In the cold mountains of Sichuan (Liangshan) in China, about fifty kilometres from the Lugu Lake region subjected to the glare of the media, the author conducted an up-close ethnographic study of the Na. More than two years of fieldwork allowed her privileged access to the underside of the social fabric.

Her immersion in the ordinary life of the Na and her participation in various everyday activities allowed her to shed the anthropological exoticism in which explanations of the group are generally couched. Songs, dances, myths, rites, and mutual aid and exchange all provide windows on to the emotional tenor and logic of the Na system of thought. They make possible an assessment of contextualized practices, based on the justifications the villagers give from within their historical, economic, political and ideological constraints.

PRESENTATION OF THE NA BY PASCALE-MARIE MILAN, THE AUTHOR’S BOOK

The Na live in territories in the foothills of the Himalayas, on the border of Sichuan and Yunnan provinces: Lugu Lake, the Yongning plain, the Liangshan mountains and the county of Ninglang. They are better known today by the name “Mosuo”, despite constituting a disparate group with respect to the semantic divisions of the historical ethnonyms (Nazé, Nari, Nahing, Naru). [1] Widely discussed by anthropologists because of their matrilineal kinship system and their matrilocal residence, they appear to be a special case in the ethnological landscape, since they do not marry and practice a type of free sexual union, called Séssé. [2] Their social organization into a matriclan confers on the Mosuo certain particularities no longer found among the neighbouring Naxi of Lijiang, such as the transmission of property and filiation through the women.

Na girls wearing wool-and-bead head coverings made by their elders. Photo Pascale-Marie Milan, 2013.

The Na in the literature
The history of the Na dates back to the most remote times of imperial China, via a long written tradition recorded in the Chinese administrative annals. Among other things, we know that the regions populated by the Na resulted from a migration of the Qinghai plateaux. Some say that the Na are mentioned for the first time in the annals under the Eastern Han Dynasty (Dong Han, 25–220), in narratives relating the superiority of the women and the matrilineal system in the region. [3] Others say that the first writings date to 225, with the appearance in the Chinese annals of the ethnonym Mo-sha to refer to the inhabitants of the Yanyuan region.[4] Traces of this people are also found under the Tang Dynasty (618–907). [5]. A few sources written by explorers or missionaries satirize them. [6] But the systematic study of the Na began only with the launch of a classification project in 1956, whose aim was to control minorities. For a long time, however, they had escaped the historical administrative control of imperial China, [7] because they lived in craggy and largely inaccessible territories. [8] Despite these sources, the history of the Na as they themselves experienced it is still veiled in obscurity, since there are no endogenous written sources. The Na are in fact a people without writing, whose oral history was transmitted for centuries through myth and song.
Considered a “primitive”, “uncivilized” and “exotic” population by the Chinese, they were granted the status of minzu, being officially categorized as Naxi in 1958, during the ethnic classification project.

Séssé

The majority of the Na practice Séssé, in which men visit nonconsanguineous women at night. A furtive activity, the Séssé for those who engage in it is a modality of noncontractual, nonobligatory and nonexclusive sexual life9] that belongs to the Na matrilineal kinship system, so much so that it anticipates both the principle and the foundation of the cultural values that give meaning to the life of the Mosuo. [10]. It is a historically dominant mode of identification “practised by all the Na”. [11]

The region of Lugu Lake, very exposed following the spectacular rise of tourism there, [12] is the principal focus of research on the group. Yet the Na are geographically dispersed. They also populate the Sichuan region of the Liangshan mountains, especially the Muli Autonomous Tibetan County in the hinterland of Lugu Lake. These Na, dispersed in mountain villages (the village of Lijiazui, for example, where I conducted my research), are officially categorized as Mongols. The Nazé of Lijiazui attribute various images to themselves. They claim, for example, to be the possessors of a certain “tradition”, unlike their Lugu Lake neighbours, who now call themselves Mosuo. Their rich oral literature is in danger of being lost, as a result of an ever-increasing Sinicization. Having become a minority in the region over the course of time, they face various pressures (economic, political, ecological and so on) resulting from different interactions and social reconfigurations.

Séssé, a historical practice and the nexus of Na society, [13] still remains at the root of what allows the Nazé to constitute a society and to define itself as a unique ethnic group. The practice is explained in a range of myths and songs that are being forgotten, given the strong tendency toward Sinicization and the Chinese state’s efforts to rewrite these works, which are sometimes judged indecent. [14] In view of that threat, it was urgent to collect this corpus through audiovisual media (recordings, videos, and so forth). It was also necessary to document and analyze the practice through observation, interviews, and photographs, but without engaging in the typical idealized caricature, as has occurred at Lugu Lake, where the tourist industry has largely used it to ensure local colour.

This practice is accompanied by rites of passage that needed to be brought to light, contextualized and situated. For example, the transition to adulthood, the birth of children and the end of sexual life are all markers in the lives of the Nazé of Guabieka. They have been documented and analyzed, inasmuch as they belong to social and symbolic life and allow for the ethnography of local customs.

Na children and their aunt. Photo Pascale-Marie Milan, 2013.

Aim of the study
The aim of this study, then, is to provide further data about the Na living out of the media spotlight of the Lugu Lake region, through the use of a preexisting body of literature centered primarily on the Na/Mosuo of Lugu Lake, in line with the anthropological studies of Eileen Walsh, Cai Hua, Chuan-Kang Shih and Christine Mathieu. Its purpose is to gain an understanding of the local interactions and structures that maintain the Nazé social fabric in a lasting manner.

NOTES

[1] These divisions are a result of the richness of the oral Na language (Michaud 2008).
[2] Cai 1997, Shih 2000, 2001, 2010.
[3] Cai 1997, p. 14. 14.
[4] Yanyuan is a town located east of Lugu Lake in Sichuan Province, in the heart of the Liangshan mountains, where Stevan Harrell conducted a number of studies. Mathieu 2003, p. xxi.
[5] McKhann 1995, p. 48; Shih 2010, p. 23. 23.
[6] Cordier 1908; Rock 1947.
[7] This statement needs to be put in perspective, given the complex relations between Naxi and Mosuo. Nevertheless, it seems that the Mosuo were less inclined toward Sinicization because of the inaccessibility of the Lugu Lake region, which even today is marked by climatic constraints (landslides, snow).
[8] Cai 1997, pp. 51-52; Mathieu 2003, p. 2. 2.
[9] Shih 2000, p. 697. 697.
[10] Shih, 2000, p. 701. 701.
[11] Cai Hua 1997, p. 143. 143.
[12] Walsh 2005.
[13] Shih 2000, p. 701. 701.
[14] Trebinjac 2008.

