art in cunaland: ideology and cultural adaption

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Art in Cunaland: Ideology and Cultural Adaption Author(s): Lawrence A. Hirschfeld Source: Man, New Series, Vol. 12, No. 1 (Apr., 1977), pp. 104-123Published by: Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and IrelandStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2800997Accessed: 24-08-2015 22:08 UTC

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ART IN CUNALAND: IDEOLOGY AND CULTURAL ADAPTION

LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD

Columbia University, New York

This article offers a structural-marxist analysis of San Blas Cuna (Panama) aesthetic tradition. Processes integral to Cuna cultural adaptation are isolated by focusing on relations inherent in the production and performance of art, and by investigating the formal coincidence of Cuna aesthetic and political economic structure. The article presents (i) a formal model for the inter-action of art and economy, (2) the application of that model to the description of a structural schema for Cuna art, and (3) analysis of the role of art in Cuna political economy and cultural adaptation. The article has wider implications within the general theoretical discussion of the relationship between base and superstructure.

I In his recent analysis of Northwest Coast masks, Levi-Strauss noted that 'it

would be illusory to imagine, as so many anthropologists and art historians still do, that a mask, or more generally a sculpture or painting, could be interpreted in terms of itself, by that which it represents, or by the aesthetic or ritual use to which it is destined' (I975: I I6). This article is an attempt to heed that advice by applying a structural-marxist approach to the analysis of a single aesthetic tradition; that of the San Blas Cuna of Panama. Central to this analysis is the contention that while no explanation of ideology can be complete without reference to infrastructure, ideology cannot be reduced to infrastructure.

For the most part the anthropology of art has focused on the aesthetic as symbol; as reflection of a culture's larger symbolic internal coherence. Seen as a commentary on symbolic action art represents what Geertz has called a 'model of' reality, i.e. 'processes which function not to provide sources of information in terms of which other processes can be patterned, but to represent these patterned processes as such, to express their structure in an alternate medium' (Geertz I973: 94). Althusser's belief that 'art makes us see ... the ideology from which it is born' (I972: 222) sums up much of the approach that has characterised the anthropology of art'.

Most of this work has focused on what the aesthetic symbol means, although how it means is often unaddressed. The present article does not address the issue of how or what Cuna aesthetic symbols mean, not from the assumption that an interpretation of that meaning is impossible or unfruitful, but rather from the contention that the principal intersection of Cuna art and economy involves the construction of structural, rather than semantic, links within Cuna art. This article will attempt to show that art as an aspect of ideology can function to store information, preserving possible principles of organisation in a generalised (and generalisable) form. Thus as environmental conditions vary, and economic organisation is restructured, organisational principles retained in the ideology can reappear in the economy.

Man (N.S.) 12, I04-I23.




All social domains contain information about how the society organises relationships between actors and their environment. Since the relations defined by the aesthetic domain do not function directly to supply the energetic needs of society, the number and type of relationships which constitute the aesthetic domain are less rigidly constrained than those of economy.

The notion that ideology stores information is not novel. Rappaport (I968: 239-40) and Geertz (1973: 92) have suggested that ideology acts as an information storage system akin to that of a computer and whose function 'may be of considerable importance in evolutionary processes' (Rappaport I968: 241). I contend that it is the categorical relations embedded in the art system that can be called upon by the social formation to respond to new environmental needs, i.e. to provide flexibility in an integrated and coherent form necessary for social reproduction. In other words, art is a logically structured domain of 'preserved possibilities' that interacts with economy, a body of 'realised possibilitics,' providing a potentially adaptive response to changing circumstances.

For this article it is not relations of meaning within an art style whith are important, but rather the relations between categories described through analysis of the totality of art forms found in a given culture. To that end I will analyse the arts of the San Blas Cuna as a coherent, structured whole, by reference to aspects of the arts' production and performance. The second goal will be to show how the genesis of a novel Cuna art form, the mola, is integrally related to the evolution of Cuna political economy.

The Cuna possess a rich and varied aesthetic tradition. The dominant plastic art is the mo/a, a reverse applique blouse worn by the women. In addition, there are a number of verbal forms, differing from colloquial Cuna, which are of considerable aesthetic interest both to the Cuna and to anthropologists (see Howe 1974; Sherzer 1975; Sherzer & Sherzer I972; Kramer 1970). Sherzer has offered a three-part classification of these types: (i) pap ikar, an historical, religious, and political chant, (2) the kantule ikar, a chant which accompanies female puberty rites, and (3) chants used in curing ceremonies (Sherzer 1975: 263). These ritual chants together with the mo/a comprise the major Cuna art forms. In the following section each will be described and then contrasted with one another in an effort to delimit the structure of Cuna art.

II pap ikar

Several evenings a week, and occasionally during the day as well, most villagers gather in the onmakket nteka, a large, centrally located congress house owned by the community. Much like a typical Cuna dwelling writ large, the oiinmakket neka is the site of the most frequently held and important politico-religious event in San Blas, the chanting of pap ikar. Performed by one of the ranked chiefs, pap ikar is a medium of moral teaching and social control, incorporating themes from Cuna culture history, the teachings of culture heroes, and contemporary events into a fixed, chanted format. Essentially allegorical, the chants are meant to instruct, a point that is underscored by the interpretation in colloquial Cuna given at the chant's conclusion by another ranked official called an arkar, or speaker. Like all other Cuna



io6 LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD

verbal arts, pap ikar differs syntactically and lexically from spoken Cuna. Although each type of ritual chant is idiosyncratic to some extent, and those who are not ritual specialists are said not to understand (Sherzer & Sherzer I972), there are a number of indications that the audience can follow the text itself, or at least the text in combination with the arkar's interpretation whose spoken recitation is clearly comprehensible. For instance, during the performance of pap ikar itself a third official, called a sualipet, periodically reminds the assembly in piercing screams that they should not sleep but pay attention to the chief's recitation. While other Cuna chants are said to be incomprehensible none of them requires the audience to be at all attentive to the performance. Combined with the emphasis on repetition and interpretation by the arkar, this suggests that in some fashion the audience is able to comprehend pap ikar. Thus its performance involves communication between the chanter and the audience, i.e. a horizontal communication between people.2

