Mead to Boas - Feb. 15, 1926:

Dear Dr. Boas:

I have been taking stock of the amount of material which I have accumulated and I think I can report that my work is going nicely. I have finished, with the exception of a few gaps which I have to await the opportunity to fill up, a study of the domestic industries and of all others in which girls and women participate, a study of rank and its peculiar aspects in these three villages, a study of the ceremonialism surrounding the various crises, of age classes, division of labor, the relationship system and its implications, ownership of property and its ramifications, a measure of the degree in which women participate in the knowledge of the community and in the various activities, of her social status, and her specialized skills. This for general background. For my particular study I have 66 children, 26 between 8 and 12 years old, ten between 12 and puberty and 30 between puberty and about 20 years of age. About 30 percent of these children I know intimately and am acquiring new intimacies every day. For these 66 I will have at the end of the next month the following information: approximate age, rank and birthplace of parent, make-up of household, order of birth, amount of schooling in government school and pastor’s school, amount of foreign experience, health and any physical defect, date when puberty was attained, regularity, pain, amount of disability during menstruation; extent to which [the] girl has participated in various crises, as birth, death, miscarriages, etc.; the extent to which she participated in a knowledge of the current superstitions, taboos, sancties[?], paraphernalia of range and status; what are her specific ambitions in the way of a choice of a husband, number of children, etc.; her training in etiquette, her skill in all the various domestic industries; her general personality traits, intelligence as measured by observation and by a series of short, well standardized intelligence tests; her friendships, and allegiances within the household, and her general status in her age group.

There will then remain for special investigation, her sexual life and any philosophical conflicts. These are of course the most difficult to get at, require the greatest facility in the language and the longest intimacy. And of course I have a good deal of material on both subjects already. The conflict of the girl with her family and social group is largely centered about the question of sex, either because she is unwilling to marry or because she chafes under the restraint after she has attained puberty. This unwillingness to marry seems to be largely an expression of an unwillingness to assume responsibility rather than an attitude toward the phenomena of sex. The material which I have been able to collect on sex so far indicates a minimum of sexual activity before puberty and great promiscuity between puberty and marriage, coupled with a normal amount of laxity in the married state. I am getting a good deal of interesting light on the flexibility of the concept of any sort of relationship presenting a barrier to marriage, and also on the curious expansion of the brother and sister taboo to all the male or female relatives, and the fluctuating emphasis on this taboo so that to some people it is a thing forbidden to eat or walk together and to others merely something, unseemly, awkward, rude. It is also interesting to see that not only is it taboo for a brother to solicit her sister for friend, either in marriage or for a temporary relationship, but it is likewise taboo to a sister to so persuade another sister. I’m trying to work on as many problems as possible which can be most effectively solved by a familiarity with the personnel of a primitive community as that happens to be an essential prerequisite of my particular problem.

If nothing untoward occurs in the next two months I should be able to complete my problem fairly satisfactorily. I’m sorry that I wrote you such a blue letter in the last mail, but I have had a haunting fear of getting sick before I had accomplished anything at all and completely disappointing you. It still seems to me as if I had perfectly little on paper, but that is probably because it takes so much material to produce one generalization worth recording.

I’ll have to amend the statement that I made about my pursuing adolescents. The emphasis is misplaced. They pursue me from morning till night and even into my sleeping hours.

With best wishes to Mrs. Boas and the Department and most heartfelt thanks to you for the kindness with which you anticipated my possible desire to reapply for the fellowship, I am, 

very sincerely,

Margaret Mead