| Anthropology Terms Abroad |
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AN ETHNOGRAPHY OF A FIJIAN COMMUNITY
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| House | Gvmt. Funding | Relatives | Selling Goods | Cane Farming | Employment | Land Leases |
| One | $50/mo | $50/mo | $20-$30 mats, pillowcases | |||
| Two | $10/wk | $2000/3mo | $180/wk (PWD) | $500/twice yr | ||
| Three | $18-19,000/yr | $500/twice yr | ||||
| Four | $50-100/2wks | $100/3wks | $500/twice yr | |||
| Five | $50-100/mo | $100/3wks | $80/wk (Jan-Jun) carpentry | $500/twice yr | ||
| Six | $40/3mo | $24/wk |
As the table shows, the sources of income for each of the households vary but these are limited to only six different sources. The lowest income in household one is that of a widow who does not work but spends the days either in the village tending to the house or visiting friends and relatives in other villages. In addition she supports her three children who live in the house and attend school. She receives $50 per month from the government for her children's school fees. She also receives money on an as needed basis from her uncles in the village. This is usually $20 every two weeks. Finally she makes doormats which she sells at $2 for a small mat and $5 for a larger mat. The cloth for the mats costs approximately $3 every time she makes the mats and a few mats can be made per week. Savu also makes pillowcases which sell for $1.50 for a set of two. She spends .80 on the cloth for the pillowcases and can sew one pillowcase in a half-hour. In the past month she has not made any mats or pillowcases and thus has not received any income from this source
The second lowest income of the households surveyed, household six, is that of the minister of Drana. She is a young woman with her weekly income paid in weekly $3.00 donations from each household in the village, giving her a weekly income of $24 from the villagers in Drana. In addition she is supported by family members in her home village and receives $40 every three months.
Households two through five receive the greatest income of those surveyed, in large part because they include male members of the household who are also heads of the mataqali in Drana. The family owns lands around Drana that they lease out to Indians. They receive the payment of about $3000 twice a year in January and June and then divide the money among the male members of the mataqali. Of the six males, five living in Drana and one living in Vautukola, five receive $350 twice a year for the land lease while the chief of the village receives the remaining $1250.
Household two is that of the village chief. There are nine people living in the household who are supported by numerous sources of income. The father, Mikali, has a job at the Public Work Department from Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. He receives a payment of $180 every two weeks. As part of the mataqali, the family receives money from the land leases which is $1250 twice a year. From the cane fields that this household inherited they receive $1000 every three months. The money is divided equally with an Indian man living near the village as Mikali cannot farm himself with his full time job. They each get equal shares of the money, so the household receives $1000 as well as does the man who farms the fields. The mother, Asana, fishes for prawns in the river twice a week. She goes out at night for approximately one to two hours and then sells the prawns in town the following morning for $10 per kilo.
The income of household three supports three adults and two children. The family receives $350 twice a year for the family land that is leased out to Indians. In addition the household head inherited cane fields from his father who was the last chief of the village for which he receives $8 - 9/year depending on the amount of cane that is cut. He pays five men in the village to cut his cane and receives approximately half of the money for an approximate total of $5000 per year.
One of the men who cut cane lives in household four with his wife, his two small children and his elder son who also cut cane. The two men cut cane every day from approximately 9:00 a.m. until 6:00 p.m. and are paid $100 every three weeks for their work. In addition to this the father receives $350 in December and June for the land leases of the mataqali. Finally the brother of the man who is a primary school principal living in Vautukola gives the family $100 every two weeks as a supplement to their income.
The last man who cuts cane lives in household five with his wife, their two children and his son who also cuts cane. From the cane cutting they receive $100 each every three weeks. When the cane season ends in December the father does carpentry wok on a weekly basis for which he receives $80 per week. In addition to this the family receives money from the family cane fields which are two payments of $350 in December and June. The final source of income is from family members who give them $50 - $100 monthly depending on what is necessary.
The only household with a source of income from a full time job outside the village is household two, that of the village chief. This can be attributed to the fact that when expenditures are considered he has the greatest responsibility for the village and the members of the mataqali who live there. As one woman in my village noted, "There are a lack of jobs in Fiji and that is why many people if they do further schooling they return to the village because they can not find jobs." Thus, within the village they will always be afforded some opportunity to earn money no matter what the source of income. The chief does not employ men to farm his cane fields, but his cousin who lives in Drana does. In addition to finding employment in the village, an important point to stress is that the network within the family allows people to borrow money from others whenever needed. Living in the village lessens the pressure to find a source of income because you will have economic support from those around you.
