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This article was nominated for speedy deletion. I have developed a couple of sentences and asked for expansion. I will also find an appropriate stub for it. Capitalistroadster 03:24, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
It seems to me that the most logical expansion would be to outline common beliefs and notable features of Melanesian mythology in areas such as New Guinea, New Caledonia, Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands. Capitalistroadster 03:42, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
Good work so far Capitalistroadster! I think I started this page in error when I was making the Category for Melanesian mythology. It is a needed article tho, and I am also hoping to improve the kindred article on Polynesian mythology (more my area) which needs better content. Please also see the article on Encyclopedia Mythica to avoid a trap for the unwary that we are trying to get rid of from the Polynesian mythology pages: many of the Melanesian stubs will have been started from that source and it is unreliable to say the least. Kahuroa 05:06, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
Kastom is the more commonly used word to describe the range of myths and associated praxis. Merge? Paki.tv 08:23, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:
Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. — Community Tech bot ( talk) 02:30, 9 January 2020 (UTC)
I was fascinated by this article. Then I realized it doesn't cite sources. This must be changed. Please, some editor who has specialized knowledge in this area, insert references. Pete unseth ( talk) 15:21, 12 May 2022 (UTC)
https://books.google.ca/books?id=24x0AAAAMAAJ&pg=PA378 Elinruby ( talk) 15:07, 26 July 2022 (UTC)
Under “Origin of the sun and moon”: Compare to source above, from article: “the version given by one of the tribes of the Massim district of British New Guinea. One day a woman who was watching her garden close to the ocean, seeing a great fish sporting in the surf, walked out into the water and played with the fish, continuing to do this for several days. By and by the woman's leg, against which the fish had rubbed, began to swell and became painful until at last she got her father to make a cut in the swelling, when out popped an infant. The boy, who was named Dudugera, grew up among the other children of the village until one day, in playing a game, he threw his dart at the other children rather than at the mark, whereupon they became angry and abused him, taunting him with his parentage. Fearing lest the others might really harm him, Dudugera's mother determined to send him to his father; so she took the boy to the beach, whereupon the great fish came, seized him in his mouth, and carried him far away to the east. Before he left, Dudugera warned his mother and relatives to take refuge under a great rock, for soon, he said, he would climb into a pandanus-tree and thence into the sky, and, as the sun, would destroy all things with his heat. So indeed, it came to pass, for excepting his mother and her relatives, who heeded Dudugera's advice, nearly everything perished. To prevent their total annihilation his mother took a lime-calabash, and climbing upon a hill near which the sun rose, cast the lime into his face as he came up, which caused the sun to shut his eyes and thus to decrease the amount of heat.“ Elinruby ( talk) 15:11, 26 July 2022 (UTC)
The whole entry is essentially a cut-and-paste of Dixon's book, since these edits of 23 May 2014 (which itself was a response to the speedy-deletion discussion the same week).
Dixon's 1916 book may be public domain now, and indeed freely accessible, but I do find it a problem that this whole entry is copied from a single author's book, which was never meant to be an encyclopedic entry to begin with; and I really don't think that this contents, written as it is now (interesting though it may be) is in line with what a WP entry should be like.
Add to this, numerous issues due to the old date of the book (1916): many place names that are now outdated (as I said here), e.g. “ Banks Islands” and “ New Hebrides” being two different archipelagos (even though they've been part of Vanuatu since 1980); “Lepers Island” for what is now Ambae; actual country names like Papua New Guinea being mentioned nowhere, and called instead using old-fashioned categories like German New Guinea and British New Guinea (i.e. pre- Treaty of Versailles!). I've tried to edit some placenames, but that's not enough. Also, major areas of Melanesia are missing entirely, like New Caledonia or Fiji.
