From the Geil Archive (13)—Out of the Frying Pan

Click here for the introduction to the Round and Square Series "From the Geil Archive"
Click here for the "From the Geil Archive" Resource Center
To learn more about William Edgar Geil, click here for the Accidental Ethnographer Resource Center
A year ago on Round and Square (24 September 2012)—Academic Autobiography: John King Fairbank-c

Two years ago on Round and Square (24 September 2011)—Styling Culture: Quotations and Captions

[a] Mini Grove RF

Today's Round and Square Guest Contributor is Rachel Johnson. Rachel, from Burr Ridge, IL, just graduated from Beloit College with a BA in anthropology and a minor in Asian Studies. She was introduced to William Edgar Geil through a course taught by Rob LaFleur, and she is currently working in Doylestown, Pennyslvania with four other interns to digitize his archives with the Doylestown Historical Society. She and Geil share a mutual love of travel and of Chinese history and culture in particular, which is what drew her to study him further.

Click here for Rachel Johnson's other posts in the series "From the Geil Archive"

             1-About Me                    2-Naming (Un-)Conventions                3-Out of the Frying Pan

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Please note that all items marked "DHS" are property of the Doylestown Historical Society, and used with DHS permission. If you wish to use an image, you need permission of the Society. Please contact Robert LaFleur (lafleur@beloit.edu), and he will put you in contact with the appropriate people.

          A rolling stone gathers no moss.
          You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink.
          Still waters run deep.

[b] Unstill RF

Proverbs are a universally renowned teaching tool. Every country and every culture has them. But how can something so fundamentally intertwined with language be universal? After all, would a non-native English speaker understand the meaning behind “a stitch in time saves nine,” even if they understood each individual word in the phrase? If one had never before seen a lemon, wouldn’t the phrase, “when life gives you lemons, make lemonade,” lose something in explanation?

And what, you are undoubtedly asking yourselves, does all of this have to do with William Edgar Geil?

As it turns out, Geil took quite an interest in proverbs himself, taking time to stop and write down proverbs in their native tongue as he heard them, especially in Africa during his Great World-wide Tour, and translating them as best he and his translators could.And as he does so, a pattern begins to emerge.

While proverbs undoubtedly have a strong connection with language their true power lies in meaning, and in the ability to teach a lesson that will be remembered for life with just a few simple words. And there are some lessons everybody is taught, no matter what language they speak. Geil hits upon that time and again with the proverbs he records.

[c] Steps RF

Take, for instance, “sitting down won’t finish your journey,” a proverb he records while in Uganda, along with his transcription of the original,“Okuwumula si kew kutaka.” (All quotations from Geil are transcribed herein exactly as they were written in his manuscripts. I hereby absolve myself of any blame for the butchering of any languages other than English [or Chinese] in this post.) The English language has a very similar proverb---”the journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” Except, of course, that this particular proverb has its origins in Chinese culture and is attributed to Lao Tzu (or Laozi), and would have originally read, “a journey of a thousand li starts beneath one’s feet,” (千里之行，始于足下). 

In fact, Geil was often very aware of these similarities. Just under his transcription of “Nambere nyineka atalieikere bitemba enju,” or, “When the master of the house is away, the frogs will climb up the thatch,” he writes, “i.e. When the cat’s away the mice will play.” And on the backside of one of his manuscript pages, he scrawls in pencil the very note which inspired this post, (and which he later quotes in A Yankee in Pigmy Land): 

“Airukire enjura omu rufunjo, 
He runs from the rain into the papyrus
Out of the frying pan into the fire.” 

[d] Fuzzy DHS

Of course, to some extent proverbs are, along with poetry, lost in translation. They are often so intrinsically linked to a particular turn of phrase, cultural or historical context, or even location that they cannot always fully carry over into another language or another culture. And, of course, we have only Geil’s interpretations of these proverbs to go off of, and we must keep in mind that he did not himself know the languages he was writing down.

