Malekula (1975.1.1 - 3)
odd: label: General
content: Local Numbers: HSFA 1975.1.1 - 3
name: label: Collection Creator
content: Müller, Kal, 1939-
setName: label: See more items in
content: Kal Muller films and photographs of Vanuatu (New Hebrides)
label: See more items in
content: Kal Muller films and photographs of Vanuatu (New Hebrides) / Series 1: Malekula films
physdesc: label: Extent
content: 1 Film reel (25 minutes, color silent; 903 feet, 16mm)
unitdate: label: Date
content: 1970-1974
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: Human Studies Film Archives
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials
label: Type
content: Film reels
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: Footage shot in the Lendombwey region of south central Malekula in 1970 among the Nambas. Documented are ritual activities within the Nambas ceremonial ground. These include: shots of male participants carrying out a life-size funerary effigy (rhambaramb) and placing offerings of yams before it; women loitering near the edge of the ceremonial ground; dance sequences, killing of a pig with spear; ceremonial yams being decorated with flowers and leaves after which the ends of the yams are ritually cut off with the tibia bone of a male warrior; yam tips redistributed for later replanting; men drumming on the slit gongs and their perambulations around the ceremonial enclosure; close up shots of the large funerary effigy and smaller "marionettes" (temes nevimbur); men placing lap-lap (grated taro root) wrapped in banana-like leaves next to the yam offerings. Shots of a related phase of ceremonial activity which features the perambulations of costumed/masked figures within the ceremonial enclosure; six men whose bodies are decorated with various layers of smoked fern branches to form a down-like covering in addition to various types of leaves; shots of a large "tusker" pig being speared with old bayonette in partial payment to the elders by the costumed men for learning about and participation in this phase of the ceremony.