Pacific Islands Languages and Societies Commons^™

Fraught Aging And Frayed Social Networks, Laura Zimmer-Tamakoshi

Pacific Studies

This article looks at the challenges of aging in Gende society and why the Papua New Guinea government should consider a safety net for more vulnerable populations. It begins with an overview of how the Gende used their exchange system over many generations to deal with periods of extreme uncertainty and inequality. Investing in a moral economy that encouraged gender equality and expansive kin relations and obligations, the Gende weathered tribal warfare that drove them off their traditional lands long ago. Moving into sparsely populated mountains in what is now Madang Province, Gende became middlemen in trade routes connecting the …

Fishing Camps And Topiary Trees: Place, Affect, And Moral Agency In A Papua New Guinea Modernity, David Lipset

Pacific Studies

Despite being regarded as a founding father in sociology and as no less canonical in anthropology (Merton 1934; Horowitz 1982), the overall theoretical framework of Durkheim’s arguments with respect to place, affect, and agency in The Division of Labor in Society (1933) and The Elementary Forms of Religious Life (1995) are too often ignored or unwittingly reinvented (Stewart 2007; Berlant 2008). I therefore want to begin this essay with a brief outline of how I understand his main points in order to lay a theoretical groundwork for my analysis of the shifting relationship of place, affect, and agency among the …

Rural Development In Papua New Guinea: Mining, Logging, Agriculture, And Alternatives, Tj Askew

CMC Senior Theses

This thesis examines multiple approaches to providing rural, indigenous Papuans with improved social services and economic opportunities. Rural Papuans, who make up 80 percent of the population, face below average rates of nutrition, education, disease, crime, and other quality of life indicators. Due to location, land use rights, lack of infrastructure, and minimal access to economic markets, the PNG government has struggled to provide rural communities with basic social services. Historically, the development of resource extraction projects such as mining, logging, and agriculture have been the main strategies used to improve the livelihood of rural Papuans, with limited success. This …

A Critique Of The Youth Bulge Theory In Papua New Guinea And Melanesia, Patrick Kaiku

Pacific Studies

In this presentation, I address a pressing development issue in Papua New Guinea, an independent nation in the subregion of the Pacific known as Melanesia. Papua New Guinea is undisputedly the largest country in Melanesia in terms of land mass and population size. The sociocultural diversity and complex precolonial history of Papua New Guinea is highlighted as one of many contributing factors to the contemporary challenges it faces as a nation.

On Being Modern People: Abandonment Of Pig Husbandry In Haivaro, Papua New Guinea, Sandrine Lefort

Pacific Studies

The abandonment of pig husbandry by several communities in Papua New Guinea has been explained in terms of hygiene, Christianity, and economics or combinations of all three. At Haivaro—a small village in the lowlands of northwestern Gulf Province—these three factors were reinforced by an emerging desire to act, and be seen, as “modern.” A progressive decrease in social occasions that entailed the exchange of pigs or the sharing of pork, combined with increased availability of new modern items, led Haivaro people to revalue their world in monetary terms. In this process, they developed a sense that some of their past …

Names As A Means Of Inclusion And Transformation: Naming And Transcultural Kinship Among The Wampar, Papua New Guinea, Doris Bacalzo

Pacific Studies

This study examines how naming practices function as strategic tools for identity negotiation and social positioning among children of interethnic marriages in Dzifasing, a Wampar village in Papua New Guinea. Through analysis of transcultural kinship networks, the research investigates how names serve as resources in negotiating belonging, rights, and identities within an increasingly multiethnic environment.

Late-Pleistocene And Holocene Obsidian Transfer In The Bismarck Archipelago, Papua New Guinea, Matthew C. Leavesley, Caroline Read

Pacific Studies

Obsidian analysis allows for archaeologists to investigate notions of trade and exchange over vast areas of land and sea. Here we report the results of Particle Induced X-ray Emission-Particle Induced Gamma-Ray Emission analysis undertaken on obsidian excavated from Buang Merabak, a Pleistocene cave site in central New Ireland, Papua New Guinea. Although the dataset is relatively small, it provides new information reflecting cultural connectivity as early as 20,000 (uncalib) bp. Also, it provides a valuable opportunity to re-evaluate some pre-existing models of trade and exchange. The data support the notion that there may have been more than one trade/exchange network …

Book Review Forum: Reverse Anthropology: Lndigenous Analysis Of Social And Environmental Relations In New Guinea, Conservation Is Our Government Now: The Politics Of Ecology In Papua New Guinea, Jamon Halvaksz

Pacific Studies

Kirsch, Stuart. Reverse Anthropology: Indigenous Analysis of Social and Environmental Relations in New Guinea.

