I have chosen to present a selection of statements made to me by senior anthropologists, which highlight ideas about the relationship between feminism and anthropology in the 1980s. For me, feminism expanded the scope of anthropology by acknowledging women’s lives and the historical changes wrought by colonialism. For others, especially male anthropologists, concentrating on women and introducing historical factors into ethnographic research was seen as narrowing the field.
By the time I began studying anthropology I had been involved in the feminist movement for several years—first in Melbourne and then in Cambridge. In Melbourne I had been in a consciousness-raising group that was transformative—not only for me but for the other women. At that time, I was a secondary school teacher who, like all female teachers, had been forced to resign and become casually employed when I married. I actively campaigned against this regulation, which in 1969 applied to all females employed in government jobs.
I vividly recall one evening when we went around the group, each saying what they would like to change about their lives. Helen Garner said that she wanted to become a writer—we all encouraged her, complimenting her on the wonderful letters she wrote. Winsome McCaughey said she wanted to stand for the local council and work to improve childcare—we all agreed that she was eminently suited to it (she later became Lord Mayor of Melbourne). Jill Macmillan said that she wanted to do a postgraduate degree in Psychology—we all thought that was an excellent idea. She did, later becoming Professor in the Centre for Women’s Health at the University of Melbourne. I wanted to stop teaching and return to undertake the final year of an honors degree in History and Literature. Everyone supported this move, so I did.
These were the heady years of Women’s Liberation and everything seemed possible. Sisterhood was powerful.
I went to Cambridge, intending to pursue a study in History and Philosophy of Science. For various reasons, I abandoned this plan. So, let me leap ahead. After I completed my anthropological studies in Cambridge, I applied for and gained a PhD scholarship at Australia National University (ANU). My study was of the small island of Tubetube in the Kula Ring. I proposed to examine the ways that colonization and conversion to Christianity had transformed the kula. My argument was that what Malinowski observed in 1919 could not have existed in that form prior to colonization. In particular I concentrated on the economic changes that occurred from the late-nineteenth century and their effects on inter-island networks of exchange. It was a historical ethnography firmly located in Economic Anthropology. I was unabashedly Marxist in my conviction that any good anthropological study must be grounded in the material conditions of people’s lives. When I told one of the professors at ANU of my experience teaching Women’s Studies at Cambridge, he remarked: “Well that was very astute of you to choose a PhD topic that has nothing to do with women; much better at this stage to prove yourself in a more serious theoretical field.”
When I completed my thesis, Roger Keesing called me into his office and told me, “Your thesis is ground-breaking, but I have discussed this with others in the school and we have decided that it is too historical to be examined exclusively by anthropologists. You have several chapters that are devoted to the effects of colonization and conversion to Christianity. One of your examiners will have to be an historian.” Donald Denoon, then professor of history at the University of Papua New Guinea (UPNG) was that examiner. In the thesis, as a feminist, I had deliberately tried to present a gendered perspective of social and economic life—past and present. How odd that it was not deemed necessary to have an examiner whose expertise was in the area of gender.
My final example is a statement that came from my supervisor, Michael Young. I had written a chapter for a collection on gender and fieldwork edited by Diane Bell (Mcintyre 1993). I gave it to him for comment. He was full of praise but for one section in which I described my response to the death in childbirth of a Tubetube woman, Dinah. I had been devastated by her death. She was a close friend, a brilliant and imaginative woman. She was my own age, and like me, had two children. I had found that section very hard to write, but as a feminist, I was committed to reflexivity and felt that it spoke of the differences in our lives, which had to be acknowledged. I loved her. I cried as I wrote it. Michael dismissed it as “purple prose” and said I should delete it. I kept it in.
So, in the 1980s, being a feminist anthropologist was difficult. Writing about women was viewed by many as situating yourself in a marginal field. Writing about the effects of colonialism and missionisation was not even considered anthropology. Finally, including emotional descriptions based on affection, respect, and identification as a woman was an unforgivable lapse in the sanctioned style of scholarly prose.
Read another piece in this series.
Works Cited
Macintyre, Martha. 1993. “Fictive Kinship or Mistaken Identity?: Fieldwork on Tubetube, Papua New Guinea.” In Gendered Fields, edited by Diane Bell, Pat Caplan and Wazir Jahan Karim, 44-62. London: Routledge.
In addition to the work of the guest editors, this piece was edited by Cameron Brinitzer.
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