1991 No. 1 CONTENTS - Institute of Social and Cultural ...

56 Terence Wright
FIG. 9. Diamond Jenness, Man Climbing a Tree, Goodenough Mission
'old-school' ethnographer, an approach that was soon to be eclipsed by the new
social anthropology--f which Malinowski was arguably the founder (Langham
1981). Jenness, with prescribed methods and rigid objectives, seemed to lack the
flexibility that would enable him to cope with novel or difficult situations. In
particular, this is reflected in his use of photography. Guided by an aim for clearly
defined types of pictures, his camera imposed a structure on the subject, with little
room to explore it or let it determine the image in any way. Yet further, his
photographs reveal a photographer detached from his subject: usually taken from
a distance, his images show little evidence of intimacy or involvement (Fig. 9).
Of course, the techniques of anthropological fieldwork have advanced
considerably over the last seventy years. Yet in spite of the changes · in photographic
technology, the photographs of Diamond Jenness are neither better, nor
worse, than those of many contemporary anthropologists. So, to be fair to Jenness,
I should allow him the last word. In a letter to Marett written on 21 st February
1919 he wrote: 'the work I did in the Arctic had made me realize how much I had
left undone in Papua, how much better the report might have been if only I had
known how to set about the fieldwork. I ought to have obtained more information,
more knowledge of the natives .... '