Remembering Bernard Juillerat. Visiting the Bánaro After Richard Thurnwald

Journal de la Société des Océanistes 130-131 | 2010 Hommage à Bernard Juillerat Remembering Bernard Juillerat. Visiting the Bánaro after Richard Thurnwald Marion Melk-Koch Electronic version URL: http://journals.openedition.org/jso/6075 DOI: 10.4000/jso.6075 ISSN: 1760-7256 Publisher Société des océanistes Printed version Date of publication: 15 December 2010 Number of pages: 29-40 ISBN: 978-2-85430-027-7 ISSN: 0300-953x Electronic reference Marion Melk-Koch, « Remembering Bernard Juillerat. Visiting the Bánaro after Richard Thurnwald », Journal de la Société des Océanistes [Online], 130-131 | 2010, Online since 15 December 2013, connection on 09 June 2020. URL : http://journals.openedition.org/jso/6075 ; DOI : https://doi.org/ 10.4000/jso.6075 © Tous droits réservés Remembering Bernard Juillerat. Visiting the Bánaro after Richard Thurnwald by Marion MELK-KOCH* ABSTRACT RÉSUMÉ Bernard Juillerat followed in Richard Thurnwald’s Bernard Juillerat, en s’intéressant aux effets des footsteps as a result of their common interest in the structures sociales sur la psyché individuelle, a mis ses impact of specific social structures on the psyche of pas dans ceux de Richard Thurnwald (1869-1954). individuals. Both considered research in New Guinea as Tous deux sont allés en Nouvelle-Guinée enquêter spé- particularly rewarding for answering such questions in cialement sur ce sujet et tâcher de l’élucider en s’affran- an area unaffected by European-American culture. This chissant des influences culturelles européennes ou amé- article will discuss Bernard’s restudy of a group of ricaines. Le présent article discute l’étude à nouveaux people, living by the Keram river, which had first been frais qu’a donnée Bernard d’un groupe vivant sur les contacted by Thurnwald in 1913 and had been described rives de la Keram, auparavant contacté en 1913 par by him as ‘‘the Bánaro’’. Their complex social structure, Richard Thurnwald qui l’a décrit sous le nom de analysed by Thurnwald in two different publications in «Bánaro», et qui lui a consacré une monographie dont il 1916 and 1920, made them the subject of one of the a livré deux versions. Ces deux savants ont apporté de la earliest monographs on a Melanesian society. In restu- sorte une contribution marquante à l’histoire de l’ethno- dying and analysing Thurnwald’s work Juillerat, like logie. Thurnwald, contributed significantly to the history of ethnology. Mots-clés : Nouvelle-Guinée, Sépik, Bánaro, sys- tèmes de parenté, histoire intellectuelle, études Keywords: Papua New Guinea, Sepik, Bánaro, critiques kinship systems, intellectual history, restudies Actually, I did not really know Bernard Juille- Bernard Juillerat, who was living on the same rat. In addition, my French was and is not good housing estate, agreed spontaneously to forsake enough to comprehend fully his profound expla- a very interesting TV discussion about the situa- nations of philosophical and psychoanalytical tion in Afghanistan, which had absorbed his questions. My memories of him are letters, attention, and to keep us company. It was a very Christmas cards and two personal meetings ¢ agreeable evening. one in Berlin shortly after the fall of the Berlin Our point of contact was Richard Thurnwald Wall in the summer of 1991 and another one in (1869-1954) and his two monographs about the Paris where Marie-Claire Bataille-Benguigui Bánaro. (i) 1916 Bánaro Society. Social Organi- had invited us for dinner and where it turned out, zation and Kinship System of a Tribe in the Inte- during a conversation, that we knew each other. rior of New Guinea, in Memoirs of the American * Curator Oceania/Australia Staatliche Ethnographische Sammlungen Sachsen, Leipzig, Germany, marion.melk- [email protected] Journal de la Société des Océanistes, 130-131, année 2010 30 SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES Kolonialamt» ¢ and the Royal Museum of Eth- nology in Berlin had organised an interdiscipli- nary expedition to explore the inner part of Kaiser-Wilhelms-Land along the Sepik river. This primarily geographic exploration included anthropological and ethnographical research as well. The group, consisting mainly of Roesike, Behrmann and Thurnwald ¢ who joined a year later ¢ found several tributaries of the Sepik. In 1913, Richard Thurnwald and the geographer Walter Behrmann, were both participants on the «Kaiserin-Augusta-Fluss Expedition», as the Sepik was called during the German colonial period. They were the first to contact the Bánaro, who lived on a tributary of this river. Here it is necessary to somewhat develop my own research. This will help understand the pro- blems Bernard Juillerat had in finding documents relating to Thurnwald’s work about the Bánaro.Astheyarekeptinseveralplacesthrough- out the world, the search for Thurnwald’s archives reads a little bit like detective work. By autumn 1988, I had nearly completed my thesis. And when Bernard’s inquiry reached me, I was about to map some important details concerning Thurnwald’s research in