Margaret Mead, Derek Freeman
...and the Samoans
.
Margaret Mead's fieldwork in Samoa, which resulted
in her first major work, Coming of Age in Samoa, was completed over a period of
months during 1925/26. Upon publication, it became an immediate success with the
public. Through it, people were given access to a society unburdened by the
problems of twentieth century industrialized America. She wrote of a society
where love was available for the asking and crime was dealt with by exchanging a
few mats. This book launched Margaret Mead's, career, which led to her becoming
one of the most renown figures in American anthropology, if not in the
world.
In 1983, Derek
Freeman published his own study of Samoa titled, "Margaret Mead and Samoa: The
Making and Unmaking of an Anthropological
Myth"(1983a.).
Derek Freeman
read Mead's "Coming of Age in Samoa" soon after it was published. Enthralled, he
became a regular visitor to the islands, learned the language, customs, and even
became a participant local village politics as a full-fledged member of the
community. He is recognized by his peers, and by the Samoans themselves, as an
authority on Samoan culture. In his text, which is actually a refutation of
Mead's work, Freeman takes particular umbrage at Mead, and claims that she was,
or may have been, duped in regard to her conclusions. Freeman's work in Samoa
encompassed the same area of Mead's, yet with quite different results.
What emerges through
Freeman's detailed research is the somewhat troubling possibility that what was
published by Mead in 1928 could not have been what she observed during her
fieldwork in 1925/26.
On
Margaret Mead's "Coming of Age in Samoa", Dr. Martin Orans, Emeritus Professor
of Anthropology at the University of California, Riverside, opens his book "Not
Even Wrong" (Harvard University Press, 1983), thusly;
"Occasionally
a message carried by the media
finds
an audience so eager to receive it that
it
is
willing to suspend all critical judgment
and
adopt
the message as its own. So it was
with
Margaret
Mead's celebrated 'Coming of Age
in
Samoa.'"
[1(a)]
Dr. Orans also did
fieldwork in Samoa and compiled his book using Margaret Mead's actual
fieldnotes, loaned to him by her daughter.
He states that he
carried "Coming of Age in Samoa" on his required reading list for the
anthropology classes that he taught over the years. He then seems to lament this
deed by waxing thus:
"The greatest fault lies with those of us like
myself who understood the requirements of science, but both failed to
point out the deficiencies of Mead's work and tacitly supported such
enterprise by repeatedly assigning it to students."
[1(b)]
Derek Freeman, on
the other hand, revels in no such remorse at the possible tarnishing of Margaret
Mead, an anthropological legend. In fact, throughout his book he goes for the
throat, so to speak;
"It is with the scientific adequacy of Mead's
picture of Samoan society that I shall be concerned with from now on,
for to the extent that this picture is defective, Samoa ceases to be a
negative instance and Mead's central conclusion that culture, or nurture,
is
all-important in the determination of adolescent and other aspects of
human behavior is revealed as ungrounded and invalid." (Freeman, 1983a: 83)
When Freeman's book was
published, Mead had been dead for five years. Criticism was leveled at Freeman
for this because he had completed his study for the book years earlier, while
Mead was still alive. If this criticism is based on a belief that Freeman held
back on publication until after her death to avoid the possibility of her being
able to respond to his charges, it is a non-sequitur argument.
Freeman had met with
Margaret Mead and showed her the evidence that he had accumulated during his
work in Samoa. He also discussed her work in comparison and explained that he
was not ready to publish at that
time.
Mead's reaction to this
visit will be discussed in the conclusion of this paper.
By attacking
Mead and her work, leveling charges of bias, and insinuating academic fraud,
Freeman found himself on the outside of the anthropological circle.
David
Williamson[3], Australian playwright has written a satirical play based on the
Mead-Freeman controversy titled: "Coming of Age in Academia"
(http//:www.monash.edu.au.pubs/). Writing of himself in an advertisement for his
play, William's states:
"He believes that it is ironic that while
anthropologists argued that there was no biological essence to
human nature or links to our animal ancestors "'Their treatment of
Derek was identical to the treatment a chimpanzee troupe gives to one of it's
outcasts."3
Another perspective of the
Mead/Freeman controversy is offered by James E. Cote, Professor of Psychology at
the University of Western Ontario. In this research monograph titled Adolescent
Storm and Stress, Professor Cote offers his views of the controversy as seen
from the eyes of a social psychologist. A 1994 press release announcing
publication states:
"...a great deal of attention
has been directed toward the Mead/Freeman controversy. This book
contributes to that controversy and to the general understanding of
adolescent storm and stress by undertaking an interdisciplinary analysis of
Freeman's criticisms and
an assessment of the plausibility of Mead's work.
