RIGHTING WRONGS ON ANUTA

Authors

Richard Feinberg, Kent State University

Abstract

Apology and compensation are commonly employed to reestablish social harmony when one person causes injury to others, thereby disrupting social order. Here I explore the way in which these mechanisms are utilized by the people of Anuta, a Polynesian outlier in the Solomon Islands. I suggest that compensation and apology need not be counterposed and, in fact, are often intertwined as aspects of a single process. Historical transition from the widespread Polynesian emphasis on rank, respect, collective responsibility, and mutual assistance to a more individualistic and competitive cultural environment has led to changes in Anutan views of right and wrong. This, in turn, adds to the difficulty and complexity of moral judgment, and it has affected Anutan understanding of the consequences of illicit behavior—consequences that range from the automatic workings of the cosmos to curses, physical punishment meted out by chiefs, and composition of songs intended to shame the offender. Woven through this article is a consideration of Anuta’s cultural logic and the strain under which that logic has been placed as a result of the community’s exposure to the wider political and economic realities of late-twentieth-century life.

Recommended Citation

Feinberg, Richard (1998) "RIGHTING WRONGS ON ANUTA," Pacific Studies: Vol. 21: No. 2, Article 4.
Available at: https://digitalcollections.byuh.edu/pacific-studies-journal/vol21/iss2/4