Article Notes: Stewart, PJ and A Strathern

Female Spirit Cults as a Window on Gender Relations in the Highlands of Papua New Guinea
By P J Stewart and A Strathern
Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 5.3 (Sept 9,
1999): p345.

This article examines three cults based around female spirits in the PNG highlands: one in Hagen, one in Duna, and one in Pangia. The cults generally are/were practiced by groups of men worshiping a female spirit, asking for success in reproduction and other things (varied by cult).

Duna, which was the more geographically removed of the three focused on acquiring powers for the individual. Such powers might be detecting witches through divination, healing, etc. Each parish had its own maternal spirit.

Hagen was more group oriented in its goals, stressing alliances through exchanges. Pangia was similarly group-focused.

Christianity has since its introduction influenced these beliefs. Many of the menstral rituals were abandoned, cult practices were dissuaded and it promoted monogamy rather than the polygyny (and some polyandry) practiced by these groups.

Hagen's cult was extant from 1964 through 1984. Pangia's began in the 1920s, but died out within a generation, no longer present when Christian missionaries arrived in 1967. Duna the cults slowly vanished in the 1960s as Christianity came into the region. That said, the middle aged and older adults are still influenced by some of the cult beliefs today.

Hagen's cult was around Amb Kor. The tribe would invite allies to participate in the rituals. They divived the men into 2 groups, rapa (men's house) and amb-nga (women's house). One man from each group would be paired together in the ritual. Women stayed outside of the ritual grounds and sex was avoided during the ritual. However, women provided the food and sacrifices for the rituals. After preparations were complete, there would be a ritual dance and a feast.

The Pangia cult was around Laiyeroa. It placed limits on menstrating women. Also limited which foods could be consumed and involved a ritualized cooking. Sex again was avoided during the ritual. There was a fear about injesting menstral blood. It was believed that doing so could make a man pregnant. As gender confusion is greatly feared in the culture, any such injestion was greatly feared and the rituals protected the men from the power of menstral blood.

In Duna, Payame Ima was worshiped. Married men were also excluded with the women. The rituals were for a coming-0f-age for boys into manhood. However, the ability to divine witches was also received through the rituals. This was believed to help protect the boys from witchcraft.

Major Themes:
1) Women's work was integral to the cult.

• cults needed both genders to collaborate
• women provided needed food/sacrifices (pigs)
• Also made netbags (which symbolized the womb)
  

2) Observing Taboos

• both genders have to keep taboos
• even the exclusion taboos needed to be kept for the rituals potency
• ritutals benefited both genders

3) Reproductive Symbolism

• Hagen/Pangia had visual elements that inferred sexual activity and the procreative outcome
• used reproductive organs of sacrificed sows
• Duna had male and female elements merged in a hut (womb)
  

4) Menstral Taboos

• Blood -> fertile woman, no blood (yet) -> Not fertile
• Absence of blood in a fertile woman was a good sign
• Taboo due to 'power of menstral blood' and the fear of male -> female gender changes
  

5) Collaboration vs Trickery

• narratives stress that achieving procreation (or at least wives) through trickery leads to problems
• Rituals require the collaboration of the genders
  

6) Incest, cosmos, exchange

• Incest both frowned upon and common
• Boys today "spend too much time with their mothers", implied that it might lead to incest
• everyone helps with brideprice for sons to avoid incest
• Daughters' brideprices used often to pay off father's debts paying for the mother

Conclusions:

• Male cults have collaborative elements and themes
• Male exclucivity obscures both female agency in the rituals and symbolization of gender relations
• Gender alliances stressed rather than male dominance
• Both separation and conjuction stressed
  

Local Market

Went to the local market in town today. We say "market" but it's a bit different than Hagen's. There is a trade store there, with a smattering of goods, all behind fences in the building, topped with razorwire. One section had individual items (cans of coke, cooking oil, flour, etc.) the other side had more wholesale type items (cases of coke). Bought a can of coke to break a K50 note (think stopping at the quick-e-mart to break a $20 bill).

