Do Rocks Listen?

The Cultural Politics of Apprehending Australian Aboriginal Labor

Author(s): Elizabeth A. Povinelli
Source: American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 97, No. 3 (Sep., 1995), pp. 505-518
Published by: Wiley on behalf of the American Anthropological Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/683270 .
Accessed: 25/11/2013 19:08

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .
http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of
content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms
of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

Wiley and American Anthropological Association are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and
extend access to American Anthropologist.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
ELIZABETHA. POVINELLI / UNIVERSITY
OF CHICAGO

Do Rcks listen?
The Cultural Politics of ApprehendingAustralian Aboriginal Labor

It is as if "the reality of the mode of production enters the talk, or, more generally, intentionally act and react to the
scene at the moment when someone is discovered who invents presence of humans nearby? And they turn to issues of
the theory of it" value and evaluation: what political or economic weight
-Jean Baudrillard, The Mirror of Production should these beliefs be given, and in what social realm
should they be assessed? Are Aboriginal people working,
in the commonsense meaning of that word, when they talk
ONE HOT, STICKYNovember day in 1989, a large part of to local Dreamings or when they sit and relax, talk, play
the Belyuen Aboriginal community was gathered on the cards, or sleep on a beach? And how should this work be
coast of the Cox Peninsula, across from the Darwin Har- stacked up against the kind of labor that produces the
bour, to participate in one of the last days of the Kenbi Australian gross national product?
Land Claim.1 Five of us-myself, Marjorie Bilbil, Ruby That these behind-the-scenes conversations inevita-
Yarrowin, Agnes Lippo, and Ann Timber-stood back bly return to questions of belief and value is striking in
from the hustle of microphones and notepads and the contrast to the singular absence of such questions in the
hassle of nonstop questions from government officials for jural scene. While the Commonwealth government has
as well as against our side. The other four women ranged made Aboriginal cultural traditions the productive motor
in age from 38 to 70 (I was 27) and came from a variety of of indigenous land rights, it has splintered the referent of
Dreaming (totemic) backgrounds. We stood listening to "the cultural"and sidestepped a direct confrontation over
Betty Billawag describing to the land commissioner and how to assess human-environmental interactions and
his entourage how an important Dreaming site nearby,
cross-cultural notions of labor.2 The land commissioner
Old Man Rock, listened to and smelled the sweat of Ab-
listens to Betty Billawag in order to evaluate the cultural
original people as they passed by hunting, gathering,
authenticity of her notion of human labor and the Dream-
camping, or just mucking about. She outlined the impor-
tance of such human-Dreaming/environmental interac- ing environment. In his effort to balance the beliefs of the
tions to the health and productivity of the countryside. At Aboriginal community with the needs of the larger non-
one point Marjorie Bilbil turned to me and said, "He can't Aboriginal community, he does not critically interrogate
the cultural beliefs that subtend and organize his own
believe, eh, Beth?" And I answered, "No, I don't think so,
not him, not really. He doesn't think she is lying. He just evaluative schema. Not surprising. Those beliefs "went
can't believe himself that that Old Man Rock listens." underground" long ago, as if they were themselves a
This scene in a variety of forms and settings has been Dreaming.3 In other words, the culture of progress, pro-
repeated over and over since I first met the people living ductivity, and political economy that subtends his evalu-
at Belyuen in 1984. Whether on sacred site registrations, ations remains, in the policy world, an unassailable to-
ethnobotanical surveys, tourist excursions, or in my own tem.4 Again, not surprising; the cultural frameworks
classroom--where I use a similar story to illustrate the subtending political economy (not the disputable ways of
concept of cultural hegemony-questions always turn to assessing political-economic systems) were long ago
a matter of belief: does the judge, the ethnographer, Be- transmuted into neutral, natural, and objective fact. Belief
lyuen people, or I believe that Dreamings listen, smell, may be part and parcel of society and culture, but labor,
ecology, and economic value refer to material conditions
most accurately approached through a scientific para-
digm. As Baudrillard(1975) noted, subaltern perspectives
ELIZABETH
A. POVINELLIis AssociateProfessor, of
Department on labor, political economy, and the nature of human-en-
Anthropology, of Chicago,Chicago,IL60637.
University vironmental interactions are subordinate to the dominant

American
Anthropologist97(3):505-518. ? 1995,American
Copyright Association.
Anthropological

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
506 * VOL. 97, No. 3 * SEPTEMBER1995
AMERICANANTHROPOLOGIST

perspective not only because they are popularly imagined cultural construal of politics and the economy (di
as preceding it in social evolutionary time but also be- Leonardo 1991:26-27; Roseberry 1989). In its most elegant
cause they are represented as beliefs rather than a method form, political economy is understood as a framework for
for ascertaining truth. Aboriginal traditions are legally analyzing unequal relations and access to cultural and
productive not because they are "true"but because they material resources and power.6 However, serious ques-
are beliefs and thus part of the multiculturalism to which tions remain: Is there an internal limit to political-eco-
the contemporary nation-state can demonstrate a liberal nomic approaches to the cultural construction of econom-
reconcilement. But reconciliation with multiculturalism ics? If culture is a lens through which the local group
ends where a conceptual accommodation to a multi- mediates the practices and policies of the larger system
economism would begin. (Ortner 1989:83),then what ofthe lens ofthe larger system
Put in a more obvious way, what the Common- and its practices of knowing? Is a lens sufficient to explain
wealth-through its courts and public realm (media)-is the manner in which culture and power articulate? In any
evaluating is not the verity of Betty Billawag's and other case, how are these beliefs and practices in conflict with
Belyuen Aborigines' descriptions, but whether or not their Betty Billawag's ways of knowing the human-environ-
words represent the common beliefs of the community mental nexus? And how are the cultural assumptions
and, if they do, whether or not these beliefs can be said to underlying political economy linked to dominant institu-
reflect an evolving set of Aboriginal traditions. The signifi- tions of power? Is this cultural underpinning reinscribing
cance of culture is its presence or absence in the person dominant power over local minority communities even as
and community and its positive relationship to traditions, the researcher is trying to empower local sociocultural
not its positive or negative relationship to environmental practices or, at least, to portray the systematic and histori-
or economic "facts." Thus the real conflict over the cal ties between local and global cultural and political-
grounds for assessing the value produced by human ac- economic institutions (Wilmsen 1989a; Comaroff and Co-
tion in the environment is never addressed in formal legal maroff 1991)?
venues although it may be tentatively raised in political
settings. A full discussion is forever deferred to second-
level issues: Are these beliefs sufficiently traditional? Are The Subject of Labor
there a sufficient number of believers to constitute a
community? How does the nation-state balance the eco- If my answer to Marjorie Bilbil is correct, if the land
nomic needs of the entire nation with the cultural tradi- commissioner does not believe that the rock is a semiotic
tions and beliefs of a minority population? The cultural agent but does believe that the Aboriginal women and men
organization of Western disbelief-its deep disbelief that believe that it is, then he is left with the problem of how
Dreamings can listen in anything but a metaphorical to think about their belief. What does it indicate about
sense-forever eludes the grasp of liberal political-eco- them? About himself? About the economic viability of a
nomic theory and the environmentalism that sprouts from multicultural nation? More specifically, he might have
it. The incorporation of some form of Aboriginal law into wondered, like his predecessors in the judiciary before
Commonwealth legislation merely serves to mask further him, how these beliefs affect who is granted sovereignty
the subterranean machinations of Western cultural no- over land and how citizenry rights are distributed.
tions of production, value, leisure, and labor, their sub- Since the colonial period, nation-states have denied
jects and objects, and the relocation of objectivity from full citizenship to hunter-gatherers based partly on the
the cultural to the ecological-economic realm. But such belief that they had not sufficiently extracted themselves
masking must occur in liberal democratic nations like from or productively engaged their environment, and
Australia, where multicultural "rights"must be reconciled partly on the more pragmatic "self interest of the colonial
with economic and environmental "reality."5 powers, who did not want to be hampered by the incon-
In many critical ways, political-economic anthropol- venience of acknowledging the rights of indigenous peo-
ogy (even the most recent version of culture and political ples, or of colonial rivals who might try to acquire land
economy) has also sidestepped the perplexing problem of from those peoples" (McRae et al. 1991:110). Colonial
how to incorporate or represent local non-Western under- legal theorists and Enlightenment thinkers bridged the
standings of labor and the environment. Some political- conceptual and pragmatic side of indigenous disenfran-
economic studies have begun to acknowledge the rela- chisement by basing the partiality of hunter-gatherer
tionship between dialogically constituted local property rights on their supposed partial achievement of
knowledge and global political-economic processes. human subjectivity. The hunter and collector owned only
Since Peter and Jane Schneider's classic Culture and the "Acorns he pickt up under an Oak or the Apples he
Political-Economy in Western Sicily, the attempt has gathered from the Trees in the Wood," because to these
been made to move away from a world-systems approach objects "something (i.e., intentional labor) was annexed"
and toward a theoretical perspective that emphasizes the (Locke 1988[1690]:28-32). Hunter-gathers did not own the

