The History of Samoan Sexual Conduct and the Mead‐Freeman Controversy

1996/09/01 by Paul Shankman · 1 citation
Social Sciences · #Island Studies and Pacific Affairs

paper · doi:10.1525/aa.1996.98.3.02a00090

openalex publication_date 1996/09/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/22

Abstract

ABSTRACTS The Mead‐Freeman controversy over Samoan culture—especially Samoan sexual conduct—has provoked debate for more than a decade. A key issue involves the nature of the Samoan system of institutionalized virginity. Citing historical sources, Freeman has argued that the taupou system's restrictive code of sexual behavior permeated colonial Samoan culture. Yet a rereading of many of these sources indicates that sexual conduct was less restrictive and more variable than Freeman allows. His refutation of Mead rests on the accuracy of his historical reconstruction, but the evidence does not support important parts of his interpretation.

Citations

• the wizard from Oz meets the wicked witch of the East: Freeman, Mead, and ethnographic authority
• Margaret Mead and Samoa: Coming of Age in Fact and Fiction
• status, property, and the value on virginity
• The Height of Her Powers: Margaret Mead's Samoa

Cited by

• Margaret Mead [wikipedia]