The book on the Gan, a population located in the south-west region of Burkina Faso, guides us through the history of that small kingdom, where the relationship to the sacred took root with its founding near the end of the sixteenth century. For the Gan, every form of power is legitimized by its relation to a traditional and official state system of cults dedicated to a pantheon of supernatural entities, associated in particular with the spirits of the dead who held princely rank during their lives. The cult objects and symbols identifying these entities – spectacular animal figurations in bronze – turn out to play a determining role in the procedures for relating the present to the past, to the point of constituting formidable “objects of memory”. Alongside their mediating function and powerful representativeness, they are key material signs for reconstituting the history and symbolics of this kingdom from the standpoint of the oral tradition.

Showing that ethnohistory and the anthropology of art can complement each other, this richly documented essay presents the historical and organizational foundations of the Gan monarchy through the symbolics and aesthetics of the major cult objects that make it unique and that contribute toward memorializing and transmitting its past and its modes of thought and action.

Le pays winye est situé dans le centre-ouest du Burkina Faso. Il comprend une série de communautés installées dans la partie sud-est et sur la rive droite de la boucle du Mouhoun (ex-Volta noire), et sur les deux rives du Petit-Balé, un affluent du Grand-Balé (lui-même affluent du Mouhoun). Son peuplement actuel n’est pas antérieur à la fin du XVIIe siècle. Il est constitué de groupes d’origine ethnique diverse (surtout des Gurunsi – Nuna, Sisala, Phuo – mais aussi des Dagara, des Bwa, des Marka, des Peul, des Mossi…) qui se sont fondus progressivement dans un même moule linguistique et culturel : le winye. Au niveau mytho-historique, la langue winye est considérée comme le résultat des interactions langagières entre un homme sisala et sa femme phuo (ou d’ascendance phuo par la ligne maternelle), ce que les linguistes confirment à leur manière, puisque le winye est classé comme une langue plus proche de l’isala et du phuo que de toute autre langue faisant partie du groupe gurunsi (qui comprend également le kasena, le lela, le nuni…).

La région est constituée aujourd’hui d’un nombre relativement restreint de collectivités – dix-neuf –, formant une ethnie jeune et peu nombreuse (environ 30 000 personnes), unie par la langue, des institutions communes (culte de la terre, des masques…) et les références à quelques villages anciens (abandonnés ou existants). L’aire d’influence du groupe s’exerce également sur une dizaine de villages limitrophes – bwa, marka ou nuna – avec lesquels les Winye entretiennent des relations économiques, rituelles et matrimoniales.

Le pays winye est divisé en deux par le Petit-Balé (Son), du nord au sud. La rivière constitue une frontière symbolique puisque les richesses ne circulent pas librement entre ses deux rives : toutes les choses « fécondes » (femmes enceintes, œufs, récoltes, productions artisanales, fétiches) doivent être aspergées de son eau avant d’être admises à traverser. Les Winye de la zone comprise entre la rive droite du Mouhoun et la rive gauche du Petit-Balé viennent soit du sud (pays phuo, dagara) soit du sud-est, du groupe nuna situé sur la rive gauche du Mouhoun (région de Zawara, Sili, Bouly, Pano), soit du nord (pays marka, nuna). Ils traverseront le fleuve pour fuir des guerres dont ils situent les causes dans les dissensions internes aux groupes auxquels ils appartiennent. Pour s’installer, ils contactent d’abord le village de Kienbõ et y séjournent même parfois, ce village, installé à proximité de la rive droite du Mouhoun, étant tenu comme le plus ancien de la zone (il disparaîtra dans les années 1910, à cause de la trypanosomiase). Il est reconnu comme tuteur par la majorité des communautés installées. Les différents groupements humains s’éloignent ainsi progressivement du fleuve et repoussent la forêt en direction du nord-ouest et du sud-ouest, en s’établissant à proximité de marigots et de rivières non pérennes. C’est de leurs contacts avec le village de Kienbõ, que les différents groupes disent adopter progressivement la langue winye, langue réputée n’être parlée au départ que par les seuls habitants de ce village. Cette zone comporte le nombre de villages winye le plus important (15) et son désenclavement est ancien : on y trouve les plus grands marchés (marchés de Boromo, Solobuly, Danduo…) et une route commerciale reliant Djenné à Kumasi la traverse au début XIXe siècle (elle passe par les villages de Sombou, Boromo, Wako, Kalembuly, Kwena). Au XVIIIe siècle, l’exploitation aurifère des sites environnant Poura (rive gauche du Mouhoun proche de Boromo) est importante. Elle a une influence sur la migration massive de lignages nuna, dagara, bwa, phuo, bobo jula sur la rive droite du Mouhoun.

Les quatre villages winye de la rive droite du Petit-Balé sont également d’origine ethnique très diverse. La colonisation de la zone provient soit du flux de populations bwa du Kademba qui émigrent vers l’est —on retrouve des communautés bwa jusque sur la rive gauche du Mouhoun, dans la région de Poura, Fara—, soit de groupes venus du nord —pays marka—, soit venus du sud —dagara— soit encore des groupes originellement installés sur la rive gauche du Petit-Balé. Actuellement, le tutorat foncier sur l’ensemble des communautés situées entre la rive droite du Petit-Balé à l’est et les premiers gros villages bwa (Bagassi, Pompoï) ou marka (Datomo) à l’ouest est revendiqué par trois lignages winye, les Ganou et Aka installés à Kwena pour le nord, (villages winye de Koupelo et Souboye) et les Boudo installés à Nanou pour le sud (villages bwa de Vi, Pahin, Kayo, Saïrou et Banou).

L’ensemble des établissements humains winye, qu’ils soient situés sur la rive gauche ou sur la rive droite du Petit-Balé, luttent pour leur survie pendant tout le XIXe siècle et la première partie du XXe siècle et beaucoup ne résistent pas aux épreuves. Dans le contexte des guerres du XIXe et du début XXe siècles (razzias des « Peul noirs » vers 1820, jihad de Mamadou Karantao en 1860 razzias des Zarma de Babato vers 1885, guerre des Marka [meke yo] en 1915-1916) notamment, des villages entiers disparaissent corps et biens, des individus sont sommés de choisir entre la mort ou le marché aux esclaves, des familles entières sont déplacées ou brisées par les flux et reflux incessants des migrations forcées. Ces « grandes » guerres qui leur sont imposées permettent la réaffirmation des alliances entre communautés puisqu’une fois les chefs de guerre de chacune de ces zones mis en difficulté (pendant le jihad de Karantao notamment), de nombreux villages se portent mutuellement assistance (envoi de guerriers, accueil de réfugiés…) et ce, quelle que soit leur situation de part et d’autre du Petit-Balé. De cette époque date l’homogénéisation ethnique et le renforcement des systèmes d’alliance entre les chefferies de terre des différents villages à envergure véritablement régionale. Par ailleurs, entre ces grandes guerres, les Winye poursuivent de leur pleine initiative de plus petits conflits inter et intravillageois. Les conflits intervillageois sont provoqués par le vol —très fréquent— de femmes mariées entre villages dont les chefferies de terre ne sont pas alliées. Les conflits internes sont déclenchés, au nom de l’honneur, par des leaders de factions qui s’opposent au pouvoir local (chef de terre et chef de village). Cette contestation des pouvoirs est une constante dans la société et elle se traduit par de nombreuses conduites de défection (exit options). En cas de désaccord avec les autorités en place, les individus ou les sous-groupes changent de patronyme (donc d’appartenance), migrent vers d’autres villages (notamment chez leurs oncles maternels ou les beaux-frères chez lesquels ils peuvent toujours trouver de la terre) ou créent de nouvelles communautés, du moins tant que l’abondance des ressources le leur permet.

