NAMING SETS AMONG THE WORORA (NORTHERN KIMBERLEY, WESTERN AUSTRALIA) Michael Silverstein In the course of life, each Norora person accumulates five types of expressions for referring to him or her as a particular ‘iptions and oe kinship phrases. These expressions together form a naming set. Each element of the set can be exhaustively characterised by (1) metapragnatic information on the historical event of "baptism" or “performative nomination"---describable as a speech event--~in which the name element has been legitimately associated with the referent; and by (2) pragmatic information on the types of speech events in which the name element can be legitimately used by various social personae in Worora society. These Jointly are the "meaning" of the name-elements (and hence naming sets), and provide a systematic, structurally-balanced picture of how the individual as an historical and statistical entity, is socially constituted in terms of the culturally absolute, timeless frameworks of } geography (the fundamental "natural" Aboriginal order) and kinship structure (the fundamental "cultural" Aboriginal order). The individual, defined through the metapragmatics of bestowal and the pragmatics of use of his/her naming set, is an historical precipitate of these cultural orders. Session: Wednesday 25 August 1981 H.C. Coombs Lecture Theatre "Pragmatics in the study of Aboriginal Communities"Worora Naning-Sets Bepe Orientation of Polarity roferont—aource Linguistic Use Kinship of Use links Dareotionansty Frovenionce --Ghazuetesistics ‘Efteata Conditions Ronaxhe (a) i-pumba’ -ezoenaiy Male ancestor vent of = [Opsmenoxs zee (ayposstively Baptism oxe~ jarre-ya (genttor) gots selZ-annowmoe- ferent to down- specifieg tar ates an indi~ ‘great Fatrileteral name from ref eyolic, Gland G* gen- vidual niyth alse") erent ut place Hlaco; Clanclan re* erations in’ tine-spuce, ete. of tarth- — 2:speoles or Jationsiipe all four stzue~ parallel to announcenent formations tural petri. Goat of the (eonce;tion") 3.means Lines clan struc- % ture () Mabian ‘SHIP Given by o Anchors ref- (o)noutraly | In_princiyle mane’, on behals of fezent to down basic mame of a fixed store Patrileteral classif. fafa, ward, alter=. people of yatriline/ fafasi, “duplit nating-ganera~ “clan nanea cating’ one of tion contin~ thas reeyele the nine-set of uity of pstri- in structural ancestor Tine errant (e) matzonym | | xinsHry Known to al. Anchors ref- (~)negatively Bn from mane of erent to con- speciiied for Matrilateral a tinulty of Feference to 7 natrilateral ejasoif. faj.e, ma: 0 filiation up O"Meple—.G2*" be; ward rorezent in Hon triline A | spective matri alole ee ibteral ity (as) ei2iation Substitution Anchors ref (—)nogatively Alternutive of nano of wi erent to uatri-specified for” avoidance ven or dau lateral tonds ref. to classit.matronym would Of spkr's line wife-giver ‘be taboo for spkr(A}orsub- ab. ref.) | ale (@) no's dece}. GEocRAZY Referent gets Event of death Anchors ref (——)ni H te: et nt ors ref- (-—-)highlyBaptisnal event gent topo} une from fe~, (and burt te aya Motriisteral “Gale pacseter's ES PUPEL) oF por DCE ERIS ME svecttied determines us Place of death place On nie age taboo on ng! ons of clans other modes of referenceKinstatus classification among the Worora (Northern Kimberley, Australia) EQOCSRTRIC KINTHNA RECKONING, gulazn, wapage IO 4 Od a Qa oA A > A 12 amale:njao Hitmlesya 3 ojanarnje eganarya basgainja scan tazelya 1} omaygainja swatys Jao Gulazya ac 20° 2 odjena:nja sajanaya 1 ogera:nja ease sgegerya wazsginjae go ebjanainja a CR 40° gajanarye thocada:nja i agadjerya iparnjac Y Shatya 2 002409 jboguruna:nja L771 eee wa} bayiinja.o walbaya 6% 46°, SOCLOCENERIC. ABA:BIA © wasanatal (ayua:Way © GaRA:RaYE: ‘A GAGA:GAYE: (pasteaR)NAMING SETS ANONG THE WORORA (NORTHERN KIMBERLEY, WESTERN AUSTRALIA) Michael Silverstein In the course of life, each Worora person accumulates five types of expressions for referring to him or her as a particular individual, in addition to analysable definite descriptions and kinship phrases. These expressions together form a naming set. Each element of the set can be exhaustively characterised by (1) metapraamatic information on the historical event of "baptism or "performative nomination"---describable as a speech event---in which the name element has been legitimately associated with the referent; and by (2) pragmatic information on the types of speech events in which the name element can be legitimately used by various social personae in Worora society. These Jointly are the "meaning" of the name-elements (and hence naming sets), and provide a systematic, structural ly-balanced picture of how the individual as an historical and statistical entity, is socially constituted in terms of the culturally absolute, timeless frameworks of geography (the fundamental "natural" Aboriginal order) and kinship structure (the fundamental "cultural" Aboriginal order). The individual, defined through the metapragmatics of bestowal and the pragmatics of use of his/her naming set, is an historical precipitate of these cultural orders. Session: Wednesday 26 August 1981 H.C. Coonbs Lecture Theatre "Pragmatics in the study of Aboriginal Communities" | |To appear in H. C. Conklin, ed., Proc. Amer. Ethnol. Soc. for 1980. Naming Sets among the Worora (Northern Kimberley, Australia)* Michael Silverstein The University of Chicago One sometimes has the impression that social anthropologists have spent so much energy in studying naming systems because, like Everest (or Chomolungma; cf. Searle 1969:165), they at least seem to be there, Analytic philosophers would already note from the term ‘naming system’ that the sets of linguistic expressions anthropologists interest themselves in are not proper names in the narrow logical sense.’ Indeed, studying their systematicity with respect to established sociological categories suggests that anthro- pologicai understanding sees names as either abbreviated or covert descriptions of individuals in a system of categories, a folk-derived philosophical position now increasingly rejected by philosophers (see, for example, Kripke 1972; Domnellan 1972). But anthropologists have done little to explicate the relevance of particular case-studies of provenance, etymology, knowledge, and usage in societies to a comparative, generalizing theoretical perspective that has potential for orienting further work, In this paper, I use the data of the personal naming system of a community in which I have worked? to demonstrate that the systematicity in bestowing and using per- sonal names bespeaks their essentially duplex nature as both prag- matic and metapragmatic referring entities. They are pragmatic entities in that, as Peirce long ago maintained (ca. 1893] 1932:167), they "must, then, be or contain indices';? they are metapragmaticentities in that, as philosophers are now beginning to formulate, they encapsulate a kind af harkening back to a describable or char- acterizable event of "baptism" or performative nomination. I will return to these semiotic issues in concluding. First I present an outline of the naming system. The Worora-speaking (and related) patriclans traditionally in- habited the mountainous coastal and immediately interior country (plas the offshore Indian Ocean islands) from the eastern coast of King Sound to the Prince Regent River, in the region of Western Australia Known as the Northern Kimberley. Inland were the Nayinjin- speaking clans, and to the northeast, about as far as the present town of Wyndham, were the Wunambal-speaking clans, both of which con~ stituted with the Worora a self-reckognized cultural and social system. Today, representatives of all three traditional linguistic groups live in Mowanjum Community, outside of their traditional territory near the town of Derby at the southern end of King Sound. They have been gathered there by missionaries after several intermediate moves since contact in L915, It is only since the completed move to Mowan- jem in 1961 that rapid social change has affected such indicators as learning the Aboriginal languages, great increases in socially-incom- Prehensible marriages and liaisons, submission to external modes of social control, and partial reorientation toward a cash economy (for some, in the form of Federal welfare checks). However, the naming system as reported here was just beginning to show signs of loss of vitality during my stay in ways and for reasons related