West, Paige. Conservation Is Our Government Now: The Politics of Ecology in Papua New Guinea.

Review: JAMON HALVAKSZ

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT SAN ANTONIO

Book Review Forum Response: Reverse Anthropology Redux, Stuart Kirsch

Pacific Studies

Kirsch, Stuart. Reverse Anthropology: Indigenous Analysis of Social and Environmental Relations in New Guinea.

West, Paige. Conservation Is Our Government Now: The Politics of Ecology in Papua New Guinea.

RESPONSE: STUART KIRSCH

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN

Vol. 33 No. 1 (2010): Pacific Studies Full Issue, The Jonathan Nāpela Center For Hawaiian And Pacific Islands Studies

Pacific Studies

Pacific Studies is published two times a year by The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies, Brigham Young University Hawai‘i #1979, 55–220 Kulanui Street, Lāʻie, Hawai‘i 96762, but responsibility for opinions expressed in the articles rests with the authors alone. Subscription rate is US $40.00 yearly, payable to The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies. The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies (formerly The Pacific Institute) is an organization funded by Brigham Young University Hawai‘i. The Center assists the University in meeting its cultural and educational goals by undertaking a program of teaching, research, …

Book Review Forum: Reverse Anthropology: Lndigenous Analysis Of Social And Environmental Relations In New Guinea, Conservation Is Our Government Now: The Politics Of Ecology In Papua New Guinea, Jill Nash

Pacific Studies

Kirsch, Stuart. Reverse Anthropology: Indigenous Analysis of Social and Environmental Relations in New Guinea. Stanford, CA: Stanford Univ. Press, 2006. Pp. 296. 2 figures, 2 illustrations, 2 maps. ISBN 0804753415 (cloth), US$60.00; ISBN 0804753423 (paper), US$23.95.

West, Paige. 2006. Conservation Is Our Government Now: The Politics of Ecology in Papua New Guinea. Durham, NC: Duke Univ. Press, 2006. Pp. 352. 25 illustrations. ISBN 978-0-8223-3712-6 (cloth), US$89.95; ISBN 978-0-8223-3749-2 (paper), US$24.95.

Review: JILL NASH

PROFESSOR EMERITA, BUFFALO STATE COLLEGE

Book Review Forum Response: Reverse Anthropology: Indigenous Analysis Of Social And Environmental Relations In New Guinea, Conservation Is Our Government Now: The Politics Of Ecology In Papua New Guinea., Paige West

Pacific Studies

Kirsch, Stuart. Reverse Anthropology: Indigenous Analysis of Social and Environmental Relations in New Guinea.

West, Paige. Conservation Is Our Government Now: The Politics of Ecology in Papua New Guinea.

RESPONSE: PAIGE WEST

BARNARD COLLEGE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

Vol. 33 No. 1 (2010): Pacific Studies Front Matter, The Jonathan Nāpela Center For Hawaiian And Pacific Islands Studies

Pacific Studies

Front Matter for the Vol. 33, No 1-Apr 2010 edition of the Pacific Studies Journal.

