Gell's Methodological Philistinism

Posted at Mar 11/2007 10:27PM:
Gell’s Methodological Philistinism

Alfred Gell’s research on an anthropological theory of art has influenced many other anthropologists’ fieldwork. His work emphasizes art as a form of action, that the making of objects is a means of influencing the thoughts and actions of others. The theory that had a major impact on the anthropology of art was methodological philistinism. Methodological philistinism is a rejection of the critical evaluation of western aesthetic criteria and to understand art objects as part of social relations rather than as merely reflective or representative of them. Two case studies that used Gell’s methodological philistinism theory are, “The Materiality of Contemporary Art in Vanuatu” and “Drum and Voice: Aesthetics and Social Process on the Rai Coast of Papua New Guinea.”

The first case study, “The Materiality of Contemporary Art in Vanuatu” used Gell’s theory towards understanding the role of materiality in social and political relationships to understand that the images-as-objects were not only representation or reproductions of social values and consciousness, but rather an important part of the production of social values and consciousness. The article described contemporary art in Vanuatu as art heightened by the ideas of the past in the present, also known as kastom. Kastom is constituted by the replication of forms and images that are either considered to have been handed down through generations by ancestors, or are more prosaic artifacts that are still intrinsic to the perpetuation of customary practices such as rituals, fishing, clothing, and food preparation. The concept of kastom is seen as a vital key to social reproduction, especially because some of the practices were disrupted or halted due to a century of colonial and missionary influence. The article supports Gell’s theory of methodological philistinism. The case study is an example of how art objects are more socially interactive, rather then aesthetically pleasing.

The article also has a critique of the rubric of art when discussing with a local artist about contemporary art versus traditional art. He said, “I think that all this talk of contemporary comes from you white guys. When you say contemporary, what do you really mean? Contemporary means of today, but for some people this applies to art only, it does not include traditional artifacts. But traditional art is contemporary, it’s alive. It’s all the men who spend their time studying art that come up with the categories around it. All of us, who work today to make our art, we just create things.” The quote supports Gell’s idea that in order to examine art objects you must distant yourself from western values and criteria.

The second case study “Drum and Voice: Aesthetics and Social Process on the Rai Coast of Papua New Guinea” also uses Gell’s work on objects as a foundation of human social existence. The article uses the example of a garamut, a drum made from a hollowed tree trunk, that the people of Rai Coast of Papua New Guinea often say, “a garamut is a man.” The garamut is like a man because it has a span of life, and is precipitated from men, generated by men, and thus participates in ongoing relations between persons. The production of a garamut brings forth a form of relations and this is possible because the object is not simply produced through a complex technical process but because it works on and through social relations drawing sociality from others and directing that sociality into a form recognizable as human. The question associated with the drum is not how it’s like a man, but what is a man?

References: 1.) James Leach (2002) Drum and Voice: Aesthetics and Social Process on the Rai Coast of Papua New Guinea. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute. Vol. 8 (4), 713-734

2.) Haidy Geismar (2004) The Materiality of Contemporary Art in Vanuatu. Journal of Material Culture. Vol. 9 (1): 43-58