For approximately eight months during 1931-1932, anthropologist Margaret Mead lived with and studied the Mountain Arapesh-a segment of the population of the East Sepik Province, Papua New Guinea. She found a culture based on simplicity, sensitivity, and cooperation. In contrast to the aggressive Arapesh who lived on the plains, both the men and the women of the mountain settlements were found to be, in Mead's word, maternal. The Mountain Arapesh exhibited qualities that many might consider feminine: they were, in general, passive, affectionate, and peaceloving. Though Mead partially explains the male's "femininity" as being due to the type of nourishment available to the Arapesh, she maintains social conditioning to be a factor in the type of lifestyle led by both sexes. Mead's study encapsulates all aspects of the Arapesh culture. She discusses betrothal and marriage customs, sexuality, gender roles, diet, religion, arts, agriculture, and rites of passage. In possibly a portent for the breakdown of traditional roles and beliefs in the latter part of the twentieth century, Mead discusses the purpose of rites of passage in maintaining societal values and social control. Mead also discovered that both male and female parents took an active role in raising their children. Furthermore, it was found that there were few conflicts over property: the Arapesh, having no concept of land ownership, maintained a peaceful existence with each other. In his new introduction to The Mountain Arapesh, Paul B. Roscoe assesses the importance of Mead's work in light of modern anthropological and ethnographic research, as well as how it fits into her own canon of writings. Roscoe discusses findings he culled from a trip to Papua New Guinea in 1991 to clarify some ambiguities in Mead's work. His travels also served to help reconstruct what had happened to the Arapesh since Mead's historic visit in the early 1930s.

This unique volume presents an ecocultural and embodied perspective on understanding numbers and their history in indigenous communities. The book focuses on research carried out in Papua New Guinea and Oceania, and will help educators understand humanity's use of numbers, and their development and change. The authors focus on indigenous mathematics education in the early years and shine light on the unique processes and number systems of non-European styled cultural classrooms. This new perspective for mathematics education challenges educators who have not heard about the history of number outside of Western traditions, and can help them develop a rich cultural competence in their own practice and a new vision of foundational number concepts such as large numbers, groups, and systems. Featured in this invaluable resource are some data and analyses that chief researcher Glendon Angove Lean collected while living in Papua New Guinea before his death in 1995. Among the topics covered: The diversity of counting system cycles, where they were established, and how they may have developed. A detailed exploration of number systems other than base 10 systems including: 2-cycle, 5-cycle, 4- and 6-cycle systems, and body-part tally systems. Research collected from major studies such as Geoff Smith's and Sue Holzknecht’s studies of Morobe Province's multiple counting systems, Charly Muke's study of counting in the Wahgi Valley in the Jiwaka Province, and Patricia Paraide's documentation of the number and measurement knowledge of her Tolai community. The implications of viewing early numeracy in the light of this book’s research, and ways of catering to diversity in mathematics education. In this volume Kay Owens draws on recent research from diverse fields such as linguistics and archaeology to present their exegesis on the history of number reaching back ten thousand years ago. Researchers and educators interested in the history of mathematical sciences will find History of Number: Evidence from Papua New Guinea and Oceania to be an invaluable resource.

Annual series exploring perspectives on the history of anthropology.

Margaret Mead once said, "I have spent most of my life studying the lives of other peoples--faraway peoples--so that Americans might better understand themselves." Continuities in Cultural Evolution is evidence of this devotion. All of Mead's efforts were intended to help others learn about themselves and work toward a more humane and socially responsible society. Scientist, writer, explorer, and teacher, Mead brought the serious work of anthropology into the public consciousness. This volume began as the Terry Lectures, given at Yale in 1957 and was not published until 1964, after extensive reworking. The time she spent on revision is evidence of the importance Mead attached to the subject: the need to develop a truly evolutionary vision of human culture and society. This was desirable in her eyes both in order to reinforce the historical dimension in our ideas about human culture, and to preserve the relevance of historical and cultural diversity to social, economic, and political action. Given the present state of academic and public discourse alike, this volume speaks to us in a language we badly need to recover.