Women in the village seemed to contribute the least amount of money to the income of each household, relying mostly on either income from their husbands or money from relatives as support. Only two of the women, from households one and two, sell goods from their home. The woman in household one sews pillowcases and weaves mats a few times per month, although in the course of my research I did not witness her making any income by means of selling goods. The woman in household two fishes at least twice a week in the local river to catch prawns, which she then sells in the market for $10 per kilo. For the remaining women in the village it is almost impossible for them to get jobs because they would be leaving behind their young children.
In the village of Drana the social structure of the mataqali sets the tone for the supply of income among each household. Household two has a large income but in turn they have the greatest responsibility to distribute money among other family members. Respectively, households one and six have less of a responsibility to contribute to the greater benefit of the entire village and thus have less pressure to seek additional money.
The expenditures of the six households surveyed in relation to the amount of income that they receive supports the idea that their incomes are "leveled" according to their status in the village. Thus, while some households take in more money as far as income, their greater distribution of this money places them in the same economic bracket as other households. For example, the widow living in household one who has virtually no source of income in relation to other households is living in the nicest house in the village. It includes one large sitting room, a kitchen with a gas stove, two bedrooms, and an indoor toilet and bathroom, plus screens on all windows of the house. In contrast, the chief, who has one of the highest incomes in the village, is living in a smaller wooden house with only one large bedroom and a large sitting room. The kitchen, bathroom and toilet are all outdoors plus there are no screens on any of the windows. It is a demonstration of the degree to which redistribution occurs in the village. In general, the people in Drana do not spend much of their money on lavish items to enhance their style of living. According to the families in the survey money is spent only on the necessities of living.
The amount of money spent on food varied in each household according to the total number of members living within the household as well as the amount of food consumed by each member of the household. Household two, with nine members, spends the highest amount of money per week, with $60 allocated for food. In addition to his wife and unmarried children, he also supports his married daughter, her husband and their two children. This is typical of richer people: they often feed many extra dependents, another way in which wealth is dispersed. The five other households spent a lesser amount but were all in the general range of $20 to $30 per week, for approximately four to five people.
As a major source of food the villagers rely on the mataqali's plantation where they grow taro and cassava among other fruits and vegetables. One man in the village noted, "We don't have to worry about money because of the plantation. We know that even if we have no money we will never grow hungry because we can plant whatever we want and we will have food." Money is not regularly spent on "extra" food items such as sweets, soda, and other snacks.
According to one woman in Drana a good deal of money is spent on household goods because "they are necessities. When you run out of something like toilet paper you can't really put off buying more so you have to spend money on it whether you want to or not." The villagers spend roughly the same amount per household, $10 per week, on goods, including toothpaste, laundry detergent and soap.
Money spent on clothing varied in each of the six households. One family told me they spent $100 per year on clothing for seven people, another informed me they spent $450 twice a year on clothing for five people and a third said they only buy clothing on Christmas Eve and they generally spend $30. The $450 per year is a bit extravagant in comparison to the other numbers from the village and it is quite possible that the informant was unsure of the accurate number. Again, however, this variation can be attributed to the fact that the household which spends only $100 per year on clothing is that of the village chief. For him, clothing is a luxury that cannot be purchased as frequently as in other households. Rather, clothes are passed down from child to child. The household that spends the least amount of money relies heavily on clothing donations from an aunt and uncle who visit Drana every two weeks to fill up their bottles with water from the village. The wife said, "They have children that are grown up so from time to time when they visit Drana they bring us old clothing from when their children were younger." For most men, women and children clothing is a necessity but one that is shared among family members and passed from one person to another.
Kava was the highest expense for only one household in the village, and again this was in household two of the village chief. The wife noted, "We spend roughly around $80 a week on kava. That is because as the chief of the village we hold many kava drinking sessions at our house for the other men." Thus, while many households did not consider expenditures on kava a strain on the income of the family their kava drinking is supported by the chief. Thus, his wife said, "Of course the amount of money that is spent on kava causes tension! If you look at our other costs we spend more money on kava than we do on clothing. And we are not even the ones who drink it for the most part. It is other men in the village who come to drink with my husband." It is easy for most of the other households to say that there is not tension because they are not spending their own income on kava.