Margaret Mead And Gregory Bateson In The Sepik, 1938: A Timely Polemic From A Lost Anthropological Efflorescence, Eric Kline Silverman

Pacific Studies

Margaret Mead and Gregory Bateson's 1938 study of a Iatmul-speaking village in the middle Sepik River, Papua New Guinea, remains an anthropological efflorescence. At the very least, this collaboration resulted in a well-known fieldwork photo: Mead and Bateson in the famous "mosquito room." Ironically, little is actually known about the 1938 undertaking, which remains, however famous, sadly obscure. Towards correcting this misjudgment, I have two objectives. First, I want to provide a selective overview of the 1938 project, focusing on its unique outlook, tone, voices, morality, and theoretical perspectives. But my objective is not merely historical and descriptive. Hence, my …

Expressions Of Interest: Informal Usury In Urban Papua New Guinea, Michael Goddard

Pacific Studies

This article examines the nature and practice of small scale usury in a "grassroots" urban community in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. In this environment the moneylenders are people of limited financial resources, barely richer than their clients. The latter are often self-employed in informal occupations. Using examples from cases where usurers have taken defaulting debtors to urban "village courts," I show how debt is negotiated by usurers and clients, and I indicate differences between local attitudes toward usury and those that are generally held in Western societies. I discuss prevalent views in social science literature about the influence of …

Films And Other Trials: Reflections On Long-Term Fieldwork Among The Maisin, Papua New Guinea, John Barker

Pacific Studies

This essay is a personal reflection on my developing relationship with the Maisin of Papua New Guinea from December 1981 to the present. I discuss my initial research focus and how my early fieldwork helped me to better understand the ways the Maisin have responded to changes in their community over the past twenty years, particularly in dealing with outsiders. I contrast my understandings of Maisin society with portrayals in two documentary films made in the community, Anthropology on Trial (1983) and Changing Ground (2001). I argue that the relationship between anthropologists and host communities fuses intellectual engagement with a …

Gender And Cosmos Emplaced: Women's Houses And Men's Houses In Bariai, West New Britain, Papua New Guinea, Naomi Mcpherson

Pacific Studies

In Papua New Guinea, the men's cult houses are dramatic examples of vernacular architecture that have overshadowed the importance and symbolic meanings of the domestic dwelling, or women's houses. This essay is an ethnography of house forms, specifically women's houses and men's cult houses in Bariai, West New Britain. The focus is on relationships of articulation between the built environment and gender concepts within the framework of Bariai cosmology, which show how gender concepts and relations are emplaced and the built environment is gendered.

"Where Will You Sleep Tonight?" The Samo Longhouse, A Metaphor Of Spatial And Social Structure, R. Daniel Shaw

Pacific Studies

The juxtaposition of physical space and social interaction among the precontact Samo people of Papua New Guinea's east Strickland Plain is analyzed through a rich cultural metaphor reflecting on where people habitually sleep. Where a person sleeps establishes individual status within the collectivity of a household, which is identified as both a dwelling and an interactive group of family-oriented people. A longhouse was typically built on a ridgetop amid gardens, sago-lined swamp, and surrounding forest, together creating an economic environment that, in effect, fed the community. Similarly, social space was created through the reciprocal exchange of female siblings that enabled …

Celebrating Mother's Day In A Melanesian Village Church, Deborah Van Heekeren

Pacific Studies

Christianity dominates village sociality in the Hula villages of Papua New Guinea's southeastern coast to the extent that the United Church has appropriated and indigenized the Western custom of setting aside a day to celebrate motherhood. In the process Mother's Day has been transformed into an expression of local Christian values to which women should aspire. In many ways the events that take place invert gender roles, but we also find that certain things are always left to women. The events related here, through the perspective of the United Church Women's Fellowship (UCWF), also comment briefly on Adventism in Irupara …

Rascals, The State, And Civil Society In Papua New Guinea, Nand E. Hart Nibbrig

Pacific Studies

This article contends that as conditions worsen in Papua New Guinea's urban areas, it is apparent that the escalating crime and violence associated with rascal gangs are creating new rules of authority. The cumulative effects of criminal activities associated with gangs are negating the existing social order, spreading fear deep within civil society. In so doing, these activities deliver yet another blow to the legitimacy of the state. Continuous migration and the concomitant expansion of the newly urbanized population are defining a new urban landscape. Likewise, the persistent drain of national wealth by pervasive corruption, civil war, or domestic unrest …

Visual Media Reviews: Taking Pictures, Nancy Lutkehaus

Pacific Studies

Taking Pictures. 1996. Video, 56 min., color. Written, produced, and directed by Les McLaren and Annie Stivan. Distributed by First Run/Icarus Films (32 Court St., Brooklyn, NY 11201; fax: 718 – 488 – 8642; ; http://www.frif.com).

