TAHITI BEYOND THE POSTCARD: AN ETHNOGRAPHIC REVIEW

When one considers the south pacific island of Tahiti, images of white-sand beaches, turquoise lagoons and exotic women permeate the mind. This “postcard image” of Tahiti masks a different reality that most outsiders are unaware of. Past colonial influences and nuclear testing has scarred the landscape and indigenous people and the outsider’s dream of Tahiti masks the neglected medical maladies and environmental disasters that have been inflicted by nuclear testing.

In Dr. Miriam Kahn’s ethnography “Tahiti Beyond the Postcard: Power, Place, and Everyday Life”, the reader examines the struggle for Tahitian cultural identity through early fantasies that were influenced by colonialism, cold war nuclear testing, and the current image produced by today's tourism industry. The fierce dichotomy between foreigners and natives are told in relation to historical perspectives.

Kahn’s ethnography is a holistic view into the cultural identity of the Tahitian people that leaves nothing to be desired. As a personal favorite of mine, I find that this ethnography makes me question my own cultural identity in relation to historical events and perspectives and challenge the very notion of what it means to be subjected to structural violence. The ethnographic descriptions of nuclear testing are profoundly powerful, and one cannot help but sympathize with the people of Tahiti, who are themselves slaves to modernization. Kahn’s success in conveying such a powerful message is due in part to the narrative that expresses the foreign and native perspectives in French Polynesia in a way that the reader is able to grasp what is at stake for both sides.

HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES

In the mid-1700’s, many Europeans, intimately versed in biblical references to paradise, began to search the pacific ocean in search of utopia. Kahn articulates that long before Europeans set foot on the island, early images of Tahiti were “deeply influenced by imperialist ambitions and philosophical speculation” (Kahn, 33). In French Philosopher Jean-Jacques Rosseau’s book, “discours sur l'origine de l'inégalité parmi les homes” (discourse on the origin of inequality among men), he painted this image of an idyllic society in which all men are equal and lived in balance with nature, he christened this society as a gathering of the “noble savage” (Kahn, 32). In 1767, British explorer Samuel Wallis became the first European to land on Tahiti, “Wallis and his men bartered beads, mirrors, and nails (which Tahitians specially coveted for making fishhooks) in exchange for food and sex” (Kahn, 33). This exchange exacerbated Rosseau’s “noble savage” myth, which generated embellished stories, including the story of the HMS Dolphin that nearly fell apart as sailors pulled nails from the ship. This prompted the Tahitian leaders to believe that they could “tame” foreign ships by sending women out in canoes to offer themselves to sailors.

After contact with the Tahitians, numerous exotic images began to circulate after painters depicted vast landscapes and loose women. In 1797, this prompted Catholic and British protestant missionaries to the island to change the indigenous lifestyle. Missionaries banned dancing, singing, and the worship of ancient Tahitian deities (Kahn, 39). The missionaries paved the way for stronger colonial foothold. Kahn argues that “France altered the geography of Tahiti to suit its needs for national security and economic growth” (Kahn, 40). Under the colonial power of France, Tahiti served as a maritime station, serving as places for French military and commercial vessels to be refueled and resupplied and a nuclear testing site (Kahn, 41).

NUCLEAR TOURISM

In the early 1960’s, Tahiti experienced two major changes. France relocated their nuclear testing program from Algeria to French Polynesia and the worldwide intensification of mass tourism. Kahn says “this contradictory phenomena- which created destruction and nightmares on one hand, and dreams and fantasies on the other- became deeply entertained in French Polynesia’s political economy. Now representations of a seductive paradise served new purposes.” She speculates that the imagery of paradise was engineered to “divert attention from the nuclear testing program by creating a veil behind which dire consequences of the testing could be hidden” (Kahn, 61). According to Dr. Kahn, control is a key element. This allows a screening of the “mess” of reality. While exploring the realm of successful tourism campaigns, Kahn uses the idea of a cocoon as a protective shield. She reasons that each tourist employs to keep away the aspects of daily life that aren’t desirable; these cocoons are nurtured by tour guides and travel agencies. They unknowingly help tourists interpret their experience and give them information to help them produce their fantasies.