The content ofpap ikar is not fixed, and a chief's prestige is derived in large part from his ability, innovatively and aesthetically, to integrate various indigenous and exogenous themes into the fixed form (Howe I974: 89-go). Currently a man learns to chant pap ikar after he has been installed as a low-ranking chief, developing his repertoire by attending inter-village congresses and by studying with chiefs of his own and other islands. Although in the past apprentices may have offered labour in exchange for the formal instruction, then as now, no one has the right to charge another a fee fQxr teaching pap ikar (Howe I974: I63). In a sense the chief has usufructuary rather than proprietorial rights to pap ikar since its performance is part of the rights and duties of the chief, an office of achieved status dependent on consensus.

kantule ikar In addition to the evening gatherings in the onmakket neka, the community at

large frequently assembles to celebrate a young woman's physical and cultural maturation through a series of complex rites, called innas. Throughout the inna, the ceremony's ritual leader, the kantule, performs a chant specific to these rites called the kantule ikar.

The rites publically proclaim first a girl's pubescence, and later her marriageabili- ty. During them her hair is bobbed like that of a mature Cuna woman and she is instructed in her duties as an adult. Part of this instruction is given to the initiate at the point during the ceremony when her soul is said to travel to the spirit world. The kantule's flute is said to be the agent of this soul transmission and is prompted by the chanting of the kantule, who addresses his chant to the flute rather than the assembled guests (James Howe, personal communication). The chant itself is incomprehensible to all but the kantule and his apprentices, and, in fact, the audience pays little attention to the performance (Sherzer & Sherzer I972: I95). Unlike the pap ikar, the kantule ikar is fixed in both form and content, and the text is not expected to move the community to action, instead functioning to manipulate spiritual and cosmological relations (Sherzer & Sherzer I972).

Unlike the chief, the kantule is paid a substantial fee for teaching others the chants, although, like the chiefs there is a hierarchy among the practitioners of the kantule ikar determined by their level of study (Howe I974: 23I, 235). The kantule ikar contrasts with pap ikar in other ways as well: the kantule ikar has both a fixed form



LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD I07

and content and the chant is clearly incomprehensible. In addition, the chant acts within the spirit world, providing a mediatidn between that world and the human domain, thus being a vertical communication, whereas pap ikar is horizontally addressed, comprehensible and innovative.

Curative chants The Cuna model of illness sometimes attributes sickness to loss of soul resulting,

for example, from contact with a contaminated place or a frightening experience, causing the person's soul to be taken to the under-world by malevolent spirits. By addressing wooden and stone images representing benevolent spirits, the chanter prompts these spirits to retrieve and return the lost soul (Nordenskiold I938: 340-50).

Unlike the kantule ikar or pap ikar, the curative chants are not performed in public, but in the patient's home in the case of illness, or in a small hut set aside for birth rituals in the case of difficult births (Chapin I975). In each village there are a number of individuals who can perform the required chants. No formal hierarchy exists among its practitioners, and anyone who knows the chants can teach another the texts for a fee. Like the kantule ikar the curative chants have a fixed text and can be considered the property of the knower (Howe I974: I63). Unlike either of the other forms, it is domestically focused and non-hierarchical.

Molas Molas are the rectangular panels of reverse applique worn by the women on the

front and back of their blouses. They are the central element in a complex and stylised woman's wardrobe, which includes gold nose rings, breast plates and earrings, as well as strung beads worn as wrist- and anklets, and necklaces. Molas represent one of the few labour intensive activities in San Blas today. A woman learns to sew molas by imitating her mother and other senior women in the household. The production, sale and distribution of cash realised by the trading of molas are entirely under the aegis of the women, usually supervised by the household's most senior female. It should be noted that molas are only traded for export, i.e. a woman produces her own molas herself, and there is no internal Cuna trade or sale of molas. Molas are a pre-eminent domestic product, and their production is the concrete expression of female solidarity in the matrilocal, extended family household.

In terms of content or subject matter, there is virtually no restraint. Any design a Cuna artist might encounter is likely to appear in a mola. Some molas display scenes from Cuna cosmology, although spirits, culture heroes, and mythical scenes are seldom depicted. Molas are a secular, decorative art form with no magical significance (Nordenskiold 1938: 38-9). They have been considered a communication medium, the reification of the pervasive Cuna norm of egalitarianism and equality, what Sherzer has called cunaite' (Sherzer & Sherzer I974).

III

In spite of a formal affinity among the arts (see Sherzer & Sherzer I972; Sherzer I975; Kramer I970) a structure derived from contrasts can be isolated resulting



io8 LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD

from the operation of two distinct structural principles. First, the four types present two sets of polar inversions; pap ikar is a civicly focused event whose performers stand in a hierarchical relation to one another. It is a horizontal communication in that the performance is addressed to a human audience. The innovative text itself is comprehensible to the audience (or at least made comprehensible by the mediation of the arkar). One who knows the text is obliged to teach it to the appropriate student without payment. Diametrically opposing this is the curative chanting; a domestically focused event, taught by practitioners who are not formally ranked, it has a fixed text and is incomprehensible to the human audience. It is a vertical communication that attempts to enter and alter relations in the spirit world.

A second complete inversion characterises the relationship between the kantule ikar and the mola. The former is a fixed performance with an incomprehensible text which represents a vertical communication between the chanter and the spirit world. A kantule is paid to teach another the text and kantules themselves are hier- archically ranked and they perform at a civic event. The mola, on the other hand, is a horizontal communication whose imagery is comprehensible to the community at large, its content is innovative, and its production is domestically focused. Training is informal and without payment, and a hierarchy of performers is unknown.