And then there is a deeper problem, namely that what is outdated are not just placenames, but the entire approach to the very subject of “ Melanesian mythology”. The author's 1916 approach consists in bringing together, sometimes under a single paragraph, cultural narratives from very different places, like the Banks islands and then the Admiralty islands and then moving on to so-called “New Hebrides” (meaning Ambae), then back to the Baining etc. as if those were all variants of a single culture, that one could lumpi under a single umbrella term of “Melanesian mythology”. That is such a 19th-century approach — similar to some books written at the time, that would claim to describe an “African mythology” from Senegal to Mozambique. This makes no sense at all, by today's academic standards.
Also, Dixon doesn't cite his own sources, which is yet another problem.
So I'm afraid this whole entry should be taken with caution, enriched with disclaimers, or even fully rewritten. The original 1916 texts could/should be posted on WikiSource for example (similar to Codrington's The Melanesians, 1891), and some refs made to it. Also, other sources should be taken into account in the entry, post 1916, including Maurice Leenhardt, Bronisław Malinowski, Jean Guiart, Maurice Godelier, Daniel de Coppet, Alban Bensa and so many others.
The current version of the page is unsatisfactory, but I don't know where to start to fix it. — Womtelo ( talk) 16:04, 26 July 2022 (UTC)
1. ‘The "Melanesian" mythology, on the other hand, has more myths relating to cosmogony,’ 2. ‘According to Dixon's classification, the mythology of his "Melanesian" area (i.e. the area peopled by Oceanic-speaking populations) is characterized by the almost total lack of myths relating to the origin of the world’ 3. ‘While Dixon did not focus on the beginning of the world in his "Melanesian" area’
These three statements are incompatible. Cosmogony is precisely about the origin of the world, so statement 1 and 2 contradict each other. And statement 3 is incompatible with either of the other two - the other statements presuppose that Dixon looked for cosmogonic myths and either found them (according to statement 1) or didn't (according to statement 2), whereas statement 3 implies that the only reason why Dixon didn't find any is that he didn't bother to look (presumably because he was especially racist against Melanesians as opposed to Polynesians - but that assessment of his research would itself need to be sourced). 62.73.69.121 ( talk) 15:14, 21 February 2024 (UTC)
This article was nominated for deletion on 20 May 2014. The result of the discussion was keep. |
This article has not yet been rated on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | |||||||||||||||||||||
|
This article was nominated for speedy deletion. I have developed a couple of sentences and asked for expansion. I will also find an appropriate stub for it. Capitalistroadster 03:24, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
It seems to me that the most logical expansion would be to outline common beliefs and notable features of Melanesian mythology in areas such as New Guinea, New Caledonia, Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands. Capitalistroadster 03:42, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
Good work so far Capitalistroadster! I think I started this page in error when I was making the Category for Melanesian mythology. It is a needed article tho, and I am also hoping to improve the kindred article on Polynesian mythology (more my area) which needs better content. Please also see the article on Encyclopedia Mythica to avoid a trap for the unwary that we are trying to get rid of from the Polynesian mythology pages: many of the Melanesian stubs will have been started from that source and it is unreliable to say the least. Kahuroa 05:06, 4 July 2006 (UTC)
Kastom is the more commonly used word to describe the range of myths and associated praxis. Merge? Paki.tv 08:23, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:
Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. — Community Tech bot ( talk) 02:30, 9 January 2020 (UTC)
I was fascinated by this article. Then I realized it doesn't cite sources. This must be changed. Please, some editor who has specialized knowledge in this area, insert references. Pete unseth ( talk) 15:21, 12 May 2022 (UTC)
https://books.google.ca/books?id=24x0AAAAMAAJ&pg=PA378 Elinruby ( talk) 15:07, 26 July 2022 (UTC)
Under “Origin of the sun and moon”: Compare to source above, from article: “the version given by one of the tribes of the Massim district of British New Guinea. One day a woman who was watching her garden close to the ocean, seeing a great fish sporting in the surf, walked out into the water and played with the fish, continuing to do this for several days. By and by the woman's leg, against which the fish had rubbed, began to swell and became painful until at last she got her father to make a cut in the swelling, when out popped an infant. The boy, who was named Dudugera, grew up among the other children of the village until one day, in playing a game, he threw his dart at the other children rather than at the mark, whereupon they became angry and abused him, taunting him with his parentage. Fearing lest the others might really harm him, Dudugera's mother determined to send him to his father; so she took the boy to the beach, whereupon the great fish came, seized him in his mouth, and carried him far away to the east. Before he left, Dudugera warned his mother and relatives to take refuge under a great rock, for soon, he said, he would climb into a pandanus-tree and thence into the sky, and, as the sun, would destroy all things with his heat. So indeed, it came to pass, for excepting his mother and her relatives, who heeded Dudugera's advice, nearly everything perished. To prevent their total annihilation his mother took a lime-calabash, and climbing upon a hill near which the sun rose, cast the lime into his face as he came up, which caused the sun to shut his eyes and thus to decrease the amount of heat.“ Elinruby ( talk) 15:11, 26 July 2022 (UTC)
The whole entry is essentially a cut-and-paste of Dixon's book, since these edits of 23 May 2014 (which itself was a response to the speedy-deletion discussion the same week).
