Historicity and assemblage: Im/material dimensions of a religious movement in Kiribati

Abstract

In this study, I explore the role and relationship of material and immaterial entities as constituents of a religious movement that emerged in 1930 on the atoll of Onotoa in present-day Kiribati. To this end, I conceptualize the movement as a heterogeneous assemblage, encompassing the interweaving and distributed agency of humans, material settings, and immaterial elements in a variety of historical representations. These historicities cover various time periods and include archived statements of participants, the academic account written by a colonial administrator turned Pacific historian, as well as recent narratives of Onotoans. By examining different historical perspectives and the kinds of people, material forms, and experiences associated with them, we gain a better understanding of the emergence, consolidation, and containment of a religious movement.