18 ANTHROPOLOGICAL RESEARCH OUTSIDE AMERICA. 



MALAYSIA. 



This term is used to comprise a large region including the Malay Penin- 

 sula, the islands of the Malay Archipelago, Borneo, the Philippines, Formosa, 

 and also Madagascar, which (though situated close to the African continent) 

 is linked by its culture more closely to the islands southeast of Asia. This 

 vast and scattered region is one of great ethnological unity, which presents 

 a very important field for research. 



We possess extensive records of survey work from this region, but only 

 here and there has any intensive work been done, and even that lacks much 

 that we wish to know about social organization and the details of rite or 

 custom. The larger part of the region is formed by the Dutch colonial pos- 

 sessions and is not undergoing any rapid change, but in some regions, such as 

 the Malay Peninsula, Sumatra, the Philippines, and probably Madagascar, 

 changes are taking place with sufficient rapidity to make the matter one of 

 some urgency. 



NEW GUINEA AND MELANESIA. 



The island of New Guinea is the greatest storehouse of ungarnered lore 

 which remains for the ethnologist. Many parts of the island have not yet 

 been visited at all, while there are others where native life still goes on almost 

 wholly undisturbed by the influence of western peoples. In consequence, 

 many regions of the island are not yet ripe for intensive ethnological investi- 

 gation and may safely be left for some years. Other regions have now been 

 subjected to the influence of official and missionary for just about that time 

 which gives the opportunity for work of the most fruitful kind, and in stiU 

 other places the changes due to external influence have been so rapid that 

 the native culture is akeady on the point of extinction and only a few years' 

 delay will mean the complete loss of unique varieties of human culture. This 

 is particularly the case in the neighborhood of Port Moresby and Samarai, 

 the two chief settlements in British New Guinea, but there are similar places 

 in German New Guinea, though the more recent settlement of this part of 

 the island perhaps makes the urgency somewhat less acute. 



Of the three political divisions of the island, the western half, which is 

 a Dutch possession, is so little explored that there is here no urgency, except 

 perhaps in a few districts of the coast. In the British portion, which is now 

 governed by Australia, much has been done by officials and missionaries, and 

 by expeditions from England, among which the Cambridge Expedition to 

 Torres Straits and the work of Messrs. Seligmann, Williamson, and Landt- 

 man must be especially mentioned. All of this work, however, has only 

 collected samples here and there out of the vast variety of human culture 

 represented by this region, and there remains work for many investigators, 

 some of it of great urgency. 



In the German portion of New Guinea much has been done in the last 

 few years by various expeditions, but this work has been largely of the survey 



