Ethnography of Rock Art

Ethnographic data on other types of art can be useful in interpreting rock art research.

For example, Morphy's (1991) semiological study of Yolngu bark paintings illustrates the complexity of Aboriginal art, and the manner in which it encodes and communicates a range of information on social organisation, political relations and rights to resources. Because of this, Morphy's work provides important information and insights.

Until recently, such concerns were not well voiced in studies concerned with the archaeology of the art of small-scale societies, and a working knowledge of the role of art in ethnographic contexts has not been seen as an essential prerequisite for the interpretation of archaeological art. This was not always the case. At the end of the nineteenth century, European researchers concerned with the discovery and interpretation of Upper Palaeolithic art, were heavily influenced by the publication of Tylor's Primitive Culture (1873), Frazer's Golden Bough (1890) and Spencer and Gillen's The Native Tribes of Central Australia (1899), all of which emphasised the importance of totemism in 'primitive' ideology. Spencer and Gillen's work also described the totemic context of rock art in Central Australia. The result was that the concept of totemism was lifted directly out of the ethnographic literature and used to explain Upper Palaeolithic art as being concerned with sympathetic magic. Such crude use of analogy later led some researchers to reject totally the use of ethnographic parallels in interpreting Upper Palaeolithic art. Instead it was argued that interpretation must be based on the Palaeolithic evidence alone.

A similar distinction between 'ethnographic' and 'archaeological' approaches to the analysis of rock art has been made by some Australian researchers (e.g. Maynard 1979; Clegg 1981). Such distinctions do not take into account sufficiently the extensive literature dealing with the relationship between ethnography and archaeology, as well as the more general literature on the philosophy of science (see Davidson 1988). Although rock art studies have a unique data base, they are concerned with material evidence for past human behaviour and can be undertaken using the same basic methods of analysis.

In the case of archaeological/rock art research, ethnographic data is just one of a number of possible sources for generating ideas for the explanation of material evidence for past behavioural systems. In some cases, detailed ethnographic information on local group ideology and beliefs has enabled finely-resolved explanations for the content and structural properties of rock art assemblages to be advanced and tested. In other cases the lack of ethnographic context or historical continuity means that explanations, which may be drawn from a variety of sources, including the general ethnographic literature, are necessarily more coarse-grained.

MEANING IN ROCK ART

Similarly, in South Africa researchers, such as Vinnicombe, Lewis-Williams, Dowson and Ouzman, have used 19th century ethnographic information to infer specific meaning for San rock paintings. They conclude that much of this rock art depicts visions experienced during trance, the central religious experience of the San.

Still it is important to face the difficulties that can be involved in ascribing meaning to motifs. This problem is exemplified by Macintosh's (1952, 1977) experiences at Beswick Creek Cave (Doria Gudaluk) in the Northern Territory, Australia. This site was fully recorded in 1949 and species identifications made by Macintosh without the help of local Aboriginal people. Later, when local people were asked to explain and identify the art Macintosh estimated found that 90% of his initial subject identifications of paintings were incorrect. Macintosh concluded that to differentiate species in the rock art (e.g. pademelon from rock wallaby), or even male from female human, it was essential to obtain information about the minutiae of draftsmanship and the conventional norm. He further observed that, even after informed identification, the recorder was totally dependent on local, informed Aboriginal people to gauge the specific purpose and 'thought context' of the art.

In most situations detailed ethnographic information on rock art is not available and it is not possible for a researcher to obtain specific meanings. Nevertheless, it is still possible to study the role of rock art in past societies by analysing the content as well as the natural and cultural context of the art. For instance, in the Central Queensland Highlands there is a consistent association between rock art and burials. It is clear that rock art production in this region was closely associated with disposal of the dead (Morwood 1984).

This approach to the ethnography of rock art is based on the notion that rock art data should be treated as part of broader cultural systems of meaning and, as such, should be analysed in a similar manner to other archaeological data -- that is, in terms of spatial and temporal patterning and relationship to other archaeological material. The argument here is that the basic archaeological problem of establishing links between material evidence and the original cultural context remains the same regardless of whether the evidence being examined consists of stone artefacts, food remains, sediments, or rock art. Middle Range Theory is often used as a device for establishing links between rock art and cultural context and for producing hypotheses which can be tested in the field.