Les influences culturelles

Conformément à l’origine extrêmement diverse du peuplement et à la jeunesse de l’ethnie, les institutions et les coutumes winye peuvent être rapprochées de celles d’autres sociétés environnantes, plus anciennes. On peut identifier, au hasard des informations collectées sur d’autres groupes (au travers de lectures ou des récits d’informateurs winye soumis grâce aux voyages et du fait de l’exiguïté de l’espace ethnique propre à des exercices de comparatisme permanents), plusieurs « paquets » correspondant à des aspects divers de la vie sociale et des coutumes locales : chefferie de terre, rites saisonniers, rites funéraires, rites liés à la naissance, scarifications… Il est possible de distinguer entre les situations d’influences (une coutume usitée dans une société plus ancienne repérable avec des modifications diverses chez les Winye, comme l’influence mossi dans les coutumes de la chefferie de terre et les rites saisonniers, l’influence mandé dans les levées de deuil et nuna pour les masques) et les espaces de partage d’une même coutume par différentes ethnies voisines (dagara/lobi/pho pour les rites liés à la naissance et les cultes de chasse ou marka/bwa pour les scarifications). La liste n’est pas exhaustive. Il est probable que les coutumes musulmanes ont influencé certaines conceptions winye, comme la pratique des offrandes –zakat–, le fait de se déchausser à l’entrée des lieux de culte, les vocalises des femmes à certaines occasions cérémonielles, les déplacements publics dans le sens inverse des aiguilles d’une montre… La société winye, suivant son positionnement géographique dans l’espace national, apparaît bien comme le lieu de transition entre les sociétés de l’Est (Mossi, Nuna) et les sociétés de l’Ouest marquées par l’influence mandé.

L’occupation rituelle et pratique de l’espace

Un homme qui s’est aventuré assez loin dans une zone inconnue repère un poste de chasse caractérisé par l’abondance de son gibier (et donc de l’eau). L’homme, séduit par l’intérêt du lieu, retourne chez lui et revient avec des parents et le projet de fonder une communauté, parfois pressé par l’insécurité ou les dissensions dans sa communauté d’origine. Ensemble, ils s’efforcent d’identifier un premier culte à la brousse et pour ce faire pratiquent un test, qui consiste à enfoncer dans un endroit non défriché (révélé par divination) un piquet enduit de « médicaments ». Si les génies du lieu acceptent la présence des hommes et décident de faire alliance avec le fondateur, le piquet reste intouché. Si le piquet est arraché après trois nuits c’est que les génies sont hostiles et les hommes doivent renoncer à leur projet d’installation. Si le piquet n’a pas été arraché, les hommes installent leurs huttes d’habitation en branchage (les mêmes qu’on trouve actuellement sur les champs de brousse) et cultivent leurs premiers champs (d’abord des cultures « basses » —haricot, arachide, pois de terre—, puis des cultures « hautes » —mils—). On pratique à ce premier autel de brousse, dès qu’on en a les moyens un sacrifice de mouton ou de bœuf qui a pour objectif de rendre la terre favorable au projet d’habitation des hommes et à lui faire accepter la souillure et la chaleur inhérentes aux activités auxquels ils se livrent (rapports sexuels, enterrement de placentas, de cadavres, cuissons de nourritures épicées, désordres divers…).
Ce sacrifice, qui n’est jamais réitéré, va permettre aux habitants de construire leurs premières maisons en banco, construites un peu à l’écart du culte de la brousse, si bien que s’impose l’identification d’une antenne de l’autel de la brousse à proximité de cet embryon de village, de manière à pouvoir procéder sans trop avoir à se déplacer à des sacrifices urgents. Dans ces premiers temps de l’histoire du peuplement, les déplacements en brousse peuvent être rendus impossibles par l’insécurité. Il se produit ainsi une spécialisation, le culte de la brousse original demeurant le destinataire des « gros » sacrifices (de « quatre pattes » : chèvre notamment) tandis que l’antenne est le destinataire des sacrifices urgents, où l’on offre surtout des « deux pattes » (volaille) et des promesses d’offrandes (par dépôt de cendre). C’est cette antenne qui deviendra l’autel de terre.

L’emplacement a été choisi parce que les devins ont déterminé qu’il s’agissait d’un lieu ayant une vocation ancienne de rencontres animées et pacifiques entre des populations diversifiées de non humains (ce sont d’anciens lieux de marché ou de places publiques des génies), dont le village des hommes qui va s’installer doit s’efforcer d’imiter les qualités. Le choix du lieu est confirmé par une ordalie (« test de poulets »). Le fondateur installe cet autel de la terre, dont l’influence est considérée comme déterminante dans le peuplement de l’établissement humain. Il faut attirer du monde dans l’embryon de village, pour le faire grossir et rendre plus sûre l’implantation humaine. On y enterre des objets qui sont des biens sacrés, hérités des ancêtres, qui constituent les principes de la fertilité du village. On y pratique ensuite un sacrifice de bœuf. Il s’agit de faire de la terre une sorte de fétiche qui a « une bouche et des oreilles », une bouche pour manger les offrandes sacrificielles et des oreilles pour écouter les requêtes. La terre est considérée comme un bloc d’énergie massive mais plein d’inertie et c’est ce sacrifice de bœuf, puis les offrandes qui vont y être faites périodiquement, qui vont permettre au fondateur —puis aux chefs de terre qui vont lui succéder— de la « commander », de la stimuler pour qu’elle s’échauffe, nourrisse les hommes en parcourant les cycles saisonniers, les attire, les protège, les sanctionne le cas échéant. L’autel de la terre est l’autel où l’on « attache » la pluie en début de campagne agricole en lui demandant de rester et où on la « libère » pour qu’elle ne fasse plus de dégâts lorsque les récoltes sont à point. Au fur et à mesure que l’établissement humain grandit, on crée des champs de brousse, qui à la différence des champs de village, continuent d’être, en co-partage avec les hommes, la possession des génies de la brousse (ce qui explique les interdits qui y subsistent). Le rôle des aînés, réunis dans un conseil des anciens autour du chef de terre, est entre autres de s’assurer que la combinaison unique, d’idées, de savoir-faire et d’efforts, qui a mené à la création et au progrès de l’établissement humain et de l’environnement humanisé qui se développe à partir de son centre (l’autel de la terre), preuve très littérale de sa « fécondité » —c’est-à-dire de sa capacité à porter des fruits et des relations— est reconnue, rappelée régulièrement, protégée de tout usage illégitime et justement compensée pour son exploitation. Ils ont pour se conforter dans l’idée du caractère exceptionnel du processus ayant mené à la conservation et au progrès de leur propre communauté (preuve qu’elle est bien poussée par un savoir-faire efficace qui a permis d’en révéler la force fécondante), l’exemple moins heureux des dizaines de communautés avoisinantes, disparues dans les guerres, les razzias ou les épidémies.