Dixon's 1916 book may be public domain now, and indeed freely accessible, but I do find it a problem that this whole entry is copied from a single author's book, which was never meant to be an encyclopedic entry to begin with; and I really don't think that this contents, written as it is now (interesting though it may be) is in line with what a WP entry should be like.
Add to this, numerous issues due to the old date of the book (1916): many place names that are now outdated (as I said here), e.g. “ Banks Islands” and “ New Hebrides” being two different archipelagos (even though they've been part of Vanuatu since 1980); “Lepers Island” for what is now Ambae; actual country names like Papua New Guinea being mentioned nowhere, and called instead using old-fashioned categories like German New Guinea and British New Guinea (i.e. pre- Treaty of Versailles!). I've tried to edit some placenames, but that's not enough. Also, major areas of Melanesia are missing entirely, like New Caledonia or Fiji.
And then there is a deeper problem, namely that what is outdated are not just placenames, but the entire approach to the very subject of “ Melanesian mythology”. The author's 1916 approach consists in bringing together, sometimes under a single paragraph, cultural narratives from very different places, like the Banks islands and then the Admiralty islands and then moving on to so-called “New Hebrides” (meaning Ambae), then back to the Baining etc. as if those were all variants of a single culture, that one could lumpi under a single umbrella term of “Melanesian mythology”. That is such a 19th-century approach — similar to some books written at the time, that would claim to describe an “African mythology” from Senegal to Mozambique. This makes no sense at all, by today's academic standards.
Also, Dixon doesn't cite his own sources, which is yet another problem.
So I'm afraid this whole entry should be taken with caution, enriched with disclaimers, or even fully rewritten. The original 1916 texts could/should be posted on WikiSource for example (similar to Codrington's The Melanesians, 1891), and some refs made to it. Also, other sources should be taken into account in the entry, post 1916, including Maurice Leenhardt, Bronisław Malinowski, Jean Guiart, Maurice Godelier, Daniel de Coppet, Alban Bensa and so many others.
The current version of the page is unsatisfactory, but I don't know where to start to fix it. — Womtelo ( talk) 16:04, 26 July 2022 (UTC)
1. ‘The "Melanesian" mythology, on the other hand, has more myths relating to cosmogony,’ 2. ‘According to Dixon's classification, the mythology of his "Melanesian" area (i.e. the area peopled by Oceanic-speaking populations) is characterized by the almost total lack of myths relating to the origin of the world’ 3. ‘While Dixon did not focus on the beginning of the world in his "Melanesian" area’
These three statements are incompatible. Cosmogony is precisely about the origin of the world, so statement 1 and 2 contradict each other. And statement 3 is incompatible with either of the other two - the other statements presuppose that Dixon looked for cosmogonic myths and either found them (according to statement 1) or didn't (according to statement 2), whereas statement 3 implies that the only reason why Dixon didn't find any is that he didn't bother to look (presumably because he was especially racist against Melanesians as opposed to Polynesians - but that assessment of his research would itself need to be sourced). 62.73.69.121 ( talk) 15:14, 21 February 2024 (UTC)