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Erotic Legends and Narratives in Chuuk
Beatriz Moral
Centre de Recherche et Documentation sur l’Oceanie, Universite de Provence, Marseillle

Ambivalence is characteristic of many aspects of Micronesian cultures and in the case of sexuality it is expressed by two contrary conceptions in Micronesian legend. On the one hand it is full of danger, a destructive freedom that might threaten the social order. On the other hand, it is a positive force that provides humans with pleasure and joy.


The main topic of my research has always been, from different perspectives, gender and sexuality in Chuuk, but it is only now that I have begun to pay particular attention to erotic legends. Until now, these legends have been a tangential theme and, it seemed to me, were only an echo of Chuukese sexuality. In my former work I only used them to illustrate some aspects of Chuukese sexuality, but I did not take them as an object of research. However, I have come to realize that they can provide us with a very particular kind of information about sexuality. In this paper I will analyze some erotic legends, including their characters as well as other supernatural beings. I consider that the legends allow us an interesting glimpse of the place sexuality occupies in Chuukese cosmogony as well as giving us a complementary point of view on extra terrestrial sexuality itself.

Ambivalence is characteristic of many aspects of Micronesian cultures and in the case of sexuality it is expressed by a sort of double conception that I consider as two sides of the same coin. On the other hand, sex is equal to danger; it is a destructive force that might threaten the social order. This is the sex that invades the realm of the family, which in Micronesia represents to a great extent the social order. Sex has to be in its right place, in the dark, in the bushes, in the silence, it has to be hidden and clandestine; otherwise it is danger, incest, and chaos. On the other hand, when sex stays where it belongs it is a positive force that provides humans with pleasure and joy. In any case, the act of sex itself is always exempt from any negative moral judgment, what might be negatively judged is the use of it in an inappropriate way or context. Negative judgment is more related to the danger that it represents than to a pure moral statement about the activity itself. This double aspect of sex is well represented in erotic legends. In addition, legends indicate other characteristics that can help us complete the picture of sexuality on Chuuk. Erotic legends allow us a better understanding of the relation between sex and the supernatural world, the non-human forces that make sex dangerous. This particular relation shapes the conception of sexuality, where sex, as human as it could be, is somehow rooted in a non-human world.

My analysis is focused on Chuuk, but examples from some of the outer islands of Yap (Ifaluk and Woleai) will be introduced as well, for they are closely related to Chuuk1. Chuuk is part of the Caroline Islands and one of the four states of the Federated States of Micronesia. Chuuk is composed of a lagoon with high volcanic islands and several atolls surrounding it2 that will be referred to here as “outer islands”. Different dialects are spoken in Chuuk but they are all mutually intelligible. Even though there are some cultural differences among atolls, all of them share many cultural similarities. Concerning our subject, I observed that the same legends are known all around Chuuk, as well as in some islands of Yap, which are linguistically and culturally close to the islands of Chuuk.

The legends that are analyzed in this paper are commonly known in Chuuk and they are easily shared in groups of the same gender. The legends that I collected myself are not very different from the ones that have already been published but sometimes they present some variations3. Their heroes are often ghosts, gods or demigods as well as humans helped by supernatural beings or magic, making possible the accomplishments of incredible actions or tricks that are not accessible to human beings. In order to have a more complete approach to the problem that I present in this paper, I have also included an analysis of sea-ghosts from real life, for they have a relation with sex that is more than similar to that found in erotic legends.

The qualification of “erotic” might not be appropriate to all the legends and other narratives that I include in this analysis. Some of them do not have an erotic intention, but I decided to take them into account, because they show some interesting sexual aspects.

THE CHARACTERS
I have chosen three types of characters that I consider the most representative of erotic legends and narratives (where sex and the supernatural world are involved): ghosts, gods, and humans (with or without supernatural help). If we are to choose the most representative character of these legends, there is no doubt that this is Wonofaat, the most famous trickster god of Micronesia. Sea-ghosts give us some important key elements in the understanding of non-human sex, in this case we will be concerned more closely with ghosts than with those from legends.

Among the few characters who do not receive any kind of supernatural help, we find wives and husbands who lay tricks to discover each other’s sins or entertain adulterous relationships. Another typical human character in this category is found in the numbskulls’ stories that always lead to incest by ignorance. There are also humans with extraordinary qualities but without any supernatural connection, for example, a woman with eighty labia minora. Other than that, most of the human characters of erotic legends are associated with supernatural forces.




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