A third opposition unites pap ikar and the mola in contrast to the kantule ikar and curative chants. The first two are temporally continuous in their performance, and thematically expansive. They occur with a regularity that is not dependent on special context. They can, and do, incorporate non-Cuna images and themes. On the other hand, the performance of the kantule ikar is dependent on periodic con- textual relations, i.e. the physical maturation of the female around whom the ceremony is organised. Similarly, the curative chant is performed in response to an illness. Both are conservative, or contractive, in their adherence to fixed texts, and both are responses to situations of liminal status. The kantule ikar and curative chants restore balance in periods of disturbance or change, while the mola and pap ikar maintain balance through social control and shared symbolism.

In addition to defining a structure of polar inversion, the four art forms constitute a closed structure in which each art form is a coordinate in a series of less severe transformations. These transformations follow a linear circuit such that a mola bears a 'family resemblance' to pap ikar, since both have comprehensible irnages. Yet they contrast in that the former is domestic and non-hierarchical, like the curative chanting, while the latter is like the kantule ikar in its civic focus and ranked performers. By following the circuit defined by the four art forms it is apparent that another 'circular' structure unites them (see fig. i).

The first structural principle of polar inversion sets each form in opposition to another, while the second structure defines the set as a whole in conjunction with the formal parallelism which all four forms share. Each element in the set is more than the sum of its intrinsic features, but contrasts structurally to the other art forms.

At the outset I suggested that the totality of a culture's arts defined relationships critical to understanding any of the inclusive forms. Nonetheless, I have dealt only with some of the arts found in San Blas, albeit the most important ones with respect to frequency of performance and indigenous valuation. The claim here is that these stand as classes of art forms rather than the individual forms themselves.



LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD lO9

con.tractive -, I A (..) | incomprehensible-veriticol-fixed | (_J

personol property-poyment

KANTULE CUTIV E ? (4+,-) IKAR CHANT C 3.-)

.2 ~~~~~~~0 -C~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~C

oX PAP IKAR MOLA :

W comprehensible innovative W I public property - non payment expansive

FIGURE S.

Thus even if we consider alternative aesthetic types as candidates, the structural properties outlined above remain valid.

In addition to the chanting that accompanies an inna there is a dance called kwilet associated with the ceremony. Like other ceremonial events at an inna the spiritual direction of the dancing is under the supervision of the kantule, so that the kwilet possesses structural properties parallel to the kantule ikar. There is another form of dance performed in San Blas called the noka koppe. It is similar to the kwilet in that it is an ensemble performance, but like pap ikar in that it is non-magical, a horizontal communication, and has a structured hierarchy of officials associated with it. On the field-site where I worked it is performed once a week alternately with pap ikar.

The Cuna also produce smnall, carved wooden icons, called nuchus, used in conjunction with curative chants. Again the structural properties which characterise

C-) , i lI (.-)

KWILET NUCHU ,

0

NOK t<A l<OPPE LU LL ABY.r 0+ ) ( 0)

non - magicalI PIGUQB ..



IIO LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD

the oral tradition apply to its attendant paraphernalia. Thus the nuchus are magical, part of a vertical communication, domestically focused and used by a performer (and made by a producer) who is not part of a formal hierarchy. The final type, lullabies, are sung by women to soothe their children to sleep. Performed at home, they are not magical and are sung in colloquial Cuna, and thus are comprehensible. From these types a structural schema identical to the one already described results (see fig. 2).

IV

It cannot be claimed that one art form would not exist without the others, but it can be hypothesised that the categories defined by the relationships the Cuna arts describe could not stand in isolation. In this sense-and it is a very real sense-the Cuna arts are structured dialectically. 'Dialectic' used here in its traditional form as 'an instance in which one opposite cannot stand without the other and vice versa.... Not-A is the negation of A. In itself and for itself it is nothing; it is the negation of the other and nothing else' (Colletti 1975: 4). Again it must be emphasised that it is not the concrete forms of the Cuna arts which are structured in and of themselves, but it is the relationships between the categories which the Cuna arts establish that are dialectically related. Oppositions, binary or otherwise, are not necessarily dialectical, although the confusion is often made (see Colletti 1975). The discovery of oppositions is not an analytic goal, but a mnethod. It is a method for uncovering structures or models which predict and explain. In this case, it is the structure of the cognitive processes which underlie the Cuna arts; cognitive processes which are structured similarly to those found in cultural phenomena the world over.

Still, methodologically sound or not, one may nonetheless find the 'elegance' of this type of structural analysis unappealing, one is apt to say 'so what?' Universal properties of the mind may not be a subject that all anthropologists find compelling or interesting. By investigating one possible ethnographic objection which might be raised to the analysis it may be possible to see not only what this structure is, but what it does.

It might be claimed that I have made an organisational error, i.e. the eight art forms I have described neatly break themselves into two categories, the verbal arts (pap ikar, kantule ikar, curative chanting, and lullabies), and the visual arts (mola, nuchu, kwilet, and noka koppe). The structural diagrams presented could be combined thus rather than in the manner offered. While it was claimed that the two were merely instances of the same structural cohesion, this alternative organisation would uncover a new structural opposition, viz., verbal v. visual. The validity of this cannot be denied, but this recombination obscures an important contrast already alluded to, i.e. the diagrams as presented distinguish major from minor arts.

The criteria for determining the relative importance of any art form are twofold. First, the Cuna lay greater emphasis on what I have called the major arts. Second, and perhaps more importantly, aesthetic acumen manifest in the performance of the first four (pap ikar, kantule ikar, mola and curative chanting) bestows prestige on the performer, while the latter (noka koppe, kwilet, lullaby and nuchu production) do not represent especially prestigious skills to have mastered.

