Power Sharing: Language, Rank, Gender and Social Space in Pohnpei, Micronesia

by Elizabeth Keating

Overview

What allows certain individuals and groups to maintain control over the actions and lives of others? Linguistic anthropologist Elizabeth Keating went to the island of Pohnpei, in Micronesia, and studied how people use language and other semiotic codes to reproduce and manipulate status differences. The result is this inside view of how language works to create power and social inequality. This book challenges widely held theories on the nature of social stratification, including women's roles in creating hierarchy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780195354713
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	12/03/1998
Series:	Oxford Studies in Anthropological Linguistics , #23
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	6 MB

Table of Contents

	Introduction	3
1.	The Ethnographic Setting	18
2.	What Are Honorifics?	37
3.	Paths and Regions in Honorific Speech: Hierarchy of Place and Access to Status	68
4.	Honorific Possession: Grammatical Relations of Control and Permanence	99
5.	Women's Power Etiquette: Relationships between Gender and Honorifics	122
6.	Positioned Knowledge: Constructing Asymmetrical Epistemologies	155
7.	Valuing Stratification: Honor in Oratory and Feasting Practices	178
	Conclusion	195
	Bibliography	199
	Index	211