Théorie de la personne, chasse et rites funéraires

Les spécialistes de la société winye la caractérise souvent comme une société sans initiation. Dans les faits, il existe des initiations à divers cultes (masques, divination, culte anti-sorcellaire…) mais il est vrai qu’elles ne concernent jamais tout le monde. Le système d’initiation collectif organisé autour de la chasse a disparu depuis une bonne quarantaine d’années, du fait de l’extinction du gros gibier (lions, léopards) ou de la prohibition de sa chasse (éléphants). Cela constitue un handicap certain pour l’anthropologue dans la mesure où certains indices nous laissent penser que l’initiation à la chasse était conçue en stades et comportait donc un cycle initiatique qui produisaient les hommes socialisés dont la société avait besoin (futurs responsables de cultes et devins), les grands moments de ce cycle initiatique correspondant aux grands moments du cycle des rituels agraires à effets sous-régionaux, pour l’ensemble de villages associés pour les battues collectives autour d’un même culte de chasse. Aujourd’hui, chaque chef de terre organise pour sa communauté les rituels agraires indispensables pour faire venir puis arrêter la pluie, ouvrir et fermer la culture des champs de brousse, consacrer la production de l’année et la rendre consommable, chasser l’impureté…

Les seules occasions d’entr’apercevoir le caractère fondateur de la chasse dans l’univers symbolique winye sont les levées de deuil et notamment les parties de ces rituels qui concernent les aînés masculins (chaque rite de levée de deuil est l’occasion de célébrer les funérailles de 7 membres d’une même famille, 3 hommes et 4 femmes). Elles mettent en scène une âme (celle du défunt) qui n’a pas encore été capturée : elle ère en brousse depuis l’enterrement survenu juste après le décès, des années avant qu’on puisse organiser une levée de deuil, qui demande des moyens importants. Lors de ce rituel, cette âme est mise en situation de devenir maître de chasse et d’organiser une dernière battue en brousse en guidant les chasseurs vers le gibier. Celui-ci une fois tué est ramené triomphalement au village, la ronde animée et bruyante des chasseurs entraînant dans son sillage l’âme du défunt, flattée par les honneurs qui lui sont faits et qui accepte finalement de rejoindre ses ancêtres, à l’issue d’une initiation pendant laquelle un masque important appartenant aux oncles maternels du défunt lui apprend à marcher dans le sens des aiguilles d’une montre (sens qui est associé dans beaucoup de sociétés d’Afrique, au monde des ancêtres et des esprits). Car c’est seulement lorsqu’elle aura rejoint ses ancêtres que l’âme pourra être mise au service de ses descendants et leur apporter des bienfaits. Lors des levées de deuil, ce n’est pas seulement l’âme du défunt mais également son corps et tout ce qui y a été attaché, tout ce qui s’est imprégné de lui (comme les habits) qui est traité. Pendant les cérémonies, le corps est acheté aux griots au travers de don d’argent et d’animaux, afin qu’il ne soit pas maltraité par eux car c’est seulement lorsque le corps n’a pas été maltraité, que l’âme peut être mise au service des hommes. Les Winye expliquent en effet qu’avant le rituel des levées de deuil, il y eut un temps où les griots s’emparaient des cadavres pour les manger. Or, selon leurs conceptions, pour qu’il y ait une âme, il faut qu’on ait enfoui un corps intact dans la terre lors de l’enterrement. Le corps est le témoignage indispensable d’une âme qui reste vivante. On traite aussi les habits du défunt, et on achète aussi des habits pour compléter et faire des cadeaux généreux aux griots et à tous ceux qui sont présents. Le corps du défunt est donc transformé en argent, en animaux que tout le monde mange et les habits dont ce corps se vêtait sont transformés en habits que tout le monde va porter. La purification du mort, c’est-à-dire son élévation au statut d’ancêtre passe par son partage en centaines de morceaux qui vont servir à habiller et à sustenter les vivants.

Note complémentaire sur ce projet

En mai 1985, pour photographier une cérémonie de levée de deuil importante organisée pour célébrer un aîné, ancien chef de terre et membre influent d’un lignage possesseur d’un culte de chasse à l’éléphant dans le village winye de Wibõ, au sud du pays, j’avais fait appel à Guy Piacentino, fondateur à Genève de l’association Devimage, pour la promotion de l’image numérique. Il en avait ramené de très belles images. Malheureusement, à l’époque, mes connaissances anthropologiques ne me permettaient pas de décoder ce que nous apercevions sur ces photos et le sens global qu’avait le rituel auquel nous avions assisté. Plus de 30 ans plus tard, et après des enquêtes qui se poursuivent encore, j’ai suffisamment amélioré mes connaissances sur la société winye pour être en état de leur fournir un commentaire adéquat. Leur publication sera également un moyen de rendre hommage au talent de Guy, décédé en 2007.

The aim of this essay is to acquaint people with the Kararaô, a group of Kayapo Indians in central Brazil, who in 2010 numbered only fifty-four, by focusing on their extremely complex history. The anthropologist Gustaaf Verswijver conducted three years of intensive research on the history of this little-known people.

Although the Kararaô did not break away from the other Kayapo groups until the early 1930s, their history is composed of an uninterrupted series of splits and mergers, displacements to escape attacks and massacres, and the disastrous consequences of their increased contact with Brazilian society, which at times they themselves sought. This history not only reflects the Kararaô’s struggle for survival, it also attests to the Brazilian state’s inability to provide adequate assistance to them before the 1970s. Finally it shows the impunity of Brazilian caboclos (and their bosses), who set out to eliminate the indigenous peoples.