The combination as presented essentially hinges on the anomalous reversal of



LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD III

two forms, the mola and the lullaby. The problem is that although the mola 'fits' well into its structural space, it is, nonetheless, somewhat peculiar with respect to pap ikar, kantule ikar and curative chants. It has a relatively short history, it is dependent on trade goods, and it is a plastic art; in all these features it is dissimilar from the other arts to which it is contrasted. More importantly, the lullaby shares the same intrinsic features of the mola, but is like the other arts in its history, indigenous self-sufficiency and its verbal form. In fact, the mola has shown a steady increase in both importance and size since its inception. Apparently stemming from now moribund body painting, the mola has developed from a simple border decoration to its contemporary form of large reverse-applique panels joined by a simple yoke (Keeler I969: 83; Stout 1947: 67-8). At the same time the lullaby has enjoyed decreasing popularity. Why then have I, and the Cuna, placed so much stress on the mola? Why is the lullaby performed less and less often, while mola-making is a growing and vital art form.

Earlier I suggested that there may exist a dynamic relationship between the Cuna arts as an aspect of ideology and the evolution of Cuna political economy. I would now like to make an extended digression to establish that point. Specifically, I contend that the genesis of the mola as a novel and anomalous art form functioned historically to provide continuity in two structured spheres of Cuna society: (i) in that its organisation of production maintained a basic economic principle necessary for reproduction of the Cuna social formation, and (2) it coherently 'filled' an appropriate spot in the pre-existing structural space of Cuna aesthetics.

Molas first appeared as part of the crystallisation of a unique Cuna woman's costume emerging in the mid-nineteenth century. Along with the mola, an interest in gold jewellery redeveloped, as did an emphasis on trade beads and imported cloth used for shawls and skirts. With these changes a woman's wardrobe became the major vehicle of wealth, display and investment (Stout 1941: 109; 1947: 76). Although the costume as a collection is unmistakably Cuna, every item of the ensemble is either imported, or, like the mola, produced indigenously from imported materials.

During the same period the Cuna political economy experienced a number of major changes: riverine, mainland villages were abandoned for island homesites, private tenure replaced communal land tenure, women virtually ceased participation in agriculture, and extensive cash-cropping of coconuts began (Stout 1947; Howe 1977; Brown I970). Nonetheless, much of Cuna socio-political organisation remained unchanged. Interestingly, although the primary means of production, land, was now held privately,3 a near equality in wealth distribution (as well as a virtual lack of incipient classes) has remained a hallmark of Cuna economic life.

This lack of economic asymmetry is not accidental. The second half of this article will focus on the mode of distribution within Cuna political economy which has maintained this economic egalitarianism, and I will attempt to demonstrate how the complex of nineteenth-century changes supports this maintenance. To do this it is necessary to describe the Cuna mode of production characterised by (i) the structure whereby access to the means of production (and not wealth per se) cannot be concentrated in one social group, and (2) the means by which major portions of surplus produced can be channelled into areas which cannot generate wealth through alternative means of production.



I12 LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD

v

The basic unit of Cuna production and consumption is the matrilocal, extended family. The household is an autonomous economic unit under the authority of the senior male, although each adult member owns property individually. When property is bequeathed the inheritors sub-divide the subsistence farm lands, or in the case of coconut plantations, the co-inheritors each receive harvest rights to the plot in 'rotation. Although the co-inheritors are normally members of different households, and thus under the economic authority of different persons, they can hold joint title and share the yield from a single plot without compromising the unity of their respective households since the coconut plots require virtually no management. Thus, although co-inheritors are joined through common title to a particular plot, this common title does not compete with the bonds which tie them to separate and autonomous households.

Since there is no structural bond which can permanently link households economically, wealth tends to be dispersed over time, since if one household accumulates a significant measure of wealth, within a few generations this wealth will be spread among several households, given the traditional practices of village endogamy, matrilocal residence, bilateral and paritible inheritance (Holloman I969: I74)

(see fig. 3).

Shaded figures inherit from ego. Matrilocal households are circled.

FIGURE 3.

This aspect of the mode of distribution, in part, accounts for the continuing economic equality. Nonetheless, there is a critical limitation to this system of distribution; it can accommodate only those types of wealth which are readily paritible or easily given over to rotation. If inherited property required significant management or care, for instance, the common owners' interests could conceivably conflict with the economic unity of their respective households. This poses little problem for most of San Blas since the primary means of production are either subsistence farms or coconut plantations. This does not mean that other economic opportunities do not exist in San Blas, but only that for most of the Comarca those commercial and service institutions dependent on fixed capital investment are under the direct control of the village and not in private hands. This feature of Cuna political economy stems largely from the control of capital circulation (and hence accumulation) which is customarily specified.




VI Circulation of cash

It is clear that the Cuna have not controlled the distribution of wealth by shunning capital producing activities. In 1940 Stout estimates that I3 million coconuts were sold (I947: 24), while by I960 the amount was nearly 24 million (Bull I962: II).

Yet it cannot be assumed from the size of the trade that the Cuna have maximised their production. It should be remembered that at the same time that extensive cash-cropping was getting under way, the Cuna effectively halved their cash producing labour force by eliminating women from the agricultural labour pool. In addition, the male productive life span has decreased, since males do not fully enter the labour force until marriage, and the age of marriage has steadily risen since the turn of the century (Holloman I969: I62).

While it is not uncommon to see groups of idle young men in San Blas, their female counterparts are experiencing a quite different set of pressures. Significant responsibility is assumed by even pre-pubescent girls, and long before marriage a young woman is a full member in the household economy. Like all other women in the household, Cuna girls will spend most of their time in the only labour intensive activity in San Blas-sewing molas. This labour represents a significant drain on family resources since the materials necessary to produce the average number of molas in a woman's wardrobe are the equivalent to the cash realised from the sale of i,ooo coconuts.

