Missionization, Material Culture Collecting, and Nineteenth‐Century Representations in the New Hebrides (Vanuatu)

Dr. Brown's Study: Methodist Missionaries and the Collection of Material Culture in the Pacific

“…The second approach, born of post-structuralist critiques of orientalist discourse, avoids the notion of past authenticity and the views that collecting originated in science and is without political consequences. Rather, it situates collecting in its historical context, reasoning that collections reveal aspects of the collectors themselves, and the ideas and political agendas of the time (see Fabian 1998;Lawson 1994a;Thomas 1989 andSmith 1997). This is the approach I adopt, understanding collecting as a product of a particular historical era, and as located within a field of knowledge and power relations.…”

“…When missionary and natural history collecting are collapsed together unproblematically, the complexity of each form is erased. The assumption of sameness is a result of focusing on the early stages in the collecting process, that is, the initial acquisition and classification, rather than later stages in the life cycle of the collected object, where it is subject to recontextualization and the kinds of transformation described by Lawson: "Collecting is not a neutral process ... because it permanently transforms objects with certain cultural identities into other ones, fixes cultural identities that are dynamic, and imposes identities on objects that have none" (Lawson 1994a:34 and see Eves 1998:51 and also Jenkins 1994. 8 Once collected, items of material culture enter the repertoire of Western material culture (Schildkrout and Keim 1998:1), where they are inscribed with new meanings, identities, and significances, which reflect the values and perspectives of the collectors, museums, curators, and audiences rather than the creators.…”

“…Missionary collections differ from natural history collections in other respects as well, most notably in their lack of comprehensiveness. Indeed there is a selectivity in many collections made by missionaries, something which has been noted by a number of scholars, including Lawson (1994a and1994b) of Hugh Angus Robertson's collection, and Smith (1997) of Joseph Annand's collection. 9 Lawson remarks that Robertson's selection of material culture was thoughtful and excluded objects showing any European influence, items that were of an ordinary nature, those that were crudely made, and those "embarrassing to missionary propriety" (1994a:32).…”

“…In the last few years, interest in the collection of material culture by missionaries has increased. See, for example, Binkley and Darish (1998); Cannizzo (1998); Coombes (1994b); Eves (1998); Lawson (1994a and1994b); Meyer (1997); Rubel and Rosman (1996); Schildkrout and Keim (1998);Smith (1997); and Stanley (1994a and1994b). See Gunson (1978) for a history of missionary presence in the Pacific from 1796-1860.…”

An Archaeology of Early Christianity in Vanuatu

“…Robertson held at the Redpath Museum in Montreal is the most welldocumented of missionary collections from the New Hebrides (Lawson 1994a(Lawson , 1994b(Lawson , 2001(Lawson , 2005. The collection was a source of pride for the Redpath Museum, because of its rare, even unique sampling of Erromangan material culture, but also as an expression of a shift from Canada as a colonised culture to a colonising one (Lawson 1994a: 46-47, 153).…”