Anthropology and the Making of Chumash Tradition

Current Anthropology Volume 38, Number 5, December 1997 1997 by The Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research. All rights reserved 0011-3204/97/3805-0005$3.00 larry w. wilcoxon is Senior Archaeologist with Wilcoxon and Associates, Goleta, Calif. He was born in 1951 and educated at the University of California, Santa Barbara (B.A., 1974; M.A., Anthropology and the 1976; C.Phil., 1979). He has published (with M. A. Glassow) ``Coastal Adaptations near Point Conception, California, with Particular Regard to Shell®sh Exploitation'' (American Antiquity Making of Chumash 53:36±51) and ``Subsistence and Site Structure: An Approach for Deriving Cultural Information from Coastal Shell Middens,'' in 1 Archaeology on the Northern Channel Islands of California, ed- Tradition ited by M. Glassow (Coyote Press Archives of California Prehis- tory 34, 1993). The present paper was submitted 15 xi 96 and accepted 31 i 97; by Brian D. Haley and the ®nal version reached the Editor's of®ce 17 iv 97. Larry R. Wilcoxon Anthropologists have played an important role, some- Anthropologists employ concepts of cultural persistence, indige- times inadvertently and sometimes seemingly will- nous resistance, and primitivist imagery which mystify their fully, in promoting Chumash Traditionalism. By ``tra- own roles in the construction of Chumash identity and tradition. ditionalism'' we mean a movement which seeks to We attempt to demystify the scholars' remembering, forgetting, transform contemporary traditions by instituting be- and imagining of the Chumash past that has helped to construct an in¯uential Chumash Traditionalism since the 1960s, and we liefs and practices that the group's members believe are discuss how scholarly advances in understanding the ¯uidity of both taken from their own past (Geertz 1994:5±6) and cultural identities now contest Chumash Traditionalism. We ex- more natural, appropriate, and authentic than the be- amine the variety of roles played by anthropologists in this pro- liefs and practices to be replaced (Handler and Linnekin cess of identity negotiation, especially in traditional-cultural- 1984:278; Handler 1988:32±39). Contrary to the man- property evaluation and contract archaeology. The origin of the current sacredness of Point Conception, California, provides an ner in which it is popularly represented and understood, issue to frame this examination. We ®nd that anthropological traditionalism represents a break in cultural continuity practice and Chumash identity and tradition are so deeply entan- and is itself an important force for change. Traditional- gled that there is little hope that anthropologists can avoid partic- ists are therefore not necessarily any more traditional ipating in the self-determination of Chumash people. We con- clude that this creates a great need to historicize anthropology's than nontraditionalists (Geertz 1994). role in shaping and constraining identity and tradition until fur- We examine this traditionalism to reveal and ac- ther progress can be made in resolving the ethical dilemmas of knowledge anthropologists' position of in¯uence and to the anthropological study of cultural creativity. illustrate some of the problematic implications of a contemporary anthropological understanding of the re- brian d. haley is Senior Anthropologist with Wilcoxon and As- lationship between tradition and cultural identity. sociates, Goleta, Calif. (his mailing address: 7396 Freeman Place There has been considerable revisionism in the social #B, Goleta, Calif. 93117, U.S.A. [[email protected]]). Born in 1957, he received his education at the University of Cali- sciences over the past two decades regarding the use of fornia, Santa Barbara (B.A., 1979; M.A., 1987; Ph.D., 1997), where history and traditional culture in contemporary con- he was a researcher with the Center for Chicano Studies. He has texts. At the heart of this revisionism is recognition of published Aspects and Social Impacts of Size and Organization the creative representation of the past and its political in the Recently Developed Wine Industry of Santa Barbara County, California (Center for Chicano Studies Working Papers use as a weapon of or for power. Studies of the `ìnven- 2, 1989) and ``We Want Our Town Back!'' Housing Discrimina- tion of tradition'' (Hobsbawm and Ranger 1983, Handler tion as Exclusion (Center for Chicano Studies Papers on the and Linnekin 1984, Anderson 1991) have encountered a Working Poor, in press). serious and unresolved ethical problem; research which unmasks recent cultural or social constructions is threatening to the social position or goals of the group 1. We thank John Johnson, who has followed our project from its that claims them as its heritage or tradition. The notion inception and