less than an instance of dividual personhood and agency, fundamentally distinct from the possessive individual of modern secular society.
Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Jun 1, 2010
Recent discussions by anthropologists and others regarding the transmission and adoption of exoge... more Recent discussions by anthropologists and others regarding the transmission and adoption of exogenous cultural elements have been framed by such tropes as cultural 'rupture', 'collision', 'disjuncture', 'hybridity', and 'globalization'. These studies have been undertaken largely independent of the 'New Melanesian Ethnography' and its distinctive understanding of partible personhood. Burgeoning studies of Christian conversion have elided the partibility of persons with respect to both indigenous modes of agency and analogous features of Christianity, while practitioners of the New Ethnography have mostly avoided analysing religious change. I seek to transcend this bifurcation by demonstrating the dividual character of personhood and agency in several exemplary instances of Melanesian Christianity (Maisin, Karavar, Gebusi, and Urapmin), which previous investigators have portrayed in opposed terms as inherently individualist. There and in a further ethnographic treatment (North Mekeo) I show how people's assimilation of Christianity has been effected through elicitive exchanges involving parts of their persons and corresponding personal detachments of God, Jesus, Mary, Holy Spirit, the Devil, and so on. Paying due heed to these heretofore unrecognized analogies between indigenous dividualism and Christian 'individualism' provides a novel explanation for the nature and rapidity of conversion and change in Melanesia and beyond.
KDn the Order of Chaos Social Anthropology and the Science of Chaos Edited by Mark S. Mosko &... more KDn the Order of Chaos Social Anthropology and the Science of Chaos Edited by Mark S. Mosko & Frederick H. Damon ... On the Order of Chaos This On« 8AOB-EOC-GLOJ ... ON THE ORDER OF CHAOS Social Anthropology and the Science of Chaos Edited by Mark S. Mosko and ...
Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, Jun 17, 2020
Numerous stellar thinkers have left indelible marks on anthropology. There are few, however, whos... more Numerous stellar thinkers have left indelible marks on anthropology. There are few, however, whose contributions over the past century have had revolutionary, albeit controversial, impacts upon the discipline's theoretical foundations comparable with those of Claude Lévi-Strauss. It is ironic, however-to the relief of many notwithstanding the grief of a few-that from the 1980s onwards the larger share of Lévi-Strauss's structuralist brilliance came to be occluded and his overall legacy largely forgotten. Yet paradoxically-to the grief of many notwithstanding the relief of a few-pivotal luminaries of the post-structuralist 'New Kinship' (e.g., Schneider, Carsten, McKinnon, Strathern, Franklin) and the 'Ontological Turn' initiatives of recent years (Wagner, Strathern, Viveiros de Castro, Descola, Sahlins) can well be understood as 'intensifying certain trains of thought' traceable to Lévi-Strauss (see e.g., Holbraad & Pedersen 2017; Franklin & McKinnon 2001). Even so, for many devotees, it can be argued that there remains much misunderstanding regarding the substance and merit of Lévi-Strauss's thought due to a persisting reluctance to probe beyond previous generations' doctrinaire and superficial decrees. Anthropology is thus greatly indebted to Maurice Godelier who, with remarkable erudition, meticulous scholarship and clarity, has summarised and critiqued the principal components of Lévi-Strauss's oeuvre after devoting three years to its re-reading in his book Levi-Strauss: A Critical Study of his Thought. There is probably no other anthropologist better qualified for an undertaking of this magnitude. Godelier and Lévi-Strauss were locked in a complex relationship, personal as well as professional, nearly from the beginning. Sharing complementary interests in the revolutionary possibilities of structuralist thought, Lévi-Strauss focused on 'superstructures', Godelier on 'infrastructures'. But very quickly Godelier abandoned these notions as they are devoid of analytical efficiency and because economic activities are not everywhere disembedded from kinship or political-religious relationships as they are in Western societies. More recently, however, Godelier has penned masterpieces addressing both orientations: The Metamorphoses of Kinship (2004) and The Imagined, the Imaginary and the Symbolic (2020) respectively. In view of the demise of Lévi-Strauss's repute, Godelier now
Actions speak louder than words", they say-especially if you are holding a gun. As a Euro-America... more Actions speak louder than words", they say-especially if you are holding a gun. As a Euro-American I take this to mean there is something self-evidently coercive about the use and effects of firearms beyond their ability to wound and kill. And, as a social scientist, I recognise that the same is usually held to be true with regard to the deployment of "physical force" generally. Where non-Western people's responses to tokens of Western culture such as money, Christian missionisation, literacy, Hershey bars, Adidas tennis shoes, rock music and the internet seem necessarily variable and unpredictable, owing at least partly to the choices afforded by people's pre-existing cultural schema, physical force by definition allows little scope for subjects' volition.
