15-17 December 1994
Basel, Switzerland

THE BASEL CONFERENCE OF THE EUROPEAN SOCIETY FOR OCEANISTS (ESO)

By J�rg Wassmann and Verena Keck

From December 15 to 17 1994, the Basel conference of the European Society
for Oceanists (ESO) was held at the Institute of Ethnology of the
University of Basel, Switzerland. The general theme of the conference was
'Knowing Oceania: Constituting Knowledge and Identities'. The topic was
discussed in ten working sessions under the following titles:
1. Local and imported knowledges; chair: Maurice Godelier
2. Common worlds and single lives; chairs: Andrew Strathern and Christina
Toren
3. Cultural practices of identity construction and nation building; chairs:
Barbara Glowczewski-Barker and Toon van Meijl
4. Genealogies: land and titles; chair: Ton Otto
5. Competing and converging systems of exchange; chair: Allen Abramson
6. Ecological pluralism? chair: Ulla Hasager
7/8. Scrutinizing regional systems and modelling Oceania; chair: Andr‚
Iteanu
9. Identity of objects -- objects of identity; chairs: Michael O'Hanlon and
Mark Busse
10. Ethics and  politics of field work; chair: Gunter Senft
11. Informal audiovisual working session; chair: Rolf Hussmann

Around 200 participants from European and overseas countries were present.
A total of 90 papers was presented by researchers from different
disciplines with an interest in Oceania.
Marilyn Strathern, Robert Tonkinson, and Jonathan Friedman were invited to
give the keynote speeches elaborating the main theme from the viewpoints of
Melanesia, Australia, and Polynesia. It was a special honour to have a
contribution from Sir Raymond Firth presented by Michael O'Hanlon. The
discussants were Maurice Godelier, John Morton, Serge Tcherk‚zoff,
Christine Jourdan, Ton Otto, Meinhard Schuster, and Andrew Strathern.
The next conference will be held in 1996