Thus, on the one hand, the available surplus production is limited by the exclusion of female labour and the foreshortened male productive life span; on the other hand, the cash which is produced is reduced by the expenses required for the production of molas. In one sector the yields are restricted, while in the other expenses are increased.

One might object that I claim that surplus from cash-cropping is 'disarmed' by investment into an unproductive medium, when in fact that 'unproductive medium' is a lucrative cottage industry. That is, that in spite of the fact that molas are made entirely from expensive trade goods, and thus a considerable amount of capital is tied up in their fabrication, when sold they represent a transformation of that capital investment into profit. Molas, rather than being an instance of Marx's formula for the circulation of commodities, C - M - C (Marx I967: I46-55) are a phase in capital accumulation more appropriately represented by the formula M - C - M.

There is no contradiction, however. This discussion concerns the historical process of the mola's genesis. For a considerable period of time the sale of molas was insignificant or nonexistent, yet their production has been the primary labour task of women since at least the turn of the century (Stout I947: 77). Unless we credit the Cuna with the extraordinary foresight of inventing and producing an indigenously used and conceived commodity in the mid-nineteenth century in anticipation of intense commercial demand a century later, we must assume that it functioned admirably as a repository of dead-end wealth.

But nonetheless, it might be pointed out I am claiming that the mola remains such a drain even now and certainly mola sales currently account for a good deal of cash income. The issue here, however, is not whether it produces income, but



II4 LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD

whether that revenue is greater than the prior investment, i.e. is there a profit? In fact, the data collected strongly suggest that for a representative sample of molas produced and sold, there is in fact a loss on each, not including consideration of labour necessary for construction.4 That is, Cuna women on the average sold molas for prices which did not cover the initial cost of production materials let alone labour. Thus the importance of the extension of the productive life span of females vis-a-vis that of males. If shortening the amount of work men do maintains a lower level of realised surplus, then lengthening the time which women work (the major part of which is making molas) expends more and more of that realised surplus in an eminently unprofitable activity.

The mola was but one of several changes in women's wardrobes, and a woman in full regalia of molas, skirt, head shawl, beads, gold earrings, and breastplate represents an investment of several hundred dollars. Most of these items are perish- able to some degree, with the exception of the jewellery, but unlike the molas, jewellery is inalienable and cannot be sold. Rather than representing a liquid investment, the jewellery in particular, and the entire wardrobe in general, thus, constitutes a significant drain of household surplus into non-productive means.

In addition to a wardrobe the household is obliged to provide each daughter with several of the inna ceremonies described earlier. Sponsorship of these ceremonies requires large capital and labour expenditure by the host household which must offer the festival's participants considerable amounts of food and drink.

Thus both the wardrobe and the innas are wealth repositories which transform surplus into non-productive means. Not all households sponsor innas of the same scope or with the same frequency, however, and some households can boast of more elaborately, and more expensively, adorned women. Not surprisingly, these variations reflect differences in the capital and labour resources available to each household. To some extent these repositories of surplus serve as 'leveling devices' (Nash I960: 35) by requiring larger investment from those whose resources are greater, while allowing less affluent households to follow a more moderate course. There is, of course, prestige which accrues to those who are most lavish, but '. . . this prestige articulates very minimally with status-ranking derived from political and religious positions....' (Howe I974: 262). As we have seen, given the mode of distribution neither wealth nor prestige can be converted into economic advantage over time.

The inna and the wardrobe are the largest non-subsistence expenses a household must meet. Besides requiring capital input from the domestic surplus they share a number of features, both have women as object, and both stress the continuity of the domestic matri-set which we have seen from the marriage and inheritance rules, tends to disperse wealth over time. With mola production (and its concomitant isolation from the agricultural sphere) women become the physical nexus of the household, involved in a labour intensive activity which is domestically focused, and whose training and direction emphasise the matri-set of the household. The domestic centre of the matri-set is further underscored by the practice of matrilineal inheritance of the house-site itself (Costello 1975). Women stand as mediators of the basic unit of Cuna economic life, since that unit, a man and his son-in-law, requires a female link. This link constitutes a basic continuity for a household since, with matrilocal residence, men must marry and live out. The mola, as mentioned



LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD IIs

above, is the objectification of the behavioural link between women in terms of the organisation of its production, the location of that production, and the site of training for the women who produce it. The question now becomes, why did the Cuna find it necessary to alter their political economy to accommodate large sur- pluses without attendant wealth inequalities if the basic feature of that political economy, equality in wealth, was already assured by the economic structure extant in the mid-nineteenth century? Why did they begin cash-cropping coconuts and producing molas if they were only interested in finding a fair way to 'squander' its fruits? And why have some areas developed wealth inequalities and incipient classes, while most of San Blas has not? The answer requires a brief historical examination of Cuna political and environmental adaptation.

VII

Unlike most Circum-Caribbean groups the Cuna have historically retained political independence (Steward & Faron I959: I74-20I). Subject to immediate and near-constant military threat from the European colonials since the Conquest, the Cuna retained their independence through shrewd politicing and military acuity.

By the mid-nineteenth century the immediate military threat had waned. The Cuna were able to abandon the mainland villages for the more comfortable islands, which, although less defendable, are cooler and free of mosquitos and poisonous snakes. In addition the island homesites allowed the introduction of extensive coconut cash-cropping which is dependent on easy access to sea-going trading boats.

Although the military threat had largely abated, attempts nonetheless were made to colonise the Cuna politically and culturally, and defence against this cultural, rather than military, threat required a different strategic response. The new island villages offered many creature comforts, but also offered easy access to the purveyors of acculturation. Successful competition called for economic-as well as military and political-strength, and coconuts provided the base for this strength. The seemingly contradictory attempt to preserve a conservative cultural formation through more extensive economic interaction with the outside world is not a response peculiar to the Cuna. Linares (1970) has shown that expanding cash-cropping among the Diola of Senegal has promoted isolation by providing the wherewithal 'to meet the demands of the outside world without altering local organisation' (1970: I96).

