WOMAN ANTHROPOLOGIST

Otago Daily Times, Issue 24336, 28 June 1940, Page 9

WOMAN ANTHROPOLOGIST

THIRTEEN MONTHS WITH NEW GUINEA TRIBE MAKING OF “YAM MAGIC” (By Tasman Air Mail) (From Our Own Correspondent) ■ SYDNEY, June 19. Help in making “yam magic" was one of the experiences of Dr Phyllis Kaberry, a young Sydney anthropologist. who recently returned to this city after living for 13 months in a native village in the foothills of the Torricelli Range, New Guinea, The village was spread in a horseshoe shape along a 1100 ft high ridge, and there Dr Kaberry lived alone in a native sagothatched bush house, with camp bed, phonograph, and a few other necessities as her only furniture. At first Dr Kaberry was a curiosity for the natives, for. though most of them had seen white people before, the contact was not close. By degrees, she changed their curiosity to confidence, She learned their language, and took a lively interest in their babies and their yams. Particularly the yams, the staple food product of the South Sea Islands. Ginger is an important ingredient in. the making of the native magic por tions, and the head man of the village recognised, as soon as he investigated, the smell of tincture of ginger in Dr Kaberry’s medicine box. So he “ borrowed ” some of it and smeared it on a yam. “ Fortunately." said Dr Kaberry. “ the yam flourished. Otherwise my reputa. tion would have been ruined. Yam magic is an important ceremonial which takes place each month, and each month the magic differs. One magic is to increase the yam’s length, another to improve the flavour, and so on. This magic is performed by the men, who plant all the big yams, weed them, and harvest them. The women are not allowed to enter yam fields.

and are allowed to plant only small yams. “J?he women are kept in the background on public occasions, to do th« cooking while the men thoroughly enjoy themselves at the ceremonials These are picturesque, especially that held for the display of yams. Then the men comb their hair back from their shaven foreheads, arrange ii round their heads like a fan, and decorate it with beads and plumes and sometimes hibiscus flowers. The owners of the, yams parade up and down in 'all their finery, and with their long spears, chanting the tribal song about the glory of their ancestors ” and their yams, and boasting how much better "both are than those o 1 the next tribe. They stamp and prancf and make an. art of losing their temper. It is really like a scene from ar opera. “Women are not allowed to witness these ceremonials, but I was giver special permission by the tribal grandfather. I was also allowed to see the carvings in the men’s ceremonial houses, an honour for which I paid four axes. Yams play an important part, in the marriage dowry, for they are usually exchanged between the immediate relatives, as well as from two to five shell rings worth about 30 shillings each. But there are many love matches, too. “Though women are., kept in the background on public occasions, they seem very conteted at home. They are not subservient, and they can > swear as vehemently as the men. They are intelligent, with a keen sense of humour. Though they delight in gossiping. they are very tolerant of one another. Sometimes I would try to draw them on by criticising someone, but they would merely say. with a shrug: ‘That’s her business,’ When I became friendly with them they asked • me into their huts, and would discuss/ their babies and their menus and their pots and pans. The children are spoilt and bad-tempered, but no woman has any status in the village unless she has a child.” Dr Kaberry will spend two years on writing about her studies in New Guinea, and then hopes that she will be se.nt to do more research work. i