The Pitt Rivers Museum's current special exhibition, titled 'Intrepid Women: Fieldwork in Action, 1910–1957', highlights the lives and fieldwork careers of six notable female anthropologists who made significant collections during the first half of the twentieth century: Beatrice Blackwood, Ursula Graham Bower, Audrey Butt Colson, Barbara Freire-Marreco, Maggie 'Makereti' Papakura and Elsie McDougall. This article by Zena McGreevy, who curated the section on Beatrice Blackwood, reproduces and makes available original material from the Museum's photograph and manuscript collections displayed or reproduced in the exhibition:
Born to a wealthy family, Beatrice Blackwood (1889–1975) could have settled for finishing school and a conventional marriage. Instead she applied to Oxford, gaining a degree in English in 1912 and a distinction in 1918 for the Diploma in Anthropology. She worked as a research assistant, and later Demonstrator, in the Department of Human Anatomy within the Oxford University Museum of Natural History. In 1924 she spent three years doing fieldwork in Canada and the United States, spending time in the same Pueblo communities as Barbara Freire-Marreco.
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| 'Intrepid Women: Fieldwork in Action, 1910–1957', Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford, 15 October 2018 to 11 March 2019; section of the exhibition devoted to Beatrice Blackwood and her ethnographic fieldwork in New Mexico, United States of America (1926), and in Papua New Guinea (1929–1930, 1936–1937). Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford |
Her second fieldwork trip in 1929 was to New Guinea, on the islands of Buka and Bougainville in the Northern Solomons. Few anthropologists had travelled to this region and Blackwood was the first woman anthropologist to do so. In 1935 Blackwood transferred to the Pitt Rivers Museum, becoming the Demonstrator in Ethnology, and then embarked on her third fieldwork trip in 1936 to the interior of New Guinea.
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| Lantern slides made by Beatrice Blackwood, including images from New Guinea. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.385.4.25, 'Buka & Bougainville') |
Blackwood never married. She later lectured at Oxford, and put her research into action: during World War II, her lectures featured stern admonishments to students that 'THERE IS NO ARYAN RACE!' She retired in 1959 but continued to come in to work at the Museum until a few days before her death in 1975.
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| Acoma potter Maria Chino; Pueblo Keresan people. Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Acoma, New Mexico, United States of America. 1926. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.169.10.1) |
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| Acoma potter; Pueblo Keresan people. Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Acoma, New Mexico, United States of America. 1926. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.169.10.2) |
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| Acoma potter; Pueblo Keresan people. Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Acoma, New Mexico, United States of America. 1926. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.169.10.3) |
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| Petats village. 'Arriving at Buka Passage on September 25th, 1929, I started work a few days later on the island of Petats, one of the string of coral islets fringing the west coast of Buka. There are no white residents on this island, and it seemed in many ways suitable for my purpose.' Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Petats, Buka Island, Northern Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea. 1929–1930. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.161.22.6) |
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| Kurtachi village. 'I finally, at the beginning of 1930, moved to the neighbouring island of Bougainville, and settled in the village of Kurtachi, on the north coast, about ten miles east of Buka Passage.' Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Kurtachi, Bougainville Island, Northern Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, 1929–1930. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.462.105) |
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Beatrice Blackwood's house with her assistant Ross standing on the steps. 'I secured as my servant a young man named Ross, a native of Petats, who had worked for white people and knew what was required of him. He came with me to Kurtachi, and soon made himself at home there, although at first he could not understand the local dialect. [...] He was bitterly disappointed that he could not come home with me.'
Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.459.63)Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Petats, Buka Island, Northern Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea. 1929–1930. |
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| Selecting taro stalks for planting. 'The staple is taro, and as ground which has borne a taro crop must be allowed to lie fallow for a long time (sometimes it is left for two generations) before it can be planted again, its cultivation involves the constant clearing of fresh patches of bush.' Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Kurtachi, Bougainville Island, Northern Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea. 1929–1930. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.463.113) |
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| Children on the beach. 'Children appear from everywhere as soon as I produce my camera.' Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Petats, Buka Island, Northern Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea. 1929–1930. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.459.83) |
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| Children with balloons. Blackwood made friends with the local children, given them balloons, small mirrors and tinsel. Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Tanei, Bougainville Island, Northern Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea. 1929–1930. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.458.80) |
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| Poem by Beatrice Blackwood, written in June 1930 during her fieldwork in Buka and Bougainville, Papua New Guinea. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (Blackwood Papers, Box 8, Item 23: typescript of a poem by Beatrice Blackwood ('Lament of an Anthropologist'), enclosed with a letter from Beatrice Blackwood to Arthur Thomson, 8 June 1930) |
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| Manki village; Anga people. 'As far as I can find out, no one has worked among the Kukukukus, so I hope it will be worthwhile.' Kukukukus was the name the Anga people were known by at the time. Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Manki, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea. 1936–1937. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.553.352) |
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| Making Beatrice Blackwood's house; Anga people. Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Manki, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea. August or September 1936. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.553.203) |
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| Warriors with Sally the cat; Anga people. 'Some of the toughest old warriors would spend hours trailing bits of string for her to play with. I can send you, if you are interested, a photograph of a group of Kukukuku on the occasion of their first introduction to Sally, who was one of my best assets, from the professional as well as the personal standpoint.' Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Manki, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea. 1936–1937. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.553.1001.1) |
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| Beatrice Blackwood's house, her assistant Andetei holding Sally the cat. Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Manki, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea. 1936–1937. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.553.308.1) |
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| Wealthy woman making an armlet; Anga people. Wearing jewelry was a sign of wealth. Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Manki, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea. 1936–1937. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.553.222.1) |
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| Beatrice Blackwood's assistant Andetei with Oyendapo and Sitoun; all playing the panpipes. Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Manki, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea. October 1936. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.553.18.1) |
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| Making a shell necklace; Anga people. Photograph by Beatrice Blackwood. Manki, Morobe Province, Papua New Guinea. November 1936. Copyright Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford (1998.553.117) |
Zena McGreevy
Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford
15 October 2018
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