TY - CHAP
T1 - Longgu
T2 - Conceptualizing the human person from the inside out
AU - HILL, Deborah
N1 - Funding Information:
The financial support from U.S. Public Health Service( grant no. AM-GM-10765) is gratefully acknowledged.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 Taylor & Francis.
PY - 2019
Y1 - 2019
N2 - The Longgu people (Solomon Islands) conceptualize the human person as consisting of two parts, suli (‘body’) and anoa (roughly, ‘spirit’). Understanding the concept of anoa requires an understanding of other concepts, including agalo ‘ancestor spirit’ and Marapa, the place of ancestor spirits. This chapter discusses and explicates these culture-specific terms in Minimal English. The author argues that the conceptualization of the human person in Longgu can be described as seeing a human person ‘from the inside out’: rather than conceptualizing the human person as something visible (a body), with something invisible inside, Longgu people think in terms of what is inside (a ‘spirit’), and then as what can be seen on the outside (a body).The chapter contributes to the wider discussion of personhood in Melanesian societies. One of the most significant concepts in Melanesian anthropology is that of the Melanesian person as ‘dividual’ as opposed to the European person, who is ‘individual’. The dividual person is ‘permeable’, while the individual is ‘impermeable’. That is, the Melanesian concept of the human person is argued to be one that is less bound by the human body. The significance of spirits in the Longgu conceptualization of the human person points in the same direction.
AB - The Longgu people (Solomon Islands) conceptualize the human person as consisting of two parts, suli (‘body’) and anoa (roughly, ‘spirit’). Understanding the concept of anoa requires an understanding of other concepts, including agalo ‘ancestor spirit’ and Marapa, the place of ancestor spirits. This chapter discusses and explicates these culture-specific terms in Minimal English. The author argues that the conceptualization of the human person in Longgu can be described as seeing a human person ‘from the inside out’: rather than conceptualizing the human person as something visible (a body), with something invisible inside, Longgu people think in terms of what is inside (a ‘spirit’), and then as what can be seen on the outside (a body).The chapter contributes to the wider discussion of personhood in Melanesian societies. One of the most significant concepts in Melanesian anthropology is that of the Melanesian person as ‘dividual’ as opposed to the European person, who is ‘individual’. The dividual person is ‘permeable’, while the individual is ‘impermeable’. That is, the Melanesian concept of the human person is argued to be one that is less bound by the human body. The significance of spirits in the Longgu conceptualization of the human person points in the same direction.
KW - Semantics
KW - Ethnopsychology
KW - Oceanic language
KW - personhood
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85061855388&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.4324/9781315180670
DO - 10.4324/9781315180670
M3 - Chapter
SN - 9781138745308
T3 - Routledge Studies in Linguistics
SP - 58
EP - 81
BT - Heart- and Soul-like constructs across languages, cultures and epochs
A2 - Peeters, Bert
PB - Routledge
CY - New York
ER -