Road Belong Cargo by Peter Lawrence

Road Belong Cargo

A Study of the Cargo Movement in the Southern Madang District New Guinea

by Peter Lawrence

University of Manchester, 1964, 291 pages, hardcover with dust jacket

Good Condition, some underlining, price clipped dust jacket, previous store stamp & inscription (see photographs)

''Cargo cult' in its various forms is one of the most fascinating phenomena to emerge from the meeting of modern industrial and non-literate societies.  The native in some parts of the world first saw the fruits of industrialism - aircraft, automobilesm, electrical devices, radio, etc. and the power these confer, without ever having seen their source in the white man's factories, mines and workshops.  He attributed them, therefore, to the white man's superior religious power to which he too might have the key if he could find the appropriate ritual to invoke it.

This book, which deals with the Maadang district of New Guinea, is one of the few full-scale studies of the practice and the only one to treat it in its historical context.  The author has devoted many years to the observation of the cult in the field, to its interpretation, and to assessing its significance for the administration of the territory.  His vivid narrative should interest the general reader as well as the professional social anthropologist.'