It is now urgent to take an interest in the Kararaô, in view of the many threats they face. One of the largest hydroelectric dams in the world was constructed near where they live, affecting their fisheries and creating pools of stagnant water conducive to waterborne diseases and malaria. In addition they suffer from deforestation and the illegal exploitation of their lands’ abundant natural resources. Over the last two decades they have succeeded in defending their forest, the source of life that supplies them with food and medicine. But the pressure is building…

PRESENTATION OF THE KARARAÔ BY GUSTAAF VERSWIJVER

In the early and mid-twentieth century, the frequent attacks by the Kayapo Indians hampered the economic development of vast areas in central Brazil. In those days, the Kayapo numbered about 5.000 Indians and were divided in three main groups, being the Irã´ãmrai-re (often called ‘Kayapo of the Araguaia’) who became extinct by 1940; the Xikrin (the smallest group); and the Gorotire (“those of the big group”), often called ‘Kayapo of the Xingu’. The Gorotire were divided in five subgroups, called Gorotire, Kubenkranken, Kokraimôrô, Mekranoti and… Kararaô.

Friendly contacts were established with all still surviving Kayapo groups from 1937 on; the majority of the groups were contacted in the late 1950s, early 1960s. That was about the time when anthropologists from different countries started exploring this huge, uncharted domain of Kayapo groups and subgroups.

Different reasons can be advanced to explain this special status of the Kararaô, the main reason being that they lived scattered over three very small communities that were virtually decimated by diseases in the first years following their first friendly contacts with members of the national society. No anthropologist felt appealed to study the renowned complex social system of the Kayapo in a small settlements numbering barely a handful of survivors. The result is that, in nearly all works treating the Kayapo, the Kararaô were ‘mentioned’ as a Gorotire subgroup, but that was often the sole reference to their existence. One single article was dedicated to them, with the all-saying title ‘A extinção dos índios Kararaô (Kayapo) – Baixo Xingu, Pará’ (‘The extinction of the Kararaô Indians (Kayapo) – Lower Xingu, Pará’). It appeared in 1989 and its author, Expedito Arnaud, did not actually work among the Kararaô, but instead conducted interviews with the government agents who had established the first friendly contacts with the Kararaô faction in question, and consulted the extensive archives of the FUNAI (National Indian Foundation). The article treated a Kararaô faction that since then has been considered extinct.

History of the Kararaô group
This observation leads to the history of the Kararaô group. Mekranoti informants told me several times the story of how a particular belligerent Kubenkranken leader, called Kôkôiaumti, one day killed a respected old village leader. Fearing to be killed in revenge, Kôkôiaumti immediately left the village after the homicide. He was joined by a number of kinsmen and followers. The story says that the dissident group crossed the mighty Xingu River in the hope to be able to join the Mekranoti. Yet the latter, aware of Kôkôiaumti’s reputation, killed the belligerent chief whereupon the rest fled into the forest. These refugees were called Kararaô, supposedly after the name of Kôkôiaumti’s faction in the main Kubenkranken village. This episode, which took place in the mid-1930s, is about all that is actually known about the history of the Kararaô. No data are available on how, a few decades after the referred clash with the Mekranoti, at least three (maybe even more) small Kararaô groups were found and contacted in the period between 1957 and 1972, at locations more than 400 kilometres one from the other.

No data are available on how, a few decades after the referred clash with the Mekranoti, at least three (maybe even more) small Kararaô groups were found and contacted in the period between 1957 and 1972, at locations more than 400 kilometres one from the other. Yet all indicates that the degree of the factionalism among the Kararaô by far exceeds the one observed in the other Kayapo groups and subgroups. The mystery of the Kararaô therefore starts at its very genesis, and that is why an in-depth study of their ethno-history is crucial to understand the particular contemporary situation of the Kararaô. Indeed, although some Kararaô members live scattered in several other Kayapo villages, today there is one Kararaô village. It numbers some sixty people, predominantly Kararaô cohabiting with a few immigrants from other Kayapo groups. Because of the low population, and because of the peculiar fact that all these Kararaô people are descendant from one single Kararaô couple (!), this is the only known Kayapo society to have lived for several decades without having a men’s house, men’s societies, and the possibility to perform the major naming ceremonies. All these aspects are considered typical and even inherent to Kayapo society as we know it. The question therefore is, how the absence of these elements have affected the small Kararaô community. Or, in other words, how can a Kayapo society function without being able to create ‘beautiful people’ (at least, not through the known mechanisms of ceremonies and rights owned by Houses)? Why do the Kararaô refrain from participating in the performance of ceremonies in neighbouring Kayapo villages, as some other, recent emerging, small Kayapo homesteads do?

The Belo Monte Dam
A note should be added on the term Kararaô, which in Kayapo language refers to a type of shout uttered when preparing for an attack. Indeed, the Kararaô Indians may constitute a Kayapo faction that has been neglected by anthropologists, but this does not mean that the name Kararaô is unknown. This has to do with the plans of the Brazilian government, in the 1980s, to construct a series of hydroelectric dams along the Xingu River. The first and major one to be constructed was to be called Kararaô because of the proximity of the Kararaô village to the artificial lake that would emerge. The Kayapo refuted the idea of constructing hydroelectric dams near (or even inside) their reserves. They were also disgusted with the idea that a Kayapo term was used for something they despised. That is why, in 1989, all Kayapo joined forces to demonstrate in the small city of Altamira against the building of the first dam. The manifestation lasted three days, and drew the attention of the international media. This action, combined with an appearance of some young Kayapo leaders in the World Bank where they expressed their disapproval of the plans, made the Brazilian government desist of their plans. Today, thirty years later, the dam is being built. It is now called Belo Monte… It is incontestable that the construction of the dam will have a deep effect on the small and fragile Kararaô community, especially since one of the reservoirs almost reaches the northern border of the Kararaô Indian Reserve.

Review of the book in Journal de la Société des américanistes :

Stéphanie Tselouiko, « Gustaaf Verswijver, Les Kararaô du Brésil central », Journal de la Société des américanistes, 107-1 | 2021, posted on 30 September 2021.

On Jeju Island, located off the southern tip of the Korean Peninsula, jamnyo(women divers) meet in the early morning on the shore to enter the sea together. Fifteen days per month, they carry out this ritual of free diving, risking their life, staying in the water for between four and seven hours to support their families.

Through the study of the kinship-exchange system (kwendang), and the community and value system of the jamnyo,the anthropologist Ok-Kyung Pak describes and analyses a society «centred on women» in which the women divers’ shamanic rituals for the sea goddess, who offers them her protection, coexist with the influence of the mainland’s neo-Confucianism. In addition, she traces the various steps leading to the formation of this social model promoting the protection of and the symbiosis with nature. This study is all the more relevant as the number of jamnyo divers is shrinking, due to industrial development and the oceans pollution.