However, it is my belief that Geil was on to something. Something he could never quite internalize or vocalize, but which seemed to speak to him through these proverbs he so meticulously recorded. He has stumbled upon a sort of social universalism, the idea that regardless of geographical location, religion, language, race, or any of the other factors that seem to separate us (in the broader sense of humanity as a collective) there are some lessons that everybody learns, some truths that are universal and unavoidable...such as the age-old belief that a situation, if left to its own devices, will go from bad (the frying pan or the rainstorm) to worse (the fire or the papyrus grove).

[e] After the storm RF

From the Geil Archive (10)—One of These Things Is Not Like the Others

Click here for the "From the Geil Archive" Resource Center
To learn more about Geil, click here for the Accidental Ethnographer Resource Center
A year ago on Round and Square (18 September 2012)—Writing and Time: Reading Logs (b)

Two years ago on Round and Square (18 September 2011)—Hurtin' Country: Jolene

Click here for other posts in the Round and Square series "From the Geil Archive":

               Introduction                              1-Southern Mountain Museum             2-Sacred Mountain Map           

               3-Hat and Cattle                       4-Seeking Anthropology                       5-Curly Fives
               6-How to Write the Book          7-Mortarboard Man                               8-Orator
               9-Naming (Un)Conventions     10-Unlike the Others                            11-

[a] Later Era RF

Today's Guest Contributor on Round and Square is Amara Pugens. Amara is from Brookfield, Wisconsin, and recently  graduated from Beloit College with a B.A. in history and anthropology and a minor in museum studies. She is currently working with four other Beloit College graduates to digitize, process, and research the William Edgar Geil Collection at the Doylestown Historical Society in Pennsylvania.

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Please note that all items marked "DHS" are property of the Doylestown Historical Society, and used with DHS permission. If you wish to use an image, you need permission of the Society. Please contact Robert LaFleur (lafleur@beloit.edu), and he will put you in contact with the appropriate people.

One of These Things is Not Like the Others 
I first learned of William Edgar Geil in a class I took with Rob LaFleur called "Calendars and Almanacs in East Asia." Geil was described as a grand traveler at the turn of the twentieth century who documented his experiences through central Africa, across the Great Wall, and down the Yangzi River.  When I later took a course (again with Rob LaFleur) called "The Accidental Ethnographer," I discovered more about the man behind the explorer—finishing the class with a ten-thousand word essay that attempted to describe his character and personality based on his personal archives. Therefore before arriving at the Doylestown Historical Society, I knew quite a bit about Geil; I had read his books, analyzed his files, written papers, and studied articles about him. 

All this background information did not, however, prepare me for the following headline:

[b] Unlike the Others DHS

At first glance, I could not help but think: one of these things is not like the others. Pictured with his fellow laymen, Geil stands apart, dressed in an ostentatious explorer outfit with a perfectly placed journal and goofy hat. The photograph illustrates that though Geil was an evangelist, the title did not define him, at least not in the traditional sense of the word. While the word "evangelist" today might evoke ideas of stuffy men in starched collars, Geil turned this image on its head. While we may think it silly today, by presenting himself as an adventurer in his exploration gear, Geil claims his authenticity as an evangelist. Compared to all the other churchmen, Geil was a true evangelist because he was also an adventurer.

[c] Different RF

This photograph of Geil helped prove his validity, discrediting any who thought him fake. It presents him as the "Big White Chief" traveling around the world to visit different peoples and conduct various missions. Not a doctor, professor, or reverend, he still held importance because he took action—doing what he preached, instead of simply lecturing about it.

In her "Naming (Un)Conventions" post on September 16th, Rachel Johnson wrote that Geil "was not always taken seriously, even at the time of his travels."  Although today we think he may not be helping his cause for authenticity with this image, in 1916—when traveling was much more  difficult and dangerous—this photograph of Geil shows us what evangelism meant to him. In presenting himself this way, Geil challenges our perceptions of what it means to be an evangelist.

[d] Explorin' RF