Talk:Coming of Age in Samoa

message: Derek Freeman's conclusions are very controversial, and are not accepted as fact by anyone. Can someone rewrite this to indicate that the views stated by him are that of a minority of anthropologists and are not considered mainstream?
:You can edit it yourself. After all...it is the wikipedian way. Mahlered 03:18, 11 January 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree that in a literal sense "neither Mead, nor Freeman really got it right" is true in that of course Freeman made mistakes as any researcher does. But I think it overstates it to equate them like that. This is "controversial" in the sense that people with an agenda still nit pick about this or that fact that Freman got wrong or find ways to interpret things since of course Mead wasn't completely wrong. But on some of the most fundamental claims of the book, the things about how free and easy the Samoans were about sex there is no serious debate. Mead was wrong. There is even one of the women who she interviewed many years later who says quite plainly that her and her friends were lying to Mead as a joke. --MadScientistX11 (talk) 00:41, 28 September 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: Derek Freeman's conclusions are very controversial

message: Hi. The book appears to have been published in 1928. When was Mead in Samoa doing her research? I think it would good to mention that. 64.48.158.78 15:41, 29 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Inside the front of the book it says "In 1925 she won a National Research Council Fellowship and went to Samoa...". Of course she could have won the fellowship in 1925, and then planned the trip for the following year; it would probably have taken some time to organise. In the Introduction, she states she was there for nine months. 82.37.218.153 (talk) 17:14, 25 February 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dates of research 

message: While certainly not an academic source, my father spent several years in Samoa in the late fifties, early sixties, and recounts the same story as Freeman.  He says that he was told that the Samoans thought that Margaret Mead was arrogant and presumptive.  And in response to her "holier than thou" attitude, they lied to her to have fun with the whole thing.  This is much earlier than Freeman's sources and refutes the argument that the stories changed over then years. Mrmcgibby 03:32, 5 August 2006 (UTC
Did your father speak to the specific girls (or girls in that age group)? Although it's not of direct interest in terms of the article, it'd be interesting in its own right. And what age was your father at the time? It's one of the curses of ethnography that each ethnographer can honestly have a totally different picture of the same society depending on who they are and in which capacity they're studying it in! <sigh> - RR
:As I understand it, there are considerable amount of records left by Samoan fluent Western missionaries during the time of Mead. Diaries of expat Westerns, like your father, would be another source of archival evidence. Freeman, before going to Samoa, appear to have done considerable research on these material. I work as an interpretor and, consequently, I really can't take seriously a cultural research done by someone who doesn't speak the local language. Consequently, I find it hard to accept Holme's argument that Mead, who spoke no Samoan, had a better rapport than Freeman who spoke Samoan fairly fluently and stayed there considerably longer than Mead. It does remind me of an academic paper on Shakespeare in Japanese, written by an academic with a poor grasp of English or Tudor culture. So far, only positive evidences which support Mead's version of Samoa is her own work. Vapour (talk) 15:49, 17 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Why do you say that Mead spoke no Samoan? How do you think she would have interviewed any of the native girls, or even managed to live there for nine months, without some knowledge of the language? Her book contains numerous examples of Samoan words, and in Appendix 1, she spends some time explaining the different words Samoans use for relatives, and later she discusses how "to know" is translated in different contexts. She also discusses how the "k" was introduced into the language and used in some places instead of "t", and how children corrected her usage. 82.37.218.153 (talk) 17:24, 25 February 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Early verification 

