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Book Synopsis
For the Foi people who live on the edge of the central highlands of Papua New Guinea, the flow of pearl shells is the heart of their social life. The pearl shell is the exchange item that mediates the creation of their most important sexual and social roles. The Heart of the Pearl Shell analyzes a number of myths of the Foi people, elegantly bringing together significant ethnographic materials in a way that has important implications for the development of social theory in anthropology and in Melanesian studies. Scholars of semiotic-symbolic anthropology and of comparative religion will also share the author's interest in the meaning and role of mythology in Foi culture. Instead of relying on orthodox methods of Freudian or structuralist interpretation, James Weiner assumes there is a dialectical relationship between the images of Foi myth and the images of the Foi's social world. He demonstrates how each set of these images is dependent upon the other for its creation. This innovat

The Heart of the Pearl Shell

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    A Paperback by James F. Weiner

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      Publisher: University of California Press
      Publication Date: Publication Date: 8/19/2022 12:00:00 AM
      ISBN13: 9780520336926, 978-0520336926
      ISBN10: 0520336925

      Description

      Book Synopsis
      For the Foi people who live on the edge of the central highlands of Papua New Guinea, the flow of pearl shells is the heart of their social life. The pearl shell is the exchange item that mediates the creation of their most important sexual and social roles. The Heart of the Pearl Shell analyzes a number of myths of the Foi people, elegantly bringing together significant ethnographic materials in a way that has important implications for the development of social theory in anthropology and in Melanesian studies. Scholars of semiotic-symbolic anthropology and of comparative religion will also share the author's interest in the meaning and role of mythology in Foi culture. Instead of relying on orthodox methods of Freudian or structuralist interpretation, James Weiner assumes there is a dialectical relationship between the images of Foi myth and the images of the Foi's social world. He demonstrates how each set of these images is dependent upon the other for its creation. This innovat

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