In the summer of 2012, while I was conducting research on the repercussions of nuclear testing in French Polynesia, I would examine the few tourists that visit the island. There were mostly French citizens who vacationed in fancy resorts that were staffed by Tahitian workers. They traveled by bus and inhabited closed spaces that locals were banned from. Private, pristine beaches were serviced by locals who were unable to enjoy the fruits of their labor by swimming at the beaches. Instead, locals swam in beaches covered in hardened volcanic ash and broken coral pieces. The tourism industry boasts the biggest industry in the world and the movement of people continues to escalate as places and politics more interconnected. The Fa’a international airport, which opened in 1960, was originally created for the French to transfer personnel and nuclear material but currently serve the thousands of tourists that travel through there annually. Many of these tourists are ignorant to this fact. Kahn says that the “production of imagery that reinforces the myth is critically important to the economy of French Polynesia” (Kahn, 77). It is severely important to note that exploding nuclear bombs in the atmosphere and altering the environment to create artificial paradises are not how Tahitians would behave toward the land. This prompted a fierce ongoing struggle about how place is understood, used, respected, and represented.

TAHITIAN PERSPECTIVES

Kahn described the tension between local and foreign perspectives of the land as a battle, characterized as a “struggle between conceiving space through representation and living place through actual sensual experience” (Kahn, 61). For Tahitians, their cultural identity is rooted in the land, “Tahitian’s experience their land… as alive with procreative powers and nurturing abilities.    The Ma’ohi (the indigenous term for Tahitians) notions of place define the complications in struggle over the land, Kahn articulates, “In Polynesia, land figures as equivalent to one’s own body and family rather than as an inanimate object” (Kahn, 62-63).

The land provides Tahitians with basic needs for survival and childcare, which prompts many Tahitians to see it as a mother figure. The most poignant evidence of their beliefs is demonstrated by the Tahitian custom of burying a child’s placenta and umbilical cord “in the belly of the bountiful mother”.  A Huahine woman named Marama Teiho explained:

“The placenta is always replanted in the earth. When a child is in the womb the mother takes care of the child, but when it is born the mother asks the land to take care of her child. The land will give life to the child by providing food…You can bury the placenta and then move away. It doesn’t matter where you live because you are still connected to your family’s land” (Kahn, 66)

In Gay Becker’s article, “Metaphors in Disrupted Lives: Infertility and Cultural Constructions of Continuity”, he states that order begins with the body. Centrality of the body is how individuals construct meaning and how order is constructed through bodily knowledge. In the case of Kahn’s ethnography, Becker’s idea of bodily knowledge is evident in this maternal practice. The body (which is symbolically represented by the mothers placenta or the infants umbilical cord) is buried deep in the ground.

CULTURAL ASSIMILATION AND RESISTENCE

Today, French Polynesia remains a colony of France. The local people have adopted the French language and have employed them in governmental proceedings, education systems, and necessary employment criteria. In order for an individual to be successful in school, he or she must master the French language. The Tahitian language is only taught in university classrooms or in an individual’s household. This past summer, I met a 25-year-old Tahitian man named Mahei who was stuck at a crossroads. He had completed schooling in Huahine (an island three hours away from the island of Tahiti) and the only way for him to continue would be to travel to France for further training. A venture that is strongly discouraged by his grandparents, who require his help with the family farm, and his parents who fear he would return “French”. Mahei continues life canoe racing, Tahitian dancing, and making more, (the decorative grass skirts used in cultural festivals). The process of assimilation into the life of a French citizen is met by resistance and results in limited economic opportunities for the Tahitians. Throughout the history of Tahiti, the main exports have always been visions and illusions. This has been made possible due to the growing tourism industry but the material conditions of Tahitian living are absent.