A Jamnyodiver gathering her harvest underwater. Photo Koh Sung-Mi.

PRESENTATION OF JAMNYO DIVERS OF JEJU BY OK-KYUNG PAK

The Island of Jeju is little known to the outside world. It abounds with countless myths and shamanic epics, with 18,000 gods and goddesses and 346 shrines, where 68% of which are for worshiping goddesses.
Jeju is famous for its “three abundant entities” (samda) – women, wind and rocks. Being a volcanic island, it is covered with rocks above and below the ground, producing extremely dry land. Exposed to the sea on all sides, the island is often shaken and washed by strong winds and storms. Life on the island – the human habitat, the vegetation and economic activities- has been a struggle against the wind. Jeju men who went out to sea for fishing were often drowned, which resulted in an abundance of women and a shortage of men on the island until recently[1]. In sum, the famous “three abundances” of the Island meant that it is women who had to bear the burden of life and cope with the harshness of the environment in the near absence of men. The symbolic representation of such Jeju women is “sea women” or “women divers” (haenyoor jamnyo), who dive into the sea everyday not knowing if they will come out alive. They are referred to as the women who travel between “this land” and “that land” (the land of death). The patron goddess of the women divers is the giant goddess called Seolmundae Halmang (grandmother). According to Jeju creation myth, it is Seolmundae Grandmother who created the island. The creation myth has five stories, which tell how the Island was created. These are about the geography of the island, how the goddess tried to connect the island with the mainland, and how she coped with the famine on the island. The struggle of the giant goddess and the largeness of her spirit and courage are rather similar to those of haenyodivers.

Decreasing number of jamnyodivers and disappearance of their culture
In present Jeju, caught in a fast pace of modernization and the development of tourism, the population of women divers is rapidly disappearing, as well as the image of the giant goddess. In 2012, only 4702 divers remained, and 90% of them were over 50 years old. In 1969 there were 20,832 divers.

Jamnyodivers back from a dive. after diving. Photo Koh Sung-Mi.

Along with the population of divers, their culture and value systems are also disappearing, quite different from those of the mainland (peninsula). Haenyoculture entails an egalitarian and women centred social organization, with a human-nature symbiosis model. It is a great surprise to discover the existence of such a small pocket of an alien culture with a female creation myth and women centred society in Korea, which is deeply entrenched in Confucian ideology and known as a staunch patriarchal society.
It is not surprising, then, that the proponents of the conservation of Jeju culture and identity are alarmed by the present situation. Jeju Stone Park (with a 300 ha of land) has been constructed to commemorate the Seolmundae Halmang creation myth and to remind the younger generation of their female ancestors. Many monuments such as Haenyo Museum and Haenyo Summer School are being built and Haenyosongs are being recorded and archived at the university [2]. Folklorization of haenyoculture is on the increase. Many books have been published documenting divers’ life. However, all of these records are collections of data with little analysis and they are mostly in the Korean language. Therefore I feel that it is urgent to let the world know of this intangible heritage of women divers of Jeju which is being lost.

NOTES

[1] In 1935, the sex ratio of Jeju population was 10:6::W:M. In 2013, the ratio is 1:1.

[2] www.jst.re.kr. (Jejustudies Archives, Digital Archive), in Korean language.

Is Yaure an art de salon? How many Western collectors place one of their “ravishing” masks on a shelf, not considering that in a village the mask is so sacred that it is forbidden for any woman to see it—at the cost of her life?
The Yaure, a small ethnic group in the centre of Côte d’Ivoire, have created a unique art. All the neighbouring peoples attribute power and menace to animal masks covered in coagulated blood, but the Yaure confer the same sacredness and dread on refined human faces with virtuoso lines, which seem to have been chiselled by a goldsmith.
These masks are charms. Giving material form to ambivalent deities—both benevolent and maleficent—they have the aim of beseeching them. The best way to win the gods’ favour? Invite them to the dance, enchant them, include them in choreographies that regulate their energy. It is during nocturnal ceremonies that the celebrations are the most grandiose, when the dancers, galvanized, twirl in the light of the torches. Mystic ecstasy restores a purifying sovereignty to the supernatural spirits that the masks are charged with symbolizing. Did not Nietzsche’s Zarathustra say: “I would only believe in a God who could dance”?

This book focuses on the Jiye people and their closest neighbours, the Toposa. The Jiye population is less than eight thousand, which makes it one of the smallest groups in that part of South Sudan. It is a particularly resilient society, which, over the two centuries of its existence, has survived periods of extreme droughts and famines, severe cattle diseases and periods of devastating raids by their more powerful neighbours. Not much has changed since then …

The south-eastern corner of South Sudan, the newest country in the world, used to be labelled the “Great Thirst”. It is a remote area marked by a low, and above all, unpredictable annual rainfall. Early Western explorers in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries rushed through the region from one water point to another, barely pausing to get to know its inhabitants. The Jiye, Toposa, Murle and Nyangatom continue to be relatively unknown, and although some NGOs started working in the area, little attention is paid to the cultural diversity and the social structure of these agro-pastoralist societies whose economy is mainly based upon a mixture of pastoralism and agriculture, whenever and wherever the latter is possible.

PRÉSENTATION OF THE JIYE OF SOUTH SUDAN BY GUSTAAF VERSWIJVER

The Jiye are pastoralists. They are part of the so-called Karamojong Cluster, a set of societies with which they acknowledge a tradition of common origin, speak dialects of a single language, follow similar modes of livelihood, and display, predominantly, similar social institutions.

Boy with a cattle herd. Photo Kyra Verswijver.

They are the neighbours of the culturally and linguistically very closely related Nyangatom and Toposa (who live to their south), and of the Murle in the north who are not as closely related. Since at least one century now, the core of the Jiye habitat is situated in the vicinity of the Kassangor Hills, on the border between the Kapoeta and Jonglei Districts (East Equatoria Province, South Sudan). Data on the Jiye population are scant and even more contradictory. The WHO advances a total population of 52.000 but that is definitely an overestimation. Having personally visited all main Jiye villages during brief ethnographic surveys in the period 2006 – 2009, I premise that Jiye population does not exceed 12.000 people. They are as such a small group surrounded by demographically stronger populations (Toposa 180.000; Nyangatom 25.000; Murle 80.000). Almost nothing is known about the history of the Jiye, except that somewhere in the eighteenth or so, they separated from the Ugandan Jie. No study has ever been made of the Sudanese Jiye. In fact, up to very recently, the administration in Sudan did not really consider the Jiye as a separate people but rather considered them as a section of the Toposa.

