General setting

I begin with non-linguistic matters, such as the geographical location, demography, and socio­ cultural and historical background of the Lewo language community.

2.1.1. Geographical setting

The Lewo language is spoken in the north, east, and south-east of the island of Epi, right at the geographical centre of the independent Pacific island micro-state of the Republic of V anuatu.1 A century-old statement by Robert Steel, an early visitor to the missionaries of the day, still stands (at least as far as it describes Epi’s geographical position and features):

“The island o f Api was estimated by Captain Cook to be between fifty and sixty miles in circumference. It is o f a triangular shape, with the base towards the north-east. At the south-east point, mountains rise to the height o f 1800 feet; in the centre, they reach 2800feet; and to the north, about 2500feet. It lies between 168° 7 ’ and 168° 26' east longitude, and between 16° 3 5 ’ and 16° 5 0 ’ south latitude. It is singularly rich and fertile, and one o f the finest islands in the group. It has received the praise o f all who see it. The people, however, are fierce and cannibal.’’ (Steel 1880:273)

1 Vanuatu is the former New Hebrides, which became independent in 1980. Except in formal citations, all references in earlier materials to the New Hebrides are modernised to Vanuatu. The name of the island of Epi has had a variety of spellings in earlier documents, including Ahpe, Apee, Appe and Api. The people of Ambrym and Paama call Epi Liman, while in the Shepherd’s Group to the south, Nakanamanga speakers call it Etasiwo, most Namakira speakers call it Ataiwo, and the Namakira speakers of Tongariki call it Atai.

We could add that the topography of the island betrays its volcanic origins, with many now extinct craters and still dormant cones. The above estimate of the circumference of the island is as good as any: the island as a whole is irregularly shaped, and the coastline, jagged and rugged in many places, affords a very uneven perimeter. The island is on an east to west downwards tilt, so that the east coast (si kaawa ‘rough sea side ’) is characterised by more rocky formations, and cliffs rising from the sea, often without any off-shore fringing coral reef. The winds and waves of the east-south-easterly trades that blow for most of the year impact this shoreline directly, while the more sheltered west coast (si malum ‘peaceful sea side’) is much flatter, gently sloping off at many points into coral-sand bays with perimeter reefs. The land area of Epi has been given as 452 km2 (Harcombe 1991:261).

The whole island is blessed with fertile volcanic soil, and while traditional subsistence gardening provides an abundance of food for everyone,2 most families are also able to participate in the cash economy with production and sale of copra,3 some cocoa and trochus shell (ultimately exported from Vanuatu), and kava, some garden produce, and occasionally beef cattle (shipped to the capital, Port Vila). Many families send food supplies to their family members working in town in exchange for cash contributions. Women will forage on the reef (mainly for shellfish and octopus), some men go spear fishing, and whole communities infrequently engage in fish drives, but the orientation of Epi people is to what can be produced in their gardens rather than what can be harvested from the sea. There are some inland forest resources which one would hope will be utilised and managed in an ecologically sustainable manner.

While most villages in earlier times were located inland, settlement is now almost entirely around the coastal perimeter, much of which is linked by a road, used by the ten or so vehicles on the island. There are two airstrips on Epi, one at Lamen Bay in the north, and another at Valesdir in the south-west, with regular flights from Port Vila, making the Lewo-speaking area, also serviced by a few copra and passenger service boats on an irregular basis, quite accessible. After the forty minute flight from Vila to Lamen Bay, one can take a taxi truck for a bumpy six kilometre ride across the northern top of the island to the east coast where the first of the main Lewo-speaking villages are found.

2 Epi is of course in the cyclone belt, so the usual abundance has turned to scarcity on several occasions in recent years when quite destructive cyclones have damaged gardens more than once in a season, or in consecutive seasons.

3 Vanuatu produces more copra per head of population than any other copra-producing country in the world. Within Vanuatu, Epi produces more copra per head of population than any other of the Local Government Council regions, making it arguably one of the most prolific coconut growing areas in the world (Dan Etherington, pc.).

Chapter 2 The Lewo language and its speakers

The location of Vanuatu in the south-west Pacific is shown in Map 1 on the next page; and following pages (pp. 16 and 18) show the location of Epi within Vanuatu (Map 2), and the area over which Lewo is spoken on Epi, along with that of the other languages on the island (Map 3).