[We] cannot do without some general knowledge. Without a comparative background we cannot go beyo... more [We] cannot do without some general knowledge. Without a comparative background we cannot go beyond a rough description of people's actions and utterings; we cannot relate them with one another and obtain a simpler picture. A fortiori we cannot pretend to lay bare the ...
Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Dec 1, 2009
Anthropologists have long appreciated that animals are 'good to think'. In this essay I ponder wh... more Anthropologists have long appreciated that animals are 'good to think'. In this essay I ponder whether plants might be good to think too, and particularly whether there is any sense in asking if plants (along with animals) might also be 'good to act'. The botanical metaphor of 'base', 'body', and 'tip' animates the origin structures of many if not most societies of the Austronesian world. Less attention has been directed at indigenous elaborations in other socio-cultural domains of the region. Based on recent fieldwork, I outline such ramifications in Trobriand culture, drawing upon the notions of fractal recursion and self-similarity from chaos theory wherein emergent 'tips' yield 'fruit' which become the condition or 'base' for further production and transformation. Accordingly, the base-body-tip-fruit metaphor serves as a cultural template or scenario for social action, shedding new interpretative light on many topics of long-standing anthropological interest (e.g. yam propagation, display, and exchange, kula, mortuary celebration, age categories, fame) as well as more recent theoretical interests. Anthropologists have long appreciated that animals are 'good to think' (Lévi-Strauss 1966; Tambiah 1968). In this essay I ponder whether plants are good to think too, and particularly whether there is any sense in asking if plants (along with animals) might also be 'good to act'. Distinguished researchers have recently provided affirmative answers to the first question in The social life of trees (Rival 1998). My second query and any credible answers to it probably seem more opaque. If 'good to think' means something like 'indigenous cultural classifications of plants are good for humans to think with about themselves and the universes in which they live' , then what might it mean to consider whether plants are 'good for people to act with in respect of themselves, their relations, and their cosmos'? In his contribution to the aforementioned volume, Maurice Bloch touches on this issue when, citing Turner, he reminds us that 'ritual symbols are part of a process ... of substitution, where one thing "becomes" another' (1998: 39). I therefore take 'to act' to involve enactments in and with the botanical world which become or affect transformations in the human world. Specifically, I outline certain action scenarios of Trobriand Islanders which rely systematically on plant imagery-on the recursive succession of
Hau: The Journal of Ethnographic Theory, Sep 1, 2020
Jarillo et al.’s attempted refutation of Malinowski’s claims as to Trobrianders’ “universally” sh... more Jarillo et al.’s attempted refutation of Malinowski’s claims as to Trobrianders’ “universally” shared belief in baloma reincarnation fails. Contrary to their claims, Malinowski’s “Baloma” article (1916) documented wide, often contradictory variation in Islanders’ opinions which his revolutionary methodology was explicitly aimed at resolving. Jarillo et al.’s multidisciplinary research has not produced an explanatory model sufficient to supersede Malinowski’s solution—the formulation of the culture as a functionally integrated totality. Methodologically, they incorporate ethnographic preconceptions arising from Euro-American assumptions about indigenous personhood, agency, exchange, hierarchy, and the afterlife which are incapable of shedding new light on beliefs and practices current in Malinowski’s time. Their claims as to Malinowski’s own Western preconceptions do not change the documented fact that reincarnation beliefs predate his arrival. Finally, Jarillo et al.’s Trobriand collaborators and survey participants have been selected through non-random procedures at variance with the standards of quantitative social science.
