Ajië

ETHNONYMS: Canaque, Houaïlou, Kanak, Kanaka

Orientation

Identification. Ajië is one of the major southern languages found in New Caledonia. Today, Ajië speakers call themselves "Kanak," which has deep political meaning for them, because along with the vast majority of the other native Peoples in New Caledonia, they are asking for independence from France. "Canaque" was introduced to the territory by Polynesian sailors, and in the local context it had a pejorative meaning. In the early 1970s the native peoples of New Caledonia changed the spelling to "Kanak" and this marked the birth of a Black-power type of consciousness. If they are successful in their quest for independence, their new country will be named "Kanaky."

Location. Ajië is spoken primarily on the east coast of New Caledonia's main island, La Grande Terre, from Monéo to Kouaoua in the Houaïlou Valley, but it has spread as far as Poya. Ajië is also spoken or understood by other western and southern language groups in New Caledonia, particularly those on the Ajië's border. Rainfall distribution reflects the classical opposition between windward and leeward slopes, and this feature is accentuated by the mountainous character of the main island. Average local rainfall may exceed 400 centimeters in the east and may be less than 100 centimeters in the west. Seasonal distribution is marked by maximum rainfall during the first three months of the year, although heavy daily rainfall is rare. The average temperature falls between 22° C and 24° C, with February being the hottest period and July-August the coolest.

Demography. In 1774, Captain Cook estimated that there were 60,000 natives on La Grande Terre and other sources guess that there were another 20,000 in the Loyalty Islands at that time. Regardless of the actual numbers, it is clear that every part of the islands was claimed or occupied by the local population. In 1989 the total population of New Caledonia was 164,173, of which 73,598 were Kanak. The Kanaks are the largest ethnic group in the territory (44.8 percent of the total population), followed by the Europeans (33.6 percent), Wallisians (8.6 percent), Indonesians (3.2 percent), Tahitians (2.9 percent), Vietnamese (1.5 percent), and Ni-Vanuatu (1 percent). The Ajië are approximately 3,600 or 5 percent of the native population. They can be found in the commune of Houaölou and in the territorial capital of Noumea.

Linguistic Affiliation. New Caledonian languages belong to the Eastern Subdivision of the Austronesian languages. There are thirty-two native languages in New Caledonia, of which twenty-eight are still spoken. Ajië is one of the nine major languages of the southern language group. It is from the same proto-Melanesian root language as all the other languages in New Caledonia with the exception of Faga Uvea, which is spoken in the north and south of the island of Ouvea and has Polynesian origins.

History and Cultural Relations

According to the archaeological record, the earliest ancestors of the Kanaks came to New Caledonia from southeast Asia between 6,000 and 5,000 years ago. They brought with them slash-and-burn agriculture, irrigation techniques, a polished-stone tool complex, pottery, and double-pontoon sailing craft. There was also settlement from within Melanesia, especially from the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu. After 1840 there was regular contact with European and American whalers, merchants, and sandalwood traders in addition to British and French missionaries. After New Caledonia was annexed by France in 1853, tribal lands were expropriated for the establishment of a penal colony, settler colonialism, and nickel mining. This systematic and radical reduction of Kanak lands meant that the culturally cohesive and contiguous clan territories of the past were reduced to a shattered collection of isolated communities. By the end of the nineteenth century, Kanaks were confined to native reserves and compelled to do corvée (forced labor) for the settlers and on public works. After World War II, colonial policy was liberalized, forced labor was abolished, and the Kanaks were accorded the right to vote. However, in spite of increased political participation, the Kanaks continued to be economically marginalized as the financial gap between the Kanaks and the rest of the New Caledonian population continued to widen. The early 1970s was a boom period for New Caledonia because of the rise in world nickel prices (the territory has one-fourth of the world's nickel deposits). Urbanization increased as the rural areas were drained of labor. The collapse of the nickel boom in the mid-1970s led to unemployment and economic recession. Kanak youths returned to overcrowded native reserves only to find that there was little place for them. At this time Kanak demands for participation in economic and political decision making increased and the Kanak independence movement grew. In 1984 the Kanaks boycotted territorial elections, set up a provisional government, and demanded freedom from French rule and a "Kanak socialist independence." A settlement known as the Matignon Accords was negotiated in 1988 between Kanaks, the settlers, and the French government. This agreement heralds a ten-year "peace period" during which the French government will attempt to redress the socioeconomic inequalities in the territory, particularly by promoting development and training programs in Kanak communities. In 1998, at the end of this ten-year period, New Caledonians will be asked to choose between independence and staying within the French republic.

