American Anthropology in Micronesia: An Assessment

Chapter Eight: Missed Opportunities: American Anthropological Studies of Micronesian Arts

255 C HAPTER EIG HT Missed Opportunities: American Anthropological Studies of Micronesian Arts Karen L. Nero There seemed to be so little that could be called art, and that little was so simple, that I remember thinking, during those early days, “For a study of art, this is pretty poor picking.” Edwin G. Burrows, Flower in My Ear From their inception, American anthropological studies of the arts of Micronesia have suffered from problems of definition and analysis—obstacles that continue to this day. With the exception of the work of Edwin G. Burrows, however, these studies and conceptualizations of Micronesian arts were guided by existing paradigms. It is important to situate this research within the history of anthropology, and not fault the early anthropologists for failing to take into account theoretical advances that postdated their work. Once Burrows started grappling with a definition of art that could incorporate the artistic complex he found on Ifaluk, whether or not it conformed to western expectations (1963, 6–11), he offered theoretical perspectives well ahead of his time. Although Burrows foreshadowed Jacques Maquet’s (1971, 1986) later formulations of art and aesthetics, Burrows’ contributions were not widely appreciated, nor did Maquet cite him. Burrow’s study was published posthumously , and unlike some others among the Coordinated Investigation of Micronesian Anthropology (cima) and Scientific Investigation of Micronesia (sim) anthropologists, Burrows had no students who followed him into the field. Had others incorporated his insights into their research, some of the negative developments in Micronesian arts under the American administration might have been avoided. 256 KAR EN L. N ERO Few American anthropologists who worked in Micronesia wrote seriously on the arts. Of the roughly three hundred postwar writings on Micronesian arts, only about 60 percent were by academics, broadly defined to include cultural anthropologists, archaeologists, ethnomusicologists, art historians, and others. More than half of these publications were under ten pages. Only four PhD dissertations (L. Carucci 1980, LeBar 1951, Jernigan 1973, Montvel-Cohen 1982), seven master’s theses (Bailey 1978, Brooks 1988, Gillespie 1977, Le Geyt 1986, Mulford 1980, Schmidt 1974, Yamaguchi 1967), and one bachelor’s thesis (Iwata 1985) were written directly about the arts and ritual behavior. Many of the academic contributions on the arts appeared in territorial publications, local journals, or encyclopedias outside the mainstream of anthropology, and their impact on the anthropology of art was limited. The educational institutions established on Guam and in the former US Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands (USTTPI) never supported the arts in a manner comparable to the University of the South Pacific (usp) or the University of Papua New Guinea (upng). Only in the last two decades have US Historic Preservation and National Endowment for the Humanities funds been available to help support local agencies, museums, and galleries. However, applied activities undertaken by American anthropologists in Micronesia in the fields of the arts, museums, and education have had significant impacts, both positive and negative. Among the more positive impacts of the anthropological endeavor were the collegial relationships established with indigenous researchers, beginning in the early years of the colonial administration. Of all publications in the decade from 1954 to 1964, nearly 10 percent were written by Micronesians, a percentage that more than doubled in the decade from 1985-1995. During the early period of the American administration, anthropological theory was ill equipped to deal with any art systems other than the plastic and visual arts of painting and sculpture. The areas of artistic creativity practiced within Micronesia—performance arts, tattoos, costumes, architecture, stone monuments, sculpture, religious effigies, and rock art—nearly all fall outside this limited western view of visual arts, narrowly defined. Micronesian aesthetics are even further removed from European sensibilities: the minimalist lines of its rare wooden sculpture; the force of its basalt architecture; the aesthetic attention paid to utilitarian objects such as bait boxes; or Micronesians’ multisensory emphasis on the ephemeral arts of integrated chants, scents, and meditative movement—the composite impact of a line of dancers moving and chanting in unison, wearing hibiscus fiber skirts or geometrically woven tur cloths, their skin glistening with turmeric-spiced coconut oil, accented by gar- American Anthropological Studies of Micronesian Arts 257 lands of rare shells and rustling coconut leaf decorations, crowned by richly scented floral wreathes. Many Micronesian artistic endeavors are transitory; their aesthetic emphasis is on the perfection of the performance rather than the creation of a lasting object...