The market was across the "street" (loose term for a gravel path slightly wider than the upiquitous trucks). Market consisted of people (mostly women and older men) sitting under umbrellas with their fruits and vegetables for sale. Some had cardboard signs with prices, other you have to ask. Some produce (like the kaukau, the local sweet potato) are sold by the small pile, others sold individually. Almost all of it looks of decent quality, though the bananas they had you'd want to eat quickly as they were already yellow-brown.

Scott, who went with me the first time, said that it's mostly safe for station people. A lot of the people on station who sell their produce (and buy it) come down there and will look out for the white-skins (which are assumed to belong to the station). Sort of "our tribe", if you will, versus the local townsfolk. (I'm not sure how much bigger the town actually is. The station has a number of houses, but there is a school outside the walls and a church. Several small shops along the market way, but I can't see much else through the dense vegetation around the market and roads.) He also said that today's selection was down, as there are usually more bananas, pineapples (we bought the only 4 available) and the like. Though if we ever run out of kaukau, I know where to get more.

There are also street vendors selling food which We Are Not Supposed To Eat. Scott and I split some sort of deep fried dough thing, though it was cold. There were also on the way back "lamb flaps" or something like that. Basically they're lamb ribs that are grilled fresh for you. I was full (and not quite that adventuous) or we would have stopped for some.

Article Notes: Romaine, Suzanne

Boring Bibliographical stuff:
The Grammaticalization of the Proximative in Tok Pisin
By Suzanne Romaine
Language, Vol 75, No 2 (Jun 1999), pp 322-346

Notes on terms:
Grammaticalization refers to the process by which a word moves from having one specific (usually concrete) meaning and slowly over time picks up an abstracted sense, usually one that becomes almost technical in nature. Examples of this would be the pas in the French negation ne V pas. Orginially from the root for "foot", it was used for the sense of "it doesn't go". Overtime, that became obfuscated and now it's simply part of the negation in French.
Proximative is the grammatical form that is used to mark an action that is about to take place. In "the wind is about to blow", "is about to" is forming the English proximative, however it is not a fully grammaticalized morpheme. (English lacks a proximative marker, rather has contructions like "is about to".)

Article reaction:

There are two major proximative markers in Tok Pisin: laik ("like") and klostu ("close to"). Both of these seem to be used today, however laik is a newer gramatical term. Klostu has history back to the 19th century, however its grammaticalization slowed or stopped when laik began to be used in the early 20th century.

The two terms are from different kinds of words. Laik expresses desire as it root did, "like". While it began in this fashion, as it become more of technical term used to show proximate actions, it by necessity lost some of the implied desire. One cannot say "the wind likes to die down", however since the statement Win i laik dai is used to say "The wind is about to die down", laik has clearly lost the volition that it had previously implied. This happens often in other languages as words become grammaticized. The Hebrew pәne (lit: "face") is used as "surface", usually of things not necessarily being anthropormorphized. (See Gen 1 where God is hovering on the surface of the waters, since it is assumed that water does not have a face as a person would.)

The other proximative seems to have begun the process earlier but then developed in tandem with laik. Klostu also is used in conjuction with laik when the latter alone might confuse the audience. Em i laik dai could be either "he/she/it is about to die" or "he/she wants to die". However, klostu em i laik dai takes away that ambiguity, making it clear that the subject does not necessarily want to die. This is not to say that klostu has to be used with laik. Klosto em dai would convey the same meaning. While laik syntaxtically falls into the verbal slot, making the verb it is acting as a proximate for into its object, klostu can be placed either preverbally (em klostu dai) or external to the phrase it is modifying (klostu em dai).

Klostu, as a locative, also did not need to shed its sense of volition during its grammaticalization process. Rather it merely moved from a spacial proximate ("The tree is close to the river") to a temporal ("The tree is close to falling"). Later, it even shed the temporal and began modifying quality or other aspects.

Betel Nut (part 2)

Source: Wikipedia

The practice of chewing Betel Nut spans the area from south east Asia (Thailand, Cambodia, etc.) to PNG and the Solomon Islands. Combining the Areca nut and the Betel leaf for their psychoactive properties seems to have been around for at least four thousand years, according to archeological findings in Indonesia, the Philippines, and Thailand.

The effects typically are the same as a cup of coffee. That said, it does have a fairly strong carcinogenic effect, especially the processed/dried forms. The preparation is a cut nut wrapped in a leaf, with lime.

In PNG, the nut is usually consumed fresh, not in its dried forms.

Some thoughts on Tok Pisin

Verbs only have 2 states with regards to person: 1st/2nd and 3rd. Example:

Mi lainim Tok Pisin
'I learn/am learning/learned Tok Pisin'

Yu lainim Tok Pisin
'You learn/are learning/learned Tok Pisin'

Em i lainim Tok Pisin
'He/she learns/is learning/learned Tok Pisin'

Note: Tense is implied via context. Also, the 3rd person singular pronoun is ungendered.

The difference, seems to be the presence of the particle i. The source would be gramaticalization and simplification of the phrase "Him, he learns". The /h/ is weak and drops out, leaving just the vowel /ee/, which in Pisin is written i. Since the "he" would have no place in 1st or 2nd person, it was never used, thus the difference in syntax.

Article Notes: Bartle, Neville

Basic Themes of Melanesian Worldview
Published: self published (?)

Major themes/concepts:
Life is clan-centered

• Tribe first, self/others later
• leads to corruption in govt and business
• resources should be used to help tribe
  

Life is balanced

• A gives B a gift. B now owes A one, A can ask for it
• No giving vs selling, all trade
• Share the wealth (means lots of people owe you)
• Pols spread money/projects for votes.
• A injures B, B can extract revenge from A
• Modern courts confuse this, causing problems with law/order
• Friends will pay back/give gifts
  

Male > Female

• Males stay and give to tribe
• Females give to another tribe
• Males -> Gardener, Females -> Garden
• Homosexuality is rare/non-existant
• Sex not mentioned, marriage a way of "sharing the wealth" and making someone owe you
  

Life's goal is to be "Big Man"

• Big Man has a lot of people who owe them
• Happens in Politics lots
• Pols switch sides as it suits them
• Polygamy -> lots of people, children, also allies with wives' tribes

Life is measured in events, not a timeline

• Time is neither linear nor cyclic
• Series of "nows"
• "Do you have a headache" will be answered in the affirmative if they have -ever- had a headache
• Tok Pisin does not have true tenses
• Little planning for future (food always available, no need)
• Some remembering of past
  

Goal of life is well-being & harmony

• Live in now
• Life abundant
• no spirit/physical duality
• Appease spirits to right physical issues
  

Power should have results

• All power should produce
• Less stress on religious doctrine, more on what it does for the adherent
• pragmatic life view
• no need for future planning (food available year round)
  

Dead live on as spirits

• Similar to Shinto beliefs
• Dead influence physical
• need appeased via sacrifice
• blood sacrifices have become rare
• no traditional heaven/hell analogue
  

More sources of power -> good

• Polyreligous tendancies
• "Cover all bases"
  

Life is to be celebrated

• Like to feast
• No indiginous methods of food storing
• Rather, when abundant, share with everyone. Then they owe you
  

Betel Nut (Part 1)

It seems to be the regional drug of choice. A stimulant, so says the guide book, from some local plant that grows on the island. The seed-pod is plucked, the nut extracted and chewed, spitting the saliva it causes you to create. It also has the effect of staining one's teeth red-brown.
The stains are on everyone: men, women, children that I would think would be barely out of elementary school. It's somewhat omnipresent. (Easily a third of the people I saw at market and the grocery had evident stains on their teeth.) Even the roads are stained with the bright red splatters of the spit from users. I've not seen anyone I could tell was on the substance, but I don't know how potent it is.
One of the local missionaries says that it's addictive, but I don't know if it is physiologically or psychologically addictive. (And I find it amusing that coffee and caffeine are just fine, but any other stimulant is to be treated with suspicion.) A bit further study on it will help.
I've seen what I think is it being sold from little stands on the side of the road. It's a small, green pods. Usually set apart from other stands. I can't tell if there's a native stigma to it or if the stigma on it is because white-man put it there. It is forbidden in a number of places, but it seems that may be to prevent the red stains and possibly the problems with intoxicated users.