On Deer and Dolphins: Nage Ideas Regarding Animal Transformation

Abstract

According to the Nage of eastern Indonesia, certain animals regularly transform into animals of another kind. Similar beliefs—specified here as notions of ‘contemporary zoological transformation’—have been documented for Malays and at least one other Indonesian society, as well as for the Kalam and Rofaifo of New Guinea. Referring to interpretations by ethnographers of these other societies, the paper analyses the Nage beliefs in regard to their connection with observation of zoological kinds. Attention is also given to their possible utilitarian value, connection with ethnozoological classification, and relation to similar yet distinct transformations encountered in myth and spiritual representations. Drawing on Atran's thesis (1990), it is concluded that Nage beliefs in contemporary animal transformation posit changes of essence and are in this sense counter‐intuitive. At the same time, certain ontological features demonstrate that the beliefs cannot be accommodated to a category of mythological or religious representations, and that in several respects they share more in common with modern scientific thought.

Why the Porcupine is Not a Bird: Explorations in the Folk Zoology of an Eastern Indonesian People. By Gregory Forth. 2016. University of Toronto Press, Toronto. 375 pp.

“…His research is based largely on participant observation ethnography and direct conversations with people in the Nage language and other local Austronesian languages. His writing includes work in ethnozoology, ethnotaxonomy and classification (Fontijne 2004;Forth 1996Forth , 1998a, local economy and ecology, religion, ritual, and mythology (Forth 1988(Forth , 1991(Forth , 2008. Forth studied local knowledge of Varanus komodoensis (the Komodo dragon) to demonstrate how local knowledge of this threatened species can contribute both to zoological investigation and conservation efforts.…”