Page:Margaret Mead - Coming of age in Samoa; a psychological study of primitive youth for western civilisation.pdf/314

 failed to substitute as forceful an inducement to circumspect conduct. The girl whose sex activities are frowned upon by her family is in a far better position than that of her great-grandmother. The navy has prohibited, the church has interdicted the defloration ceremony, formerly an inseparable part of the marriages of girls of rank; and thus the most potent inducement to virginity has been abolished. If for these cruel and primitive methods of enforcing a stricter régime there had been substituted a religious system which seriously branded the sex offender, or a legal system which prosecuted and punished her, then the new hybrid civilisation might have been as heavily fraught with possibilities of conflict as the old civilisation undoubtedly was.

This holds true also for the ease with which young people change their residence. Formerly it might have been necessary to flee to a great distance to avoid being beaten to death. Now the severe beatings are deprecated, but the running-away pattern continues. The old system of succession must have produced many heartburns in the sons who did not obtain the best titles; to-day two new professions are open to the ambitious, the ministry and the Fitafitas. The taboo system, although never as rigorous in Samoa as in other parts of Polynesia, undoubtedly compelled the people to lead more circumspect lives and stressed more vividly difference in rank. The few economic changes which have been introduced have been just sufficient to slightly upset the system of prestige which was based on display and lavish distribution of property. Acquiring wealth is easier, through raising copra, government employment, or manufacturing curios for the steamer-tourist trade on the main island. Many high chiefs do not find it worth while to keep up the state to which they are entitled, while numerous upstarts have an opportunity to acquire prestige denied to them under a slower method of accumulating wealth. The intensity of local feeling with its resulting