For the modern Cuna meeting 'the demands of the outside world' means com- bating colonial attempts to alienate them from their land and culture. This threat to Cuna autonomy has been no less apparent because it is economic and cultural rather than military. Although the shift to island villages provided refuge from the discomforts of the rain forest, the ecological bufferzone which previously had separated the Cuna from their enemies was lost. In its place the Cuna have constructed an economic and political border whose protection requires that commercial and cultural exchanges across it be subject to internal rather than external control.

The predominant exports from San Blas are coconuts and molas. Mola sales are



ii6 LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD

largely haphazard and do not occur within a centrally structured market system. In fact, one feature of the economic defence in general is an absence of a centralised market structure for export. While coconut sales are consigned exclusively to the Colombian owned and manned trading vessels which circulate through San Blas, the Cuna rigidly control this trade. Colombian sailors are not allowed to move freely within the villages and there is little social interaction between the Colom- bians and the Cuna with the exception of the trade itself. Exchanges are on a cash basis, attenuating the possibility of patron/client relationships based on credit.

Although some goods are bought from the Colombian traders most imports are purchased from local, Cuna-run stores. The majority of these stores are coopera- tives, obtaining stock from Cuna owned and operated trading launches which buy goods wholesale in Colon and distribute them throughout San Blas. Usually these launches are owned by the community, and the funds for their construction and maintenance, as well as the labour needed to run them, are channelled through the existing village political structure. Unlike the Colombian trade, credit is often available from the cooperative launches, but again, like other aspects of their operation this credit is internally restricted, and is between the individual and the village, rather than one individual to another.

By organising imports in this manner the Cuna face the Panamanians en masse. More specifically, the Cuna economy as a demand market confronts the Panama- nian supply market as a bloc and buys in bulk. Thus, although individual Cuna consumption of manufactured goods is small relative to a Panamanian household, the Cuna meet the Panamanian market as a peer since purchase demands of groups of villages rather than individuals interact directly with the Panamanian markets. Second, individual credit contracts are largely limited to direct community control since the creditor is the community itself, thus reducing the possibility that wealth inequalities will be used to establish patron/client relationships among themselves.

A system as complex as this requires more than the capital investment necessary for construction and operation. It demands that sufficiently trained personnel be available to operate the launch, conduct the trade, and keep adequate records and books. Clearly if the Cuna are to meet the Panamanians on an equal footing they must possess the requisite skills as well as cash. In this regard the Cuna emphasis on education is critical to their ability to retain economic (and thus political and cultural) autonomy. By providing at least a grade school education the Cuna need not depend on non-Cuna for skilled personnel.

Western education is of course one of the most effective agents of acculturation, and the Cuna recognise this threat. The organisation of contemporary Cuna schools reflects this awareness; only Cuna teachers are employed and a Western curriculum is offered in conjunction with instruction in Cuna culture history in the schools themselves. While some of the system's costs are underwritten by the national government, considerable indigenous control of the schools is afforded through the major financial contribution the Cuna make themselves. The community, through taxes, fines and communal labour obligations, builds the schools, while each household individually provides each pupil with supplies.

Earlier I noted the paradox of a cultural formation which seemed to increase surplus opportunities on one hand, while squandering that surplus, on the other. It should now be -clea7r that Cuna economic adaptation requires a large cash-pro-




duction to support the primarily economic defence of internal autonomy. None- theless, both the suppfy of, and demand for, cash varies over time. While many of the costs necessary to provide the economic defence are fixed and constant (the continued operation of a launch, up-keep on the school and the wharf, etc.), many of the costs are variable and episodic (the construction of the school, launch, and wharf, etc.). Although the primary source of cash, coconut trees, has a relatively fixed return (cf. below), the system must be flexible enough to provide cash when needed, while also capable of preventing unused cash, i.e. surplus, from developing into differential access to the means of production. This problem is compounded since the supply of cash is only 'relatively' fixed. That supply is dependent on coconut production which is subject to variation (due for instance to crop failure), and changes in returns from production (a function of price levels not under Cuna control which have historically varied considerably (Stout I947: 73-7)). Again, the system must be flexible enough to accommodate these changes without producing differential ownership of generative surplus.

The wardrobe and inna expenses provide that flexibility. If a household's cash at hand is required to meet community or educational needs, the household can post- pone without discomfort investment in molas, jewellery, or inna ceremonies. The most apparent loss that results from this postponement is, as we have seen, not critical to either economic, political, or religious advantage. That is, the loss is one of prestige.

The reproduction of the household is a function of the reproduction of the community, and that reproduction is dependent on an economic strategy of successful competition with the outside world. Therefore, to consider the cost of the household's reproduction as merely its subsistence requirements would obscure a critical adaptive response. This historical adaptation provides the household with continued integrity by obliging it to support large scale community projects.

By requiring labour service and cash contributions from each household the community can mount a variety of projects which effectively place the conglomerate households (on one level) and the conglomerate villages (on another) in a position of power vis-a2-vis the national economy. The economic flow, therefore, is centripetal when viewed from a perspective of cash flow out. In contrast, the cash flow in is centrifugal. Each household manages its own economic affairs with relative autonomy, and owns the instruments of production itself privately. Over time centrifugality characterises the passage of wealth from one generation to another (see fig. 3). By imposing certain constraints on both the product and the producers rather than the means of production, Cuna economic structure can accommodate both the centripetal and centrifugal tendencies.