FURTHER ANALYSIS

While Kahn’s ethnography does contain many strong points, I find the issues discussed in the ethnography to be beyond what any worldly citizen is able to influence. It is a call to action that negates to mention a formal plan of action; instead it influences deep discussion and further dissection of the destruction of a whole cultural identity.  In Susan Scrimshaw’s article “International Public Health”, Scrimshaw states that culture is constantly modified through lived experiences which dictates that “culture is not static on either the group or individual level, because people are constantly changing. This concept helps allow for cultural change as people migrate… acquire additional education and experiences, and as conditions change around them” (Scrimshaw, 44). The Schrimshaw article begs further critique of this ethnography, is culture-found equal to culture-loss? In Kahn’s discussion of Tahitian cultural identity; culture is presented as harmonious when static but subject to harmful fluidity and foreign assimilation.

The issues presented in the ethnography are ongoing political struggles that have culminated in a love/hate relationship that the Tahitians have toward the French. Seen as the responsible of the death of their culture and their economic liberators, the relationship between two groups have grown rather complex. The process of colonization, though constantly met with opposition, has inhabited the mind of every Tahitian and their desire for economic liberties denies them the ability to be “fully Tahitian”. They must concede to French education, language, and mannerisms in order to fiscally support their household. This helps the reader sympathize with the Tahitian community. It is very easy to demonize France for the seemingly neglectful treatment of French Polynesia but it is important to note that France considers French Polynesia to be a part of their empire as well. For the French government, it was an extension of their lands, supported for their economic growth and national security needs.

Although this book does not explicitly detail a global health issue, it does touch upon different cultural perspectives. During the thirty year reign of nuclear testing in the French Polynesian island of Moruroa, many Tahitians were offered three times the normal salary to work in the nuclear testing site. Without proper knowledge of what the government was doing, the Tahitian workers were ordered to walk outside and examine the fallout of nuclear testing, collect nuclear material, and ordered to halt cultural activities (such as fishing, swimming, and hunting) without a governmental explanation. The result has been a catastrophic increase in cancer rates, something that the Tahitian workers have been unable to have recognized in French legal courts.

CONCLUSION

Racial tensions of the “conqueror” and the “noble savage” are brought to the forefront as the reader examines relations between both groups during colonization, nuclear testing, and the exploitation of tourism in French Polynesia. Dr. Kahn enlists the help of Tahitian activists, artists, governmental officials and oppressed natives to tell the story of Tahitian fight for independence and autonomy. She serves as a vigorous advocate that calls the reader’s attention to human rights abuses and demands action. This ethnography is especially important for understanding the construction of culture in the face of modernization and exploitation. It can be used in cultural studies as a lesson in cultural humility. It outlines the perception of health for Tahitians as intricately tied to the land they inhabit. For Tahitians, the land is a spiritual figure that supports life and for the western world, land represents capital and financial opportunities. The entire ethnography is about breaking down misconceptions, Tahitians pay no mind to the “Tahiti of western imagination” while the relationship also works inversely, western societies pay no mind to the material realities of Tahitian living.

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1.      Kahn, Miriam. Tahiti Beyond the Postcard: Power, Place and Everyday Life. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2011. Print.

2.      Errington, Frederick, and Deborah Gewertz. "Tourism and Anthropology in a Post-Modern World." Oceania. 60.1 (1989): Pages 37-54. Print.

3.      MacConnell, Dean. The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure class. New York: Schoden, 1976 Pages 91-107. Print.

4.      Becker, G. (1994). Metaphors in disrupted lives: Infertility and cultural constructions of continuity . Medical Anthropology Quarterly , 8(4), 383-410. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/649087

5.      Scrimshaw, Susan (2001). “Culture, Behavior and Health”. In International Public Health. M.H. Merson, R.E. Black and A.J. Mills, eds. Gaithersburg, Maryland: Aspen. Pp 53-77.