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 AUSTRALIANABORIGINALLABOR / ELIZABETH
A. POVINELLI 507

land through which they moved because nothing had been First, Robert Gordon, moving from Edwin Wilmsen's
added and because the human subject who could "addto" provocative work, has argued that the so-called bushmen
and "transform"the land had yet to be formed; the land or San peoples in Namibia were produced by colonial
remained "empty" (terra nuUius) of people or, more policies of land appropriation and material dispossession
precisely, "unoccupied" (as against occupatio) by fully (1992). The debate over the origins of the Namibian bush-
human subjects and the civil nations they were able to men has been long and acrimonious. Whatis most striking
create (Hocking 1988). It is true that some colonial legal is the careful attention each side has given to the material
theorists like de Vittoria, Grotius, Vattel, and Pufendorf basis of Namibian San life. While both those who argue
argued that indigenous Americans owned their land and that San groups are dispossessed pastoralists and those
thus "should not be deprived of civil and political rights." who hold that they are besieged hunters and gatherers
But they also argued that "Spaincould assume rights over quote local people, the argument in the literature has
the Indians and their land if it was for the benefit of the centered on the economic and ecological facts of the case
tribes" (Schaffer 1988:22). Not surprisingly, the dubious and how they should be measured and assessed.8 And who
bestowal of civil benefits became the key rhetorical could argue against resting the case on those facts?
means through which indigenous land was acquired.7The Tim Ingold has critiqued approaches to the fourth
prevailing view was that the rights that Aborigines had to world in quite different terms. He has strongly argued
their resources, and in some colonial contexts their land, against conceptualizing the hunting mode of production
were based on occupancy (which simply depended upon in a way that defines hunter-gatherers as less fully human
the presence of people) not ownership (which depended than other social groups. In his The Appropriation of
upon the transformation of the environment typically Nature (1987), Ingold notes the correlation between the
through cultivation). Because no one prior to the Crown denial of human and civil rights to hunter-gatherers and
owned the land, Aboriginal communal rights to it were a the confusion of the economic activity of people who
subset of Crown rights to and needs for it. By implication, hunt and collect for the behavior of animal foragers. To
Aborigines could alienate their land only to the Crown counter this, he returns to human intentionality as the
(McRae et al. 1991:110). "component of action that transforms the forager-preda-
Anthropologists, ecologists, environmentalists, and tor into a gatherer-hunter"(Ingold 1987:95).Intentionality
legal theorists who defend hunter-gatherers' and the becomes the key diacritic to the human; or, echoing Marx,
fourth world's environmental and human rights against who echoed the humanists who preceded him, through
wider state and business interests usually do so against "purposeful action" man established himself as a subject
this colonial background, but they also do so within a and thus distinguished himself from the animal and object
theoretical framework imported from the West and built world. The distinction between the extractive behavior of
upon Western concepts of what happens when humans nonhuman animals and the appropriative (fully and dis-
act in the natural world. In particular, they partition local tinctively human) behavior of hunters and collectors is
cultural beliefs about the limits and meanings of human "the subjective intentionality that is brought to bear on
and environment from scientifically apprehended "facts" the procurement process, and by virtue of which it is lifted
of ecological and economic systems. For example, they from the sphere of extractive behaviour to that of appro-
might argue that no matter what indigenous people be- priative action" (Ingold 1987:79, 106-107). The defining
lieve occurs when they act in the environment, this does feature of production is not, then, producing in excess or
not alter the fact that they rely on these environmental transforming one's environment but "the subjection of an
resources for their livelihood. Or they might argue that by extractive process to intentional control" (Ingold
believing the land is sentient or populated by spiritual 1987:105). It is through this subjection that the human
agents, indigenous people are better able to manage their subject is produced, and it is at this moment that the
ecosystems-and this can be shown by measuring their primate became the human.9
work-leisure ratios, the rate by which they alter their In a series of essays, Nuit Bird-Davidtakes yet a third
environment, or other aspects of their economic prac- tack to the reconceptualization of hunter-gatherer socie-
tices. In all cases, however, writers rely on Western no- ties by rooting their difference in their "attitude"or "style"
tions of human intentionality, subjectivity, and produc- toward the natural environment rather than in their mate-
tion embedded in the very legal discourses they seek to rial or social organization (technology or mode of produc-
oppose, which creates an unresolvable tension between tion). Through this redefinition she seeks to alter public
the political goals of these projects and the theoretical policy regarding hunter-gatherer people. Bird-David's
frameworks in which they reside. This is apparent in even analysis ofthe "givingenvironment" (1990, 1992a) and the
the most radical reconceptions of gatherer-hunter socie- "cosmic economy of sharing" (1992b) among immediate-
ties. Three scholars' works bear special attention, for each return societies (the south Indian Nayaka, the Mbuti of
tries in a very different way to upset historical treatments Zaire,the Batek of Malaysia) seeks to tear down the walls
of the fourth world. dividing humans, animals, and natural objects and envi-

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
508 * VOL. 97, No. 3 * SEPTEMBER1995
AMERICANANTHROPOLOGIST

ronments on the basis of agency. By attempting to do so, the good temper of the environment. Second, too singular
she promises to provide a startling critique of economic a focus on communication turns attention away from the
and political policy premised on that divide. Rather than knitting of cultural frameworks and social, economic, and
grounding hunter-gatherer society in universals of human politico-legal power. And it assumes that communication
nature, she moves from "the natives' point of view" and and translation are the only barriers to achieving an ideal
describes the similarities and linkages between human community rather than exploring the ways that repre-
and natural agencies. She writes, "each group has animis- sentation and conceptualization arise from the various
tic notions which attribute life and consciousness to natu- efforts of social groups to secure resources, entrench
ral phenomena including the forest itself and parts of it power, and understand the historical conditions in which
such as hilltops, tall trees, and river sources" (Bird-David they find themselves.
1992b:29). "Natural(human-like) agencies" socialize with, What has been the effect of these evolving cultural
give gifts of food to, and have personalities like the and political-economic frameworks for how hunter-gath-
Nayaka, Mbuti, and Batek. In short, when Bird-David erer labor action is valued and evaluated in national legal
discusses intentional action in an economic context she and economic realms? On the surface, altering the essen-
seeks to show how humans organize their material activi- tial meaning of production from "transformation and in-
ties based on the assumption that a natural sentient envi- crease" to "intentionalsubjection" counters legal and eco-
ronment will give what is needed. It is through an appre- nomic policies that discriminate against communities
hension of these cultural frameworks (metaphors in whose economic history or praxis includes hunter-gather-
particular) that Western theorists and policymakers can ing. In Australia, where I have conducted long-term re-
begin to make sense of immediate-return societies' eco- search, the reconceptualization of Aboriginal socioeco-
nomic actions, in particular, why these societies think and nomics seems to have aided generally in the courts' and
act as if they "have it made" (Bird-David 1992b:32). legislature's positive reevaluation of Aborigines' tradi-
A nagging question remains. Do hunter-gatherers, no tional cultural practices, if not specifically their contem-
matter how you define them, really have abundant re- porary labor practices. For example, in the 1992 Austra-
sources or do they just think they do? That is, are the lian High Court decision Eddie Mabo v. Queensland, the
Nayaka, Mbuti, and Batek deluding themselves, especially doctrine that Australia was terra nullius at the point of
given the national and global context of their environ- colonization was overturned because it was seen to rest
mental practices? Bird-David is careful to note that the on a "discriminatory denigration of indigenous inhabi-
very formulation of questions such as this one depends tants, their social organization and customs." Moreover,
upon a Western preoccupation with scarcity and famine the High Court argued that for Commonwealth, state, or
and with the uncertainty of the naturalized objectified territory governments to extinguish native title, they must
world. Nevertheless, Bird-David speculates on how be- meet the nondiscriminatory standards laid out in the Com-
liefs affect people's actual material conditions and on how monwealth Racial Discrimination Act of 1975, which bars
attention to these beliefs might reformulate public policy the taking of Aboriginal land without just compensation.
with regard to hunter-gatherers. It is in the effort to an- The broad scope of this decision potentially subjected all
swer these questions that she ultimately returns to a quali- unalienated Crown lands in Australia to a traditional Abo-
tative division between not humans, animals, and objects riginal land claim.
but cultural belief and economic-ecological reality. Turn- While seemingly a striking reversal of previous court
ing to metaphor theory as a communicative bridge be- positions (but see Povinelli 1994), the Mabo decision and
tween delayed-return societies (into which Western capi- prior state land rights legislation did not discuss directly
talism and Australian Aborigines fall) and immediate- how to value or evaluate Aboriginal labor, except to meas-
return societies, she argues that specific metaphors such ure how it contributed to the material well-being of the
as natural environment as bank allow policymakers to community (that is, in terms of "detriment").x?Thus in the
reconceive the relationship between humans and the ani- Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act of 1976,
mate natural world. Through a metaphorical bridge, poli- the Land Commission is charged with examining how a
cymakers would be able to see that hunter-gatherers' successful land claim might harm the economic develop-
attitude toward the environment really does generate ment of the larger region and how an unsuccessful claim
wealth. Thus metaphor theory-changing our lenses- might harm the economic livelihood of the Aboriginal
holds out to Bird-David the possibility of achieving an claimants. Local understandings of labor action in no way
ultimately consensual community. Recourse to Haber- aid in this economic evaluation. Instead, Aboriginal no-
masian notions of ideal communication, however, pre- tions of what happens when humans work in the environ-
sents its own set of problems. First, a tendency toward ment fall within a broader category called "Aboriginal
cultural reification sets in whereby the authentic style of traditions." To summarize grossly, in the recent Mabo
hunter-gathering is a "trust in abundancy" undermining decision and in most earlier pieces of state land-rights
those groups who do not show such unswerving faith in legislation, Aborigines who have managed to maintain