message: :in practice they engaged in high levels of premarital sex and boasted about their sexual affairs amongst themselves
:They suggested that such women, in this new context, were unlikely to speak frankly about their adolescent behavior. Further, they suggested that these women might not be as forthright and honest about their sexuality when speaking to an elderly man as they would have been speaking to a woman near their own age.
:Lowell Holmes, who completed a lesser publicized restudy commented later, "Mead was better able to identify with, and therefore establish rapport with, adolescents and young adults on issues of sexuality than either I (at age 29, married with a wife and child) or Freeman, ten years my senior"
Has any source ever pointed out that if premarital sex was a matter of pride among peers then the rapport Mead could have had may not necessarily mean they were less likely to lie to her, but equally likely or even more so since if they they felt her a peer they may wanted to boast about sexual conquests, even if they never had them if that was the norm in their society? (As seems to occur a lot in modern Western society among teenagers, especially males.) Or in other words, it seems easily possible they were just as willing to lie no matter how they felt about the person just in different directions? (Of course if they felt Mead was some naïve foreigner they might have been even more willing to make up stories just for the hell of it but that's already discussed I guess) To some extent:
:After an initial flurry of discussion, many anthropologists concluded that the truth would probably never be known
implies this but only in a roundabout fashion and it seems a key point that someone studying this must have considered. Nil Einne (talk) 11:54, 19 May 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: You cannot boast about sexual adventures ou have not had.  You seem to think people live in a place with privacy, where people do not know what is going on.  But when a community consists of a bunch of houses that have split bamboo walls, if they have walls at all, and thatched roofs, and everyone knows everyone else, it is pointless to boast about something that didn't happen.  Aside from the fact that others will see the amorous couple or at least hear them, for a boast to work, the sexual partner has to make a similar boast.  And if both are willing, why think they did not actually have sex?  You seem to be trying to interpret how Samoans think about sex based on your own experiences in your own "modern Western society."  Haven't you read Mead's book?  Isn't her point that the Samoans were not a modern Western society and did not make assumptions we do? Slrubenstein   |  Talk 12:15, 19 May 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Samoans didn't, and don't live in huts.Drew Smith </small>What I've done 12:58, 19 May 2009 (UTC)

text: When Mead did her fieldwork, typical houses consisted of a circle of pillars with a thatch roof.  They had no doors (or locks, Mead specifies).  Non-anthropologists seem to fixate on the teen-age sex part of the book, which reallly takes up less than one chapter.  Mead's argument about the Samoans involves much more - key points to her argument are a general lack of privacy, in fact she describes the Samoans as "a civilization which suspects privacy" and children grow up watching babies being born, adults having sex, and people dying.  This is one of the reasons she believes helps explain why their adolesence (transition to adulthood) is less traumatic or difficult than it is for people in the West, where so many of the facts of life are hidden from children. Slrubenstein   |  Talk 15:09, 19 May 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Mead's rapport and honesty of communication 

message: Current Anthropology, Vol. 54, No. 1, February 2013, The “Fateful Hoaxing” of Margaret Mead, A Cautionary Tale, by Paul Shankman. He presents an analysis of the interviews with the woman which led Freeman to believe that Mead had been hoaxed. He also discusses whether it is likely that Mead's conclusions of the sexual conduct of Samoan teenagers was based on informations from this woman. 
His conclusion is 
::"Yet analysis of Mead’s relationship with Fa’apua’a demonstrates that she was not an informant for Mead on adolescent sex, and an examination of the three interviews used by Freeman does not support his interpretation of them. In fact, responding to direct questioning during the interviews, Fa’apua’a stated that Mead did not ask her questions about her own sexual conduct or about adolescent sexual conduct. Nor did she provide Mead with information on this subject. Crucial passages from these interviews were omitted by Freeman in his publications on the alleged hoaxing. Based on the interviews themselves, there is no compelling evidence that Mead was hoaxed."
/Pastisch (talk) 09:20, 8 March 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks for that reference. The article is available online, I just downloaded it. Here is the link if anyone else wants to take a look: http://dirwww.colorado.edu/Anthropology/people/bios/documents/FatefulHoaxingpdf.pdf  Interesting that when I searched for it one of the first links that came up was:  Is the “Fateful Hoaxing of Mead” a hoax? Not making a comment on either article, haven't read them yet, just it's amusing for each book or article there seems to be a counter-book, almost like particle theory in physics where each particle has it's anti-particle :-) --MadScientistX11 (talk) 21:29, 5 October 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: So I took a look at the articles. My anti-particle theory was wrong also, the other article in spite of the confusing title actually supported the "Mead wasn't hoaxed" theory. I'm still reading the sources here so may change my mind but from my reading so far I think there are two things that need to be differentiated. The first is the question: "was Mead hoaxed?" the second is the question "was Mead wrong?" From what I've seen so far there seems to be a good case that whether she was hoaxed is controversial and we may never know. But that she was wrong in some important ways, I think that is irrefutable. So far the defenses of Mead I've read don't really dispute that Mead's claim about how relaxed the Samoans were about casual sex and virginity is not consistent with subsequent ethnographic research. I plan to edit the article more to address the controversies and eventually remove the tags. If anyone has opinions please document them here.  --MadScientistX11 (talk) 15:40, 6 October 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Your efforts are appreciated, I have been meaning to work on this article for a long time using more of Shankman's work. You should get his book as well if you dont have it already. I also think we should have a dedicated article on the Mead-Freeman controversy. There is certainly enough literature on it.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 17:09, 6 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  This recent article might be worth mentioning in the controversy section 