Much of this type of ethnoarchaeological research is oriented towards the development of theory. Often, this involves the use of ethnographic analogy which, sensibly used, can offer insights into the behaviours associated with the production of archaeological remains, including rock art. For example, Smith (1992) used ethnography to test a theory widely used by archaeologists that art in fertile regions would be more homogeneous than art in harsh environments. This kind of information can be used to understand patterning in rock art or other forms of archaeological art.

THE POLITICS OF PRACTICE

However, approaches to interacting with indigenous people vary in different regions of the world. While a world overview of this issue is beyond the scope of this presentation, it is instructive to consider how ethnoarchaeology is practiced in one region. In Australia, Aboriginal people have control over ethnoarchaeological research in some or all of the following ways:

• Restricting access to information and some sites.
• Discouraging researchers from reading previously published secret information.
• Editing the content of the publication.
• Controlling the distribution of visual material.
• Participating in the distribution of research results.

Australian researchers are able to work with these levels of control productively. Indeed, because Aboriginal people have a high level of input into research they are able to bring their own ideas to the project. This can redirect the research into areas that are of particular interest to Aboriginal people which ensures that Aboriginal and archaeological interests are working together. Moreover, it often produces a more rounded and deeper analysis.

SELECTED REFERENCES

Davidson, I. 1988 The naming of parts: ethnography and the interpretation of Australian prehistory. In B. Meehan and R. Jones (eds) Archaeology with ethnography: an Australian experience, pp. 17-32. Dept. of Prehistory, R.S.Pac.S., ANU

Frazer, J.G. 1890 Golden Bough. London: Macmillan.

Layton, R. 1992 Australian Rock Art: a new synthesis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Lewis, D. and D. Rose 1985 Some ethical issues in archaeology; a methodology of consultation in northern Australia. Australian Aboriginal Studies 1:37-44.

Lewis, D. and D. Rose 1988 The Shape of the Dreaming. Canberra: Aboriginal Studies Press.

Lewis-Williams, J.D. and T.A. Dowson 1990 Through the veil: San rock paintings and the paintings and the rock face. South African Archaeological Bulletin 45:5-16.

Macintosh, N.G.W. 1952 Paintings at Beswick Creek Cave, Northern Territory. Oceania 22:256-74.

Macintosh, N.G.W. 1977 Beswick Creek Cave two decades later: a reappraisal. In P.J. Ucko (ed.) Form in Indigenous Art, pp. 191-7. Canberra: Australian Institute of Aboriginal Studies.

Maynard, L. 1979. The archaeology of Australian Aboriginal art. In S.M. Mead (ed.) Exploring the Visual Art of Oceania, University of Hawaii Press: 83-110.

Merlan, F. 1989 The interpretive framework of Wardaman rock art: a preliminary report. Australian Aboriginal Studies 2:14-24.

Morphy, H. 1991 Ancestral Connections: art and an Aboriginal system of knowledge. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.

Morwood, M.J. 1984 The prehistory of the Central Queensland Highlands. In F. Wendorf and A. Close (eds) Advances in World Archaeology, 3: 325-80.

Ouzman, S. 1995 Spiritual and political uses of a rock engraving site and its imagery by San and Tswana speakers. South African Archaeological Bulletin 50:55-67.

Spencer, B. and F.J. Gillen 1899. The Native Tribes of Central Australia, Macmillan and Co., London.

Smith, C. 1992 The use of ethnography in interpreting rock art: a comparative study of art from the Arnhem Land and Western Desert regions of Australia. In M.J. Morwood and D. Hobbs (eds) Rock Art and Ethnography: proceedings of the first Australian Rock Art Research Association Congress, pp. 39-45. Melbourne: Australian Rock Art Research Association.

Taçon, P.S.C. 1988 Identifying fish species in the recent rock art paintings of Western Arnhem Land. Rock Art Research 5:3-15.

Taylor, L. 1987. 'The same but different': social reproduction and innovation in the art of the Kunwinjku of western Arnhem Land. Unpublished Ph.D. thesis. Australian National University.

Tyler, E. 1873 Primitive Culture. London: Watts.

Vinnicombe, P. 1976 People of the Eland. Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal Press.