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 AUSTRALIANABORIGINALLABOR / ELIZABETH
A. POVINELLI 509

some sufficient level of traditional life (their cultural Dreamings (maroi). But all matter (human and animal
knowledges, traditional social practices, and land ties) bodies, objects, and environments) is conceived as the
can be granted unalienable title over their traditional land. congealed labor of ancestral Dreaming beings. While the
What constitutes a viable level of traditional life is unclear. mythic actions of some dreamtime ancestors were con-
Some High Court justices distinguished between those centrated at certain now-sacred sites, the land is more
contemporary social practices that have legitimate ties to generally permeated by signs of their present-day inten-
"traditional law or custom" and those that do not, with tionality and agency. So, for example, in the region where
some leeway provided for cultural change. For instance, I work, certain water holes were formed by the travels of
Brennan's discussion of cultural change appears quite Dingo Dreaming, who moved underground, popping up at
broad; for traditions to maintain their legal veracity Ab- certain places to perform certain feats. In all the places he
original groups must simply continue "to acknowledge the came up, he left a water hole. These water holes not only
laws" and "to observe the customs" so far as practicable. mark what happened in the past, they also show where
Likewise, Deane and Gaudron bow to the dynamism of Dingo remains today.
culture, apparently acknowledging current trends in cul- It is a rather simple task to show how Belyuen women
tural theory, which see traditions as fluid rather than attribute subjective intentionality to humans, animals,
frozen and see ethnography and law as always "caught and objects and how this organizes their economic and
between cultures" (Clifford 1988:11).11In their view, an interpretive practices.12 Because the Dreaming mandate
Aboriginal society can change and still retain traditional provides all humans, animals, and objects with the poten-
rights to its land, "provided any changes do not diminish tial to act as an agent, all events may be a result of a
or extinguish the relationship between a particular tribe Dreaming's, animal's, or object's subjective intentionality.
or other group and particular land." Irrespective of their Everyone, even small children, monitors bodies, objects,
purity, then, traditions act as the litmus test of cultural and the environment for changes or odd behaviors that
cohesion and land rights; the labor theory that Betty Bil- might portend critical meaning-meaning that may be the
lawag espouses is a subset of these traditions. In sum, difference between a hunting trip resulting in bounty or
while Aboriginal traditions are the locus of value in land- calamity or, more seriously, in a person's life or death. Not
rights cases, these same cultural beliefs are left behind to be able to interpret the messages that animals, objects,
when the evaluation of Aboriginal labor action is made- persons, or Dreamings send can radically transform a
Aboriginal beliefs about work and Aboriginal productivity person's relationship with the Dreaming environment:
and labor action are separated, the latter quantified and rather than being an interlocutor with a patron Dreaming,
qualified by Western empiricism. What then are Belyuen the person may become prey to a predatory Dreaming.
thoughts on labor action and how do they represent what Three cases suffice to give a sense of the range of ways
happens when they act in the environment? that the Dreaming environment interacts with human so-
cial and economic action.

The Subject of the Dreaming Case 1: Belyuen's Lights(June 3, 1993)

If, in Westem political economy and humanism more During a short visit to Belyuen in the dry season, I was
generally, the feature that differentiates human life from told about a young women's pidjawagaidj (maturation)
animal or object existence is subjective intentionality and ceremony held at Belyuen and the surrounding country-
appropriation, then analyses based on this difference are side the December before. Women from all over the Daly
unable to describe adequately Belyuen praxis. At Belyuen, River, Cox Peninsula, and Darwin regions came and par-
subjective intentionality and appropriation are traits that ticipated in the making of a young Belyuen woman. One
characterize human, animal, and object lives. Or, all hu- of my mothers (BG) described an event that happened
mans, animals, and objects have the potential to be inten- during one evening of the long ceremony.
tional subjects; if humans are unique, it is in their ability The southern Daly River women were housed in a
to interpret the meaning of an event or to determine if it small adult education building in the back of the Belyuen
has any significant meaning at all (Povinelli 1993b). Even community close to a large water hole. This water hole is
here, humans are not absolutely differentiated from other the site of a number of Dreamings including Belyuen, after
beings. What are the implications of this cultural organi- whom the community is named. Belyuen is a trickster
zation of material-economic life for how Belyuen work is clever-man and a conception Dreaming for many Belyuen
valued and evaluated? children. On one of the first nights of the Daly River
The Dreaming can be understood as the given condi- women's visit, Belyuen emerged from the water hole in
tion of the human and natural world established in 'the the form of a big light. BG noted the cause of the big light:
ancestral past. There are many types of Dreamings, in- "different sweat, different language. .. lucky no one sick."
cluding descent Dreamings (therrawen) and conception BBM agreed and added, "never been do that with us when