VIII

We can now return to one of the questions posed in section VI: why are the privately held means of production limited almost exclusively to subsistence and coconut land? Clearly it is not because there is an absence of other commercial activities-there is considerable trade of manufactured goods requiring both trans- port and retail outlets, both of which are based on a fixed capital investment. As we have seen, however, capital circulation is controlled in such a way that each



ii8 LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD

household has extensive labour and cash obligations to the village, on one hand, and to its female members, on the other. At any time it would be difficult for a household to realise the capital necessary to mount a privately controlled trading in- stitution. Instead in most areas the household defers to those institutions provided and controlled by the village.

Nonetheless, there are some areas of San Blas where this is not the case, that is, where most of the commercial instruments are privately held, and consequently real wealth differentials exist. It is critical to remember that this does not signal a greater involvement with an external commercial network since these areas are not characterised by more extensive commercial exchange, simply that the exchange is privately regulated. It could hardly be argued that these areas have encountered some novel economic opportunities, but rather they have exploited these opportunities in a strategically different manner.

One of the features of the mid-nineteenth century changes which occured in San Blas has been an increased population growth. In part this can be attributed to the healthier island homesites which were adopted in the context of a pioneering re- settlement. The population did not resettle evenly over the entire Comarca, and not surprisingly heavier densities are found in those areas first encountered. In addition the resource base is not completely homogenous throughout San Blas, and some areas have been forced to reclaim suitable homesites with land fills consequently damaging the environment (Porter & Porter I973).

The areas which have most damaged the environment tend to be the areas which have the most marked degree of private ownership of the instrument of trade. In addition the traditional woman's wardrobe, celebration of the innas, the marriage, inheritance, and residency rules have fallen into disuse (Costello I975). It appears that as the resource base was eroded it became difficult to support the traditional repositories of wealth described above and the basic structure of capital circulation was lost.5 In spite of lower surplus production on the whole, households experienced an increase in the amount of capital for their their personal disposal. This in

A B

SURPLUS (elr)SURPLUS

CAPITAL WAROROBE investments

coconlluts) J L: j 1 2 (coconuts)

LAND ~~~~~~~~~LAND

(subsistence (subsistence crops) MLScrops)

REPRODUCTI ~~~~~~~REPRODUCTO of~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~o DOMESTIC UM O~~~~~~~~~~OMESTIC UNIT

mw"t ols as clothfngw@

variable.

not possible.

(relatively) fixed.

FIGURE 4.



LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD ii9

turn led to private investment into areas which are controlled by the community in most other areas.

The two types of economy can be contrasted diagramatically (see fig. 4a and 4b).6 It can be seen that with traditional economic structure (fig. 4a) the loop is ulti- mately open-ended, i.e. that the inna and women's wardrobe cannot feed surplus back into the system. The most important interconnexions are those which cannot be made, viz., the impossibility of converting jewellery into productive means, i.e. land.

On the other hand, the acculturated economic structure (fig. 4b) describes a closed loop. Basic subsistence needs can be met in the same manner employed in the traditional system. But in the acculturated system surplus can be used in a number of ways; to make capital investments whose returns can be returned to surplus and reinvested into land or other productive means. Or the returns can be used for subsistence itself, thus removing the need to participate in agriculture at all. Since there are no inherent checks this system can be considered unstable, from a perspective of equal wealth distribution, relative to traditional economic structure.

Ix

Conclusion Initially we suggested that art may be more than simply a reflective redupli-

cation of a more basic social reality. We contended that at times art may contribute to the construction of that reality by preserving structural possibilities, providing a template for adaptive processes, and adding a measure of integrative flexibility necessary for cultural change and evolution. To establish this point we have described the aesthetic structure and outlined a recent socio-economic adaptation of the San Blas Cuna. We can now make explicit the relationship between the two.

To summarise, the Cuna have adapted to an altered political environment threatening their socio-cultural integrity by preserving an economic autonomy which rests on their ability to control their import and export markets. This has required significant capital accumulation within San Blas which endangers the economic equality characterising the traditional mode of production. In the place of a distributive mode based on equal jural access to the means of production, the Cuna constructed a complex system regulating the circulation of capital which provided the wherewithal to control the market structure while avoiding unequal wealth distribution.

At the centre of the regulatory system is a set of repositories which transform surplus into non-productive means, thus insuring that differential production of surplus cannot become the basis for permanent economic stratification. The principal repository is the woman's wardrobe with the mola at its figurative and literal centre. The system operates not so much by limiting surplus production in general, as by controlling the use of each household's income, thus centring on domestic production.7 At the same time, while the system taxes all households (i.e. the skills needed to participate are within the public domain), no advantage is secured through differential degrees of participation (i.e. it does not imply any ranking among participants).




While the mola is a pre-eminent wealth repository, it is also one of the Cuna arts. Each of these arts, it will be recalled, was a constituent element in a cohesive set in virtue of features displayed on several dimensions. For the mola these features were, domestic focus, public access to the requisite skills necessary for its production, and an absence of ranked performers.8 These features are, of course, identical to those listed above for the wealth repositories.

It could be argued that the mola has these features not so much because it is an art form, but because it is a wealth repository. This would suggest that the arts in fact are simply a reduplication of a structure found in the economy. But this would miss a critical point: the mola appeared at the same time as the economic adaptation, but it fulfilled the structural dictates of the pre-existent aesthetic structure. The features of its form, features which insure its success as a wealth repository, were in large part already delimited by the structure of the Cuna arts.

Again, it might be objected that I am caught in a contradiction. Since I claim that the aesthetic structure pre-dated the economic adaptation, and the aesthetic structure is divined through analysis of its constituent elements, how is it that the aesthetic structure pre-dates one of its own constituent elements? That is, what proof is there that the aesthetic structure existed in essentially its present form, before the appearance of the mola. Earlier I mentioned the anomaly of the mola as a major art form; by investigating that anomaly we can see that there is no contradiction.