message: This edit by Slrubestein completely misreprssents scholars. He lists scholar who commented on the issue as 'challenging' Freeman. The first two I checked supported him over Mead.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 27.1.214.45 (talk) 12:27, 23 November 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Nah Slrubensteins evaluation of the consensus was right. He is just citing all the scholars that have written about the issues, not just the ones that sided with Mead. But we should update this with some of the more recent sources like Shankmans book. It gives a complete evaluation of the debate and the evidence and the scholarly consensus, which is not in Freemans favor within Anthropology although some non-anthropologists still consider his work to have refuted meads - particularly Evolutionary Psychologists.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 15:45, 23 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: False consensus

message: That section only has one link which is currently dead. I tried using the wayback machine to find it but none of the archived links worked either so I'm deleting that link and since that link is the only thing in the section deleting it as well. --MadScientistX11 (talk) 00:59, 28 September 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removing Videos section 

message: The quote from the book in the section "Mead" (about all the choices an American woman has) is really long and I don't think the length is justified. You can get her point with less than half the quote and having the whole thing there serves no purpose and I think makes the article harder to read. I'm going to cut down the quote to about half the length or so, I think it will still easily make the point that way. --MadScientistX11 (talk) 18:11, 29 September 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Quote in Mead section 

message: Currently reference 5 is: 
"Mead ignored violence in Samoan life, did not have a sufficient background in—or give enough emphasis to—the influence of biology on behavior, did not spend enough time in Samoa, and was not familiar enough with the Samoan language." Library of Congress, "Afterward: Derek Freeman and Margaret Mead."
It sounds like it's the Afterward to a book called Derek Freeman and Margaret Mead but if so who is the author? --MadScientistX11 (talk) 21:11, 5 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Anyone know what this reference is supposed to be?? 