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
510 AMERICAN * VOL.97, NO. 3 * SEPTEMBER
ANTHROPOLOGIST 1995

we [have] ceremony. That old man [Belyuen] been hold is usually a productive mangrove, winds rage on the coast
back. He knew we asked them [the Daly River women] to sending blinding sand. If social conditions allow, Belyuen
come and help us with this ceremony." women will attribute the cause of such quick and unex-
pected environmental changes to the presence of
Case 2: The Nyoidjand MyTruck(June 5, 1993) "strange" sweat and language. Nonlocal people's words
and bodies are not recognized by the landscape, causing
At midday, 14 older women, assorted children, and I it to become upset and jealous. In contrast, familiar sweat
went to Bagadjet, a small vine jungle on the west coast of and language make the countryside sweet and productive.
the Cox Peninsula, to fish, crab, dig yams, and shoot for Thus, in the first case above, the foreign sounds and smells
wallaby and pig. Soon after arriving I left with one of my of the southern Daly River women caused Belyuen to send
daughters, shotgun in hand, walking down the coast to- out a bright glowing light from a dark deep pool, but no
ward a series of swamps where pigs sometimes wallow in more since he knew that the nonlocal women were there
the afternoon heat. We returned later with no pig but a helping local women. Case 3 simply suggests that the
small wallaby. While we were away, the other women and ability to act with subjective intentionality includes not
children had collected crab, shellfish, yam, and sugarbag only Dreamings (therrawen and maroi) and spirits
(indigenous honey). (nyoidj, Case 2) but also the animal world. The Gandu and
As we cooked and distributed the food, two of my Wagalwagal story is just one of a large body of narratives
mothers (YR and LA) told me that a nyoidj (a type of that describe which animals and plants have knowledge
spirit) in the form of a black crow had been mucking of or relationships with other animals, places, people, and
around with my truck while I was gone. They explained to environments.
me that the nyoidj did not recognize my truck. YR said, Not only are the subjects of the above narratives not
"it's different from last time [from the utility vehicle I human, their nonhumanness is a necessary part of the
rented the previous year]." Not to worry, they assured me, performativity of the story. The fact that Dreaming water
each of them had sung out (called out) to the nyoidj, holes can hear and smell the language and sweat offoreign
letting it know that the new truck was mine-"same old women allows BG and MB to use the story of Belyuen's
Beth." We all laughed. LA concluded our short talk with light for specific social ends. But BG and MB depend on
the statement, "Mightbe why you been lucky today." their listeners knowing the social relations that exist
among the groups and the environments being discussed
Case 3: The Ganduand the Wagalwagal(February14, 1989) in the story, as well as on the sentient nature of the water
hole. Listeners (myself and others to whom the story has
Here is a story that my mother (BBM) told me one been told) can be expected to interpret the appearance of
afternoon at the Women's Resource Center at Belyuen. the light as a (potential) indexical sign showing the proxi-
Sometimeswhen you are walkingthroughthe bush you see mate relationship among southern Daly River women,
and hear that grass in front of you go shshshshsh.You think Belyuen women, and local Dreamings-which groups are
ngaden [goanna]made that grass go shshshshsh.But when "close up" and "morefurther"from Cox Peninsula Dream-
youtryandcatchit you meet a speartight betweenyouryingi ings (usually therrawen Dreamings) and thus which
[breasts].Gandu [foreignman],not ngaden,that one. Wagai groups are right and wrong for the countryside. Indeed,
ganiya [finished,you'relyingdownnow;thatis, you'redead]. just in case I have not fully understood the import of the
Butif you listen first,that wagalwagal [honeyeaterbird]will
light, BBM carefully notes, "never been do that with us
sing out werrigwerrig and you'llknow: that'snot a ngaden,
when we [have] ceremony." However, this statement does
that is a gandu mungul [malevolentmale stranger].
not simply oppose the southern Daly River women to
In these three examples, the subject of intentional Belyuen women. Instead it comments on yet a third set of
action is clearly not human. In the first case, light acts as people: regional Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal groups
the medium for a Dreaming water hole (Belyuen) to signal who claim that Belyuen families are themselves squatters
the foreignness (strangeness) of the southern Daly River on the Cox Peninsula-migrants from the south displaced
women. At Belyuen, stranger carries a variety of mean- during the colonial period-and that their real country lies
ings, including unknown person, person from nonlocal on the coastal side of the Daly River, several hundred
lands, or person whose unusual actions make him or her miles away. BBM's statement comments indirectly on this
a stranger to kin or residential group. This strangeness (or claim. If this were so, why does Belyuen react only when
foreignness, "im different") can cause Dreamings and the other people work and conduct ceremony on the Cox
landscape more generally to react in a dramatic fashion. Peninsula? In short, the belief that Dreamings (water
Dreaming sites and ecological environments become holes or otherwise) can listen, smell, and react allows
volatile and unproductive: in a usually placid harbor, Belyuen individuals to use these reactions to negotiate the
waves suddenly surge up and swamp a sea hunter's din- hierarchical relations among social groups and land-
ghy; or, after women have had no luck finding crab in what scapes without being responsible for the socioeconomic

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 AUSTRALIAN ABORIGINAL LABOR / ELIZABETH A. POVINELLI 511

implications of those hierarchies (see also Myers 1986 and are not moved by its performance. Or they are moved for
N. Williams 1987). After all, Belyuen women say, "not us, other reasons while acceding to its form.
that Dreaming now been do'im." As I and many others have noted, some Aborigines'
In Case 2, foreignness is again the immediate cause belief that all materiality is a potential source of intention-
of an unusual event. This time instead of an environmental driven meaning places high value on interpretive ability
feature (a water hole), a crow comments on the presence (see also Myers 1986:67 and N. Williams 1985). Humans
of strange objects and people. The crow in this case is a may be just another subject in the landscape, but they face
nyoidj--the spirit of a human ancestor lodged in a place the daunting task of sorting through and weighing the
where the person spent a significant or meaningful part of significance of countless minor and major oddities that
his or her life-of a deceased aunt of mine. Thus, as in the occur everyday. What does it mean that so-and-so's son
first case, the social work accomplished with this second has suddenly lost a lot of weight? Is his wife pregnant or
narrative depends both on a shared belief that animals act has a clever-man "kidney-fatted" him?13Why did a sea
intentionally and on the shared background knowledge of turtle act in an odd manner? Is it really a conception
the social ties binding the individuals and environments Dreaming (maroi) or did the harpoon not lodge properly
described. Milig is a site on the west coast of the Cox in its back? Why did a water hole suddenly dry up? Is it
Peninsula where two senior women (MB and BA) and I saddened (mari wedjirr) by the death of an older woman
led an outstation during my first visit to Belyuen in 1984. or are local white residents sinking too many water bores?
I was just a young kid (22 years old) and knew nothing-I Because all social relations (links among persons, social
was not an anthropologist or anthropology student. More- groups, animals, objects, and places) create potential so-
over, I had never been to an Aboriginal community and cial rights and obligations, the ability to make or refute
knew very little about Aboriginal beliefs. However, grow- linkages convincingly is a highly valued and potentially
ing up in the rural woods of Louisiana and having spent valuable skill. In the context of contemporary land claims
much of my life camping, I was strong, a fairly good hunter and land disputes, where Aboriginal men and women
(and gatherer), and comfortable living outdoors. During must elaborate the ties linking and separating numerous
the time I spent working for MB and BA, hunting with individuals and groups to or from various places, not only
them, chopping wood, driving, and so forth, I learned for local Aborigines but also for non-Aboriginal lawyers,
everything I know-they "schooled me up." Bagadjet is a land commissioners, and anthropologists, the value of
small dense vine jungle up the east coast from Milig where such interpretive ability has certainly not lessened. Here
MB, BA, and I spent much of our time, digging yams, I want to explore briefly how Belyuen women attribute
looking for sugarbag, and collecting crab and shellfish. cause to the natural oddities that spring up during every-
More importantly, Bagadjet is the last place where we day land activity in the face of two potentially competing
hunted (and the place where we cried for each other) environmental explanations: the Dreaming and develop-
before I left for two years. Soon after, BA became too sick ment.
to camp on her own; she died of emphysema in 1989 when
I was back at Belyuen. When women and I now hunt at Case 4: The Four-LeggedEmu(June 20,1992)
Bagadjet, crows sometimes act strangely and women
often interpret them as being BA. After finishing an outstation survey, a handful of
Knowing the social ties that bind people to each other older women and I pulled into an outstation camp on the
and to places critically affects the interpretation and so- interior ofthe Cox Peninsula. The married couple who run
cioeconomic use of nyoidj stories. Because of how this the camp were gone. They had left a few hours earlier on
nyoidj treats me and my things, I am like other strangers a shooting expedition. Expecting that they would have a
(especially with my Western come-and-go lifestyle)-de- number of kangaroo, wallaby, and, hopefully, bullock on
pendent upon Belyuen women to keep me from becoming their return, our party decided to visit with other members
prey to a predatory Dreaming-and especially beholden of the camp and await the married couple. While we
to Belyuen women for teaching and nourishing me when waited and drank tea, my aunt (MB) told us about a series
I had nothing. The nyoidj indexes the vast social, emo- of events that had occurred in the Daly River coastal
tional, and intellectual distance that I have traveled since region.
first arriving at Belyuen, and it points to the network of During the early dry season, on an outstation on the
social obligations, in traveling this distance, I have ac- south side of the Daly River, two brothers came upon a
crued. The one little wallaby I shot cannot begin to repay four-legged emu drinking from a water hole. The brothers
this social debt, although it is a start. Again, the nyoidj trapped the emu and brought it to Wadeye (previously
story's social productivity is anchored in a certain cultural Port Keats) so that a senior man and woman from their
framework-crows can be subjective agents bearing mes- family-on whose land the outstation is located-might
sages to savvy listeners. Other Aboriginal and non-Ab- look at it. Upon seeing the emu, the older man and woman
original groups who do not accede to this cultural logic insisted that it quickly be taken back to where it had been

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
512 ANTHROPOLOGIST
AMERICAN 1995
. VOL.97, NO. 3 . SEPTEMBER

found. This the two brothers did, releasing the erpu near points of entry. Answers to these direct and indirect ques-
the same water hole. tions lead listeners to remark upon and evaluate the emu
Whydid the emu have four legs? Whatdid the old man story in starkly different ways, from dismissing the entire
and woman know? Belyuen women currently have two event as "nothing, just emu" to proclaiming those in-
seemingly competing frameworks for answering these volved as having "rubbished"a Dreaming for economic
and other related questions. On the one hand, they may gain and as needing to be harshly punished. Sites of entry
attribute the cause of the emu's body anomaly to toxic may include the following:
pollution caused by economic developments in the region,
for example, exploratory on- and offshore oil drilling. The storyteller and the audience: What might her motiva-
These oil wells provide a source of much-needed royalty tion be? Does she have ties to any of the people, places,
money for the structurally impoverished Aboriginal fami- or animals discussed? Is she for or against development?
lies living in the Cox Peninsula and Daly River regions, but What is my relationship to the storyteller?
they also threaten to upset the natural and Dreaming
ecology of the region. Many Aboriginal groups are now Human actors in the story: What were the motivations
engaged in heated inter- and intragroup discussions about that led people to act in the way that they did here, to take
whether safe drilling should be allowed to proceed. On the and then return the emu? How is each person related to
other hand, Belyuen women may attribute the emu's odd- Dreamings in the region? Are any of the actors involved
ity to Dreaming intentionality. Like the Belyuen light, the in a land dispute where the emu was found, and if so, with
four legs are a sign that something or someone did some- whom? Does anyone have an emu Dreaming on or off the
thing wrong-someone or something was wrong for the Wadeye community?
area or acted in a wrong way. Or perhaps this is a Dream-
ing that people had forgotten about and its place (its Dreaming actors in the story: Is there Dreaming inten-
sacred site) is the water hole from which it was drinking. tionality here? Does this make sense of what a Dreaming
Of course, the two perspectives are often articulated-no might do? Why might it have done this in this particular
final difference exists between natural and ecological instance?
environments. As MB later speculated, the Dreaming
might have sent out the four-legged emu to signal the While in Belyuen women's eyes the above cases are
damage that oil wells can cause to the region. The four- all instances of nonhuman subjective intentionality, in
legged emu, like the Belyuen light, rearticulates Aborigi- what sense are they instances of human and nonhuman
nal and non-Aboriginal frameworks that have already appropriative action? In other words, how do they con-
been hybridized by the political-jural and economic insti- form to or diverge from Western notions of property and
tutions and regulations established for (or in response to) larceny?T4 Cases 1, 2, and 3 describe nonhuman appro-
Aboriginal traditions. Federal and state parliaments have priative action insofar as they include action that is con-
passed regulations that force companies to do business scious and purposeful. But none of the cases describes
with the Dreaming. Not surprisingly, Aborigines now read appropriative action in the sense of setting aside materi-
their capital needs through signs the Dreaming sends. als, objects, or bodies for a particular purpose or some-
Whether one explanatory frame is picked (Dreaming one's exclusive use. However, there are many senses and
or development) or whether they are (re)articulated, how cases in which human and nonhuman actors appropriate
such questions are answered depends upon the elabora- materials, objects, and bodies for their exclusive use.
tion or refutation of the ties binding the various human, Dreamings (therrawen and maroi) appropriate human
animal, environmental, and Dreaming actors and groups bodies and landscapes in ways I have discussed at length
involved in both actual and narrative events (see Bauman elsewhere (Povinelli 1993a). Briefly, conception Dream-
1986). In short, explanation relies on the sociopolitical ings (maroi) appropriate the human reproductive process
relations and the speech acts that mediate them, as vari- itself-the conception spirit "realizes itself as the child."15
ous clusters of people try to make sense of a strange event Moreover, all human life is, at one level, the material that
and the reasons specific people are recounting that event. descent therrawen Dreamings have appropriated in order
The speech acts are themselves organized by local princi- to manifest themselves in each successive generation (see
ples for agreeing and disagreeing, for forming communal also Munn 1970 and Myers 1986:50). Finally, the Dreaming
narratives, and for serializing persons, places, and events has already appropriated the entire geography, estab-
(see Povinelli 1993a:253-270). People ask, What relations lishing in humans "a habit of mind that looks behind
are motivating the event and the narration of the event? objects to events and sees in objects a sign of something
The sheer number of possible sites and levels of intention- else" wherein the "unusual is valuable in itself' (Myers
ality complicate the task of interpretation. For instance, a 1986:67). Nancy Munn has summarized these various
listener trying to pinpoint where cause or intentionality Dreaming appropriations of materiality (or instantiations
lies in the above emu story is presented with numerous through a variety of natural materials) in the following

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 AUSTRALIAN ABORIGINAL LABOR / ELIZABETH A. POVINELLI 513

ways: "(1) metamorphosis (the body of the ancestor is woman (or man) will discover signs that help make sense
changed into some material object); (2) imprinting (the of a recent traumatic event. Indeed, women and men often
ancestor leaves the impression of his body or of some tool walk through the bush looking as much for the meanings
he uses); and (3) externalization (the ancestor takes some and distractions it holds as for the foods it provides.
object out of his body)" (1970:142). Whether they are emphasizing food or memory, Belyuen
In sum, Belyuen women do not assume that transfor- women's use of hunting and gathering to produce relaxa-
mation, appropriation, or intentionality are attributes that tion and ease of mind has already been influenced by its
reside either uniquely or most fully in the human realm. juxtaposition to new modes of production and their con-
Rather, humans are simply one node in a field of possible comitant social formations (sedentary settlement life,
intentionality and appropriation. The Dreaming epito- wage labor, and welfare). Belyuen women compare hunt-
mizes the transformation and appropriation of land-
ing activities and capitalist wage-labor, saying that the one
scapes', humans', and animals' bodies and personalities
produces a lightening and lifting of the body while the
for reasons individuals and social groups can only try to
other produces anxiety and despair. Indeed, some conser-
interpret.
vative members of the Northern Territory and federal
How do these expanded nodes of subjective inten-
tionality and appropriation change how Aboriginal work governments have represented contemporary Aboriginal
and leisure should be evaluated? In an environment in hunting and gathering activities as leisure activities in
which Dreamings, animals, and spirits (nyoidj) are always order to undermine land claims based on economic need.
potentially monitoring one's action, what constitutes the Because Aboriginal people no longer need the "bits and
boundaries between work and leisure? If local language scraps" of food that they collect from the bush, the argu-
and sweat make the environment productive and sweet- ment goes, their hunting activities are essentially no dif-
one's bodily productions are constantly producing the ferent from those of non-Aboriginal campers.16Therefore
environmental conditions in which one is acting-are Aboriginal groups should not be given special rights de-
there any limits to what constitutes work? nied to non-Aboriginal sportsmen. However, women
know that the productive effect of their leisurely labor is
Case 5: HuntingRelaxation(April15, 1989) very different from that of most non-Aboriginal Austra-
lians. This productive difference lies in the way their
After a tragic death in the community, BBM sickens leisure produces both life-enabling knowledge about the
and asks that I take her family fishing and hunting for countryside and the abundancy or scarcity of the foods
warrgu (mangrove worms, Teledo sp.). We negotiate be- and materials found there.
tween two possible sites and wind up on the north coast Whether or not a person actually hunts, gathers, or
of the Cox Peninsula. It is quite a nice mid-April day. One fishes on a bush trip, he or she is likely to gain various
of my older grandmothers (djemele) clears the ground for levels of useful knowledge, such as what sites are rich
a small camp, while several of us walk up the beach for with foods and what sites are dangerous due to current
turtle eggs and several others walk through the scrub
Dreaming or social conflicts. The following two cases
behind the beach to look for sugarbag. As our party walks
provide everyday examples of what one can get out of a
along the beach, BG and her young daughter collect a
trip by just coming along for the ride.
variety of plastic bottles, plates, and cups and several sets
of unmatched thongs brought in by the tide, and they are
accused of shopping. BBM spends most of the day sleep-
Case 6: Binbinyaand the Salmon Run(March9, 1989)
ing on the beach, listening to gossip, or telling and hearing
old stories about the campsite. After everyone returns
from their excursions, we bake and eat a big lour (flour Twelve adults and about the same number of children
from two Belyuen families traveled to an estuarine creek
damper) and comed beef before returning to the commu-
nity at dusk. on the west coast of the Cox Peninsula. During the half
In Case 5, BBM seems to use a hunting and gathering hour before the tide came in, five of our group went into
trip as a recreational (leisure) activity rather than an the mangrove to collect crab and shellfish. Afterward we
economic one in order to leave behind the stressful social moved to the creek and seven of us (the same five plus
conditions of the Belyuen community for the relaxing two others) began fishing. For reasons my mother (BBM)
rhythms of the sea. The work of mourning, grief, death, attributed to the cold weather, salmon ran in large schools
and despair is lessened to a significant degree by the up the creek. Our party caught ten, plus a number of
leisure of sleeping and relaxing on a long white beach or smaller red snapper, brim, and catfish. Throughout the
walking through the bush collecting sweet foods for the day several members of our group sat near a fire we had
belly and old memories for the mind. Sometimes in the made, drank tea, played buta (a local card game), and ate
midst of such hunting and gathering trips, moreover, a fish others had caught and bread others had brought.

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
514 AMERICAN * VOL. 97, NO. 3 * SEPTEMBER
ANTHROPOLOGIST 1995

Case 7: The Gandu(January29, 1989) country allows the maroi to express itself throughout the
region and allows humans to form attachments to this
On the way to Twofellow Creek, an aunt of mine (DA) broader region. Not only does being there allow certain
pointed out the place where her daughter saw a gandu human-Dreamings interlocutors to function most fully,
mungul. DA described him as wearing red hair made from but just being there can critically affect the productivity
a horse's mane. My grandmother (djemele) added that he of the surrounding landscape. Because the by-products of
had teeth wrapped around his face like a bridle. Others in human labor-sweat and speech-are seen to influence
the truck asked a quick series of questions: Where exactly strongly the productivity of the countryside by affecting
had he stood? How big was he (tall or short)? Did he lie the disposition of the Dreaming, the presence or absence
down in the grass or stand straight up and still? In what of local people can directly affect the plenitude or scarcity
truck was DA's daughter? of the foods they hope to collect. The familiar sounds and
Both of these works of leisure significantly influence smells of local people please and calm the countryside,
women and men to go on bush trips (or, for that matter, creating within it an abiding affection for these same
to stay at home), even if they have no particular interest people and a willingness to provide the foods, goods, and
in hunting, fishing, or collecting. In Case 6, many members signs they are seeking. In sum, if land and humans are
of the Binbinya foraging group did little by way of caloric interlocutory subjects, then leisure is a labor with social
production. Instead they ate up fuel and whatever else we and economic value.
found or had brought (tea, bread, sugar, and corned beef).
But they left with more than a full belly. As others have
noted (Cashdan 1990 and Winterhalder 1987), being there
provided them with knowledge of the richness of food The Drawof Political Economyin FourthWorld
patches, of their changing productivity, and of techniques Studies
for exploiting resources that will be useful to them over
time. In short, leisure produces knowledge that will have Let us return to the courtroom one last time and to
important long-term consequences on the material basis the ways in which Aboriginal beliefs about the nature of
of Belyuen social life. In Case 7, everyone on the truck labor action and the human-environmental encounter are
who heard the Gandu story learned a number of critical assessed. The split manner in which the law (and the
ways of differentiating strange men from ordinary strang- public debate about the law) appraises Aboriginal belief
ers: red horse's hair, teeth necklaces, and grass beds. cannot be overemphasized, and neither can the problems
Moreover, they learned where the stranger had been this appraisal poses for political-economic anthropology.
sighted and who he had been looking for ("In what truck Currently the assessment of Belyuen practice is based in
was DA's daughter?"), and therefore what place to avoid the first instance on a litmus of cultural traditionality and
and what kin group to warn. Thus even if persons coming then, after passing this test, on a comparative evaluation
along for the ride did not leave with a full stomach or of the material needs of the Aboriginal community and the
ecological-technological knowledge, they left with life- economic effect of a land grant on the wider community.
enhancing knowledge. Note, however, that even when an Aboriginal community
But a more critical work of leisure, especially in the is the wider community, an even wider non-Aboriginal
context of this essay, becomes apparent when situated in community can be found (the region, the nation, the trad-
the framework of subjective intentionality and appropria- ing bloc) whose interests in economic terms will be
tion. No matter the material usefulness of knowledge, just greater. Onthe one hand, then, we have belief as a diacritic
being there becomes productive once our analysis is situ- of authentic multiculturalism (the interiority of cultural
ated within a perspective of a sentient environment. For difference); and on the other hand, we have economic
instance, some Dreamings in the countryside depend statistics, manipulatable, yes, but still some gauge of cold
upon the presence of the human body in order to instan- economic reality (the exteriority of the economy and its
tiate themselves (maroi, or conception Dreamings, for material resources).
instance), whether or not that body is hunting, fishing, or While belief and value-or more exactly, divergent
collecting. This does not mean that persons will not have epistemologies and the socioeconomic and legal appara-
a conception Dreaming unless they move through the tuses that support them-are at the heart of the conflict,
countryside, but rather that the restriction on their mobil- Western economy and its epistemologies have been mi-
ity has an effect on the spatiality of maroi expression. raculously separated from the discussion. Western beliefs
Policy that restricts Aborigines onto small settlements or are not on the examining table. Instead, land conflicts are
community areas threatens to constrict the range of cer- framed as the necessary compromises that need to be
tain Dreamings (but see Povinelli 1993a:165-166), which made as the nation-state tries to balance tolerance for
then potentially narrows Aborigines' affective and jural multicultural perspectives with the necessities of eco-
attachments to places. Thus, just traveling through the nomic development.

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 AUSTRALIAN ABORIGINAL LABOR / ELIZABETH A. POVINELLI 515

Given this political-legal context, what are the poten- mans (subjects-agents), nonintentional animals (preda-
tials and limits of a political-economic approach to the tors-prey), and objects (insentient things) or, where some
study of the fourth world, or any world in which labor effort has been made to do so, the division between belief
action and subjectivity are differently perceived? By po- and fact reemerges in the policy portion of papers. Having
litical-economic anthropology I mean those approaches arisen from the long duree of the social sciences' effort to
that examine domination and subordination in terms of define the difference between human and nonhuman na-
the control of material relations of production and repre- ture and between culture and materiality, political econ-
sentation. Thus, under political economy I am including a omy remains solidly within hegemonic notions of the
fairly wide-ranging and eclectic body of work. defining criteria of human subjectivity and object nature.
Clearly political-economic approaches to issues of Thus the kind of radical rethinking that Belyuen notions
domination and subordination hold out much to an analy- of labor and subjectivity pose to the analysis of labor
sis of the fourth world. Building in some way on Marx's action and the environment is unthinkable within political
theory of labor and resource exploitation, anthropologists economy. We can certainly discuss local beliefs but these
and other social scientists see political economy (and are always grounded in the actual material conditions of
forms of structural marxism) as offering a revolutionary the community and the material relations between the
framework for understanding and representing the devas- community and the larger national and international or-
tating effects of world capitalism on a diverse set of der.
non-Western societies. While political-economic analyses Because political-economic approaches still privi-
of social change have been heavy-handed in many cases, lege Western forms of assessment, a reevaluation of
a political-economic framework has allowed scholars to hunter-gatherer subjectivity has done little to increase the
see a common pattern to local social transformations worth of hunter-gatherer productivity in a comparative
which connects, in a very compelling way, the plight of economic framework. In an increasingly heated discus-
Kung women with that of South American miners, Suma- sion of global environmental change, population growth,
tran and Italian peasants, and Caribbean cane-workers.17 and limited resources, science and economics-and those
In addition, political-economic conceptions of the cause other disciplines that incorporate their empirical meth-
of the material conditions of the poor and dispossessed ods-are turned to as dispassionate observers of the fac-
strongly contrast with dominant economic paradigms like tual nature of human-environment relations and the eco-
rational choice, maximization theory, game theory, and nomic and ecological risks and benefits associated with
other neoconservative models for analyzing micro- and development projects. Because of this, most contempo-
macroeconomics that locate the cause of poverty in the rary land claims include supplemental reports on the
practices of the poor and dispossessed themselves. economic benefits of them to the indigenous community,
Scholars of the fourth world have drawn on two on the development prospects of the area for local and
trends in political economy to situate historically contem- regional governments, and on the environmental conse-
porary bushmen camps, especially to explain why, quences of maintaining or developing the area Social
throughout the world, they "literally smell [of] death and science projects with a humanistic, theoretical, or activist
decay" (Gordon 1992:2;see also Trigger 1992). In an effort bent are sometimes enlisted to examine the "soft side" of
to explain these material conditions, many of us have these discussions: how local people will experience eco-
turned to, on the one hand, an analysis of the material nomic change, how the government or a nongovernmental
relations of production that exist between indigenous organization might soften the impact of development on
communities and the larger nation-state and, on the other, a local community. But the evaluative apparatus of na-
the discursive regimes that constitute indigenous people tional or international economic policy has been little
as premodem societies, thereby undermining their politi- influenced by non-Western understandings of human-en-
cal and economic aspirations (Schrire 1984). By repre- vironmental relations. Until it is, indigenous groups will
senting the economic dependency and hardship wrought always lose the war of need. Some wider perspective will
by national policies for and academic representations of always be generated that puts their lives "in context."
indigenous peoples, this wide-ranging work has played a Thus as anthropologists, we must be careful not to
critical role in the struggle for indigenous civil and land be, as was once widely discussed, objective neutral play-
rights. What then is the problem? ers in these global disputes, but to be careful, self-reflec-
While political-economic theory has aided in unpack- tive players.'8 We need to be especially on guard for the
ing the material and social relations of state domination ways in which the state and the international business and
and exploitation of fourth-world communities (in some financial communities can draw on our rhetoric to reen-
cases showing that the subsistence mode of production is trench their own interests, much as the New Right has
produced, rather than simply exploited, by global capital- recently begun to draw on Gramscian notions of cultural
ism), it has done little to overturn the basic tenets of hegemony in order to demonstrate the importance of a
Western notions about the qualitative divides among hu- culture war by the right.

