Person, Space, and Memory: Why Anthropology Needs Cognitive Science and Human Geography

Abstract

Among the Iatmul of the Sepik River in Papua New Guinea, conflicts over the rightful possession of cosmologically significant names are decided by having the opponents and their supporters meet near the ceremonial stool (pabu) in the men’s house for a special debate. The thousands of secret sacred names of persons and places that may be involved are central to the ramified Iatmul mythological system, which is anchored in the landscape and which combines the past and present. Demanding elaborate feats of rhetorical skill and memory facilitated by localized mental representations, such encounters involve mastery of highly complex intellectual activities that draw on comprehensive knowledge of Iatmul myths of origin, clans, totems, migration, and settlement. This chapter first presents excepts from such debate and explains that an anthropologist’s understanding of this complex system requires insights into research on human memory and learning capacities as well as competence in indigenous concepts of local geography.