Settlements

Ancient settlements were collections of round men's and women's huts, rectangular collective kitchens, oblong meetinghouses, and variously shaped ateliers. Each woman had a hut where she raised her small children. These structures were built alongside one large dwelling known as bweamwa in Ajië, which was the symbol of the clan. This large central dwelling, used by the chief and adult males, was erected on a raised mound with a central alleyway lined with coconut palms and tropical pines leading up to it and two smaller alleyways flanking it. The central alleyway served as a collective ceremonial ground for activities such as public speeches and yam redistribution while the smaller alleyways were used for more intimate rituals such as ceremonial exchanges of shell money. Around inland settlements were yam mounds and irrigated taro gardens on hillsides. It was this social space of family residences, agricultural lands, water channels, and hunting and gathering territories that formed the basis for ritual, economic, political, and social action in traditional times.

Economy

Subsistence and Commercial Activities. Inland settlements cultivated several varieties of bananas, yams, and taro using elaborate irrigation methods. Yams were, and still are, considered "noble" and were used in ceremonial exchanges in the past. It was the yam's annual cycle that established the rhythm of the Kanak year. Fishing was a regular activity for settlements by the sea and on riverbanks. In the forest Kanaks gathered fruit, nuts, and palm-tree buds. Captain Cook introduced pigs and dogs to the islands and other Europeans introduced a variety of plant and animal species including deer, which the Ajië now hunt in the forest. Colonization affected Kanak agriculture dramatically. Lands were confiscated by settlers, gardens were ravaged by marauding cattle, and irrigation networks were destroyed by miners. The fallow period was shortened, which led to erosion and a diminished productive capacity. Subsistence crops gave way to cash crops such as coffee, which the Ajië began producing as early as 1900 and which remains an important source of income. Yams are the only crop that has offered some resistance to the overall regression of Kanak subsistence agriculture. A powerful mining and metallurgical industry coexists with agriculture in New Caledonia. In addition, tertiary activities have expanded quickly in keeping with the territory's highly developed private and public sectors. One of the major nickel and cobalt centers on the east coast was opened near the Ajië's territory in 1901, and although agriculture, fishing, and forestry are still the major employers, mining is a close second, followed by public service.

Industrial Arts. Kanaks manufactured various tools, weapons, and ceremonial objects out of serpentine, which was collected at the base of mountains and in riverbeds by men. Ceremonial axes were the most important, measuring as much as 30 centimeters in diameter. These items were produced for ceremonial exchange in Houaïlou up until 1908. Women produced fiber skirts, capes, baskets, mats, and shell jewelry. There is evidence to support the idea that the women had their own circuit of exchange.

Trade. Traditionally, each local community was integrated into a larger political and geographical system of alliance and exchange. In addition to ceremonial exchanges, trade occurred between villages on the coast and those in the interior mountain chain. Seafood (including fresh, salted, and smoked fish) was traded in a ritualized fashion for tubers (taro and yams) and wild plants from the mountains.

Division of Labor. The nuclear and extended families were the basic production unit with neighbors and allies being called in to help according to the size of the task. The division of labor occurred according to gender and age, and work was organized according to a ritual, seasonal calendar overseen by clan elders. Both men and women hunted seafood individually and collectively using spears, fishing lines, and nets. Men hunted what little game there was—birds, bats, and rats—with spears, built huts and boats, and looked after yam production, irrigation works, and heavy agricultural duties. The women collected wood and water, looked after children, and did the repetitive agricultural chores such as weeding. Men worked with stone and wood, constructing tools and weapons, and women worked with clay and plant fibers, making pots, mats, baskets, and fiber skirts. Today, families continue to cooperate in agriculture.