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
516 ANTHROPOLOGIST
AMERICAN 1995
. VOL. 97, NO. 3 . SEPTEMBER

For however liberal are the legal bows to indigenous 2. Some of the historicalcontext to the emergence of land
traditions and knowledge, they actually entrench state rightslegislationis touched on in Peterson 1988.For a general
discussionof the Mabodecision and the NativeTitleBill see the
rights over indigenous communities using the very models
we generate. State authority over indigenous communi- specialissue of the Sydney Law Review 15(2) (1993).
ties is reestablished even as state institutions are repre- 3. Belyuen women use the phrase "went underground"to
referto, among other things, what happenswhen a Dreaming
sented as acknowledging (or reconciling themselves to)
withdrawsfromthe phenomenologicalworldbecause of human
indigenous traditions. This sleight of hand is achieved
(usuallymis-)behavior(see Povinelli1993a:155).
through court and legislative mandates that recognize the 4. See Baudrillard1975;Goux 1990;and Fitzpatrick1992.
traditional rights of Aboriginal people and at the same 5. New Zealand,Canada,Norway,and the UnitedStates pre-
time give state institutions the right to sort contemporary sent similarcases.
Aboriginal social and cultural practices into the tradi- 6. Handler1988;Sider1986;and P. Williams1991.
tional (valuable) and the untraditional (valueless). Rather 7. And, it should be noted, it is the key means by which
than opposing Aboriginal land rights, a position easily internationalstandardsof human rightsare applied(An-Na'im
redeployed by Aboriginal activists as oppressing Aborigi- 1992;Pollis and Schwab 1979;and Renteln1990).
nal people and thus easily inciting a human rights contro- 8. Not surprisingly,worksarguingthatSangroupsaredispos-
versy, the Australian government expresses sorrow for sessed pastoralists cite local people as supportingthis view,
the effects of past European actions on Aboriginal people while those who view the San groupsas besieged huntersand
(although those Aboriginal groups who suffered most gain gatherersquotelocal people as supportingtheirposition.
least) and supports multiculturalism in the form of Ab- 9. Moreover,underminingintentionalityas thatwhich drives
original traditions. But in the midst of elaborate displays or shapes humanaction throughrecourseto the imaginary,the
of remorse and appeals for reconciliation, the state has unconscious,or fantasy would not change the yawningdivide
managed to maintain control over what will be the test- he posits betweenthe humanandthe nonhuman.Inotherwords,
able, factual basis for a claim, whose beliefs will be evalu- psychoanalyticallyinformedmodels of humanlaborwould still
ated for their cultural authenticity and worth, and what falter over the uniquenessof humanpsychic-psychologicalac-
tion (for example,see Marcuse1966).
will be the criteria of labor's evaluation. In no way has the
10. In the AboriginalLandRights(NorthernTerritory)Act of
non-Aboriginal Australian government or public altered
1976, even if the land commissionerfinds for the traditional
its understanding of the factual grounds of work, labor,
Aboriginalowners,he or she must commentand consider
human subjectivity, or environmental insentience. In
short, the state produces a classic Batesian double mes- the detrimentto persons or communitiesincluding other
sage. It tells indigenous persons, "Yourbeliefs are abso- Aboriginalgroupsthatmightresultif the claimwere acceded
lutely essential to your economic well-being; your beliefs to eitherin whole or in part;the effect which accedingto the
make no rational sense in the assessment of your eco- claimeitherin whole or in partwouldhave on the existingor
nomic well-being." proposedpatternsof land usage in the region;and where the
Rather than challenging the factual grounds of state claim relates to alienatedCrownland, the cost of acquiring
the interests of persons (other than the Crown)in the land
authority, the debate in Australia over native title has concerned.[Neate 1989:18-19]
repositioned the government as the middle ground be-
tween the rabid right and the radical left, between conser- 11. Law is increasinglyseen in narrativeand ethnographic
vative public analysts and cultural pundits who argue that terms (Jackson1988;West 1993;andP. Williams1991).
recognizing native title has plunged "property law into 12. I do not meanto differentiatewomen'sviews frommen's
chaos and 'given substance' to the ambitions of Australian views in any absolute way. Because of their common lives,
communists and the Bolshevik left" and radical Aboriginal beliefs, and political-economicpredicaments,Belyuenwomen
groups and activists who would challenge rationality it- and men sharecertainbroadframeworksfor understandingthe
self-the values and principles upon which the modern effects of humanbodies on the Dreamingenvironment,even if
nation-state rests.19 they have somewhat separate ceremonialtexts and economic
practices.And,at Belyuen,ways of conceptualizinghuman-land
relationsvary as much between familygroupsas between gen-
der groups.I use the phrase "Belyuenwomen'sview"to desig-
Notes nate the social locus of my own understanding.
13. Kidney-fattingis a physicaloperationwherebya clever-
Acknowledgments.I would like to thankSandraBernandthe man makes an incision in a sleepingperson'sside removinghis
two anonymous reviewers from the American Anthropologist or her kidneyand replacingit with straw.The victim,unaware
for their insightfulcomments on the form and content of this of the clever-man'sattack, slowly wastes away and eventually
essay. dies (see Elkin1980).
1. The KenbiLandClaimis an Aboriginalland claim for the 14. See a relateddiscussionin Myers1988.
CoxPeninsula,PortPaterson,andBynoeHarbourregion,North- 15. Merlan1986:475;see also Falkenberg1962and Hamilton
emnTerritoryAustralia(see Brandlet al. 1979). 1982.