New Guinea. It was to become an interesting and unexpected discovery for the field of historical ethnology. And this discovery dealt precisely with Thurnwald’s monograph about the Bánaro, which was first published in 1916 in a short version. In 1921, Document 1. ¢ Title page of the 1921 Bánaro monograph in Thurnwald followed it up with a considerably German extended German version. After the outbreak of World War I, Thurn- wald spent a total of one year in New Guinea Anthropological Association, Vol. III, No. 4, before he could leave for the United States; he Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and (ii) 1921 Die was allowed to take with him only a small part of Gemeinde der Bánaro. Ehe, Verwandtschaft his collections, field-notes and photographs. und Gesellschaftsbau eines Stammes im Innern Documentation dealing with Richard Thurn- von Neu-Guinea. Aus den Ergebnissen einer wald’s collections in the National Archives of Forschungsreise 1913-15. Ein Beitrag zur Australia in Canberra, shows that none other Entstehungsgeschichte von Familie und Staat. than Winston Churchill himself decided on the Stuttgart1. fate of these items, which today are located for In October 1988, I received a message from the the most part in Sydney.Thurnwald’s collections Berlin Museum of Ethnology telling me that a comprised ethnographic and geological speci- French colleague had made inquiries about mens, sound recordings, photographs, drawings unpublished materials on Richard Thurnwald’s and sketches of maps and field-notes. research during the latter’s stay with the Bánaro Due to the wartime situation it was impossible and would like to get in contact with me. From for Thurnwald to return home by a direct route, the Berlin Museum he had learned about my so he took the chance to try the way back to work on a doctoral thesis about the two big Germany via the United States. At the Univer- expeditions of Richard Thurnwald to the former sity of California in Berkeley, Thurnwald German South Seas Protectorate and he himself encountered great hospitality and came into planned a «restudy» of this population group. In close contact with colleagues of German descent 1911, the German Government ¢ the «Reichs- like Alfred L. Kroeber and Robert Lowie, 1. Bánaro Society. Marriage, Social Organization and Kinship System of a Tribe in the Interior of New Guinea. Findings from an Expedition 1913-15. A Contribution to the History of Origin of Family and State. REMEMBERING BERNARD JUILLERAT. VISITING THE BAÌ NARO AFTER RICHARD THURNWALD 31 Document 2. ¢ Map taken from Behrmann (1922) amongst others. There, at that time, the systema- results. Thurnwald could not complete the tic analysis of classificatory kinship systems was proof-reading because he was forced to leave the an important topic. Thus in 1916, when the first U.S. precipitately, after the country entered the publication about the Bánaro was released, it war. Once again he was not able to take his was a late-breaking publication of his research remaining records with him to Germany. Part of 32 SOCIÉTÉ DES OCÉANISTES the documents remained in Berkeley, another dence files that were preserved in the Berlin Eth- part was lost on the way to New York City when nological Museum, more questions than mailed later. Some of Thurnwald’s documents answers arose. First and foremost, the numerous are still kept in the University of California, publications and results of Thurnwald’s first tra- Berkeley, among them some handwritten copies vel heavily contradicted the letters between of Thurnwald’s texts made by Kroeber. For the Thurnwald and his supervisor Felix von Lus- German version of the Bánaro publication chan, head of the department of Oceania in Thurnwald had even fewer documents at his dis- Berlin. Many of the connections remained com- posal. Moreover, he had to leave his ethnogra- pletely in the dark and could not be enlightened phic collection behind ¢ as before in Australia. even by the articles distributed in multitudinous He was not allowed to take pictures and docu- journals and anthologies (many of them were ments with him from the U.S. In San Francisco, fortunately available as offprints in the Ethnolo- he left behind 47 boxes, 3 boxes with photo- gical Institute of the Berlin Free University, graphs and 7 boxes with notes, as well as valu- which was founded by Thurnwald after World able maps and collections. (For details see Melk- War II). It was necessary to discover new sour- Koch, 1989: 249, 2000: 53, 68; Graig, 1997: 387, ces! Where, for instance, were Thurnwald’s field- 404.) notes from New Guinea and the manuscript of It was not easy to reconstruct these processes the second volume of his Buin monograph which to this point. Additionally, I heard about the was never printed? Where were the linguistic documents in Berkeley and the other documents field-notes and the maps drawn by him? What concerning the collection in Sydney only when I was his life like before the journeys and after his had already completed my doctoral thesis.

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