Synopses & Reviews
Contrary to conventional anthropological understanding, descent groups need not always be wealth- or office-transmitting groups, but can be principally feast-sponsoring groups. Sursurunga matrilineages are activated by individual's combined participation in feasting events, but individual's reasons for participating in feasts vary and often have little to do with matrilineal group membership.
This study of Sursurunga mortuary feasting shows that the analysis of groups-in this case, matrilineal descent groups-is best conducted by attention to the reasons that the individuals who comprise those groups act as they do. The salience of group membership cannot be seen as simply the blueprint for social life, but also as the outcome of social life.
Review
Appropriate for advanced undergraduates, graduate students, and professionals interested in kinship, cognition, and mortuary practice.Choice
Synopsis
Offers insight into the ways in which matriliny operates in ritual and other aspects of the life of the Sursurunga of southern New Ireland, Papua New Guinea.
Synopsis
Discusses an infrequently encountered principle of social organization, matrilineal descent, as practiced by the Sursurunga of Papua New Guinea. Consistent with recent processual analyses of Melanesian social orders, Bolyanatz writes that members of Sursurunga matrilineal descent groups do not always behave as members of such groups.
About the Author
ALEXANDER H. BOLYANATZ is Assistant Professor of Anthropology, Wheaton College, Illinois.
Table of Contents
Preface
A Note About Language
Introduction
Sursurunga Historical and Ethnographic Milieux: Contact, Christianity, Cash and Context
Land and Matriliny
Rethinking the Logic of Matriliny
Sursurunga Mortuary Feasting
The Antecedents of Mortuary Feasting
Consequents of Mortuary Feasting: the Salience and Activation of Matriliny
Conclusion
Glossary
References
Index