Land Tenure. In traditional times Kanaks maintained individual rights to land. They were of four types:

1. First occupation rights—land belonged to the family that first cleared and occupied the land.
2. Inheritance rights—a man inherited land from his father and through his father the right to cultivate land in any of the successive sites occupied by his paternal ancestors. Succession was usually masculine. However, if a woman was the last in her line, she inherited access to her family's land until her son (who then took the name of his maternal grandfather) was old enough to inherit it.
3. Acquired rights—through marriage a man established a relationship with his brothers-in-law who could then give him some of their land. A man could also give land to his allies if he was unable to give a sister or daughter in marriage exchange.
4. Ceded rights—even though the first cultivators of the soil always had rights over that land, they could welcome newcomers or harbor refugees on that land and give them the right to settle there on a temporary or permanent basis. Land claims have been a central issue in the independence struggle and the French government has set up a series of land development agencies to deal with the problem but the population pressure in the Kanak reserves continues to mount. Although the Ajië are approximately 80 percent of the population in the commune of Houaïlou, the native reserves cover only 20 percent of the land.

Kinship

Kin Groups and Descent. The nuclear family was the basic unit of Kanak society. The family was incorporated into an extended family (usually three generations deep), lineage, and clan that did not represent territorial groups but rather successively larger patrilineal units sharing the same rites and symbols and the same marriage customs. Extended families were assembled into wider groups of affiliation by reference to a common place (homestead mound) of origin. Genealogy was spatially manifested by routes marked by a succession of occupied sites or mounds, and within each clan the lineages were positioned hierarchically according to the antiquity of their first residence in the genealogical itinerary. During the colonial period, clans were arbitrarily associated with a territory so that previously social groupings became geographic groupings on reserves.

Kinship Terminology. On La Grande Terre there were at least two distinct kinship systems. In the first system, in Hienghène, Balade, Pouebo, and Voh, all sisters and female cross and parallel cousins were called by the same term. The unique attribute of this system was its asymmetry, as a father's sister's husband was called maternal uncle even though his wife (father's sister) was called mother. In the second system, a distinction was made between consanguines and affines, that is, between sisters and female cross and parallel cousins.

Marriage and Family

Marriage. Each man and woman had a series of obligatory and optional social actions in terms of residence and marriage. Marriage traditionally was exogamous, patrilineal, and between cross cousins. However, the system was flexible. Distant cousins married and sometimes it was sufficient just to be symbolic cross cousins. Residence was usually virilocal; however, uxorilocal residence was always an option. Marriages were negotiated by families of similar rank through a Series of ceremonial exchanges, and although there are "love" marriages occurring today, many young people, particularly those of chiefly rank, still have arranged marriages. Polygamy was sometimes practiced, but because of the influence of Christianity monogamy is now the rule and divorce is not common, although couples sometimes separate and take up common-law relationships with other partners.

Domestic Unit. The nuclear family is the basic social unit. Children move around frequently among relatives and it is not uncommon for a childless family to receive children to raise as their own. Older parents will live with one of their children.

Inheritance. Under the current system reserve land is inalienable and is owned collectively, and therefore one inherits the right of access to land in the reserve rather than the land itself. Homes and movable property are inherited by the spouse and children.

Socialization. Children are raised by both parents, Siblings, and other relatives. Children are taught to respect clan elders and it is the elders who will collectively discipline a wayward youth. Boys are brought up through a series of initiation rites and girls receive instruction during menstrual seclusion.

Sociopolitical Organization

New Caledonia is an overseas territory of France and it is ruled through the office of the high commissioner. The territory has some autonomy over regional matters, but France controls all areas of education, defense, law and order, justice, etc. Today, everyone in New Caledonia is considered a French citizen.

Social Organization. The traditional social structure was closely related to a set of spatial reference points such as homestead mounds, inhabited places, and various other natural features, all of which were carefully inventoried and delimited the rights of the human population over its lands and waters. Those people descended from the first homestead mounds occupied by the clan were considered clan elders and they were consulted on all moral issues (e.g., land disputes) and matrimonial matters. Ceremonial exchanges reinforced families' social and political identity vis-à-vis one another. For example, maternal and paternal kin-group relations were defined by the ceremonial exchanges surrounding birth, marriage, and death.

Political Organization. Heads of lineages were seen as the guardians of the social and symbolic relations that united families into communal and regional political alliances. These "chiefs" were also focal points in a redistribution network. They received a part of the first yam harvest and a certain portion of all the land animals and fish caught. Some have seen these offerings as a type of tribute but in fact the chief quickly redistributed these offerings and sometimes even supplemented the redistribution with food from his own garden. Chiefs were reduced by colonial civil service into labor-recruitment officers and tax-collection agents. The territory is now divided into thirty-two districts known as communes and organized into three provinces that send elected officials to a territorial congress. A large number of traditional chiefs have entered the modern political arena.

