Embodying Modernity and Post-Modernity: Ritual, Praxis, and Social Change in Melanesia

by Sandra C. Bamford

This collection of original essays considers the relationship between ritual, embodiment and social change in the South Pacific. Over the past few years, the societies of Melanesia have undergone profound and revolutionary processes of social change. Encounters with colonialism, post-colonialism and the forces of globalization have put Pacific Island societies in touch with state formation, late capitalist culture and emerging transnational identities. In addition to shaping the contours of the burgeoning nation state, these developments are having an intense impact on the nature of embodied experience. In recent years, many Melanesian societies have witnessed the rise of charismatic Christianity, changing gender configurations and the growing use of consumerism as a means of defining new social and political hierarchies. Embodying Modernity and Postmodernity reflects on how the aforementioned processes of social change are coming to be incorporated in contemporary Melanesia. More specifically, it addresses two interrelated how globalization's ensuing rise of new social and economic forms has influenced the ways in which Melanesians think about, experience and act upon their bodies and the ways in which these new forms of bodily experience contribute to the emergence of new social and cultural identities. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of the Pacific, in addition to those concerned with processes of social change, religion, ritual and the embodied nature of social life.

316 pages, Paperback

First published December 30, 2006