ANU Gender Institute - Gender and History node 2015 seminar series

Abstract: The word ‘conversion’, when applied to religious change, points to many frames of reference, processes, subjective and objective conditions. This paper explores the conversion of three linked, historical figures and, while illustrating through them these characteristics, reflects on the gendered implications of their ‘conversions’.

These three converts lived in the Pacific Islands of Fiji during the 19th century. Their ‘conversions’ occurred in the 1840s and 1850s, during decades of intensifying missionary activity in the group and great political and economic transformation. The first convert (in status if not chronology) was Ratu Seru Epenisa Cakobau. He later became the paramount chief in Fiji and ceded these islands to Queen Victoria in 1874. But twenty years earlier, according to some chroniclers, he ‘bowed to Jehovah’ and led Fiji’s ‘great reformation’. The second convert was Adi Samanunu, his principal wife. In 1857, they married monogamously under Christian rites. She was said to have championed Christianity, and exemplifies certain challenges facing women in polygamous marriages who aspired to church membership. The third is Varani, a chief and military ally of Cakobau. In a sense, Varani was also ‘married’ to Cakobau, in that, as young warriors, they had formally become ‘man and wife’. Varani converted in 1845 and was killed in 1853 as a would-be peace-maker. His conversion and the disturbance of his sense of self were striking. While all three converts were significant for the ‘conversion’ of Fiji as a whole, each suggests different ‘conversions’ with distinctive gendered implications.

Contact: Hyaeweol Choi

Image: Thakombau [Cakobau], Vu-ni-valu, King of Mbau [Bau] Fiji, from Fiji and the Fijians v.I, "The Islands and Their Inhabitants", Thomas Williams 1858. Source: http://www.justpacific.com/fiji/engravings/williams/index.html