No. CROWLEY2006-001
Naman circumcision bullroarers (Lengaleng)
Vanuatu · Central Malekula · Lengaleng · Oceania · Melanesia
Restricted
By the time Terry Crowley sat down with the last speakers of Naman — fewer than twenty, resettled at Litzlitz on the coast — the language of the Lengaleng bush was nearly gone. The bullroarers were not. Men from the Naman country whirled them at circumcision ceremonies, as their Neve'ei neighbours did, and the practice continued into his own day, outliving the language of the district that kept it. Crowley's survey drew the line sharply: Naman men sounded the bullroarer at circumcision; the Neverver and Avava peoples beside them did not.
Men from Naman- and Neve'ei-speaking areas made use of bullroarers as part of circumcision ceremonies.
Terry Crowley, Naman: A Vanishing Language of Malakula (2006), p. 15
Particulars
- Function
- Men from the Naman-speaking area used bullroarers as part of circumcision ceremonies; Crowley records that the practice was still alive when he wrote in 2006.
Source
Terry Crowley, Naman: A Vanishing Language of Malakula (Vanuatu) (Pacific Linguistics 576, ANU, 2006), pp. 15-17 and Table 1: 'Men from Naman- and Neve'ei-speaking areas made use of bullroarers as part of circumcision ceremonies (+), whereas men from other areas did not (-)'; fn. 29: 'The use of these bullroarers in association with circumcision continues today.' Table 1 marks Naman and Neve'ei positive; Larevat, Neverver and the Avava-ancestral groups negative