Paul van der Grijp Knihy

This book examines the significance of mana in the evolution of chiefly power in the Pacific, highlighting chiefs as intermediaries between traditional and modern leadership forms, the latter defined by rationality and nation-state bureaucracy. Despite the presence of modern political figures like presidents and judges, chiefs continue to wield influence, grounded in tradition and the concept of mana, which signifies divine inspiration or energy linked to individuals, objects, and natural elements. Polynesian chiefs derive their mana from their lineage to ancient gods. The text delves into related concepts such as asymmetrical ideology, mythical social constructs, and social drama, illustrated through diverse ethnographic examples. The analysis of Tongan chieftaincy and kingship serves as a case study of the complex integration of Polynesian culture into a global framework, shaped by external forces like colonization and internal developments like state formation and democratic aspirations. This exploration, alongside other Polynesian instances, provides valuable insights into the ongoing dynamics of mana and chieftaincy amid globalization in the Pacific, reflecting both continuity and transformation.

This book is about the yearning for authenticity via art and exoticism. Exoticism related to art cannot be reduced to primitivism alone and also encompasses a search in one's own unconsciousness among other things. The yearning for authenticity through exoticism is explored in a cultural anthropological perspective in the realms of Western philosophy ( capita selecta) and colonial literature, currents of art, and in the appreciation of Western art conceptions in non-Western societies. An array of firsthand ethnographic illustrations of art production in Asian and Pacific societies demonstrates complementary processes in the non-Western world. A major hypothesis is that exoticism is closely related to, and often motivated by eroticism, a reason why exoticism should be considered as gendered. Case studies of the falsification of authentic art, the de-sacralization of sacred objects, and of the use of natural materials deriving from endangered species complete the analysis.

Collecting is a matter of authenticity, of creating new identities, both of the objects collected and, by extension, of the collector. Passion and Profit provides a range of ethnographic examples, both historical and contemporary, and also includes a selective analysis and personal evaluation of the increasingly rich and varied literature on collecting. The collectibles discussed in Passion and Profit are not only elitist cultural objects such as works of art (ancient, modern or tribal), antiques and books, but also non-elitist objects such as stamps, postcards, plants, and other mass- produced items. The central research question is: What is the cultural phenomenon of collecting all about? Or, more specifically: What moves collectors? In addressing this question, this book aims to be a substantial contribution to the collecting literature from an anthropological point of view.