Anthropology

And “Enthusiasm” in New Guinea

Letter to the Editor.

THE statement in your Tropicalities column, that, according to a newspaper report, I told the Anthropology Section of the Science Con gress that “everywhere in New Guinea European representatives were enthusiastic about anthro pology . . . including planters, judges, and miners,” will be as much enjoyed by my friends as it was “by me. The idea of those Morobe miners rushing away from their claims to pursue the fascinating lore of the Kanaka is enough to reduce us all to tears.

It is true that one Melbourne journal did report me thus; but that particular journal is notorious for its lack of sense of humour.

Needless to say, nowhere at the Congress did I make any such stupid statement. My whole paper pleaded to the anthropologists to face reali ties; to come down to Earth from their academic planets; pointing out that, except in the official world, where the work was beginning to be ac cepted as having relation to and value for native administration, our science was not regarded with esteem or favour; and this was because its pur pose was not understood. I quoted the critical reference by a member of the Legislative Council in Rabaul, last year, to the “horde of anthropolo gists” who have been in and out of New Guinea, without, according to the critic, having shown any great or practical results for the Territory.

So that the point I tried to emphasise was not that planters, etc., were enthusiastic, but rather that it behoved each anthropological field-worker who goes to New Guinea to attempt to give his work a practical application; and, in addition, always to be prepared to show to any European who appeared interested or critically inquisitive, the nature of the work being done and some idea of the technique of a sociological survey.

“Let the anthropologist come out into the open; table all his cards; show that he has nothing to hide; attempt to have his work and his point of view understood by the Europeans in the Terri tory, and so remove from the work the blight of suspicion and ridicule that are due solely to lack of understanding. Anthropology is beginning to justify itself in the official mind—after a long and uphill fight,” I said; “it is still far from finding acceptance and justification in the mind of the ordinary European. And until it does—as it will do when it is understood—it cannot hope to achieve anything great or of lasting worth.”

When I met the late Eric Randahl at Sio Island last year, for instance, I spent a couple of hours showing him, with all my records in front of us, what I was trying to do. At the outset, he was openly critical. He had just come from the Sepik River, where he had heard from the natives some thing of the doings of an anthropological party.

“What do you anthropology birds do?” he had asked me, in all seriousness. And I was glad of the opportunity to show him what one at least of the “horde” was doing. His honest remark after our session, “H’m—there’s something in this anthropology after all,” was reward for my pains.

That every anthropologist—or “ethnographer,”

if you like (perhaps we ought to put it more simply and say “every one who sets out to understand native life”) —should attempt to bring about under standing of his work and point of view amongst the Europeans in the Territory, who, after all, are responsible for its management and development (including planters and miners; I don’t know why the paper dragged the judges ini), was the burden of my plea.

But that they are enthusiastic about it already —Oh, la, lal One more point, Mr. Editor. In the summary of the paper of Mr. F. E. Williams, you quote: “Even anthropologists have come to see what academically-minded people saw long before them,” etc. This should read: “Even anthropologists have come to see . . . what less academically-minded people saw long before them.” The omission of the little word “less” makes a world of difference in the meaning. And Williams’s paper is too im portant and valuable to be misinterpreted.

I am, etc.,

W. C. Groves.

Melbourne, 23/2/35.