Cultural Alternatives and a Feminist Anthropology: An Analysis of Culturally Constructed Gender Interests in Papua New Guinea

The Chambri of Papua New Guinea are well known as being the "Tchambuli" of Margaret Mead's influential work, Sex and Temperament, in which she described them as people among whom, in contrast to Western society, women dominated over men. In this book, the authors analyze Mead's data and present original material to reveal that Mead misinterpreted the Chambri situation. In fact, Chambri women neither dominate men, nor vice versa. They use this reformulated interpretation to discuss the relev...