message: I've just started reading the book by Orans but I want to document what I think is a mistake in the current version of the article. It currently says " Taking the positivist stance, Orans concludes that..." In the introduction (p. 11) Orans says: "The requirement of verifiability is considered by these anthropologists to be a manifestation of "positivism" which they regard as outmoded" Perhaps he will say something different later on in the book but my reading of the introduction is that Orans does not consider himself, nor should he be considered, a positivist. We have to distinguish between a scientific approach and a positivist approach. Orans is striving to be scientific which is not the same as being a positivist. He references positivism as the slur applied by other anthropologists to criticism of Mead not as a philosophy he adheres to. Positivism is an outmoded philosophy. Few people take it seriously anymore. It was a reaction to Freudianism and other unverifiable approaches to the social sciences. But it went way to far as reactions often do. Positivism essentially defined science as being only about things that could be directly measured and ruled out theorizing about things like internal states. I don't know of a modern scientist who takes it seriously. A positivist would claim that virtually all cognitive science or say the linguistic research by people like Chomsky is not science. Modern critics of Mead such as Pinker are absolutely not positivists. Pinker is all about internal states. Requiring a researcher to provide verifiable and falsifiable hypotheses as Orans does is NOT positivism, it's just good science. I plan to change this but want to finish the book before I make more edits but wanted to document this now in case anyone disagrees and wants to discuss. --MadScientistX11 (talk) 19:33, 8 October 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I think I was the one who used that wording and I while I understand your point that he doesnt represent actual pre-popperian positivism I think it is not unfair to call his insistence on Poppers falsifiability criteria and the objective natural of empirical knowledge is a positivist stance. I think that the term is used differently in social sciences than in its strict sense as the school of positivism - it is still used to refer to schools of thought that maintain that results of empirical investigations are, or should be, objective facts about the world. It is certainly a very reductive view of what social sciences are and should be and one that most anthropologists today do not subscribe to. I think that is important to point out, that Orans is trying to hold Mead to a standard of scientific inquiry that is based on the natural sciences and that is not mainstream in contemporary anthropology.User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 19:37, 8 October 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I object to the term "Popperian" as well. It's just science. If you want to say anthropology doesn't need to be scientific that's fine -- I mean I disagree but I acknowledge that a lot of people think that. I haven't found anything where Orans says he believes in Positivism or explicitly is a "Popperian". "Popperian" has connotations that are not appropriate to apply to Orans. It implies someone who for example wouldn't allow internal mental states in a scientific model of human psychology or social behavior. Unless you can provide evidence that Orans has that extreme view I think it's wrong to call him either a Popperian or Positivist. --MadScientistX11 (talk) 19:58, 8 October 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I think that it is a tendentious and incorrect claim to say that the falsifiability criterion is "just science". It is one view of science, and it was one that didnt exist when Mead did her work, one which is not today prevalent in Anthropology, or in Science and Society studies, and one which is empoverished and reductionist in the extreme. I am however thinking that we should probably not apply any label to Orans that is not explicitly sourced, so I think the best way to proceed is to read some reviews of Orans book and see how they characterize his stance. I know that severeal reviews objected to the applicability of his "rigorous" stance, but I dont remember how they characterized it. I think the point that is important is that Orans piece was basically an element in the ongoing discussion within anthropology (par of the larger the "culture wars") about the kind of science that the discipline is supposed to be. It is also important to note that he is judging Mead by a yardstick that didnt exist when she was writing. User:Maunus ·ʍaunus·snunɐw· 20:39, 8 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Orans and Positivism 

message: Proposal: Add culture clash to see also, because the book itself, as well as the controversy around it clearly follow this theme. Strikefinger (talk) 20:52, 1 August 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposal: add culture clash to see also 

message: "Orans concludes that due to Mead's interpretive approach – common to most contemporary cultural anthropology – her hypotheses and conclusions are essentially unfalsifiable"
In order to make a scientific hypothesis, it must be falsifiable. https://flexbooks.ck12.org/cbook/ck-12-middle-school-physical-science-flexbook-2.0/section/1.19/primary/lesson/hypothesis-ms-ps/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_method
If as Orans states Mead's hypothesis (and those of contemporary anthropologists) are not falsifiable, than they are not science. This statement regulates Mead's book (and apparently the work of most contemporary anthropologists) to the level of a commentary or memoir--not a scientifically verifiable study. 2601:245:C100:5E5C:5520:7C5A:DB38:3E9E (talk) 02:23, 23 March 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Unfalsifiable Hypothesis 

message: "As Fa'apua'a told Freeman, in her 80s, that she and her friend had been joking, Freeman defends her testimony in the introduction of his second book about Mead: Both that the octagenarian's memory was very good, and that she swore on the Bible, as a Christian, that it was true"
This is not attributed to any RS and appears to be an editor's statement of passive-aggressive disbelief rather than a quote from a RS. This and other statements like it (the article is littered with them) should be restated or removed per WP:NPOV. 2601:601:4082:2CC0:D15:C4B:FDBA:5A18 (talk) 20:46, 24 March 2024 (UTC)
thread_title:  NPOV?