In the beginning of his piece, Rosaldo describes how his initial attempts of merely questioning the Ilongots about their practices were ultimately futile, as a result of his lack of insight about grief. Many classic anthropologists believed that an accurate representation of a culture could be obtained purely from surveying its people. Rosaldo, believing similarly, expected to receive feedback that would help him unlock the Ilongot’s secrets, thus disregarded their initial answer: The rage in bereavement was enough to bring them to decapitate other humans (168). On account of the fact that Rosaldo had never truly experienced the loss of a loved one, he wrote off the Ilongot’s justification as “too simple” (168) and lacking depth. In an attempt
