Igor Sitnikov: From Deception to Gift: Application of Interpersonal Communication Theories to Anthropological Analysis

Thursday, November 29, 2012

From Deception to Gift: Application of Interpersonal Communication Theories to Anthropological Analysis

Abstract

In my current exploratory and explanatory research I intend to clarify whether theories, which were developed in the field of interpersonal communication, could be applied for the analysis in anthropology? So far as through communication people meet their basic needs I suppose that interpersonal and intergroup communication itself could be the subject of anthropological research, especially in such its field as cultural anthropology. In this paper I argue that recent development of the both disciplines - interpersonal communication and anthropology - gives scholars opportunity to analyze complicated cases of human communication both cross-culturally and inside individual ethnic groups. In this paper I show it in terms of interpersonal communication theories application for analysis of four cases in domain of cultural anthropology. Two cases are examples of cross-cultural communication and another two illustrate the communication inside two individual ethnic groups. In the exploratory part of this study I observe the phenomenon of cultural change on example of modes of exchange transformations. I focus on the switching between such opposite types of modes of exchange as balanced and unbalanced exchange on example of gifting phenomenon. The concept of ‘gift’ is common both for anthropology, where it is a subject of many studies, and for interpersonal communication, where it is distinguished as a form of nonverbal communication. Such interdisciplinary quality of the ‘gift’ concept gives opportunity to verify possibility to apply interpersonal communication theories in the domain of anthropology. For my anthropological analysis I use several theories from the field of interpersonal communication: Expectancy Violations Theory, Interaction Adaptation Theory, Face Theory, Uncertainty Reduction Theory, and Constructivism Theory. To show the phases of ‘gift’ phenomenon development as communication instrument I designed my paper in order from non-gifting phase in Taiwan-Lamay case to the phase of mature practice of gift exchanging in Kula tradition, than to the phase of gift culture degradation into bribe phenomenon in modern Mongolia, and finally to the phase of gifting practice in present indigenous Kamchatka as a mean to purify and revive local culture.

The set of analyzed four cases from anthropological domain demonstrates the gift phenomenon as a nonverbal communication instrument. I discuss the usage of this instrument in terms of both its effectiveness and ethical concerns. In the exploratory part using interpersonal communication theories I observed the process of exchange modes transformations which have started in the post-Soviet period in Mongolian society and in Koriak indigenous culture in the northern Kamchatka peninsula in the Russian Far East. These two cases demonstrate examples of transformations of such common nonverbal form of communication as ‘gift’, which take place in ethnographic present. The analyses of this present cultural phenomenon could be applied for the reconstruction of similar processes, which took place in early history and even prehistory. In this paper I tried to make such reconstruction by comparison of two cases, both of which were observed in historical times, but which traces go back into far away prehistory. One case is the Kula exchange tradition in Trobriand Islands, archipelago off the eastern coast of New Guinea; and the second one is a conflict which took place in 1636 on the island Lamay near Taiwan.

Igor Sitnikov

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Igor Sitnikov and Miklukho-Maklai

I was born in Ryazan city (Russia, 3 hours from Moscow) in 1961. 30 years I lived in the Soviet Union on the bank of Oka-river, which is a border between a huge forest and a wide steppe. Then 12 years I spend in the Russia on the same bank, under the same sky. I like Oka, and the steppe with multitude of small slow rivers, and the forest, that carries the name of vanished people “Meshchera”. When I was a schoolboy I had read a book about the famous Russian anthropologist Miklukho-Maklai, who studied peoples of Papua New Guinea. His life was amazing for my childish imagination. I dreamed about long voyages in vast waters of the Pacific Ocean. I was envious of Tur Heyerdal, who could travel along the Pacific islands and to Charles Gogin, who could draw beautiful Tahiti women.If I could imagine that I will become an artist and will live in Pacific?

Saisiyat (賽夏)

The Saisiyat believe that a long time ago, a tribe of three-foot tall, dark-skinned dwarfs once taught them to farm, sing, and dance, but also harassed and threatened the women.
Long ago, a tribe of dark-skinned pygmies arrived in the area inhabited by the Saisiyat. They were skilled in the arts of magic. The Taai (known as the Short People) gave the Saisiyat seeds and taught them the knowledge of agriculture, how to hold ceremonies and offer sacrifices to gods or ancestors.
Therefore the Saisiyat regarded the Taai as their benefactors. Whenever rituals and ceremonies were held, the Saisiyat always invited the Taai to be their guests, and they enjoyed drinking and having fun together.
The Taai, however, gradually began to encroach upon the Saisiyat women. To avoid disrupting harmonious relations between the tribes, those women who were violated remained silent. The Saisiyat tribal elders urged patience for the good of the whole tribe. The Taai, however, stepped up their encroachments on the Saisiyat. When the Saisiyat had had enough, they swore to avenge the insult on the Taai.
The Saisiyat knew that the Taai were particularly fond of climbing on a loquat tree that overhung a precipice. Two Saisiyat youths thereupon took it upon themselves to saw the tree halfway through. That evening, the Taai, not suspecting a thing, climbed one-by-one up into the tree. As more and more Taai scaled the tree, it could no longer take the weight and the trunk snapped. All of the Taai who had been sitting in the tree went over the edge. Those that weren't killed in the initial fall were drowned.
However two Taais, who had escaped the ambush, placed a curse on the Saisiyat tribe, leading to a succession of disasters and poor harvests. In an effort to lift the curse, the Saisiyat sang Taai songs and performed Taai dances to plead for forgiveness while also appealing for fair weather and a bountiful harvest. That is the origin of the Saisiyat tribe's pygmy spirit ritual.

The pygmy spirit ritual gives raise a hypothesis by a Japanese archeologist, Kano Tadao, that the prehistoric peoples living in Taiwan included Negritoes.