NARRATIVE, VOICE, AND GENRE IN MARGARET MEAD’S COMING OF AGE IN SAMOA

Authors

Sharon W. Tiffany, University of Wisconsin—WhitewaterFollow

Abstract

My contemporary reading of Coming of Age in Samoa explores Margaret Mead’s experimental ethnography as a textual artifact whose social history may be interpreted within a framework situated in gender, time, and place. Mead’s ethnography appeared to reinforce consumer-culture representations of female alterity and “free-love” in the South Seas, yet her text challenged these popular images with a radical counternarrative. Mead’s case study approach to the problem of adolescence, as well as her fieldwork photographs, created a narrative and visual space that questioned the dominant anthropological discourse of her day. Mead’s woman-centered book, combined with her publisher’s astute marketing strategies, created a commercial bestseller that has acquired the status of “Ur-text” in anthropology. Eighty years after publication, Coming of Age in Samoa continues to generate both academic and public interest.

Recommended Citation

Tiffany, Sharon W. (2009) "NARRATIVE, VOICE, AND GENRE IN MARGARET MEAD’S COMING OF AGE IN SAMOA," Pacific Studies Journal: Vol. 32: No. 2, Article 3.
Available at: https://digitalcollections.byuh.edu/pacific-studies-journal/vol32/iss2/3