Jiye as an endangered culture

The Jiye greatly suffered under the effects of the second civil war in Sudan (1983-2005), mainly because their area was located on the crossroad between the areas occupied by the Southern and Northern armies. In addition, the increased frequency of periods of drought among the Turkana in Northwestern Kenya, also affects the Jiye. The increased attacks of the Turkana on their northern neighbours, the Toposa, result in a domino effect in which the Turkana push the Toposa who push the Jiye who are forced to push into Murle-land. At the same time, the rapid population increase of the Toposa leads to an ever greater number of Toposa moving eastward to settle around the Moruankipi Hills. The recent establishment of three mission stations in that area serves as an additional attraction pole. As such, the Toposa are now preventing the Jiye access to the Kurun River area, one of their most important grazing areas. The effects of the civil war and of the constant attacks by the powerful Toposa have weakened the Jiye. A 2002 study shows that in the period 1983-2002, the subsistence pattern of the Jiye changed profoundly, now depending more on hunting (+ 20%) and less on livestock (- 15%) then before the second Sudanese civil war.

Move at the time of a seasonal migration. Photo Kyra Verswijver.

But the pressure on the Jiye during the last decades has also caused a rift between the Jiye territorial sections, where two sections left the traditional habitat and have sought refuge in a place called Boma, an area dominated by the Sudanese Murle. Temporary ‘out-migrations’ is a quite common adaptive response to periods of extreme harshness, and accounts of the Jiye show that they used to temporarily move towards Boma whenever struck by harsh droughts, invariably returning to their core area as soon as the situation stabilized. Things are different now because the migrant Jiye have lived in the Boma area for ten years already. It is clear that, although being exploited by the Murle, the Boma Jiye prefer an alliance with the culturally and linguistically more distant Murle than with their closer kin, the Toposa. The other two Jiye territorial sections that have remained in the area south of the Kassangor Hills, are on the verge of being incorporated into the Toposa, ‘Jiye by clan, but Toposa by tribe’. The weak position of the Jiye is aggravated by the local policy where both the Toposa and Murle have control over the local administration and hence also on all kinds of assistance that may be given in the area.
In sum, it is clear that Jiye culture is rapidly changing and that their identity is compromised at the long term ― a process that is fostered by national politicians.

Sorghum processing in front of the residential hut (with the granaries in the background). Photo Martine de Roeck.

The Altai Republic is located in a mountainous region on the outer reaches of Siberia, on the border of China, Mongolia and Kazakhstan. It is home to the Turkic Altaians, a small population group, renowned in ethnography for its shamanism and for the development in the early twentieth century of Burkhanism, a large-scale millenarian movement.

Within the current post-Soviet context, the Altaians are reviving their religious practices. These have diversified, now ranging from “neoshamanism” to “neo-Burkhanism” and also include Buddhism and evangelical Christianity. Major collective ceremonies based on the cycle of the seasons have resurfaced, while throat singing, formerly used for the ritual recitation of epic poems, now resonates well beyond the borders of this small territory, paradoxically spreading the image of traditions exempt from any external influence.

This book, while emphasizing the social, political and environmental issues the Altaians now face, sheds new light on that complex and composite religious situation, fuelled by multiple tensions, which until now has not received the attention it deserves.

Author’s biography

Clément Jacquemoud is a doctor of anthropology associated with CéSor (CNRS-EHESS). The subject of his PhD (GSRL-EPHE Paris, 2017) is the religious and identity recompositions of Altaians, natives of Southern Siberia. Since then he has analyzed neoshamanic rituals focusing on women religious roles and the impact of the writing technique.

The Kouya belong to one of the smallest but also one of the least-known ethnic groups of Côte d’Ivoire. They speak a language that in 2001 was declared to be among the most threatened on the planet. This people of fewer than twenty thousand individuals had the misfortune of finding itself at the center of the conflict zone that ravaged the country in 2002–2003 and then again in 2010–2011. This account retraces the transformation of the traditional way of life and the rapid evolution of a forest society that has found itself caught in the grip of a war between the northern and southern parts of the country, which has forced an entire population to adapt to a new and unstable situation.

Denis Ramseyer, a lecturer (chargé d’enseignement) at the Université de Neuchâtel and assistant director of the Laténium (2000–2016), holds a bachelor’s degree in Ethnology-Archaeology-History and a doctorate in Prehistory. He discovered the Côte d’Ivoire in 1971, at the age of nineteen. He has continued since then to take an interest in that country, especially the Kuya ethnic group, pursuing in succession photojournalism (1972), field research in ethnology (1975), and an ethno-archaeological study (1998). Since 2009 he has been working with the Musée des Civilisations and the Université Félix Houphouët-Boigny in Abidjan, endeavoring to promote and preserve the heritage of Côte d’Ivoire. He has also facilitated the reintroduction of field studies and the training of young Côte d’Ivoire researchers in the Human Sciences.

Field research, photojournalism, notes, and regular correspondence with a Kuya interlocutor and friend have been patiently assembled over forty-five years. The world described in this book has in great part disappeared. In the last decade of the twentieth century, deforestation, climate change, and the intrusion into the region of Christian missionaries transformed the way of life of this likable people proud of its traditions.

At the intersection of several disciplines, Guigone Camus’s ethnographic study of Tabiteua, an atoll part of the independent Republic of Kiribati, opens a window on the philosophical and spiritual depths, the poetry and the complexity with which the oral tradition and the social system mirror each other in a world of the spoken word, where ritual becomes the language of the community.

The ancient archipelago of the Gilbert Islands [1], situated within the confines of Eastern Micronesia and composed of coral atolls, is difficult to access, yet hosts a people who came to the island from Samoa over a millennium ago.
In addition to written documents (missionary, administrative and ethnographic archives), continuing to collect accounts of oral histories is imperative in conducting a historical and ethnographic study of the Gilbert Islands. The Gilbertese oral tradition, a privileged mode of communication, is a testament to a subtle and complex society. After all, what is more expressive, more revelatorythan a spoken story, and especially of a mythological one, in order to understand a society? What could possibly be more conclusive than the way in which a society speaks, recountsits own past?
To the Gilberts, the very existence of the gods is reduced to a simple manifestation: their presence is acknowledged in the material by the mere existence of rocks, without the further need for the construction of religious wooden sculptures or masks. Locations, on land or at sea, are considered to be traces of a deity’s passage on earth and are recognized as places of memory to be evoked in oral tradition.

Gilbertese Mythology

Even if, from a historical perspective, it is difficult to establish the chronology of the different voyages of the Gilbert Islands’ first settlers, it remains possible to identify the founding “epics” of the Gilbertese initial structure. hese stories set the scene for both the first settlers and the ancestors of the islands’ current inhabitants.