Reviewed by Nancy Lutkehaus, University of Southern California

Book Review: R. J. May And A. J. Regan With Allison Ley, Eds., Political Decentralisation In A New State: The Experience Of Provincial Government In Papua New Guinea, Bill Standish

Pacific Studies

R. J. May and A. J. Regan with Allison Ley, eds., Political Decentralisation in a New State: The Experience of Provincial Government in Papua New Guinea. Bathurst, N.S.W.: Crawford House Press, 1997. Pp. 431, xi, maps. A$40 (available by E-mail: )

Reviewed by Bill Standish, Australian National University

Marta Rohatynskyj's Review Of Advertising Missionaries And Pacific Passages, Marta Rohatynskyj

Pacific Studies

No abstract provided.

Cosmologies, Cities, And Cultural Constructions Of Space: Oceanic Enlargements Of The World, Wolfgang Kempf

Pacific Studies

This is a commentary on Epeli Hau‘ofa’s vision of an extended Oceania. By contrasting a widening “sea of islands” with the current discourse of an ever-shrinking world, I draw attention to a heterotopic terrain of incompatible spaces. I intend to show that the widely accepted narratives and maps of a shrinking world encompass and assure the image of an ever-extending Western sphere. This rhetoric of global shrinkage as a result of an expanding West is denying others the capability to create their own enlarged world. Hau‘ofa’s critique of a reductionist and diminutive view of Oceania can be seen as a …

Jason Carter And Laura Zimmer-Tamakoshi's Review Of Charlie Nairn's A Death To Pay For: Individual Voices, Jason Carter, Laura Zimmer-Tamakoshi

Pacific Studies

No abstract provided.

The Embodiment Of Responsibility: “Confession” And “Compensation” In Mount Hagen, Papua New Guinea, Andrew Strathern, Pamela J. Stewart

Pacific Studies

We discuss two contexts of responsibility for action in Mount Hagen, confession and compensation. Verbal confessions of either wrongdoing or resentment against wrongdoing are important signs of the exercise of agency, but if they are not made, it is expected that sickness will result. “Substance” thus takes over where “agency” fails, and the two are intimately linked. Compensation payments can be seen as nonverbal equivalents of confession or the logical result of it, and if they are not paid, sickness or a failure of wounds to heal is thought to be likely as a result. In contemporary times both confession …

Contributors: Vol 21 No. 1-2, The Jonathan Nāpela Center For Hawaiian And Pacific Islands Studies

Pacific Studies

Contributors list of Vol. 21 (1998): Pacific Studies Full Issue 1-2

Vol. 21 No. 1-2 (1998): Pacific Studies Full Issue, The Jonathan Nāpela Center For Hawaiian And Pacific Islands Studies

Pacific Studies

Pacific Studies is published two times a year by The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies, Brigham Young University Hawai‘i #1979, 55–220 Kulanui Street, Lāʻie, Hawai‘i 96762, but responsibility for opinions expressed in the articles rests with the authors alone. Subscription rate is US$40.00 yearly, payable to The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies. The Jonathan Nāpela Center for Hawaiian and Pacific Studies (formerly The Pacific Institute) is an organization funded by Brigham Young University Hawai‘i. The Center assists the University in meeting its cultural and educational goals by undertaking a program of teaching, research, and …

Netbags Revisited: Cultural Narratives From Papua New Guinea, Pamela J. Stewart, Andrew J. Strathern

Pacific Studies

In this article we reconsider materials on netbags from the Highlands of Papua New Guinea and Irian Jaya, as well as other parts of Melanesia, arguing that understanding of them is best set into a framework of ideas regarding embodiment and processes of trope expansion. Starting from the equation of netbag and womb, we trace the ramifications of this object of material culture and its contemporary significance in a commodifying context. Main emphasis is placed on materials from the Melpa or Mount Hagen area of the Western Highlands Province in Papua New Guinea, with comparisons to the cultures of the …

Dan Jorgensen's Review Of John Davis's Mountains Of Gold: The People Of Porgera, Dan Jorgensen

Pacific Studies

No abstract provided.