Anthropology Film Analysis: First Contact the Film

Anthropology

Film Analysis: First Contact

The film First Contact is a real example of what happens when two cultures collide. It is the true story of over a million people in Papua New Guinea who had no idea other people existed outside their world. This changed when three white men in search of gold, walked into their world. This documentary covers the initial reaction of the people and how they perceived the white men, describes the way the white men perceived the tribe and shows how the tribe changed. This documentary offers a real look at the situation from the perspective of the non-Western culture. In the article "Cosmologies of Capitalism" Sahlins argues that the impact of Western cultures on non-Western cultures needs to be understood from the perspective of the non-Western culture. The documentary provides this focus, showing how the people of New Guinea perceived the white men. Based on their lack of knowledge of the outside world, the people of New Guinea based their perceptions on their own cultural understanding. They thought the white men were their ancestors, their skin bleached white from the sun, and that they were returning to collect their bones from the river. The documentary includes these people of New Guinea recalling their experiences. It is seen that that the people of New Guinea now appear as if they are a Western culture with recent shots of the people seeing them dressed in Western clothes and living as part of the greater global community. While this may at first appear to support the idea that Western culture replaces non-Western cultures a closer look reveals that this is not true. In "Cosmologies of Capitalism" Sahlins describes Americans seizing the land at Hawaii and says that while it is true that Americans did seize the land, it is not true that "the course of Hawaiian history since 1778 was governed by this outcome or that it consisted merely in the replacement of Polynesian by bourgeois relations" (Sahlins 414). The situation in New Guinea is another example that supports this same idea. The introduction of Westerners changed the culture of New Guinea, but did not simply replace their history. Instead, the people of New Guinea see this change as a turning point in their history. This shows that Western values have shaped their culture and shaped it significantly, but does not show that Western values simply replaced their own values.

The documentary also shows the views of the New Guinea people in regards to money. The people of New Guinea where not familiar with the concept of money as representing value or with the concept of trade. In contrast, the three white explorers accepted trade as the way to bargain and did not question that the locals would not understand the process. The white men had the people of New Guinea work for them and paid them in shells. The locals attributed their own cultural values to this, seeing the shells as a gesture of good will. In this case, money is important in the context that it is used to get people to do things. This is the basic concept of wages, one that is normal to the cultural values of the white men, but unfamiliar to the people of New Guinea. It is also seen that the white men soon adapted their means of trade based on the culture of the people of New Guinea. The white men realized that their man consideration was spiritual. They then used this to get the people to do as they wished. An example is when they needed the airstrip built. Rather than pay the people, they used their cultural values, telling them it was for the purpose of bringing in a bird whose belly would be filled with gifts. This is an example of how the white men adapted their own concepts of trade in an attempt to control the people. They realized that offering goods was not their greatest method of controlling the people and so used the spiritual values instead.

The difference between values is one of the major differences between the two cultures. The people of New Guinea had a culture unaware of the concept of trade or wages and was instead based on more spiritual understandings. The white men were used to trade and wages as part of their culture. The impact of this is seen in the violence that occurred in the situation. While the white men were rich in their own culture, this meant little to the people of New Guinea. The white men also believed that they were superior to the people and that they should be able to control them. They first used wages to achieve control, then used their status as returned spirits. However, when these both failed, they resorted to violence. This involved shooting several of the people to show the people that they were superior. This show of violence can be seen as the white men's final attempts to communicate their power to the people. This violence then is a result of the gap between the cultures, with the white men using death and violence as the one thing that means the same in both cultures.