Fijian mats: Embodying and mediating female qualities

Abstract

This article analyses the contemporary significance and sociocultural meanings of Fijian mats. Based on research in different areas of Fiji over two decades and a University of the South Pacific workshop on weaving in 2016, the article argues that mats express relational pathways between kin groups and mediate between the material and the spiritual. It also argues that, embodying ‘female qualities’ associated with women, such as providing nurture and protection in all aspects of life and death, mats are material expressions of Fijian society and the structuring principles it is founded on and sustained by.