It was noted earlier that the lullaby has enjoyed less and less popularity recently, while the mola has increased in importance. At the same time, it was noted that the mola evolved out of body-painting. Thus if we replace the mola with the lullaby as a major art, and body-painting with the lullaby as a minor art, it becomes apparent that the pre-mid-nineteenth century aesthetic structure was largely the same as it is today, except perhaps that the major and minor arts did display the distinctive contrast of verbal to visual. Thus, although the Cuna arts may have changed constituent elements over time, the structure in which they are embedded has remained stable.

It might be asked, why then was the mola 'invented'? Here we must defer to economic contingency: body-painting is neither costly nor labour intensive, qualities which mark the mola ag an adaptive economic repository. It has not been my contention that economic necessity is less important than structural constraints-the structure of Cuna aesthetics did not cause the adaptation to occur- only that cultural structures provide a context in which an adaptation can be played out. To say that it provides a context is not the same as saying it 'merely' provided a context, since 'proof that a certain trait or cultural arrangement has positive economic value is not an adequate explanation of its existence or even of its presence. The problematique of adaptive advantage does not specify a uniquely correct answer' (Sahlins I973: 287). The Cuna might have controlled the circulation of capital in any number of ways. To say that they have done so in such and such a manner, does not, as Sahlins notes, explain the phenomenon. To explain the structure of the adaptation requires that its form as well as its content be laid bare, and in this case that form is clearly a function of the cultural structure.

It is hardly surprising that the Cuna based their cash-cropping on coconuts, an available cultigen before the cash-cropping period. Similarly, it should not seem



LAWRENCE A. HIRSCHFELD 12I

inappropriate that they 'invented' molas as a wealth repository-the forms of which shaped other aspects of the adaptation-according to a structure which was also available to them prior to the adaptive response. This is not to suggest that in the last instance the ideology will be determinant, but that its importance is undeniable and not trivial.

NOTES

The fieldwork on which this article is based was supported by a grant from The Institute for Latin American Studies, Columbia University, and carried out under the auspices of The De- partment of Anthropology, Columbia University. I am indebted to Alexander Alland, Rena Lederman, Claude Levi-Strauss, Mike Merrill, and Joel Sherzer for their valuable comments on the manuscript, and Dorothea Goldys for preparing the illustrations. I particularly thank Ann Stoler for her extensive and important criticisms. I owe a special debt toJames Howe, who, from the initial planning of the fieldwork to the analysis of the data, has offered continued and generous advice and support.

I For instance, art has been considered a 'lens' through which a culture sees its 'value-image' (Sieber I97ia; I97ib), its ethos (Bohannan 1971; Mead I940), as mediator of macrocosm and individual (Munn I973a; 1973b), as a 'language' of cultural values (Forge I97I; I973; Schapiro 1953), as order providing models (Fernandez I973), or as reflections of socio-political structure (Levi-Strauss I967; Fernandez I97I; Munn 1971).

2 Sherzer (personal communication) has pointed out that from the perspective of ethnography of communication the term 'audience' may be misleading. Sherzer and Sherzer (I972) detail quite specifically the various attendants at Cuna ritual, distinguishing sender, receiver and audience. 'Audience' throughout the present article will refer to those individuals who are not ritual specialists but who nonietheless play an important role as witnesses to the ceremony, whether they are receivers of the chant or audience in Sherzer's classification.

3The shift to private land tenure in part seems to be due to the nature of the cash-crops themselves. Since coconut trees bear fruit for up to thirty years they constitute a permanent crop and extensive planting of coconut trees would conflict with a land tenure system based on shifting cultivation. The shift from communal to private land tenure in a context of permanent cash- cropping is not peculiar to the Cuna (see Nash I960: 82; Netting I968: 229; Manners I964: 270).

4 I have complete data for a small sample (N= 12) for both the price at which a mola was sold and the amount of materials used in its construction. By chance this sample reflects the distribution of molas by type and complexity, so that conclusions drawn from it, while tentative, are reasonable with respect to distribution. It was found that the average mola consisted of 0.97 yd2 of cloth. Using a figure of $I.5o yd2 which is conservative, the average cost of each mola was $I.46, exclusive of labour, thread and needles. The average sale price of these molas was $I.4I. Thus there is an average loss for each of 5?. While not a staggering loss, it is nonetheless a loss, and does not include payment for labour invested, which in the case of these mobas averaged approximately 30 hours a piece. It should also be noted that the cost of materials has steadily fallen, so that when these molas were actually produced the cost of cloth was signifi- cantly higher than the price used which was taken from current prices for cloth in San Blas. Stout notes that cloth cost in excess of $4.oo a square yard just prior to WWII (I947: 67).

5 One village, Nargana, is exceptional in that missionary pressure in the early twentieth century led to the abandonment of much of the traditional structure described here. Nonethe- less, essentially the same consequences followed, and today Nargana is one of the most acculturated and economically differentiated islands in San Blas.

6 These diagrams are intended as merely visual aids and do not represent a cybernetic model of the system.

7 The use of trade goods as repositories of non-circulating surplus is not an adaptation peculiar to the Cuna. Most of the tribal groups with bilateral kinship in insular southeast Asia are characterised by the accumulation of 'heirlooms' of Chinese gongs, jars and trade beads. As with the Cuna, these heirlooms are domestic purchases which bestow prestige but do not translate into rank differentials or economic advantage (Keesing I962: 7; Appell I966: 28I; Dozier I967: 19; Geddes 1954: 86; Freeman I970: 171). Similarly Hausa traders in Nigeria invest 'most of their profits from trade' into Czechoslovakian bowls (Cohen I969: 67).

8 It is only by defining the aesthetic structure, in part, in terms of relations of aesthetic and material production, and the economy by relations of production, that it is possible to discover the coincidence of the two domains. It is not molas or coconuts which concern us here, they are the fetishised commodities. What is crucial is the social relations which define the interaction of Cuna to Cuna as witnessed by the behaviour attendant on these commodities.




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art in cunaland: ideology and cultural adaption

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