Similarly, the money that was contributed to the last fundraiser was largest from household two of the chief. Their donation of $800 was almost double that of any other household. Household three gave a donation of approximately $450, which was still a considerable amount of money to donate, but not as large an expense as that of the chief. The remaining four households in the survey each gave somewhere between $50 - 150. In all, the chiefly status of household two, with its higher income, perhaps required them to contribute more money than the other households.
From the income and expenditures of household one, the widow Savu and her children, it is evident that a substantial amount of redistribution takes place in the village of Drana. The estimated expenditures on food alone per week totaled $30 which is more than the reported income per month. If in fact she were only receiving the income she claims the family would not be surviving with the expenditures of the household. Again she also lives in the nicest house in the village though she has no income of her own. She received the house from her mother who had a god job as a nurse, another example of redistribution. The only way to explain this is that there is redistribution of wealth occurring in the village. Those who have the greatest incomes are giving to those with the smallest incomes, thus placing everyone on the same level of wealth.
The expenditures among the villagers vary according to their status within the village. The household of the chief, number two, spends considerable amounts of money on the village as a whole. They not only spend large amounts of money on kava and village fundraising, but they also lend money to family members more frequently than do other households. Thus, looking at the income of the households, it is unsurprising that household two have the greatest source because in the end the money that they acquire seems to be distributed in large sums to the benefit of the whole mataqali rather than the individual household.
In his article, "Communication, Social Identity and the Rising Cost of Fijian Communication," Vusoniwailala argues, "...[K]inship reciprocity and communalism are more expensive for today's Fijians than for their forefathers of the pre-European era" (n.d.: 951). The extent to which this argument proves itself true in the village of Drana is dependent on the amount of income that the household earns over the course of the year. According to the six households surveyed, those with the most money also donated the most and thus found that kinship ties were somewhat costly. In contrast, those households with less money did not find that the ties of kinship were becoming expensive, but they were also not expected to contribute any certain amount of money for mataqali functions.
For households with less money such as number one, the burden of demands on income did not seem to be a problem. One woman says, "When I am asked to donate money I will give whatever I have to give. And if at the time I do not have any then I will say that I don't have any money to contribute." The wife in household number four with a larger gross income than household one also believed that fundraising and other contributions expected of them were not a burden: "It is normal, it is our way of life. Like for fundraising we have to do it and it's just what we do whether we like it or not." These households did not find donations an economic burden because they only contributed what money they had at their disposal. For an event such as the fundraiser it was said that "if we know we have something coming up in advance than we will try to prepare ahead of time and put money aside."
Only one household in the survey admitted that donations and contributions are a burden on the income of the family and that was household two of the village chief. The opinion from one daughter was that "money can be quite difficult. Our father is the only one working on things for the village; everyone is dependent on him for money. He is the one expected to pay for transports and all additional costs when there is a family event because he is the eldest in the family." Here the social structure of the village again plays a significant role in regard to attitudes about money. The burden placed on the eldest male of the family and the chief of the village is much greater than that placed on his niece who lives in the village but does not have a steady income.
According to the social structure that shapes Fijian society, the male uncles from the mother's side are expected to take care of their family, including their nieces and nephews. This in turn places another economic strain on the family because at any given time they can be asked to provide a family member with a sum of money. Although the man in household three told me he would not ask another family member for money the relatives in the other households did say that they would not hesitate to ask at any given time. As one put it, "If we have a problem and we need more money I will go right to my uncle and explain the situation to him and request his help." None of the households mentioned where they thought he was getting the money from but only stated that it is customary for the uncle and the chief of the village to look after the other members of the village.