provided advice, references, and unpublished data and reviewed early drafts. We have also bene®ted from the sugges- that identities and histories are social constructions ne- tions provided by Eve Darian-Smith, David Cleveland, Tanis gotiated between parties necessarily raises questions Thorne, Don Brown, Mary O'Connor, Richard Handler, Richard about the boundedness of self-determination, who Fox, and two anonymous referees. John Johnson, Janice Timbrook, speaks for whom, or what Chatterjee labels efforts ``to Linda Agren, and Gilbert Unzueta of the Anthropology Depart- claim for us, the once-colonized, our freedom of imagi- ment, Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, assisted us with the Harrington micro®lm. Richard Fox graciously provided a copy nation'' (1993:13; see also Castile 1996). of and permission to quote from his 1995 lecture at the University All peoples employ myth/history as a charter of their of California, Santa Barbara. Donna Sheeders brought the Esselen collective identity (Malinowski 1960 [1944]), and all en- Western Gate to our attention and provided source material. Susan gage in selective remembering, forgetting, and imagin- Davidson and Hallie K. Heiman assisted different stages of our research. A portion of our research was performed under a contract ing of that myth/history (Renan 1990 [1882]; Anderson with California Commercial Spaceport, Inc., Lompoc, Calif. We 1991:187±206). Social science generally (Handler 1988), alone are responsible for the interpretations contained herein. folklore studies in particular (Orso 1974; Dundes 1989: 761 762 current anthropology Volume 38, Number 5, December 1997 1±39, 40±56), and even archaeology (Dietler 1994) are generally within the region.2 We have made a detailed drawn upon to identify the cultural content used to dis- examination of John Peabody Harrington's (1986) mi- tinguish ethnic and national identities. Sociology is not, cro®lmed ®eld notes on the Chumash from the 1910s as Giddens (1990:15) appears to suggest, unique among and 1920s, and we have conducted our own interviews the social sciences in being re¯exive. Anthropological with Chumash Traditionalists and nontraditionalists, knowledge generated by research is incorporated by our as well as relevant non-Indians. We also draw upon our subjects and changes their own understanding of their cumulative 45 years of work with Chumash and an- cultural identity and heritage. Anthropologist partici- thropologists in the region, treating it as long-term pants in cultural identity construction may be antici- participant-observation or insider ethnography on an- pated sometimes to have their own selective-memory thropologists' roles in Chumash identity transforma- problems, too. tions over the past two decades. The actions taken by some anthropologists to liberate traditional belief and practice among the Chumash of California's central coast should be understood in the Identity, Tradition, and Oppositional context of this academic debate. Employing oppositions Convention of traditional versus modern and indigenous versus Western, guided by notions of persistence and continu- Recognition of a process of cultural differentiation in ity, and lacking a contrasting concept of identity differ- addition to the long-noted processes of assimilation and entiation or creation, local anthropologists have pro- persistence is one of the important developments in the moted the creation of a new religious philosophy and ®eld of ethnicity and nationalism in recent decades. We its classi®cation on the traditional side of the dichot- see this described as the `ìnvention'' of tradition or his- omy. They have facilitated the creation and empow- tory (Hobsbawm and Ranger 1983, Handler and Lin- erment of Chumash Traditionalists at the expense of nekin 1984), the ``creation'' of ethnic groups or tradi- other Chumash, who come to be viewed as nontradi- tions (Sollors 1989), `ìmagined community'' (Anderson tional through the logic of oppositional classi®cation 1991), the ``reconstitution'' of ethnicity (O'Brien 1991), alone. This case illustrates not only what Roseberry and the ``construction'' and ``negotiation'' of identities O'Brien (1991:11) call the ``modern tracks toward the (Keefe 1989), and `èthnogenesis'' (Roosens 1989). As traditional'' but also what may be characterized as the this list of terms implies, the creation of identities and postcolonial tracks toward the indigenous. The Chu- the creation of traditions go hand in hand, and therefore mash are roughly 3,000 persons residing on California's ethnic and nationalist movements characteristically ex- central coast who claim descent from aboriginal inhab- hibit discontinuity as well as continuity with the past itants of the same region who spoke

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