Hau: The Journal of Ethnographic Theory, Mar 1, 2015
According to the received wisdom in Melanesian ethnography and elsewhere, Christianity is "unrele... more According to the received wisdom in Melanesian ethnography and elsewhere, Christianity is "unrelentingly individualistic" (e.g., Robbins 2004: 293). In this chapter, drawing upon the notion of "dividual" or "partible personhood" of the New Melanesian Ethnography and implicit in the classic Van Gennepian model of rites of passage, I revisit Louis Dumont's, Kenelm Burridge's, and Max Weber's authoritative conceptualizations of Christian personhood. I seek to demonstrate that in the early Christian church and the later Protestant Reformation of Luther and Calvin, the person, whether human or divine, qualifies instead as a dividual-a kind of agent radically distinct from the canonical "possessive individual" of Western political and economic discourse. Following Dumont, Burridge, and Weber on close reading, I argue that the seeming "individuality" of Christian persons consists merely in singular moments of overarching processes of elicitive detachment, gift-transfer, incorporation, and reciprocation whereby the constituent parts of total or overall dividual persons are transacted. Christian "individualism, " in short, is nothing less than an instance of dividual personhood and agency, fundamentally distinct from the possessive individual of modern secular society.
Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Jun 1, 2010
Recent discussions by anthropologists and others regarding the transmission and adoption of exoge... more Recent discussions by anthropologists and others regarding the transmission and adoption of exogenous cultural elements have been framed by such tropes as cultural 'rupture', 'collision', 'disjuncture', 'hybridity', and 'globalization'. These studies have been undertaken largely independent of the 'New Melanesian Ethnography' and its distinctive understanding of partible personhood. Burgeoning studies of Christian conversion have elided the partibility of persons with respect to both indigenous modes of agency and analogous features of Christianity, while practitioners of the New Ethnography have mostly avoided analysing religious change. I seek to transcend this bifurcation by demonstrating the dividual character of personhood and agency in several exemplary instances of Melanesian Christianity (Maisin, Karavar, Gebusi, and Urapmin), which previous investigators have portrayed in opposed terms as inherently individualist. There and in a further ethnographic treatment (North Mekeo) I show how people's assimilation of Christianity has been effected through elicitive exchanges involving parts of their persons and corresponding personal detachments of God, Jesus, Mary, Holy Spirit, the Devil, and so on. Paying due heed to these heretofore unrecognized analogies between indigenous dividualism and Christian 'individualism' provides a novel explanation for the nature and rapidity of conversion and change in Melanesia and beyond.
KDn the Order of Chaos Social Anthropology and the Science of Chaos Edited by Mark S. Mosko &... more KDn the Order of Chaos Social Anthropology and the Science of Chaos Edited by Mark S. Mosko & Frederick H. Damon ... On the Order of Chaos This On« 8AOB-EOC-GLOJ ... ON THE ORDER OF CHAOS Social Anthropology and the Science of Chaos Edited by Mark S. Mosko and ...
Asia Pacific Journal of Anthropology, Jun 17, 2020
Numerous stellar thinkers have left indelible marks on anthropology. There are few, however, whos... more Numerous stellar thinkers have left indelible marks on anthropology. There are few, however, whose contributions over the past century have had revolutionary, albeit controversial, impacts upon the discipline's theoretical foundations comparable with those of Claude Lévi-Strauss. It is ironic, however-to the relief of many notwithstanding the grief of a few-that from the 1980s onwards the larger share of Lévi-Strauss's structuralist brilliance came to be occluded and his overall legacy largely forgotten. Yet paradoxically-to the grief of many notwithstanding the relief of a few-pivotal luminaries of the post-structuralist 'New Kinship' (e.g., Schneider, Carsten, McKinnon, Strathern, Franklin) and the 'Ontological Turn' initiatives of recent years (Wagner, Strathern, Viveiros de Castro, Descola, Sahlins) can well be understood as 'intensifying certain trains of thought' traceable to Lévi-Strauss (see e.g., Holbraad & Pedersen 2017; Franklin & McKinnon 2001). Even so, for many devotees, it can be argued that there remains much misunderstanding regarding the substance and merit of Lévi-Strauss's thought due to a persisting reluctance to probe beyond previous generations' doctrinaire and superficial decrees. Anthropology is thus greatly indebted to Maurice Godelier who, with remarkable erudition, meticulous scholarship and clarity, has summarised and critiqued the principal components of Lévi-Strauss's oeuvre after devoting three years to its re-reading in his book Levi-Strauss: A Critical Study of his Thought. There is probably no other anthropologist better qualified for an undertaking of this magnitude. Godelier and Lévi-Strauss were locked in a complex relationship, personal as well as professional, nearly from the beginning. Sharing complementary interests in the revolutionary possibilities of structuralist thought, Lévi-Strauss focused on 'superstructures', Godelier on 'infrastructures'. But very quickly Godelier abandoned these notions as they are devoid of analytical efficiency and because economic activities are not everywhere disembedded from kinship or political-religious relationships as they are in Western societies. More recently, however, Godelier has penned masterpieces addressing both orientations: The Metamorphoses of Kinship (2004) and The Imagined, the Imaginary and the Symbolic (2020) respectively. In view of the demise of Lévi-Strauss's repute, Godelier now
Actions speak louder than words", they say-especially if you are holding a gun. As a Euro-America... more Actions speak louder than words", they say-especially if you are holding a gun. As a Euro-American I take this to mean there is something self-evidently coercive about the use and effects of firearms beyond their ability to wound and kill. And, as a social scientist, I recognise that the same is usually held to be true with regard to the deployment of "physical force" generally. Where non-Western people's responses to tokens of Western culture such as money, Christian missionisation, literacy, Hershey bars, Adidas tennis shoes, rock music and the internet seem necessarily variable and unpredictable, owing at least partly to the choices afforded by people's pre-existing cultural schema, physical force by definition allows little scope for subjects' volition.