The important cosmogonical myth common to the majority of the islands recounts the way in which the powerful gods created the universe from an entity: “The Obscure and the Closed”. This myth lays down the foundation for the spatial and social organization of the society and is told through a series of dualisms, concentrating primarily on both the oppositions between the North and South as well as between the inferior and superior worlds. It puts the spotlight on the primordial deities linked to the natural worlds (sea, underworld – terrestrial, celestial worlds.)

Another series of myths, in line with these cosmogonical stories, concentrates on the creation of the mythical tree The Resting Place of the AncestorsTekaintikuaba, populated by deities residing in the base of its trunk, on its crown, as well as on its Eastern, Western, Southern and Northern branches. ter the gods in the trunk cut down the tree, the deities scattered, taking off either in canoes, “underwater canoes”, or “flying canoes”. They then settled down in the islands, though this step was not taken without comings-and-goings, nor without conflict or epic journeys, the lengthy process of which is extremely difficult to follow, from both toponymic and chronological standpoints.
Each god had the primary goal of building a big house, a gathering place for his descendants and for himself: the maneabaand to divide the land amongst himself and his descendants.

Mythology and Toponomy

The maneaba, always parallel to the sea, is a sober yet impressive construction. Up to fifteen such structures can be found on a single island (as is the case on the island of Tabiteuea, for example.) Wooden pillars (oka) support a roof which, in turn, rests on additional coral pillars (boua) that support its periphery. The subdivision of the interior, made possible by palm tree mats (inai) and pandanus leaves (roba), defines what are known as “seats”, or in Gilbertese: boti. These seats are spaces dedicated to the “clans” (kainga) descending from the great migrating ancestors. Over time, the space was re-divided in order to host new families, arriving in the region at a later time in either a pacific manner or following a conflict.
For its occupants, a seat (boti) determines a role within the community, a power which manifests itself in the maneabaduring large reunions by, for example, being the first to speak, the one to gather the people, the one to cut the fringes of the maneaba’s roof after reparation, as well as the one to distribute food according to ritualistic order. Additionally, each seat refers to power over the land which is observed outside of the maneaba. Indeed, for each family, belonging to one of this or that seat determines the parcels of land to which they may turn for habitation or cultivation (taro pits, palm tree plantations, and pandanus, fishing ponds, and parts of the lagoon).

In fact, mythology and toponomy are inseparable. All socio-political activities, such as land management [2], wars (alliances, conquests, appointment of factions to be opposed in war), alliances, etc., are based on myths and history relating to the island.

There is a surprising consistency between the different versions of the great myths of each island, which ethnologists such as the Father Sabatier (1886-1965), Sir Arthur Grimble (1888-1956), Henry Maude (1906-2006), Katharine Luomala (1907-1992) and currently Jean-Paul Latouche, were able to collect in the field. Meanwhile, they also reveal the extraordinary wealth of the myths in their various versions, on the scale of an atoll or even within a single maneaba. Through time, historical events have been integrated into the myths, and certain ancestors have become more prominent. Men have sometimes proven to be extraordinarily inventive in manipulating or even recreating myths for the benefit of their property or for their own prestige.

The Exemplary Case of the Tabiteuea Atoll, in the South of the Gilbert Islands

Tabiteuea atoll is a particularly interesting example in this respect. In fact, its creational myth is relatively independent from those of other villages such as Tarawa-Abaiang or Beru-Nikunau. Before the ancestors originating from the Tekaintikuabatree created their maneaba, the cosmogony mentions the creation of a sandbank in the Tabiteuea lagoon, a place named Takoronga, which would be at the origin of everything.

If Tabiteuea is an interesting example due to the particularity of its myths, it is equally interesting due to the atoll’s history. On two occasions, the island hosted violent clashes between Westerners and the islanders. In 1841, following the disappearance of one of its crewman, the men on the Peacock, a ship participating in the Exploring Expedition [3], the Panama, set fire to the village of Utiroa.
In 1880, Kapu and Nalimu, missionaries from the Hawaiian Evangelical Mission, encouraged their followers to exterminate the non-Christians of southern Tabiteuea. The consequent religious conflict climaxed in the bloody battle of Tewai, in the south.
Following research conducted in the London archives (SOAS) and the Honolulu archives (HMCS and HHS), I have attained much first-hand data on the history of the Tabiteuea. These findings will be illuminated by the testimonies I gathered during my field research.

The urgency of research

Conducting research in the Gilbert Islands is a real urgency, stemming from the environmental situation. In fact, the atolls and their assets are severely threatened by the rising seas predicted by 2050. In December 2009, Aata Maroieta, an inhabitant of Tebunginako on the island of Abaiang [4], testified on this topic in Le Monde.fr’s [5] online video for the Copenhagen Summit:
“We live in constant fear, imagining that one day, the Kiribati Islands will disappear. My greatest worry is of losing my identity along with I-kiribat and of losing my land on this island. It is my greatest fear. I don’t have much hope for the future if nothing is done. We have never heard of the problems that we face today. If the cause of all of this was natural then we would have already faced something similar in the past. It is only recently that we must face them. So, I believe developed countries are responsible.”

This problem also echoes the plea issued by the Federated States of Micronesia at the Majuro summit (Marshall Islands) on July 9, 2009, destined to alert the international community to the necessity of limiting greenhouse gas emissions.

Considering this danger, first, an ethnographic study on the island of Tabiteuea would represent the beginning of the enumaration of an ensemble of Gilbertese oral traditions. This study, thanks to the support of the Barbier-Mueller Foundation, will then emphasize the importance of the oral tradition, especially regarding the way the Gilbertese define their identity and culture.

L’Humanité Dimanche, 4-10 September 2014

NOTES

[1] The ancient Gilbert Islands, thus named in the 19th century by the Russian geographer Krusentern, are today members of the Republic of Kiribati. There are sixteen islands: Abaiang, Abemama, Aranuka, Arorae, Beru, Butaritari, Kuria, Makin, Maiana, Marakei, Nikunau, Nonouti, Onotoa, Tabiteuea, Tamana, Tarawa.

[2] Land was inherited either from the father or the mother.

[3] The Exploring Expedition was the most important American, scientific (collection of animal and vegetal specimen, hydrographic surveys, etc.) and diplomatic expedition of the 19th century, conducted between 1838 and 1841, by Capitan Charles Wilkes.

[4] In the north of the archipelago.

[5] http://www.lemonde.fr/le-rechauffement-climatique/visuel/2009/12/09/2009-2050-le-rechauffement-climatique-a-hauteur-d-homme_1278216_1270066.html