While all of the households stated they would give money if they were asked by someone in need, there was no strong enthusiasm in support of this practice. Rather, giving money when someone requests it seemed to be quite an aggravation. The woman in household five stated, "If we are asked to give money and we have it then we have to give it. We really cannot say no and this gets annoying." Once again, the burden on household two in regards to requests for money seemed the greatest. One daughter put it this way, "We always get requests for money and we have to give it if we have it. Us children, if we are to ask my father for money we will not get it but if someone from outside the household were to come in and ask my father, he would give them the money." More recently another of his daughters explained to me, "My dad has been trying to build another house for us, one that is bigger, since 1995. But he cannot save money because he is always giving it to other things. That is the problem with coming from a chiefly family." Of the households surveyed who were quick to express their views about giving and requesting money only two of the households, two and three, have actually given money to family members in the last month. The other four households have received money from relatives either living in the village of Drana or living elsewhere, but they have not actually distributed money to other members of the family. Perhaps the chief's daughter is correct when she says that it is not kinship which is costly–it is the chiefly status which stems from kinship that is the greatest expense.
Although most people in Drana survive on the income that they have and are comfortable with the lifestyle that they are living, most households did express that it would be nice to have more money. The impression from the survey was that money is a luxury and the villagers are all right with or without it.
The idea among many of the households was that the more money you had, the greater your expenses and your financial strains. The woman in household one who has the smallest income of the houses surveyed in proportion to the number of people supported by that income informed me, "When you are simple, you don't worry about a lot. When you are rich you'll see all that stuff in town and get it. Being simple you buy what you need and then use it or eat it. [You] sleep in a peaceful way, wake up peaceful, live peaceful. For me it is okay that my house is empty [no furniture] because as long as I live happily and peacefully it is good." So in the village of Drana the household with the smallest income seemed to be the most comfortable with her lifestyle.
Those households with moderate incomes had a blasè reaction to the idea of attaining more wealth. "If you are rich than that is nice to have money and if you are not you live without it and life is still good." Another man said that the ties with his family are more important than the material wealth that he acquires throughout his life. This is similar to the statement from Rika in his article entitled, "Is Kinship Costly?" Referring to his brother's funeral, he states, "... [We] all found ourselves in money terms, a lot poorer. However, in another way, from the kinship and human angle we feel far richer than ever before as a group. The death of our brother has enriched us. It has strongly deepened the ties of kinship..." (1975: 946). In accordance with his idea a few of the households in Drana assured me that they were satisfied whether they had large sums of money or not because they knew they would always have enough to eat living among their family members and they would always be looked after. However, it was only those families who received the most money in the village that were burdened with redistributing it to other people.
Overall it is the households with the largest incomes who want to attain more wealth, perhaps because of the redistribution of the money. The only household that was quite emphatic about wanting to be rich was household two. That view is at first quite shocking since they are the household with the greatest income, but on second thought it was not that surprising because this household seems to be the most afflicted with economic burdens from outside requests for money. As one put it,
Sure we would like to be rich. Then we could go to America! But of course it is impossible for us to ever become rich because once we get money we have to use it. With all the ceremonies that require donations it is impossible to keep any money in the bank. We can't save money because it is impossible to keep it for more than a few months until it has to be given out for one thing or another.
The social organization of the mataqali living in Drana is reflected in people's desires to attain more wealth. Those households who do not have a lot of money are accustomed to living day by day and have grown accustomed to their lifestyle. For them the thought of more money is equated with more difficulties perhaps even the fear that if they were rich they would be getting more requests for money which they could not refuse. On the other hand, from the chiefly family who already receives numerous solicitations for money, any additional income that they could receive would ease the financial burdens they are forced to deal with on a regular basis.
In his book, Tradition and Change in the Fijian Village, Nayacakalou presumes that "the Fijian economy is characterized by the smallness of scale; production is direct; there is no large-scale accumulation of wealth, no complex mechanism of exchange, and traditionally no money. Economic relations therefore tend to be organized around the existing framework of social relations" (1978: 120). While the six households surveyed in Drana were at times quite uncertain about specific economic interactions within their individual household, the results support the idea that the economic relations of Drana are based on the extant social structure of the village. The villagers with the greatest amount of income dispense the largest lump sum of money per household to the family as a whole, which in turn brings their economic status to the equivalent of the other households within the village. So while the argument Nayacakalou makes that the traditional economy in Fiji was more focused on social relations, seems to be true in the village of Drana there are signs of strain here. However, the ways of living are somewhat shaped by an economy where wage labor is scarce and uncertain so people need to "invest" in kin relations to maintain a secure way of life.
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