2.1.2. Administrative setting

Soon after independence in 1980, Epi and the two smaller off-shore islands of Lamen (densely populated) and Namuka (no permanent residents), were constituted as the Epi Local Government Council Region within the Republic of Vanuatu. Many governmental administrative functions were decentralised to this regional entity, which had its headquarters at Rovo Bay (see Map 2). Epi people elected the council members, including representatives from the chiefs, women, and youth sectors of the community. The Epi region had its own flag. However, this council was disbanded in mid-1994 in a national reorganisation of local government arrangements.

After the inception of the Local Government Council, the island was further subdivided into four sub-regional areas, named Varsu, Varmali, Vermaul, and Yarsu (see Map 3). These names are modem coinages, composite words formed from the predominant language spoken in each sub- region. The borders of these sub-regions take cognisance of major linguistic and geographical boundaries on Epi (Varsu makes up almost the whole of the Lewo-speaking area), and the strong sense of loyalty people feel for these sub-regions probably draws on solidarities that are more ancient than the era of modem government.

Each clan group, often many to a village, will have its chief, and each of the above sub-regions, as well as the island as a whole, has its Council of Chiefs. Traditional chiefly authority had been undermined to quite an extent by other newer power structures, especially the church and the national and local layers of modem governmental administration, but is now being reasserted. Considerable jostling for position between these various community institutions results.

Epi has one French-medium and several English-medium primary schools, and a government junior secondary school at Lamen Bay. There is a Health Centre in the north at Vaemali, which handles inpatient and maternity cases, and several clinics and aidposts throughout the regions which provide for primary health care. The main health concern is malaria.

2.1.3. Demographic setting

2.1.3.1. Population

Folk-history on Epi today contains frequent references to the pre-contact times when most of the interior of the island was occupied, and where, in areas now reclaimed by bush, “people swarmed

Map 1 : Vanuatu in the South-west Pacific H A W A IIA N ISLANDS NORTHERN M A R IA N A IS G U A M . M A R S H A LL IS

FEDERATED STATES OF MICRONESIA

E q u a to r 0° : K I R I B A T I, n a u r u PAPUA NEW GUIN) S O L O M O N IS TU V A LU P O L Y N E S IA F R E N C H S A M O A V A NU A T U V FI } I < > ; _{■ NIUE} TAHITI CALEDONIA A U S T R A L IA N EW - Z E A L A N D

Chapter 2 The Lewo language and its speakers

over garden trails and paths like ants”. Some estimates place the population of Epi at contact as being in the vicinity of 10,000 or more.4 The effects of the various factors that resulted in depopulation throughout Melanesia during the later 1800s and early 1900s can be seen in M iller’s estimate of the 1890 population at 7000 (Miller 1987:386), and his own count of the population in 1946 at around 1400 (p. 420). The 1967 census gave a population of 1645 for the island (including 200 or so non-Epi people), and the current very high rate of growth is reflected in this figure having more than doubled by the last census in 1989 to 3,626 (Office of Statistics 1991:357). At the 1990 national election, there were 2,123 registered voters on Epi (those 18 years and older), of whom 1617 (76.16%) exercised their vote.

Despite this current growth, Epi is still only lightly populated. The Lewo-speaking population is the most scattered, and although occupying a large area of east and south Epi, village settlements are small and well spaced out. These people are now realising the value of the very large areas of land that the loss of earlier populations (including whole language groups) has left in the control of their small clan groups.

However, population pressure on Tongoa to the south is resulting in many people from that island progressively gardening, then squatting, then settling on the previously sparsely-populated large southern promontory of Epi. The resultant tensions that arise are exacerbated by the fact that the Epi people in this area were mainly Seventh Day Adventists, with some Presbyterians, while the incoming Tongoans are nearly all affiliated with the Revival Church (considered by other churches to be an unorthodox sect). The Epi people who live in these areas are so few compared to the Tongoan immigrants that their children are growing up knowing Nakanamanga or Namakira (from Tongoa), but not Lewo.