Social Control. The structural model for Kanak society was the family where the junior family members were under the authority of the senior members. Similarly, junior lineages traditionally owed "service" to elder ones and conversely the elders had responsibilities toward the cadet lineages, just as adults were responsible for the well-being of the children who owed them obedience.

Conflict. Prior to French occupation, Kanak men engaged in clan warfare. The Kanaks also strongly resisted French Occupation, killing settlers and missionaries. The largest rebellion against French presence took place in 1878 when the Kanaks almost regained control of their islands. In the twentieth century, the clash of Kanak nationalism against the mass of entrenched settlers has catapulted the territory into world headlines.

Religion and Expressive Culture

Religious Beliefs. The majority of Ajië were converted to Christianity in the early 1900s by the famous French Protestant missionary and ethnologist, Maurice Leenhardt, who built his church and school in the heart of Ajië territory. Prior to that, the Ajië had a number of important totems such as the shark, the caterpillar, the lizard, and thunder. In the traditional religion the gods inhabited all important geographical features of the Kanak landscape—mountain summits, river sources, grottos, etc. Each clan had its own gods that had given birth to the clan ancestors or with whom the clan ancestors had formed alliances. It was these gods who gave power to human rituals and symbols. Gods were worshipped on clan altars, and each time a clan changed location the clan gods were moved to the new site. Spirits of the dead also were believed to roam the Kanak landscape and to be dangerous to human activities.

Religious Practitioners. Each clan had a special magic knowledge that they specialized in. Within the clan there were also specialists who dealt with specific magic and rituals such as preparing the gardens for planting or the warriors for battle. Sorcery existed but it was not practiced by specialists; rather, it was available to all who cared to use it since it was occult power and not the person that was the source of the ill will.

Ceremonies. The most elaborate ceremony was the pilou pilou, which could take three to four years of preparation and last several weeks. It was the culmination of Kanak social life, expressing the vitality of the host clan and its alliances through orations, collective feasting, dancing, and a distribution of ceremonial objects and food.

Arts. Petroglyphs have been found in New Caledonia; however, their origins remain uncertain. Kanak sculpture was primarily part of the architecture of the large central dwelling: carved support posts, ridgeposts, and doorways. Elaborate arrowheads were the main art form and representation of the clan ancestors was the principal theme. The male artists were specialists and recognized as such. The reputation of a well-known artist would continue after his death. Kanaks also possessed a rich oral tradition of historical tales, myths, humorous and moral stories, poetry, and proverbs. Kanak music consisted of songs and percussion music. Dances were often narrative, a choreographed version of a traditional activity such as fishing or yam production. Men and women both participated in the collective dances that accompanied all ceremonial events and were part of the preparations for battle.

Medicine. Illness was associated with a totem: for example, weight loss with the lizard, hysteria with the caterpillar, swelling with the shark, anemia with the rat. Each illness could be cured by a specific herb that would be chewed or chopped and then sucked on. The herb acted on the totem, not the illness. Plants from the forest, fish and plants from the sea, and some taro species were also used for medicinal purposes in poultices, infusions, etc.

Death and Afterlife. The spirits of the dead inhabited an underworld and could surface at times. In order to ensure that they did not take up residence in their former bodies, the Kanaks bound corpses in fetal positions. Mothers were buried with a wooden stick so that they would think that they had a child in their arms and would not come looking for their off-spring. Geographical features that were traditionally believed to be the gateways to the underworld remain known and respected and are still the object of offerings and prayer. This practice is part of the Ajië's unique bond with the land.

See alsoLoyalty Islands

Bibliography

Clifford, J. (1982). Person and Myth: Maurice Leenhardt in the Melanesian World. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Connell, J. (1987). New Caledonia or Kanaky? The Political History of a French Colony. Australia: National Center for Development Studies, Australian National University.

Leenhardt, M. (1979). Do Kamo: Person and Myth in the Melanesian World. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Thompson, V., and R. Adloff (1971). The French Pacific Islands: French Polynesia and New Caledonia. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Ward, A. (1982). Land and Politics in New Caledonia. Australia: Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National University.

DONNA WINSLOW