Rank and Status in Polynesia and Melanesia
eBook - ePub

Rank and Status in Polynesia and Melanesia

Essays in honor of professor Douglas Oliver

  1. English
  2. ePUB (mobile friendly)
  3. Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub

Rank and Status in Polynesia and Melanesia

Essays in honor of professor Douglas Oliver

About this book

One of the less fortunate legacies that we who practice ethnography in Oceania have given the scholarly world is the stereotype of the Melanesian leader as "Big Man". The designation "Big Man", derived literally from the metaphor commonly used in Austronesian languages or from the Neo-Melanesian Pidgin lexicon, has come to denote a "pure type" or "species" of leadership, authority and government. (Rightly or wrongly, ethnographic sources usually ignore women's role in government, although they may have significant impact). In countless introductory anthropology courses students are asked to accept and perpetuate the cliches that Melanesian leaders typify achieved rather than ascribed status, that Melanesian leaders are archetypal symbols of primitive capitalistic competition, and that Melanesian leadership represents an inferior form.

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Yes, you can access Rank and Status in Polynesia and Melanesia by Douglas l. Oliver in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Social Sciences & Social Classes & Economic Disparity. We have over one million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.

Table of contents

  1. Cover
  2. Bibliographic informations
  3. Table of contents
  4. Introduction
  5. Select Bibliography of works of Douglas Oliver
  6. Leadership Styles and Strategies in a Traditional Melanesian Society
  7. Archaeology and the Origins of Social Stratification in Southern Bougainville
  8. Race, Class and Ethnicity : Industrial Relations in the South Pacific with Special Reference to Fiji and Bougainville
  9. Tahitian Folk Medicine
  10. Tahitian Words for Race and Class