Mead to Boas - Oct. 11, 1925: (from Pago Pago)

Dear Dr. Boas:

It is not possible for me to tell you in this letter of my immediate plans because they are dependent upon the arrival of the Australia boat the day after this letter goes to you. But I want to tell you in some detail of my decisions for the next six months’ work so that if you have any suggestions to give, I may receive them before I actually put my plans into effect.

I have now visited almost every village on this island. They are divided into two types; those which are along the bus line, and those which are practically inaccessible except by difficult mountain trails or by water. The villages along the bus line have been very much influenced by American goods and American visitors and do not present a typical picture of the original culture. The villages off the bus line present two disadvantages; they are very difficult to reach and very small. No one of them boasts more than four or five adolescents, and so the difficulty of getting from one to the other makes them impossible places to work. To find enough adolescents, I would have to spend all my time climbing mountains or tossing about in the surf in an open boat, both extremely arduous and time consuming activities. There are only two villages which are really large enough for my purposes: Pago Pago and Leone, and both of these are over-run with missionaries, stores, and various intrusive influences.

Because of these disadvantages I have decided to go to Ta’u, one of the three small islands in the Manu’a group about 100 miles from here. The Manu’a islands are included in the American Concession and the government steamer goes back and forth every three weeks. They are more primitive and unspoiled than any part of Samoa, been equaled in this respect only by part of Western Savai’i. There are no white people on the island except the Navy man and his wife in charge of the dispensary and two Corps men. There is a large village, or rather a cluster of four villages there within a few minutes walk of each other. The chief, Tufeli, who is also district governor of Manu’a, was educated in Honolulu and speaks excellent English, and is probably the most cooperative chief in American Samoa.

Furthermore this is the only place where I can live in a white household and still be right in the midst of the villages all the time. This is the point about which I am particularly anxious to have your advice. If I lived in a Samoan house with a Samoan family, I might conceivably get into a little more intimate touch with that particular family. But I feel that such advantage as would be reaped would be more than offset by the loss in efficiency due to the food and the nerve wracking conditions of living with half a dozen people in the same room, in a house without walls, always sitting on the floor and sleeping in constant expectation of having a pig or a chicken thrust itself upon one’s notice. This is not an easy climate to work in; I find my efficiency diminished about one half as it is, and I believe it would be cut in two again if I had to live for weeks on end in a Samoan house. It is not possible to get a house of my own, which would of course be optimum. Of course, if I lived in a Samoan household I would have to speak Samoan every minute, and my progress in the language would be considerably accelerated. You may feel that it is not right for me to neglect any opportunity to increase my knowledge of the language and intimacy with the people. If you do, will you please write me at once, as I have arranged to live with the Holts on Ta’u and I would have to make several alterations in my plans and equipment.

By the time I go to Ta’u I will have a fairly comprehensive survey of the life of the Samoan girl, ceremonies and services surrounding birth and marriage, her theoretical functioning in the communities and the code of conduct which governs her activity. In the course of gathering this material I have, of course, collected a good deal of information of value ethnologically but not bearing with particular force upon my problem. However, this other material will be valuable and worth publishing, and I am in some doubt as to how much time I should give to checking it. Most of the observances which I am recording are still going on; my informants are of the chiefly class and well informed. How much checking would you consider it necessary and legitimate for me to do?

My knowledge of the language is progressing more slowly than at first. I take texts several hours a day, and have one definite lesson, and then prospect about for chances of conversation. For the next five or six weeks I hope to divide my time between a Samoan girls boarding school where no English is spoken and a half caste family in Leone where I can hear Samoan most of the time. These two places are only three miles apart. But I can’t be sure about going to the school until the teacher returns from Australia next week.

I am quite well and standing the climate with commendable fortitude.

With very best wished,

Sincerely yours,

Margaret Mead