Capitalizing on Complicity

Cargo Cults and the Spirit of Modernity on Bali Island (West New Britain)

Bibliographic Data

ID2740977
AuthorsAndrew Lattas (corresponding author)
Year2005
Volume52
Issue1
Pages47-80
Publication date2005-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueEthnohistory (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0014-1801 • E-ISSN: 1527-5477
PublisherDuke University Press (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1215/00141801-52-1-47
OpenAlexW2064975198
LanguageEN
Citations received8
References cited14

Using the cargo cult movement of Dakoa on Bali Island (West New Britain),this article explores the relationship between history and the other forms of human time articulated in cult practices, beliefs, and myths of origins. This relationship often entails the collapsing of historical time into biographical time. It involves Dakoa's cult taking up Western notions of kingship and the Christian figures of God, Jesus, and Moses-all of whom are merged with the heroic structure of traditional myths. New mythological figures have emerged who encompass multiple identities and who resurface at key historical moments so as to give a mythicmagical quality to the transformative processes of government, mission, and commerce. Many of the cult's new important spirit beings are extensions of the cult leader Dakoa, whose personhood embodies a history and provides a model for a new, pacified Melanesian self capable of reincorporating the globalizing processes of modernity

Aesthetics · Ancient history · Complicity · Cult · Epistemology · Modernity · Monarchy · Mythology · Personhood · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Transformative learning · Asian Studies and History · Classics · History · Island Studies and Pacific Affairs · Law · Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies · Philosophy

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