There is also population pressure on Paama to the north, and there is much advantage for Paamese people to forge friendships and marriage alliances with Epi individuals and communities. In the more northern Epi villages, all of which are Lewo-speaking, quite a few Paamese individuals who have married in, and in some cases whole families, can be found.5

The villages in which Lewo is spoken (see Map 3), beginning from the northern tip of Epi and going south along the east coast are listed, with their 1989 census populations (some are estimations based on knowledge of the composition of the village):

4 Hagen and Pineau (1889:304) name Epi along with Futuna, Pentecost and Santo as being the most densely populated islands. Miller (1987:341) records a population estimate for 1880 of between 8000 and 10,000. It is unclear whether these earlier estimates include the population of Lamen Island or not, but the later population census figures do.

5 Haberkorn’s study (1989) of Paamese migration patterns, which describes the causes of Paamese mobility, indicates that it is likely to continue, if not intensify, in the foreseeable future.

Map 2 : Location of Epi within Vanuatu TORRES \ ISLANDS Q BANKS ISLANDS MAEWO AMBAE ESPIRITU SANTO Santo PENTECOST MALO AMBRYM MALAKULA q TONGOA o O SHEPHERD ISLANDS EFATE ERROMANGA ANIWA TANNA 0 FUTUNA k ilo m e tre s ANEITYUM

Chapter 2 The Lewo language and its speakers Paia est. Vaemali 10 M o riu 141 Nivenue 156 N ikaura 172 N uvi 89 Lokopui 67 Lemam 10 Mate A 134 Lepa 34 Plate 37 Loporoga 3 Niuples 28 N ul 106 Lopalis 78 Filakara est.

(m ajority are Paamese) (includes Mapuna)

(m ajority are Tongoans)

The villages going south along the west coast are:

• W enia est. 10 out o f 110 (m ajority are Paamese)

• A lak 72

• M alvasi est. 48 out o f 96 (rest are Bierebo speakers)

The total o f these listed populations gives 1320 speakers o f Lewo. Assuming another 70 or so Lew o speakers resident in V ila or Santo, or on other islands,6 the number o f firs t language speakers o f Lew o could be in the vicin ity o f 1400.7 There are also quite a few people from other areas o f Epi able to speak it as a second language.

2.1.3.2. Ethnicity

There is no conclusive evidence o f any previous settlement on Epi (or the rest o f Vanuatu) o f the pre-Austronesian type that has resulted in the modem Papuan (and Papuan-type language speaking) populations found in Papua New Guinea and scattered in various parts o f the Solomon

6 Census data records 160 residents of V ila indicating their home island as Epi, and 40 residents of Luganville in Santo (National Planning and Statistics Office, 1986:70-71). This total of 200 is prorated to 70 for the number of them who are likely to be Lewo speakers.

7 The populations for the other Epi languages are estimated from the latest census data to be as follows: Lamen 550; Baki 220; Bierebo 500; Bieria 50; Mai-Morae 140. The bulk of the remaining 800 or so Epi residents is made up of the 400 or so Nakanamanga and Namakira speakers in south Epi, and the 300 or so Paamese speakers at Ngala/Maganua and Mate B. These figures generally show increases in line with population growth (approximately 70% over the period) over those given by Tryon in Wurm and Hattori 1981 (Lewo 1000, Bierebo 270, Baki 200, M aii 100, Bieria 70), bearing in mind that his Lewo figure includes Lamen. The exception is the falling number o f Bieria speakers, and a smaller than expected increase in the number of M aii speakers. Both of these very small languages are struggling against the odds for their survival.

Map 3 : Lewo on Epi and other language boundaries L a m e n I s , - LEWO W a la v e a j^ W M a iv a s jA 'fi *Alak ^ • jw is in a N iu p le s . r Y o p u n a BIEREBO Varsu dialect Nivenue Varmali region BonKovia .M asou BAKI iLokopuii B u ru m b a late A 16° 40' MAE 'M ate Bx (Mafilau Lem am Vermaul region V a le s d ir L o p o r o n g a / .V o w a Malupa dialect Niuples BIERIA Lopalis Filakara N om uka Is kilo m e tre s

