ABSTRACT
A yamparru in full control of her ritual faculties, Judy Nampijinpa Granites was a business leader whose authority extended far beyond the residential kin group in West Camp with whom she resided and from which she derived so much of her support. In their oversight of dangerous material, men use and distribute ritual objects, and in particular secret engraved stones, wood, and shells, in ways far different from the patterns of distribution described by Judy and corroborated by other businesswomen. The principal context in which Judy acquired early ritual knowledge was yawulyu ceremonies, both “big” and “small.” These women’s events not only provided her with the specific segments and associated dances and songs, but reinforced the sensibility of obligation that ritual activity codifies. As correlative opportunities for administratively sponsored “self-determination” grew, ritual leaders such as Judy found they could—and were in fact obligated to—extend their yamparru-ship far beyond ritual.