[We] cannot do without some general knowledge. Without a comparative background we cannot go beyo... more [We] cannot do without some general knowledge. Without a comparative background we cannot go beyond a rough description of people's actions and utterings; we cannot relate them with one another and obtain a simpler picture. A fortiori we cannot pretend to lay bare the ...
Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Dec 1, 2009
Anthropologists have long appreciated that animals are 'good to think'. In this essay I ponder wh... more Anthropologists have long appreciated that animals are 'good to think'. In this essay I ponder whether plants might be good to think too, and particularly whether there is any sense in asking if plants (along with animals) might also be 'good to act'. The botanical metaphor of 'base', 'body', and 'tip' animates the origin structures of many if not most societies of the Austronesian world. Less attention has been directed at indigenous elaborations in other socio-cultural domains of the region. Based on recent fieldwork, I outline such ramifications in Trobriand culture, drawing upon the notions of fractal recursion and self-similarity from chaos theory wherein emergent 'tips' yield 'fruit' which become the condition or 'base' for further production and transformation. Accordingly, the base-body-tip-fruit metaphor serves as a cultural template or scenario for social action, shedding new interpretative light on many topics of long-standing anthropological interest (e.g. yam propagation, display, and exchange, kula, mortuary celebration, age categories, fame) as well as more recent theoretical interests. Anthropologists have long appreciated that animals are 'good to think' (Lévi-Strauss 1966; Tambiah 1968). In this essay I ponder whether plants are good to think too, and particularly whether there is any sense in asking if plants (along with animals) might also be 'good to act'. Distinguished researchers have recently provided affirmative answers to the first question in The social life of trees (Rival 1998). My second query and any credible answers to it probably seem more opaque. If 'good to think' means something like 'indigenous cultural classifications of plants are good for humans to think with about themselves and the universes in which they live' , then what might it mean to consider whether plants are 'good for people to act with in respect of themselves, their relations, and their cosmos'? In his contribution to the aforementioned volume, Maurice Bloch touches on this issue when, citing Turner, he reminds us that 'ritual symbols are part of a process ... of substitution, where one thing "becomes" another' (1998: 39). I therefore take 'to act' to involve enactments in and with the botanical world which become or affect transformations in the human world. Specifically, I outline certain action scenarios of Trobriand Islanders which rely systematically on plant imagery-on the recursive succession of
Hau: The Journal of Ethnographic Theory, Sep 1, 2020
Jarillo et al.’s attempted refutation of Malinowski’s claims as to Trobrianders’ “universally” sh... more Jarillo et al.’s attempted refutation of Malinowski’s claims as to Trobrianders’ “universally” shared belief in baloma reincarnation fails. Contrary to their claims, Malinowski’s “Baloma” article (1916) documented wide, often contradictory variation in Islanders’ opinions which his revolutionary methodology was explicitly aimed at resolving. Jarillo et al.’s multidisciplinary research has not produced an explanatory model sufficient to supersede Malinowski’s solution—the formulation of the culture as a functionally integrated totality. Methodologically, they incorporate ethnographic preconceptions arising from Euro-American assumptions about indigenous personhood, agency, exchange, hierarchy, and the afterlife which are incapable of shedding new light on beliefs and practices current in Malinowski’s time. Their claims as to Malinowski’s own Western preconceptions do not change the documented fact that reincarnation beliefs predate his arrival. Finally, Jarillo et al.’s Trobriand collaborators and survey participants have been selected through non-random procedures at variance with the standards of quantitative social science.
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