An ethnography of emotion and morality : toward a local indigenous theory of value and social exchange on the Yolngu Homelands in remote North-East Arnhem Land

Abstract

Drawing on the key body of terms and concepts associated with affect and emotion in Yolnu-matha, this thesis explores the way Yolnu people of North-East Arnhem Land consider morality and value in everyday relations. This material suggests that Yolnu conceive of and consider persons to be fundamentally and necessarily interdependent rather than intrinsically autonomous. On a socio-centric level the relationship between groups in referred to as raki' (strings [of relatedness]). The normative ideal relationship between groups is when raki' are manapan-mirri (Joined, connected, linked [together to each other]), and the groups thus wangany-nura ([at] one). Proper practice and conduct is to malthum nhannu raki' (follow [up] the string), while upset, disequilibrium, or conflict is aid to threaten to gulk'thun nhannu raki' (cut or sever the string). This paralleled on an interpersonal level by nayanu (state or sense of feeling [among and between people]), the basic concept of affect/emotion and ground of moral evaluation. Balance and equilibrium is denoted by the normative ideal of nayanu wangany (one state or sense of feeling). Proper behaviour and moral conduct is said to be nayanu-yu (through nayanu), while moral transgressions register as nayanu wutthuna-mirri rom (law or manner of doing things that affronts or assaults the state of feeling). I analyse a series of case studies from different aspects of everyday life to show that this body of terms and concepts - and the shared understandings comprising them - motivate and shape forms and patterns of sociality and exchange in significant, culturally specific ways. This description and my findings depart from prevailing models of Aboriginal sociality and exchange in Australia, which are strongly influenced by approaches that foreground a tension between contrasting values of autonomy and relatedness. Rather than either autonomy or relatedness, it is in particular sate of the relationship between people that is significant for Yolnu; social equilibrium, balance, and value are relative to a particular, culturally recognised state of the relationship between people and groups, rather than contrasting values of autonomy and relatedness. This key point of difference allows for a unique analysis of Yolnu sociality and exchange. As with Kenneth Liberman's description of social consensus in the Western Desert, we see that the 'orderliness' that exists in Yolnu society is the collaborative product of a great deal of social and moral work. In what is effectively an example of non-State sociality - largely unmediated by the market and bureaucratic relations - the relative distribution of energy, intelligence and social concern is geared towards the realisation and maintenance of social order. The primary and paramount value is - nayanu wangany; nayanu wangany is the paramount value in both material and non-material exchange, and sociality is characterised by culturally specific strategies to maintain it. I conclude by arguing that the local interplay of forms, material conditions, and social relations of exchange can justly be considered a local theory of value and exchange in its own right. As such it sheds light upon prevailing anthropological models of exchange as well as current anthropological theories of value. Show more