The Wiru speakers of the Southern Highlands Province in Papua New Guinea have a range of ways in which they express ambiguities of social intention among themselves. These ways include both verbal and non-verbal modalities. For pig-killing festivals they construct special communal houses, and in one case in 1979-80 such a house was constructed both as a revival of past practices and to communicate modern meanings.
The house's sponsor maintained that he had a set of peaceful intentions in this project, but some of his neighbors, who were ex-enemies, declared from their inspection of the wood types used in the house's interior that the intent was actually hostile. Hostility may also be expressed in various kinds of gift-giving involving pork and shell valuables, and in the verbal pronouncements that may accompany such gifts. This article compares the verbal and non-verbal modalities of communication involved and finds parallels and contrasts. Overall, the ambiguity or ambivalence of intentions is quite marked, and this is related to pervasive fears of sorcery between groups. These fears are in turn influenced by structural and historical factors in Wiru society, as documented between 1967 and 1984.
Man and Culture in Oceania, 15: 1-22.
Key words: communication; gift; longhouse; pig-kill; Wiru; Papua New Guinea; sorcery; hostility; semiotics; identity
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Tahitian tattooing was embedded in the tapu-system, expressing social differences and power inequalities. This tattooing underwent one transformation through the interactions between Tahitians and Europeans after the arrival of explorers and more a substantial one after the arrival of the missionaries. This article focuses on the missionary influence on tattooing and the treatment of the body, and shows how tattooing and clothing manifested the intentions of individuals either to be involved in or to resist the religious and political body in the Society Islands in the early 19th century. Tattooing and clothing represented and constituted Tahitian religious complexity in the Christianization process, as tattooing was `preserved' for those who believed Tahitian religion or `hidden' from the missionaries and the converts by the wearing of European clothing. The missionaries and political élites intended to control the customs and beliefs of commoners by imposing discipline and establishing legal codes which prohibited tattooing, but there were some backsliders who resisted them and resumed tattooing.
Man and Culture in Oceania, 15: 23-43.
Key words: Tahiti; the Society Islands; tattooing; clothing; missionaries; legal codes; cultural transformation.
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A number of studies on the medical pluralism of the South Pacific have argued that the use of traditional medicine by people of the area did not decline after the introduction of Western medicine. According to these studies, this was because there existed a particular category of sickness which could only be cured by traditional medicine. This category was made up of sicknesses caused by spiritual beings and supernatural powers, which could not be treated with the scientific logic on which Western medicine was based. It is explained that this was why people still actively used traditional medicine even after the introduction of Western medicine. They chose traditional medicine for the treatment of sickness with supernatural causes, while they preferred Western medicine for the treatment of sickness with non-supernatural causes. This explanation, however, does not suffice to explain the active use of traditional medicine by the people of Tongoa, central Vanuatu. In this article, I examine the features of medical pluralism among Tongoans, referring especially to the outbreak of dengue fever that occurred in Vanuatu during 1989 and 1990.
Tongoans see their traditional medicine as effective not only for the treatment of sickness caused by supernatural forces but also for the treatment of a sickness like dengue fever, which has non-supernatural causes and is assumed to be difficult for Western medicine to cure. They construct such recognition by accepting and appropriating positive views and evaluation of their traditional medicine by people engaged in Western medicine. These views often appear in newspaper articles, radio programs, and health education talks. Thus, accepting and appropriating views and evaluations from the field of Western medicine, Tongoans recognize that their traditional medicine has efficacy even for the treatment of difficult sickness such as dengue fever, and use it actively.
Man and Culture in Oceania, 15: 45-64.
Key words: Vanuatu; Tongoa; traditional medicine; Western medicine; medical pluralism; dengue fever outbreak.
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Based on a field survey among a Huli community which engages in intensive sweet potato cultivation and pig husbandry in a swamp environment, this article (1) compares the imported foods the Huli consume with their traditional ones in terms of land and labor required for obtaining them, (2) seeks a nutritionally optimal diet under the present constraints using a mathematical model derived from linear programming, and (3) tests the hypothesis proposed by Dennett and Connell (1988) that acculturation towards a cash economy has improved nutritional status in the case of the Huli community. The purchased (imported) foods, consisting of rice, processed foods made from wheat flour, and tinned fish and meat, have a positive effect on improvement of nutritional status, especially increased protein intake, because the traditional diet is composed mainly of sweet potato that contains only a small amount of protein. Linear programming predicts that the addition of imported foods to the traditional diet can satisfy the minimal nutritional requirements set by FAO/WHO at a ``lower'' cost, in terms of investment of land and labor, than the traditional diet. The main source of income, the sale of sweet potatoes, vegetables, and pork at a local market, can avoid the serious effects of commodity production generated from conflicts between subsistence and commodity production, but cannot provide enough money to purchase the imported food owing to the low level of demand at the market.
Man and Culture in Oceania, 15: 65-90.
Key words: purchased foods; nutritional status; subsistence; commodity production; linear programming; the Central Highlands of Papua New Guinea; Huli.
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In the Papua New Guinea Highlands, the people's intakes of protein, fat, and salt have rapidly increased with an increase in consumption of purchased foods. To investigate the effects of dietary change on the people's nutritional or health status, this paper aims to elucidate the associations among dietary behavior, nutrient intake, and modernization in a rural community of the Papua New Guinea Highlands at both the household and individual levels. Nutrient intake, body mass index and blood pressures markedly varied from person to person; blood pressure was significantly correlated with body mass index. The frequency of purchased foods consumption was highly correlated with intakes of salt, and protein and body mass index. Protein and salt intakes were significantly correlated with each other. There were two major findings showing inter-household and inter-individual diversification of dietary patterns. First, consumption of tinned food and rice was related to household modernity indicators. Second, consumption of snack food was related to frequency of visits to town at an individual level, with differences in access to purchased foods existing between adults and children. It is concluded that these dietary changes, with large inter-individual and inter-household variations, may have either beneficial or harmful effects on health status.
Man and Culture in Oceania, 15: 91-111.
Key words: dietary behavior; modernization; NaCl; Papua New Guinea; snack food.
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Labrid species make up 11% of all fishes caught by pre-European Mãori and Moriori in New Zealand and the Chatham Islands. Although there are 16 species in New Zealand waters, three dominate catches in Cook Strait and the Chatham Islands. Fork lengths are estimated from measurements on 6,646 labrid bones, permitting the reconstruction of size-frequency diagrams of the original fish catches and estimation of edible meat weights with a standard error of 1%. The three species are very difficult to distinguish using osteological features alone. The prehistoric catch mixtures are decomposed into their constituent species, using modern size-frequency information.
Labrids are shown to be potentially sensitive to pressure from human predation, having low biomass and pronounced territorial behaviour. Size-frequency catch diagrams show pronounced and consistent tendency towards increasing fish size over archaeological time. The reasons for this change are not clear but could arise from a combination of changes in natural fish community structures over the past millennium, changes in human technology and targets of fishing behaviour (human culture), and responses of marine populations to sustained human predation. Early catches of labrids show significant quantities of very small specimens, consistent with long-established patterns of fishing in Polynesia, and could only have derived from use of small mesh nets and/or fish traps. Later in time, small fish are much less abundant in catches. This suggests that cultural factors were at least part of the process effecting the change observed.
Man and Culture in Oceania, 15: 113-144.
Key words: archaeology; archaeozoology; New Zealand; fish; Labridae family; selective predation.
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