Devereux] MOHAVE ETHNOPSYCHIATRY AND SUICIDE 317 



means of transportation than ever before, he was, in aboriginal times, 

 as well, or better, off than most, while in reservation times he was 

 shabbier and poorer than the whites living within his purview. In 

 such a situation the absolute advantages of warmer clothing and faster 

 transportation are more than canceled by the narcissistic blow of being 

 a pauper among relatively well-to-do persons, instead of being simply 

 a respected member of a group whose whole economy is a relatively 

 marginal one. 



The situation of the ISIohave differed, of course, from that of the 

 Plains Indians who, as Wissler (Preface to Mead, 1932) rightly 

 stressed, had been rather prosperous hunters before being confined to 

 reservations. The Mohave had never been rich to begin with, chiefly 

 because, like the Cocopa, they destroyed everything belonging to 

 the dead, thus making a gradual accumulation of capital impossible 

 (Kelly, 1919). In fact, contrary to what happened to the Plains In- 

 dians, American conquest actually enriched rather than impoverished 

 the Mohave. However, since — unlike the Plains Indians — the Mohave 

 were contemptuous of wealth, this "absolute" enrichment was counter- 

 acted by their relative poverty, which contrasted with the "wealth" 

 of the invading Americans. Yet, despite their contempt for wealth, 

 the Mohave, like other human beings, do not enjoy being inferior to 

 others, and since there was nothing they could do about it, they de- 

 veloped a compensatory contempt for whites, specifically related to 

 the white man's all-absorbing interest in property. Needless to say, 

 the very nature and intensity of this contempt makes it clear that it is 

 both a reaction formation against their culturally controlled desire to 

 acquire or keep wealth ^^ and a denial of their envy of the "rich" 

 white man. In this context it is interesting to note that the Mohave 

 continue to be quite generous with food they themselves produce and — 

 by extension — also with store-bought food, but are somewhat less 

 ready to give away other store goods,^^ while continuing to be ex- 

 tremely generous with money (and its equivalent — labor for pay) , per- 

 haps because it is less "real" to them than actual goods are.®^ 



A second deleterious aspect of their acquisition of American goods, 

 including especially labor-saving devices and also a few relatively 

 valuable frame houses, requiring little upkeep, was the increasing 

 unavailability of means for the utilization of leisure, which, in aborigi- 

 nal times, consisted of feasts, warfare, and other meaningful group 

 activities. 



" Compare the marked regret of Hama : Utce's husband over having to burn a fine bead 

 belt, which Hama : Utce : had made for her beloved father-in-law shortly before he died 

 (Case 107). 



'2 Yet, already several decades ago the Mohave used store-bought cloth, etc., as funeral 

 gifts, to be thrown on the cremation pyre (Hall, 1903). 



•'As late as the I930's all informants, and as late as 1950 informants who were also 

 friends, showed marked embarrassment when being paid their daily wages. 



