LEIKEother universal categories of human behavior, speech is the object of diverse, complementary specializations. In the context of the ethnography of speaking, not only the language spoken but also the uses of speech may be assumed to have distinctive culture patterns. Ideally, total anthropological description of the pattern of a culture could well' include its rules and uses of speech, their implementation and violation, and relevant sanctions, positive and negative. Conversely, when inquiry is focused on cultural patterns of speech behavior, the proper context is the whole culture pattern. Major intracultural variations in the uses of speech may be assumed to be systematically related to the constituents of culture patterns, including aspects of the social structure, cultural definitions of the situations of action, the cultural philosophy and value system, and their patterned interrelations.Speech is so important and pervasive in any society that at least those with a reputation for wisdom or success are probably capable of stating the norms that govern the uses of speech. Moreover, enculturation includes instruction of the young not only in the mechanics of speaking but also in the patterns of speech behavior. Hence, virtually any adult and probably many young people are potential sources of relevant information, direct or inferential.The traditional kingdom of Burundi2 offers a particularly fortunate case study of culture patterning of speech behavior. Speech is explicitly recognized as an important instrument of social life; eloquence is one of the central values of the cultural world-view; and the way of life affords frequent opportunity for its exercise. Sensitivity to the variety and complexity of speech behavior is evident in a rich vocabulary for its description and evaluation and in a constant flow of speech about speech. Argument, debate, and negotiation, as well as elaborate literary forms are built into the organization of society as means of gaining one's ends, as social status symbols, and as skills enjoyable in themselves.A highly secularized, sophisticated feudal kingdom with a population of approximately two million, traditional Burundi has well-defined criteria of rhetoric, logic, and poetics, and well-developed ideas about their uses and interrelations. The norms governing the uses of speech are explicitly differentiated according to caste, sex, and age, so that the relations of speech behavior to social structure are easily grasped by observers. Adoption of the terms, "rhetoric," "logic," and "poetics" from western culture is necessarily tentative and obviously entails the risk of culture-bound distortion. Conventional denotative meanings will be used, i.e., "rhetoric" will designate the norms and techniques of persuasion, as well as criteria of styles of delivery in public speaking; "logic" will refer to the rules and uses of evidence and inference; and "poetics" will refer to the esthetic criteria that govern discourse. The referents of these terms are neither precise nor unambiguous ...

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ECENT intensification of behavioral science interest in the cultural facts R about values parallels a similar development in philosophy. Combination studies are appearing which bring together concepts and methods of contemporary philosophy and anthropological data (e.g., Macbeath 1952; Brandt 1954; Ladd in press), and this paper as well as the larger research of which it is a part belong in the same category. The ultimate objective of such inquiry is, hopefully, the clarification of both scientific and philosophical issues which involve knowledge of actual cultural value systems-the universality or uniqueness of various values, the relation between values and behaviors, the meaning or meaninglessness oi ethical terms, perhaps even the relation between duty and happiness (the "right" and the "good"). But the less abstract and general problems of adequate description of values continue to demand attention. The immediate objective of this effort is to outline and illustrate a descriptive-analytic method for classifying values as elements of a value system. The whole is regarded as an approximation and working hypothesis which may be useful, directly or suggestively, for the further study of values.The classificatory scheme to be presented was constructed to organize data relevant to the values of five cultures in the American Southwest (Navaho, Zuni, Spanish American, Texan and Mormon), collected over a five-year period by representatives of twelve special disciplines. Both philosophical and behavioral science sources were tapped for methods, concepts and terminology.' There follows a brief discussion of the theory and method of the classification; categories for describing a cultural value system; and, by way of illustrating a heretofore untested scheme, a description of the value system of the Ramah Na va h 0.

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