....While much has been written about this controversy during the past
decade, a gap exists in the sense that most of the publicity about Mead's
work has missed her main focus concerning the processes governing
the "Coming of age" of her informants. A valuable historical document
and a pioneering study, Mead's book anticipated changes that are still
unfolding today in the field of human development. The preoccupation
with issues tangential to her main focus -- issues involving the
Samoan ethos and character -- have not only diverted a clear analysis of
Mead's work, they have also led to the creation of a number of myths
and misconceptions about Mead and her book. ...[Professor Cote] also
has an interest in Mead's original focus on the relative impact of
biological and cultural influences in shaping the behavior of those coming
of age--in all societies. Despite what has been said by her critics,
not only was this a crucial issue during the time of her study, but it
is also an issue that is now just beginning to be under-stood some 60 years
later. In addition, the issue of biology versus culture--the so-called
nature- nurture debate--carries with it many
political implications. In the case of the Mead/Freeman controversy,
this political agenda looms large..."(4)
Margaret
Mead states in "Coming of Age in Samoa" that her fieldwork was done entirely in
the Samoan language, as few, if any of the natives spoke English. Yet, Freeman
discovered, and her fieldnotes even indicate, that many of the people she
contacted did speak English.
Being a student of
Boas, Mead had learned anthropology in the Boasian school of "cultural
determination." This mode of anthropological thought (at that time current) was
advocated by both Boas and Ruth Benedict (another of Mead's professors and her
personal friend). Freeman believes that Mead left for Samoa with the purpose of
confirming this theory. Boas, Benedict and Mead argued that it was "culture"
that most influenced a growing individual, as opposed to the inborn influences
of biology.
Mead
paints a picture of Samoa as a place of nearly stress free living, where the
children pass through adolescence without the many pressures put upon teenagers
in an industrial, twentieth-century America. In Mead's Samoa, families are
large, taboos and restrictions are few, and disagreements are settled by the
giving of mats. The stresses encountered by American teenagers are unknown to
their Samoan counterparts.
In "Coming of Age in
Samoa" Mead refers to premarital sex as the "pastime par excellence" for Samoan
youth. She writes that Samoa is a virtual paradise of free love, as the young
people from (aproximately.) 14 years of age until they are married have nothing
on their minds except sex. Of Samoan girls, Mead says,
"She thrusts
virtuosity away from her as she thrusts away from her every other sort of
responsibility with the invariable comment, "Laititi a'u" ("I am
but young"). All of her interest is expended on clandestine sex
adventures..." (Mead, 1928: pg. 33)
Derek Freeman points out that this picture of Samoa Mead
presents is contradicted by other parts of her book where many restrictions on
teenagers, and sexual activity in particular, are outlined along with
punishments for offenders.
The three main limitations
on casual sex for female Samoan youth are:
1. The rank
of the girls family (high or low).
2. The age
of the girl.
3. Whether
or not the girl lives in the pastors house.
Mead
tells of clandestine sex among the trees and of a "diluted Christianity," where
the young people simply go through the motions of church participation without
reverence or real need for it. Freeman alleges that not only has Mead
misrepresented the data that she collected, but that she completely
misunderstands the attitudes held by Samoans regarding sex and the Christian
church.
The
information on female virginity Mead collected is contradictory in her book,
fieldnotes and in real life. She tells of the defloration ceremony that was
eventually outlawed by the government and of girls having their heads shaved
and/or being beaten for certain violations of sexual conduct. Several times
Freeman makes the point of mentioning that this does not mesh with her statement
of casual sex being the "pastime par excellence" of Samoan youth or with his own
extensive fieldwork.
Freeman
claims that Mead was hoaxed into believing what she wrote by two girls
[Fa'apua'a and Fofoa] that befriended her and accompanied her on various
excursions around Samoa. According to Freeman, the two girls became informants
for Mead and would tell her "stories" that they had made up concerning teenage
sexual practices (Freeman, 1991:pg. 104).2
Freeman acquired this
knowledge of the hoax through an interview of one of the girls, conducted by
Galea'i Poumele in 1987. Part of this interview is included in the
film.
In
Lowell Holmes' 1957 dissertation, "The Restudy of Manu'an Culture", he followed
in the footsteps of Margaret Mead and compared his material to hers. He
made corrections concerning some of Mead's incorrect use of the Samoan language
and corrected errors made about various social organizations. The work that
Holmes completed was generally in agreement with Mead's findings and therefore
did not spark the controversy that Freeman's book
generated.
Holmes found that
gathering sexual data from the Samoans was a difficult task. He
states: "(sex was the)...most difficult of all areas of
Manu'an culture to discuss. ...it was never possible to
obtain details of sexual experience from unmarried informants...
(though Mead may have done better)...due to the fact that she was not married
when she carried on her study."**
**Note: Mead
was, in fact, married when she did her fieldwork, but her husband did not
accompany her to
Samoa.
In
1987, Holmes published his "Quest for the Real Samoa" in which he clarifies some
of his 1957 work. He writes: "I could not agree with Mead on the
degree of
sexual freedom supposedly enjoyed by young people
on Ta'u.... However, there was considerable evidence in the form of
illegitimate children and divorces with adultery as a ground to indicate
that a fair amount of premarital and extramarital sexuality existed."
Holmes, in his 1957
dissertation, compiles a list of 5 "aspects of Samoan behavior."
1. Lack of
specialized feeling in human relations
2. Lack of
crisis, in human relations
3. Lack of
competitive spirit
4.
Interpretation of sexual activity data.
5.
Importance of the "mafaufau"
concept.
Any differences
between these and Mead's aspects of behavior, Holmes assures us, is due to
interpretation. Dr. Orans states that the overall data gathered by Holmes in
1957 is thin and inadequate to support his categorical
assertions.
Holmes ended his
1957 work in general agreement with Mead. Neither Mead nor Holmes actually
conducted surveys of households to support their contentions that large families
were one of the stress reducing factors that made coming of age in Samoa
easier.
On Lowell Holmes,
Orans states: "Apparently Holmes 's current view is that
Mead exaggerated the extent of sexual freedom, though his dissertation
gives no indication of this, nor does his book present evidence
supporting such a position."1(c),
5
Mead presented,
through her work, a picture of Samoa that, unfortunately, could only exist in a
dream. A society of leisure, living on the beach, where the word stress had no
translatable counterpart, and was nearly unknown. Where sex was a matter of
merely picking from a bounty of lovelies and finding a semi-concealed spot under
a palm tree. A place without violence, without schedules.
This state of, as Mead
called it, "felicitous relaxation" is complete fantasy, according to Freeman.
Freeman, while researching Samoan crime statistics, and history, came to a quite
different conclusion. According to Freeman, the decade of the 1920's was a
particularly violent era for American Samoa.
The world without
question accepted Margaret Mead and Coming of Age in Samoa. The world accepted
what it wanted to hear and know on her word alone, without asking for evidence
to support her statements. This is a failure for all of American anthropology.
Of Mead's "Coming of Age in Samoa," Dr. Orans' states:
"That Mead's
seriously flawed work, which is filled with internal contradictions
and grandiose claims to knowledge that she could not possibly have
had and is so weakly supported by data, could have survived and formed
the foundation for an illustrious career raises substantial doubt
regarding improved standards of research. ...That a person of
such conspicuous talent could have produced such a flawed work and
that it was so widely accepted and praised by so many should serve as an
object lesson to
us all."1(d)
Dr.
Orans then
writes:
"...Mead's
misleading generalizations were
not
the
considered opinions of one who had
engaged
in
a voyage of discovery but the polemical
claims
of
one anxious to make a case."1(e)
Dr. Orans concludes that
Mead, as a scientist and especially as an anthropologist, was a failure. But she
did achieve success beyond her wildest dreams, by putting them up for sale.
"Mead's
failures were partly those of cultural anthropology then and now; she did
not make her claims clear enough to be tested and she
did not present sufficient or adequately representative data to
support her generalizations. Had she met these requirements of
ordinary scientific practice, whatever her predilections regarding
culture and biology, she could not without falsifying have written
the rather misleading account that she
did."1(f)
Facts
aside, when different individuals view the same picture, it is not uncommon to
have two interpretations. Everything is not purely black and white, with the
dividing line clearly and indisputably drawn. Maybe Mead was duped, maybe she
was not. Both perspectives exist within her work, imperfect as it is. This is
the only defense of Mead that I can give. I will not give her an excuse.
"Never
doubt that a small group
of
thoughtful,
committed citizens can
change
the world; indeed, it is
the
only
thing that ever does."
Margaret
Mead
Born:
Dec. 16, 1901
Died:
Nov. 15, 1978
Conclusion
Margaret
Mead was, throughout her adult lifetime, the undisputed matron of American
anthropology. On the basis of one piece of work, Mead spent her life on the
crest of fame, and certainly, fortune. Was Mead really duped as has been
suggested? Or was Mead the one who duped. The video on the Freeman/Mead
controversy contained interviews with close friends of Mead. One of them spoke
of the meeting between Freeman and Mead where Freeman confronted Mead with his
evidence. She said that Mead was visibly shaken, and then told her that Freeman
had evidence that proved her work in Samoa was
wrong.
Surely, only the fact
that someone had the evidence must have been news to Mead. Margaret Mead was
obviously very intelligent, her work on Samoa notwithstanding. She was far too
intelligent not to know what the ramifications of what she had done entailed.
Did she live in fear of being discovered? Was her subsequent tireless drive an
effort to make up for the fraudulent start that provided her initial push to
fame?
And what of Franz Boas,
the "Father of American Anthropology"? Franz Boas must have known what the
penalty for academic fraud would entail. It does not make sense that a scientist
such as Boas would resort to fraud in support of a hypothesis, regardless of how
dear it was to him. If he believed that "cultural determinism" was a provable
hypothesis, why accept falsified or flawed data as correct? Could he have
seriously believed that his opponents would not test his evidence? That is not a
very scientific viewpoint, but it is almost what happened. Perhaps Boas thought
that no one would dare to question perky, young Margaret Mead's results. If so,
for a long time he was
right.
The part I see as
missing from this controversy is Margaret Mead. There is no one firmly in her
corner to stand up in her behalf and say, "But what about this,..." or, "You do
not understand." I would like to see a rebuttal to Freeman's work by someone who
supports Mead. Seeing only one side of an issue is not the way to develop
an informed opinion.
Dr.
Martin Orans succeeds in his comparison of the work of Freeman and Mead. Even
though Derek Freeman emerges as the clear victor in this battle of truths, it is
obvious that Dr. Orans still has a place in his heart, and on his bookshelf, for
Margaret Mead. His book is important for the facts that it presents, and the
unanswerable questions that arise from those facts.
How will history
deal with the famous and the infamous of anthropology. How will it change the
method and theory of anthropology in the
future?
And change it must.
The "policing", so to speak,
of one's own profession becomes a necessity in light of the Freeman/Mead
controversy. This is how the works of Freeman and Mead should be viewed in the
context of future usefulness to anthropology as a whole. Fieldwork should be
subject to the possibility of reevaluation at all times. But can fieldwork be
done effectively by a worker who knows that their work may fall under intense
scrutiny? Yes. If not, there are other occupations less demanding that are open
to those people who are inclined to fear criticism, or put less effort than
their best into their work. Another question arises whether or not a doctoral
candidate should espouse the truth in their particular dissertation as opposed
to the views of their professor's, when the possibility exists of offending the
very professor(s) who will be deciding whether or not to grant the award? Should
a student take the chance of completing the work with the possibility of being
denied their Ph.D., or support what they believe to be incorrect in order to
advance, and rewrite the work after being granted the
award?
My
recommendation is that Derek Freeman's "Margaret Mead and Samoa: The Making and
Unmaking of an Anthropological Myth" and "Coming of Age in Samoa" by Margaret
Mead, be discussed thoroughly in all cultural anthropology classes or, better
yet, have a class exclusively devoted to the subject. Indeed, it would serve as
a useful tool in any class with a focus on the use of the scientific method for
data acquisition, as an example of how the system can be manipulated and abused
by those who are entrusted with its care.
Written by
Stan
Strain
for Anthropology 4500 "Growth of Anthropology"
Professor Kofi
Akwabi-Ameyaw
California State University Stanislaus
May
1997