Ambiguating Agency: The Case of Malinowski's Ghost

Battaglia, Debbora

doi:10.1525/aa.1997.99.3.505

Cited by 27 publications

(16 citation statements)

References 15 publications

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“…For this reason agency has an ambiguating quality where pre-defined roles are often unclear and subject to change. Individuals or interest groups engage in a politics of equivocation where their links and identities are multi-faceted rather than strictly fixed (Barnes, 2001;Bartky, 1995;Battaglia, 1997;Chang, 1994). Periods of heightened ambiguity may occur at critical junctures that are inflection points of structural transformation-periods of abrupt change not well addressed under models of practice theory that stress the incremental (Calhoun, 1993, p. 72;Post, 1996, p. 102).…”

Section: Event Ambiguity and The Transformation Of Structurementioning

confidence: 99%

Re-Inventing Mississippian Tradition at Etowah, Georgia

Cobb

King

2005

J Archaeol Method Theory

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Frequent population movement and political re-organization spurred a pattern of repeated abandonment at the Mississippian mound center of Etowah in the southeastern United States. These processes also characterized the larger surrounding region in north Georgia and southeast Tennessee. The Etowah abandonments provided inflection points where interest groups were able to distance themselves from previous conventions of structure and reformulate new forms of sociopolitical organization. Re-invented traditions were embedded in changing definitions of genealogical and mythical time, and mediated through the built environment and iconography.

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Section: Event Ambiguity and The Transformation Of Structurementioning

confidence: 99%

Re-Inventing Mississippian Tradition at Etowah, Georgia

Cobb

King

2005

J Archaeol Method Theory

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“…Such places may appear either as built into the system – in the dialectics of structure (or discourse) – or as shorter or longer‐term epiphenomena, perhaps created by the actors themselves – in the dialectics of strategy (cf. Battagalia 1997; Leach 1962). This distinction is implicit in Ortner's (1996) accounts of the role of agency in relation to issues of status and power in Polynesian societies and of social mobility in stratified societies.…”

Section: Agency Ambiguity and Methodologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Social change and agency among Kubo of Papua New Guinea

Dwyer

Minnegal

2007

Royal Anthropological Inst

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An account of the history and actions of one man is used to show how agency was central to processes of social change among Kubo people of the interior lowlands of Papua New Guinea. Through a thirteen‐year period, a growing awareness of, but little exposure to, ‘Western’ modes of living challenged earlier certainties, created desires, and suggested alternatives. Modernity thus provided the context for change. But modernity is not itself a process of change. By drawing from ambiguities inherent in pre‐existing structures (or discourses) or created de novo through encounters with previously unimagined possibilities, and by favouring one or another of the multiple trajectories legitimized by those ambiguities, people were causally implicated in changing the conditions of their own existence. Those changes entailed a shift from a predominantly relational epistemology to an increasingly categorical epistemology. Résumé Dans cet article, le récit de la vie et des actes d'un homme servent à montrer comment l'intentionnalité (agency) a été essentielle dans les processus de changement social chez les Kubos des basses terres intérieures de la Papouasie‐Nouvelle‐Guinée. Sur une période de treize ans, la connaissance accrue qu'ils ont eue des modes de vie « occidentaux »– tout en y étant peu exposés – a remis en question des certitudes antérieures, créé des désirs, et suggéré des alternatives. La modernité a ainsi créé le contexte du changement, sans être en elle‐même un processus de changement. À partir des ambiguïtés inhérentes aux structures (ou discours) préexistantes ou créées de novo par la découverte de possibilités jusqu'alors inimaginables, et en privilégiant l'une ou l'autre des multiples trajectoires légitimées par ces ambiguïtés, les Kubos ont été impliqués dans une relation causale de changement des conditions de leur propre existence. Ces changements ont entraîné le passage d'une épistémologie principalement relationnelle à une épistémologie de plus en plus catégorielle.

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“…While speculation of intent stimulates lively social discourse, including the circulation of gossip and rumour (see Taylor, this volume), people take circumspect care not to impute rationale or judgment on another's actions. Doing so is likely to implicate them, and by association their dala , in chains of cause and effect; hence, the preference for tropes of ambiguity (Battaglia ). This is an important consideration in a social world organised around forms of collective identity, and where the power of magic is a pervasive mode of agency.…”

Section: Nanola and The Agency Of Desirementioning

confidence: 99%

‘I am Still a Young Girl if I Want’: Relational Personhood and Individual Autonomy in the Trobriand Islands

Lepani

2015

Oceania

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In the Trobriand Islands of Papua New Guinea, sexuality is valued as a positive expression of relational personhood, registering the efficacy of consensual and pleasurable practice in producing and maintaining social relations. The power of sexuality to demonstrate individual and collective capacity and potential holds particular salience for unmarried young people. This paper draws on my ethnographic research on culture and HIV in the Trobriands to address perduring questions about the locus of individual autonomy in Melanesian sociality, where relational personhood shapes identity and modes of exchange in the moral economy. I focus on the gendered agency of youth sexuality, including the use of kwaiwaga, or love magic, in exercising and controlling desire. The narrative identities of two young women provide the lens through which questions of agency are explored, revealing how the autonomous mind, nanola, is central to understanding the embodiment of social relations, how the power of love magic transfers agency from one individual to another, and how individual assertions and acts are ultimately expressions of situated relationality.

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Ambiguating Agency: The Case of Malinowski's Ghost

Cited by 27 publications

References 15 publications

Re-Inventing Mississippian Tradition at Etowah, Georgia

Re-Inventing Mississippian Tradition at Etowah, Georgia

Social change and agency among Kubo of Papua New Guinea

‘I am Still a Young Girl if I Want’: Relational Personhood and Individual Autonomy in the Trobriand Islands

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