Mark S. Mosko, BA (Calif), MA, PhD (Minnesota)
Professor and Head, Department of Anthropology

Email: mark.mosko@anu.edu.au

Biographical Statement

I am continuing research of the dynamics of personhood, agency and exchange in numerous contexts of North Mekeo (PNG) sociality and history including processes of commodification, Christian conversion, ritual, and changing patterns of chiefly leadership. Since 2006 I have launched a second major research programme in the Trobriand Islands based in Omarakana – the home of the Paramount Chief and the site of Malinowski’s pioneering fieldwork – reexamining numerous dimensions of Trobriand sociality including chieftainship, ritual, myth, ceremonial exchange, personhood and social change. Over 2009-2012, with funding from the Australian Research Council and the Wenner-Gren Foundatioon, I shall be conducting a further twelve months of fieldwork at Omarakana and nine months of archival research at the London School of Economics and the Digital Ethnographic Project at California State University (Sacrmento).

Research Interests

Social anthropology; symbolism; social organisation; cultural change; leadership; personhood; agency; gift exchange; religion; Christianity; chaos theory; Melanesia/Pacific.

Key Publications

• Forthcoming. Gifts that Change: Personal Partibility, Agency and Christianity in a Changing Melanesian Society. New York: Berghahn Books.
• 2009 ‘The Fractal Yam: Botanical Imagery and Human Agency in the Trobriands’. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 15 (n.s.), 679-700.
• 2009. 'Black Powder, White Magic: European Armaments and Sorcery in Early Mekeo and Roro Encounters', in Oceanic Encounters: Exchange, Desire, Violence, M. Jolly, S. Tcherkezoff and D. Tryon (eds), 259-294. Canberra: ANU E-Press.
• 2007 ‘Fashion as Fetish: The Agency of Modern Clothing and Traditional Body Decoration among North Mekeo’. The Contemporary Pacific 19:39-83.
• 2005 (with F. Damon, co-editor). On the Order of Chaos: Social Anthropology and the Science of Chaos. New York: Berghahn Books.
• 1995. ‘Rethinking Trobriand Chieftainship’. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute (n.s.) 1:763-85.
• 1994 (with M. Jolly, co-editor). Transformations of Hierarchy: Structure, History and Horizon in the Austronesian World. Special Issue: History and Anthropology 7 (1-4).
• 1985. Quadripartite Structures: Categories, Relations and Homologies in Bush Mekeo Culture. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Career Highlights

Ethnographic research: North Mekeo (1974-1976, 1990, 1993-1994, 1995-1996, 1997-1998, 1999-2000, 2000-2001, 2002, 2003, 2005, 2006); Roro (2005, 2006); Trobriands (2006, 2007, 2008, 2009); Founding Chair of Anthropology, Hartwick College, USA (1980-1993); Research Fellow, Comparative Austronesian Project, RSPS, ANU (1989-1991); Professor and Head, Anthropology Department, Auckland University (1993-2001); Professor and Head, Anthropology Department, RSPAS, Australian National University (2001-present); Major research grants: National Institute for General Medical Studies (1970-1978), National Institute for the Humanities (1993-1994), Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research (1994-1995, 2005-2007, 2009-2010), New Zealand Royal Society/Marsden Fund (1999-2004), Australian Research Council/Discovery (2009-2012); Elected Fellow, Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia (2004); Awarded the 2008 Curl Prize for Best Essay ("Partible Penitents: Dividual Personhood and Christian Practice in Melanesia and the West") by the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland.