| Society-LAU The Lau or Eastern Archipelago of the Fiji Islands is located in the South Pacific between lat. 16 degrees 43 min.-21 degrees 2 min. S and long. 178 degrees 15 min.-180 degrees 17 min. W. It consists of a chain of about 100 small islands and reefs, 30 of which are inhabited, extending north and south along the eastern margin of the Fiji group. Geographically, the Lau Islands are intermediate between Melanesian Fiji and Polynesian Tonga, and thus lie at the meeting point of two culture areas. During the British colonial period, from 1874 to 1970, Lau constituted one of the 18 provinces into which Fiji was divided. The province of Lau was made up of three major divisions: (1) the islands of Central and Southern Lau which comprise the chiefdom of Lakemba; (2) the Exploring Isles to the north of Lakemba; and (3) the Moala group to the west (which falls outside of the Lau cultural unit as defined in the Outline of World Cultures). According to Bryan's summary of the 1921 census, the total population of Lau at that time was 7,402; but the reliability of this figure is unknown (Bryan 1924: 9). This summary focuses on Central and Southern Lau. Central Lau includes the Islands of Lakemba, Naian, and Thithia. Lakemba is the principal island of the Lau group, with seven villages and a population of around 1,000 in about 1920. The high chief of the chiefdom of Lakemba and his family reside here in the main village of Tumbou. Southern Lau is composed of an isolated group of six inhabited islands and their uninhabited satellites. The inhabited islands are Fulanga, Kambara, Komo, Mothe, Namuka, and Ongea. According to Thompson, who thoroughly surveyed these islands around 1934, they contain 11 villages with a total population of over 1,500 (1940A: 5; but also note that in Thompson 1947/47: 213-214, she refers to only five inhabited islands). The indigenous language of Lau is a dialect of Fijian which belongs to the Malayo-Polynesian language family. Thompson claims that the modern Lauan dialect is a mixture of the old Lauan dialect known by only a few aged natives, the dialect of Mbau (formerly the principal chiefdom of Fiji), and the Tongan language. Lauan culture in general also reflects a fusion of three cultural traditions; early Polynesian, Melanesian, and Western Polynesian. Within the modern society these traditions are represented respectively by the "land people," the "Nakauvandra people," and the Tongans. In understanding Lauan culture, it is important to bear in mind these three cultural traditions. The "land people" were the earliest inhabitants of the area, they subsisted primarily on jungle produce supplemented by horticulture, had a simple social organization, and believed in local spirits. About 10 generations ago the ancestors of the "Nakauvandra people" immigrated to Lau. They brought with them a highly organized and complicated system of ranking which was reflected in their hierarchy of gods. They stressed the divinity of the chieftainship, and they stimulated craftsmanship, especially in the area of carpentry. The height of Tongan contact was in the mid-nineteenth century. The Tongans also stressed the divine chieftainship and they introduced new forms of ceremonialism. Little (if any) horticulture was practiced until the "recent" introduction of manioc and sweet potatoes. It is believed that collection of bush products supplemented by fishing, pig and fowl raising, and hunting sea turtles and coconut crabs provided subsistence prior to the introduction of horticulture (Thompson 1940B: 83). The modern Lauans have a diversified subsistence economy based on yams, breadfruit, sweet potatoes, manioc, bananas, fish, and fowl. Pigs and sea turtle are feast foods. Copra is the main commercial crop. Lauan society is characterized by an autocratic, stratified type of social organization with a close integration of the political, stratification, and kinship systems. At the highest level of kinship organization, there are five ranked phratries. The lowest ranked phratry is that of the "land people." The "land people" are the commoners and comprise 80 percent of the Lau population. The upper class is composed of the other four phratries with the chief's phratry (the "Nakauvandra people") ranking the highest and constituting the nobility. The other three phratries consist of two carpenter phratries and the phratry of the Tongans or "sea people." Phratries are composed of sibs (referred to as "clans" by Thompson). A sib is defined by Thompson as a "unilateral kinship unit which is as a rule, exogamous, patrilineal, and patrilocal" (1940A: 35). Formerly the sibs were land owning units which occupied hamlet sites. Modern Lauans live in villages along the coast. Neighboring hamlets joined to become villages, but each hamlet retained its unity. Sibs form economic and ceremonial units as well as geographical units. Sibs are made up of individual households which are usually nuclear families. Modern Lauan society is completely monogamous, but before the advent of Christianity, polygyny was practiced among high ranking men, especially the chiefs. The chiefdom is the largest political unit in Lau, and is made up of island groups or minor chiefdoms united in tributary relationship to the high chief at Lakemba. The minor chiefdoms are composed of villages which in turn are made up of the sib-hamlets mentioned earlier. The minor chiefdoms are ranked according to their relationship to each other and to the high chief, and the villages which make up the minor chiefdoms are ranked according to the status of the sibs of which they are composed. Village headmen are appointed by the colonial government. The immigrants who founded the chief's phratry, the "Nakauvandra people," introduced an ancestor cult to Lau. In this cult, the hierarchy of ranked sibs is reflected in the hierarchy of ancestor gods. Offerings are presented to the gods by hereditary priests for the purpose of obtaining mana, which is defined by Thompson as: ...the vital force of potency which gives superhuman significance to persons or things. ...The spiritual force is frequently one of the beings who peopled the superhuman world of the Lauans before the advent of Christianity. The most powerful of these beings were the ancestor gods [Thompson 1940A: 109]. According to Thompson, the Lau are "totemic" in two senses. First, there is a form of totemism associated with the "land people" who believe they descended from some local natural phenomena. These groups are characterized by having island endogamy. The second form of totemism is associated with the sibs. Approximately half of the sibs studied by Thompson possessed three totems. There is no belief in descent from these totems, but the sibs are exogamous. Ceremonialism involves the presentation and reception of gifts (formerly to the ancestor god by the priest, but since the advent of Christianity, to the chief), kava drinking, a feast, and dancing accompanied by a form of rhythmic chanting called meke. The most important ceremony is the first fruits ceremony. Arthur Hocart produced the basic monograph on the traditional culture (1929) after having spent four years (ca. 1920) on the island of Lakemba as a schoolmaster. Laura Thompson, a well-known cultural anthropologist, spent the years 1933-1934 in Southern Lau and has also produced a number of writings on the group. Culture summary by Marlene M. Martin and Robert O. Lagace Bryan, Edwin H., Jr. Preliminary report on the Lau group, Fiji. 2, 111 l. illus., maps. Typescript. Unpublished manuscript Honolulu, Bernice P. Bishop Museum Library, 1924. Hocart, Arthur Maurice. Lau Islands, Fiji. Honolulu, Bernice P. Bishop Museum, 1929. 241 p. illus. Thompson, Laura. Southern Lau, Fiji: an ethnography. Honolulu, Bernice P. Bishop Museum, 1940A. 4, 228 p. illus., maps, tables. Thompson, Laura. Fijian frontier. Introduction by B. Malinowski. San Francisco, American Council, Institute of Pacific Relations, 1940B. 26, 153 p. illus., maps. Thompson, Laura. The problem of "totemism" in southern Lau: a reply to A. Capell and R. H. Lester. Oceania, 17 (1946/1947): 211-224. 7857 | |
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