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 AUSTRALIAN
ABORIGINAL
LABOR/ ELIZABETH
A. POVINELLI 517

16. Belyuen Aborigines'hunting,fishing,and collecting ac- Escobar,Arturo

tivities actually contributesignificantlyto their dietaryneeds 1995 EncounteringDevelopment:The Makingand Unmak-
(see Povinelli1993aand Coombset al. 1983). ing of the Third World.Princeton:Princeton University
17. Thus, this search for a common unity, and throughthis Press.
unity a common answer to the diverse humanexperiences of Falkenberg,J.
labor and resource exploitation,seems more rooted in univer- 1962 KinandTotem.New York:HumanitiesPress.
salist thanrelativistictendencies in anthropologicaltheory(see
Fitzpatrick,Peter
Geertz1973;Sahlins1976;and Roseberry1991).
1992 The Mythologyof ModemLaw.London:Routledge.
18. Arturo Escobar's (1995) examination of development
rhetoric in the third world seems to complementthis essay's Geertz,Clifford
argument. 1973 The Impactof the Concept of Cultureon the Concept
19. HughMorgan,TheAustralian, 13 October1992. of Man.In TheInterpretationof Cultures;Selected Essays.
Pp. 33-54. New York:Basic Books.
Gordon,Robert
References Cited 1992 The BushmanMyth:The Makingof a NamibianUnder-
class. Boulder.WestviewPress.
An-Na'im,AbdullahiAhmed,ed. Goux,Jean-Joseph
1992 HumanRightsin Cross-Cultural Perspectives.Philadel- 1990 Symbolic Economies:After Marxand Freud. Ithaca:
phia:Universityof PennsylvaniaPress. CornellUniversityPress.
Baudrillard,Jean
1975 The Mirrorof Production.St. Louis:Telos Press. Hamilton,Annette
1982 Descendedfrom Father,Belongingto Country:Rights
Bauman,Richard
1986 Stowy,Performanceand Event.Cambridge: to Landin the AustralianWesternDesert. In Politics and
Cambridge
UniversityPress. History in Band Societies. Eleanor Leacock and Richard
Bird-David,Nuit Lee, eds. Pp. 85-108. Cambridge:CambridgeUniversity
1990 The GivingEnvironment:AnotherPerspectiveon the Press.
EconomicSystemof Gatherer-Hunters. CurrentAnthropol- Handler,Richard
ogy 31:189-196. 1988 Nationalismand the Politics of Culturein Quebec.
1992a Beyond "theHuntingand GatheringModeof Subsis- Madison:Universityof WisconsinPress.
tence":Culture-SensitiveObservationson the Nayakaand Hocking,Barbara
other ModemHunter-Gatherers. Man27:19-44. 1988 ColonialLawsand IndigenousPeoples:Past and Pres-
1992b Beyond "theOriginalAffluentSociety":A Culturalist ent Law Concerningthe Recognitionof HumanRights of
Reformulation.CurrentAnthropology33:25-34. IndigenousNativePeoplesin BritishColonieswith Particu-
Brandl,Maria,AdrienneHaritos,and MichaelWalsh lar Reference to Australia.In InternationalLaw and Ab-
1979 TheKenbiLandClaimto VacantCrownLandinthe Cox original Human Rights. BarbaraHocking, ed. Pp. 3-18.
Peninsula,Bynoe Harbourand Port PattersonAreasof the Sydney:LawBook Company.
NorthernTerritoryof Australia.Darwin:NorthernLand Ingold,Tim
Council. 1987 The Appropriationof Nature,Essays on HumanEcol-
Cashdan,E. ogy and Social Relations. Iowa City:Universityof Iowa
1990 RiskandUncertaintyin TribalandPeasantEconomies. Press.
Boulder:WestviewPress. Jackson,Bernard
Clifford,James 1988 Law, Fact, and NarrativeCoherence.Roby, England:
1988 The Predicamentof Culture:Twentieth-CenturyEth- DeborahCharlesPublications.
nography,Literature,and Art. Cambridge,MA:Harvard Locke,John
UniversityPress. 1988[1690] Two Treatisesof Government.Cambridge:Cam-
Comaroff,Jean,andJohn Comaroff bridgeUniversityPress.
1991 Of Revelationand Revolution:Christianity,Colonial-
ism andConsciousnessin SouthAfrica.Chicago:University Marcuse,Herbert
of ChicagoPress. 1966 Eros and Civilization.Boston:Beacon Press.
Coombs,H., M.Brandl,and W.Snowdon McRae,H., G. Netthein,and L. Beacroft
1983 A CertainHeritage.CRESMonograph9. Canberra: Aus- 1991 AboriginalLegal Issues: Commentaryand Materials.
tralianNationalUniversity. Sydney:LawBook Company.
di Leonardo,Micaela Merlan,Francesca
1991 FeministAnthropologyin an HistoricalPerspective.In 1986 AustralianAboriginalConception Beliefs Revisited.
Genderat the Crossroadsof Knowledge:FeministAnthro- Man21:474-493.
pologyin the Postmodemn Era.Micaeladi Leonardo,ed. Pp. Munn,Nancy
1-47. Berkeley:Universityof CaliforniaPress. 1970 The Transformation of Subjectsinto Objectsin Walpiri
Elkin,A. P. andPitjantjatjara
Myth.In AustralianAboriginalAnthropol-
1980 AboriginalMenof HighDegree.St. Lucia:Universityof ogy. R. Berndt,ed. Pp. 141-163. Nedlands:Universityof
QueenslandPress. WesternAustralianPress.

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
518 * VOL. 97, NO. 3 * SEPTEMBER1995
AMERICANANTHROPOLOGIST

Myers, Fred Sahlins, Marshall

1986 Pintupi Country, Pintupi Self: Sentiment, Place, and 1976 Culture and Practical Reason. Chicago: University of
Politics among Western Desert Aborigines. Canberra:Aus- Chicago Press.
tralian Institute of Aboriginal Studies. Schaffer, Rosalie
1988 Burning the Truck and Holding the Country: Property, 1988 International Law and Sovereign Rights of Indigenous
Time and the Negotiation of Identity among Pintupi Ab- People. In International Law and Aboriginal Human Rights.
origines. In Hunters and Gatherers 2, Property, Power and Barbara Hocking, ed. Pp. 19-42. Sydney: Law Book Com-
Ideology. Tim Ingold, David Riches, and James Woodburn, pany.
eds. Pp. 52-74. New York: Berg. Schrire, Carmel, ed.
Neate, Graeme 1984 Past and Present in Hunter Gatherer Studies. Orlando:
1989 Aboriginal Land Rights Law in the Northern Territory. Academic Press.
Chippendale, NSW: Alternative Publishing Co-operative. Sider, Gerald
Ortner, Sherry 1986 Culture and Class in Anthropology and History. Cam-
1989 High Religion: A Culture and PoliticalHistory of Sherpa
bridge: Cambridge University Press.
Buddhism. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Trigger, Bruce
Peterson, Nicolas 1992 Whitefella Comin', Aboriginal Responses to Colonial-
1988 Aboriginal Land Rights in the Northern Territory of
ism in Northern Australia. Cambridge: Cambridge Univer-
Australia. In Politics and History in Band Societies. Eleanor
sity Press.
Leacock and Richard Lee, eds. Pp. 441-462. Cambridge:
West, Robin
Cambridge University Press.
1993 Narrative, Authority and Law. Ann Arbor. University of
Pollis, A., and P. Schwab, eds.
1979 Human Rights: Cultural and Indigenous Perspectives. Michigan Press.
New York: Praeger. Williams, Nancy
Povinelli, Elizabeth 1985 On Aboriginal Decision-Making. In Metaphors of Inter-
1993a Labor's Lot: The History, Culture and Power of Ab- pretation: Essays in Honour of W.E. H. Stanner. D. Barwick,
original Action. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. J. Beckett, and M. Reay, eds. Pp. 240-269. Canberra: Aus-
1993b 'Might be Something': The Language of Indeterminacy tralian National University.
in Australian Aboriginal Land Use. Man 28:679-704. 1987 Two Laws, Managing Disputes in a Contemporary Ab-
1994 Sexual Savages/Sexual Sovereignty: Australian Colo- original Community. Canberra: Australian Institute of Ab-
nial Texts and the Postcolonial Politics of Nationalism. original Studies.
Diacritics 24(2-3):122-150. Williams, Patricia
Renteln, A. Dundes 1991 The Alchemy of Race and Rights. Cambridge, MA:Har-
1990 International Human Rights: Universalism Versus Rela- vard University Press.
tivism. Newberry Park: Sage. Wilmsen, Edwin
Roseberry, William 1989 Land Filled with Flies. Chicago: University of Chicago
1989 Anthropologies and Histories: Essays in Culture, His- Press.
tory, and Political Economy. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers Winterhalder, Bruce
University Press. 1987 The Analysis of Hunter-GathererDiets: Stalking an Op-
1991 Marxism and Culture. In The Politics of Culture. Brett timal Foraging Model. In Food and Evolution: Toward a
Williams, ed. Pp. 19-44. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Insti- Theory of Human Food Habits. M. Harris and E. Ross, eds.
tution Press. Pp. 311-340. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

This content downloaded from 130.88.0.86 on Mon, 25 Nov 2013 19:08:24 PM

All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions