Fruit of the motherland: Gender and exchange on Vanatinai, Papua New Guinea [microform]
- Bib ID:
- 3282706
- Format:
- Book and Microform
- Author:
- Lepowsky, Maria Alexandra
- Description:
- 507 p.
- Summary:
-
The nature of gender roles in a small-scale, unstratified, matrilineal, horticultural and foraging Pacific Island society is investigated. This society has not previously been studied by anthropologists. It is part of a culture area, the Massim, in which the status of women relative to men is said to be higher than in most of Melanesia. It was hypothesized that if women did enjoy a high status on Vanatinai, then they as well as men would participate in traditional exchange activities, the most significant public arena of social, economic, political and ritual life on the island. Vanatinai women are found to be active participants in intra- and interisland utilitarian and ceremonial exchanges and, like men, to gain wealth and prestige through their exchange activities. Such a degree of public participation by women in exchange has rarely been reported in the ethnographic literature for any society.
Both sexes on Vanatinai are involved in every aspect of organizing and carrying out a series of mortuary feasts which must be held after the death of each individual, and both have access to almost all forms of supernatural knowledge, believed to be the basis of success in all human endeavors. Vanatinai society exhibits a large degree of overlap between the roles and activities thought appropriate to each sex, and individuals of the same sex and age exhibit a wide variety of temperaments and behaviors. The egalitarian gender roles of Vanatinai give individuals of both sexes considerable freedom of choice in shaping their lifestyles. These findings are significant for cross-cultural analyses of human gender roles, exchange roles, mortuary ritual, and the ethnography of Melanesia.
- Notes:
-
- (UnM)AAI8212008
- Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 42-12, Section: A, page: 5174.
- Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of California, Berkeley, 1981.
- Reproduction:
- Microfiche. Ann Arbor, Mich.: University Microfilms International.
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Cultural
- Other authors/contributors:
- University of California, Berkeley
- Copyright:
-
In Copyright
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Copyright status was determined using the following information:
- Material type:
- Literary Dramatic Musical
- Published status:
- Unpublished
- Creation date:
- 1981
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