The Effects of First Contact; Cargo Cults
Posted on 24. Jun, 2009 by Shannon Graham in Miscellaneous, Old World
Imagine the scene when native peoples of North America first saw ships approaching from the east. Monstrous, floating structures with bellies full of strangely dressed men emerging with highly developed tools. First impressions? Friend or foe? Fight or flee?
This scenario has occurred throughout the world anytime an isolated culture encounters first contact with another more adventurous people. It’s happened in the Americas, Africa, Southeast Asia and more recently in the Pacific Rim where it spawned a religious practices of sorts known as ‘cargo cults’. In many cases the natives will interpret the newcomers as spiritual beings sent by the gods.
Wikipedia defines a cargo cult as “a type of religious practice that may appear in tribal societies in the wake of interaction with technologically advanced, non-native cultures. The cults are focused on obtaining the material wealth of the advanced culture through magical thinking, religious rituals and practices, believing that the wealth was intended for them by their deities and ancestors.
In most cases the foreign influences arrive from more technically advanced societies through exploration, colonization, missionary efforts, and international warfare. When the advanced cultures leaves, Cargo cults attempt to attract the return of the goods by “conducting rituals imitating behavior they have observed among the holders of the desired wealth and presuming that their deities and ancestors will, at last, recognize their own people and send the cargo to them instead. Thus, a characteristic feature of cargo cults is the belief that spiritual agents will, at some future time, give much valuable cargo and desirable manufactured products to the cult members.”
Some cult members in the Pacific Rim worship Americans who brought the desired cargo to their island during World War II as part of the supplies used in the war effort. The most widely known period of cargo cult activity, was in the years during and after World War II. First, the Japanese arrived with a great deal of unknown equipment, and later, Allied forces also used the islands in the same way. The vast amounts of war material that were air dropped onto these islands during the Pacifica campaign between the Allies and the Empire of Japan necessarily meant drastic changes to the lifestyle of the islanders, many of whom had never seen Westerners or Easterners before. Manufactured clothing, medicine, canned food, tents, weapons, and other useful goods arrived in vast quantities to equip soldiers. Some of it was shared with the islanders who were their guides and hosts. With the end of the war, the airbases were abandoned, and cargo was no longer dropped.
In attempts to get cargo to fall by parachute or land in planes or ships again, islanders imitated the same practices they had seen the soldiers, sailors, and airmen use. They carved headphones from wood and wore them while sitting in fabricated control towers. They waved the landing signals while standing on the runways. They lit signal fires and torches to light up runways and lighthouses. The cult members thought that the foreigners had some special connection to the deities and ancestors of the natives, who were the only beings powerful enough to produce such riches.
Many built life-size replicas of airplanes out of straw and created new military-style landing strips, hoping to attract more airplanes. Ultimately, although these practices did not bring about the return of the airplanes that brought such marvelous cargo during the war, they did have the effect of eradicating most of the religious practices that had existed prior to the war. Over the last sixty-five years, most cargo cults have disappeared.
Imagine your own reaction if aliens arrived today equipped with previously unknown technology speaking a tongue not understood….
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