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Performing Selves: the Semiotics of Selfhood In PERFORMING SELVES: THE SEMIOTICS OF SELFHOOD IN SAMOAN DANCE By DIANNA MARY GEORGINA A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN ANTHROPOLOGY WASHINGTON STATE UNIVERSITY Department of Anthropology MAY 2007 © Copyright by DIANNA MARY GEORGINA, 2007 All Rights Reserved © Copyright by DIANNA MARY GEORGINA, 2007 All Rights Reserved To the Faculty of Washington State University: The members of the Committee appointed to examine the dissertation of DIANNA MARY GEORGINA find it satisfactory and recommend that it be accepted. ___________________________________ Chair ___________________________________ ___________________________________ ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I wish to acknowledge and thank all the Samoan people who provided me with alofa , especially Cecilia and Dickie Reid and Fa’alu Iuli, choreographers Sai Stevens, Korina Chamberlin, Sandra Neria, and Taloga Tupai Drabble, and all the adolescent dancers who provided me with insights into selfhood. I would also like to thank my committee members, who helped me develop the ideas presented in this dissertation and kept me on track by asking the right questions, and who sat through several incarnations of my 56 minute documentary. Thanks, too, to all my friends and colleagues who provided me with support and inspiration, especially Millie Hill and Shawna and Adam Brown. And of course my family, who have supported me as I chase my dreams, even when they mean surviving Category 5 cyclones on tiny rocks in the South Pacific. iii PERFORMING SELVES: THE SEMIOTICS OF SELFHOOD IN SAMOAN DANCE Abstract by Dianna Mary Georgina, Ph.D. Washington State University May 2007 Chair: Jeannette-Marie Mageo This dissertation investigates three questions: 1) How valid is Erik Erikson’s theory of adolescent identity formation for teens in American Samoa? 2) What role could traditional Samoan dance play in forming a sense of self that merges two opposing cultural concepts of self? 3) Can dance provide a venue for the semiotic representation of a merging of these construals of self? While adolescence as a developmental period is not new to Samoa, teenagers in American Samoa are going through an adolescence that has become more similar to that experienced by American teens and less like the smooth and easy adolescence Mead described. Teens, according to Erik Erikson, are in a developmental period where they are asking themselves, “Who am I?” It is difficult to define self when one’s traditional culture emphasizes harmonious interdependence and playing one’s proper role in the hierarchy; meanwhile, the attractive, modern culture seen on television and in the movies emphasizes independence and individuality. Not all teens were experiencing the kind of emotional turbulence that led others to self- destructive behaviors. Adolescent girls I spoke with were demonstrating resilience and an ability iv to thrive emotionally. They have merged Western and Samoan cultural conceptions of self through traditional Samoan dance. Adolescent girls in American Samoa are also challenging the social norms of the role of girls and women in dance and perhaps in society. They are semiotically merging opposing definitions of self and identity through dance, by inserting elements of individuality in a group activity. They are dancing again in the role of clown, and in what has been an all-male dance, the ‘ailao . By reasserting their roles as clowns and warriors, they are reclaiming a modern version of pre-contact traditional roles. As American Samoa gradually changes with encroachment by the West, traditional Samoan dance also evolves. Not only is it absorbing elements of dance forms and styles from other Polynesian islands and adapting to pressures to be more appealing to non-Samoans, it is also changing to reflect the changes in conceptions of self influenced by globalization and the spread of Western ideas. It will be interesting to see how today’s adolescent girls, when they become tomorrow’s dance choreographers, modify traditional Samoan dance to reflect other changes—the seeds of which are being sown today. This dissertation contributes to our understanding of adolescent identity formation in a postcolonial non-Western culture by examining the validity of Erik Erikson’s theory in American Samoa. It contributes to theories of biculturalism by exploring the ways in which Samoan adolescent girls are using traditional Samoan dance in defining self in a two-culture world—a self that merges opposing cultural concepts of what it means to be a person. It also explores the role played by traditional Samoan dance in the creation and expression of this composite concept of self. v TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .................................................................................................................iii ABSTRACT………….......................................................................................................................iv CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION ...........................................................................................................1 About this dissertation...............................................................................................1 Introduction................................................................................................................1 Growing Up in Samoa...................................................................................4 Theoretical Framework..............................................................................................9 Adolescent Psychological Development........................................................9 Erik Erikson’s Theory of Adolescent Psychological Development ..............10 Self Theory.....................................................................................................12 Psychological Concepts of the Self................................................................13 Cultural Models of the Self............................................................................14 2. ELEMENTS OF THE SELF ...........................................................................................21 Identity.......................................................................................................................21 Social identity................................................................................................24 Personal identity.............................................................................................28 Identity formation..........................................................................................31 Autonomy..................................................................................................................43 Self Boundaries..........................................................................................................49 The Village is like a Person...........................................................................51 Subjectivity and Emotions.........................................................................................57 vi Body Image................................................................................................................65 Adolescent Egocentrism............................................................................................68 Imaginary (and Real) Audience.....................................................................68 Personal Fable................................................................................................72 3. DANCE….........................................................................................................................76 Role of Dance............................................................................................................76 Showing off....................................................................................................76 Standing out vs. standing at your post...........................................................78 Reinforcement of cultural patterns.................................................................82 Carnivale, Mana , and the Logic of Dreams...............................................................83 Semiotics of Self: Making New Meanings....................................................92 Parody and poetic discourse...........................................................................93 Samoan Dances..........................................................................................................96 Order of the dances........................................................................................99 Ma’ulu’ulu .....................................................................................................100 The ‘ Ailao and Siva Sate ................................................................................103 Siva .................................................................................................................105 The Sasa .........................................................................................................105 Fa’ataupati ....................................................................................................106 Taualuga ........................................................................................................107 4. CONCLUSIONS..............................................................................................................109 5. REFERENCES ................................................................................................................115
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