Roger M. Keesing

Cultural anthropology : a contemporary perspective

Preface. List of Cases. Part I: Culture, Society, and the Individual. 1. The Anthropological Approach. 2. Culture and People: Some Basic Concepts. 3. Language and Communication. 4. Culture and the Individual. Part II: Tribal Peoples: Toward a Systematic View. 5. The Tribal World as Mosaic, as Ladder, and as System. 6. Modes of Subsistence, Modes of Adaptation. 7. How Cultures Change. Part III: The Tribal World: The Legacy of Human Diversity. 8. Economic Systems. 9. Kinship, Descent, and Social Structure. 10. Marriage, Family, and Community. 11. Power and Politics. 12. Gendered Lives. 13. Structures of Inequality. 14. Law and Social Control. 15. Religion: Ritual, Myth, and Cosmos. 16. The Integration of Societies, the Structure of Cultures. Part IV: Anthropology and the Present. 17. Response to Cataclysm: The Tribal World and the Expansion of the West. 18. Peasants. 19. Colonialism and Postcolonialism. 20. Cities. 21. Social Science and the Postcolonial World. 22. Toward Human Survival. Postscript. Glossary. Bibliography. Index.

Exotic Readings of Cultural Texts [and Comments and Reply]

Author(s): Roger M. Keesing, Richard D. Davis, Arie De Ruijter, J. W. Fernandez, Joshua A. Fishman, Remo Guidieri, George Lakoff, Norm Mundhenk, Paul Newman and R. Daniel Shaw Source: Current Anthropology, Vol. 30, No. 4 (Aug. Oct., 1989), pp. 459-479 Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2743374 Accessed: 03-05-2016 17:10 UTC

From Fisin to Pijin: Creolization in process in the Solomon Islands

In a combination of ethnohistorical records and longitudinal data gathered over a period of 30 years, the development of Solomon Islands Pijin is documented and analyzed in light of the current debate surrounding creolization theory. Using a pragmatic definition of a creole (Jourdan 1991), the authors argue that pidgins can be very elaborate codes even before they become the mother tongue of children, and that this elaboration is the result of the linguistic creativity of adults. It is further shown that, in sociolinguistic niches where adults and children use the pidgin as their main language, the impact of the latter on the evolution of the language is of a different nature. (Creolization theory, pidgin languages, substrate influences, urbanization, Solomon Islands Pijin)*

The Young Dick Attack: Oral and Documentary History on the Colonial Frontier

A hundred years ago (I886) a Queensland schooner recruiting indentured laborers in the Solomon Islands was attacked by Kwaio warriors (Malaita) seeking plunder, vengeance and glory. The attack, repulsed with loss of life on both sides, was recounted by survivors in an i886 inquiry; their testimony is compared to accounts passed down in Kwaio oral tradition, including an epic chant. The Kwaio accounts are surprisingly rich and accurate, and show the value of indigenous oral tradition in ethnohistorical analysis.

On Quibblings over Squabblings of Siblings: New Perspectives on Kin Terms and Role Behavior

Anthropologists often claim that kin terms label behavioral roles as well as categories of kin. It is argued here that the closest relative in a category typically enacts not one role but several and that this coalescence of roles occurs only under typical or ideal circumstances. More distant kinsmen in a category may enact one or 2 of these roles, or none. Thus confusion results when the kin term is used to label the cluster of roles or when theories build on an isomorphism between kinship terminology and role system.

On Language and Early Austronesian Social Organization

on the status and position of women of different countries, the role of women in national development, male-dominated theories in womens studies, and the recognition of womanpower in domestic, national, and international spheres of action. Invitations will be sent not only to fe(male) scholars in the humanities and the social and physical sciences, but also to housewives, working mothers, women teachers, doctors, and nurses, women in the armed services and the police, women agricultural labourers and factory workers, peace researchers, women politicians, and women lawyers, among others. There will be ten panels and a number of working groups; suggestions and advice are welcome. Please write: Samir K. Ghosh, 15A Gangaprasad Mukherjee Rd., Calcutta 700025, India.

Transformational Linguistics and Structural Anthropology

The mysteries of the depths of mind remain vast and profound in contrast to men’s tentative explorations and mappings. However, two new paths for exploring these depths have been opened in recent years, and each we are told will lead deeper and enable us to map far more systematically than has yet been possible. These paths have been opened by Noam Chomsky in linguistics and Claude Levi-Strauss in anthropology; and hence they are separated not only by the gulf between language and other realms of culture, but by the gulf between the philosophical foundations of Anglo-American and continental thinking. Inevitably these two paths have been compared. Such comparison quickly reveals similarities many superficial, but some important as well as differences. The temptation to compare glibly and superficially are compelling : both Chomsky and Levi-Strauss speak centrally of ’transformations’ and of what is ’deep’ rather than shallow; both seek universals of cognitive structure beneath surface diversity. Furthermore, Levi-Strauss alludes often