Grade Figure

Male figure carved from the trunk of a species of giant fern. Long concave face with large round eyes, broad triangular nose, no mouth. Squatting slightly, hands folded just above groin. Such figures are carved and set up in village plazas to commemorate the passage of a man from one formal social rank to another. Malekula style: made by a carver from Malekula, working at the time in Port Vila.

All men in Malekula societies participate in a ranking system called, in English, a Graded Society. Fathers and material uncles set a young man up in the lowest rank. As men acumulate wealth, they finanace advancement ceremonies for themselves in which they "purchase" the rights and privileges of the rank above from its members and thus move themselves up the social ladder. Fern figures and slit gongs are made to memorialize such an advancement.