Chapter 2 _{The Lewo language and its speakers}

Islands (Pawley and Ross 1993:435).8 Like all the indigenous inhabitants of Vanuatu, the speakers of Lewo are Melanesian Australoids (Bellwood 1978:27), and possibly descendants of the presumed clan groups or small communities associated with a variant of the Lapita cultural complex which constituted the founding culture in Santa Cruz, Vanuatu, and New Caledonia from around 1200 BC (Pawley and Ross 1993:446).9

There is some degree of variation of type within the Epi and even the Lewo community, particularly in the amount of skin pigmentation, but no features that are atypical for the rest of Vanuatu. However, as for most of the larger communities or regional groupings of islands, the more finely-grained observations that insiders are able to make do allow for Epi people (and people from other islands) to claim that they can recognise with some accuracy another Epi person when they see one.

2.1.4. Sociocultural setting

The Lewo-speaking community of the Varsu area, and particularly Nikaura village, has in recent years been the subject of research by the social anthropologist Dr. Michael Young. He has written a paper about kava drinking in Nikaura (Young 1991), and his forthcoming monograph Kava Christianity will be an important contribution to the understanding of the interaction of traditional and modem culture on Epi, and in the wider Vanuatu and general Melanesian context.

Up until this time, no significant descriptions of Epi society, traditional or modem, or of the ethnography of the various language groups on the island have been produced.10 However, it is likely that important social and cultural features that have been identified and described for other Vanuatu settings will also prevail on Epi, and it is not possible to elaborate on these here, except to say that Lewo speakers live in residentially-localised patrilineally-recruited clan groups, and function as communities in groups of such clans which are led by chiefs.11 The communities are

8 However, Tryon mentions some speculation that they may have extended as far as southern Vanuatu and New Caledonia (Tryon 1984:152). Andrew Pawley (pc.) has pointed out two factors that have been taken as evidencing such settlement in Vanuatu. The first is the Australoid element in the modem populations, and the second is apparent ‘aberrations’ in Vanuatu languages. Certainly there is no archaeological evidence for such settlements, but sampling throughout Vanuatu is still weak.

9 It is not possible to be certain about the biological makeup of the first Lapita settlers, but it was probably Polynesian-like or variable with both Mongoloid (Polynesian-like) and Australoid elements (Andrew Pawley, pc.).

,0 CapelFs two pages on marriage patterns in Nikaura is the sole contribution, even of a minor nature, for the Lewo area (Capell 1938). Earlier, some notes by Deacon on Epi social organisation, including evidence for the presence of the graded society system, had been published (Deacon 1929).

11 Studies that could be referred to include Haberkom (1989) for Paama and Tonkinson (1968) for south-east Ambrym. The key components of modem Lewo social organisation (based on material provided by Michael Young, pc.) are:

managed largely by consensus, so meetings and village courts are often held in the main public area of each village, the kumai ‘meeting house’ (Bislama nakamal). The meeting house will also have its associated yo metava ‘place up/inland’, an area of open space used for functions and ceremonies, many of which will incorporate traditional dancing around the pia-lu ‘dragon plum tree buttress root (that is stamped on by the men as a sounding board)’. Interactions between certain kin counterparts are governed by respect and avoidance. O f all the rites of passage, marriage absorbs a great deal of community time, energy and productive capacity. Traditional wealth items like pigs, mats and kava are highly valued commodities. In every area of life, the counterplay between customary traditionalism and the influence of modernity can be detected.12

As elsewhere in Melanesia, the religious element is significant and pervasive, both for pre-contact traditional belief and practice, and since the adoption of modem Christianity. A good summary of many of the main features of Melanesian views relating to the natural and supernatural environment, especially “magical practices” and the “close interweaving of religion and magic” (beneficent and malevolent), and the significance of the “animistic” and “totemic” understanding

• exogamous, named, patrilineal descent groups, functioning as residentially localised and land­ owning clans, often centred on a kumai ‘meeting house’ (the patrilineal nature of these clans distinguishes them from the social structure found in Nguna and other islands to the south of Epi), • patri-virilocal marriage, such that women join their husband’s group after marriage, ie. sisters

disperse, brothers co-reside,

• lingering ideal of exchange marriage, such that if “sisters” cannot be exchanged between groups in the same generation, then there is an obligation to send a woman back for marriage into the group