Argonauts of the Western Pacific

by Bronisław Malinowski

Whether we have to deal with the wide-spread fallacy of the primitive Golden Age, characterised mainly by the absence of any distinction between mine and thine; or whether we take the more sophisticated view, which postulates stages of individual search for food, and of isolated household catering; or if we consider for the moment the numerous theories which see nothing in primitive economics but simple pursuits for the maintenance of existence — in none of these can we find reflected even a hint of the real state of affairs as found in the Trobriands; namely, that the whole tribal life is permeated by a constant give and take; that every ceremony, every legal and customary act is done to the accompaniment of material gift and counter gift; that wealth, given and taken, is one of the main instruments of social organisation, of the power of the chief, of the bonds of kinship, and of relationship in law⁶¹.

These views on primitive trade, prevalent though erroneous, appear no doubt quite consistent, that is, if we grant certain premises. Now these premises seem plausible, and yet they are false, and it will be good to have a careful look at them so that we can discard them once and for all. They are based on some sort of reasoning, such as the following one: If, in tropical conditions, there is a plenty of all utilities, why trouble about exchanging them? Then, why attach any value to them? Is there any reason for striving after wealth, where everyone can have as much as he wants without much effort? Is there indeed any room for value, if this latter is the result of scarcity as well as utility, in a community, in which all the useful things are plentiful? On the other hand, in those savage communities where the necessities of life are scarce, there is obviously no possibility of accumulating them, and thus creating wealth.

Again, since, in savage communities, whether bountifully or badly provided for by nature, everyone has the same free access to all the necessities, is there any need to exchange them? Why give a basketful of fruit or vegetables, if everybody has practically the same quantity and the same means of procuring it? Why make a present of it, if it cannot be returned except in the same form⁶²?

There are two main sources of error at the bottom of this faulty reasoning. The first is that the relation of the savage to material goods is a purely rational one, and that consequently, in his conditions, there is no room for wealth or value. The second erroneous assumption is that there can be no need for exchange if anyone and everyone can, by industry and skill, produce all that represents value through its quantity or its quality.

As regards the first proposition, it is not true either with regard to what may be called primary wealth, that is, food stuffs, nor with regard to articles of luxury, which are by no means absent in Trobriand society. First as to food-stuffs, they are not merely regarded by the natives as nourishment, not merely valued because of their utility. They accumulate them not so much because they know that yams can be stored and used for a future date, but also because they like to display their possessions in food. Their yam houses are built so that the quantity of the food can be gauged, and its quality ascertained through the wide interstices between the beams (see Plates XXXII and XXXIII). The yams are so arranged that the best specimens come to the outside and are well visible. Special varieties of yams, which grow up to two metres length, and weigh as much as several kilograms each, are framed in wood and decorated with paint, and hung on the outside of the yam houses. That the right to display food is highly valued can be seen from the fact that in villages where a chief of high rank resides, the commoners’ storehouses have to be closed up with coco-nut leaves, so as not to compete with his.

All this shows that the accumulation of food is not only the result of economic foresight, but also prompted by the desire of display and enhancement of social prestige through possession of wealth.

When I speak about ideas underlying accumulation of food stuffs in the Trobriands, I refer to the present, actual psychology of the natives, and I must emphatically declare that I am not offering here any conjectures about the origins or about the history of the customs and their psychology, leaving this to theoretical and comparative research.

Another institution which illuminates the native ideas about food storage is the magic called vilamalya, performed over the crops after harvest, and at one or two other stages. This magic is intended to make the food last long. Before the store-house is filled with yams, the magician places a special kind of heavy stone on the floor, and recites a long magical spell. On the evening of the same day, after the food houses have been filled, he spits over them with medicated ginger root, and he also performs a rite over all the roads entering into the village, and over the central place. All this will make food plentiful in that village, and will make the supplies last long. But, and this is the important point for us, this magic is conceived to act, not on the food, but on the inhabitants of the village. It makes their appetites poor, it makes them, as the natives put it, inclined to eat wild fruit of the bush, the mango and bread fruit of the village grove, and refuse to eat yams, or at least be satisfied with very little. They will boast that when this magic is performed well, half of the yams will rot away in the storehouses, and be thrown on the wawa, the rubbish heap at the back of the houses, to make room for the new harvest. Here again we meet the typical idea that the main aim of accumulating food is to keep it exhibited in the yam houses till it rots, and then can be replaced by a new étalage.

The filling of the storehouses involves a double display of food, and a good deal of ceremonial handling. When the tubers are taken out of the ground they are first displayed in the gardens. A shed of poles is erected, and covered with taitu vine, which is thrown thickly over it. In such arbours, a circle is pegged out on the ground, and within this the taitu (the ordinary small yams of the Trobriands which form the staple harvest) are carefully piled up into a conical heap. A great deal of care is lavished on this task, the biggest are selected, scrupulously cleaned, and put on the outside of the heap. After a fortnight or more of keeping the yams in the garden, where they are much admired by visiting parties, the owner of the garden plot summons a party of friends or relatives-in-law, and these transport them into a village. As we know already, from Chapter II, such yams will be offered to the owner’s sister’s husband. It is to his village that they are brought, where again they are displayed in conical heaps, placed before his yam house. Only after they have thus remained for several days sometimes up to a fortnight, are they put into the storehouse (see Plate XXXIII).

Indeed, it would be enough for anyone to see how the natives handle the yams, how they admire big tubers, how they pick out freaks and sports and exhibit them, to realise that there is a deep, socially standardised sentiment centring round this staple product of their gardens. In many phases of their ceremonial life, big displays of food form the central feature. Extensive mortuary distributions called sagali, are, in one of their aspects, enormous exhibitions of food, connected with their re-apportionment (see Plate XXXIV). At harvest of the early yams (kuvi) there is an offering of first fruits to the memory of the recently dead. At the later, main harvest of taitu (small yams), the first tubers are dug out ceremonially brought into the village and admired by the whole community. Food contests between two villages at harvest, in olden days often followed by actual fighting, are also one of the characteristic features which throw light on the natives’ attitude towards edible wealth. In fact, one could almost speak of a cult of food among these natives, in so far as food is the central object of most of their public ceremonies.