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talks:payback [2019/01/24 21:05] – [The love gift] Ryan Schram (admin)talks:payback [2021/06/29 02:27] (current) – external edit 127.0.0.1
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 University of Sydney University of Sydney
  
-January 23, 2019+February 14, 2019
  
-A {{ :talks:payback:schram_payback_beat_25jan19.pdf |paper}} presented in //The State and the Dynamics of Enslavement//, a workshop held at Deakin University, February 13-15, 2019. Slides and paper are available at: http://anthro.rschram.org/talks/payback.+A {{ :talks:payback:schram_payback_beat_13feb19.pdf |paper}} presented in //The State and the Dynamics of Enslavement//, a workshop held at Deakin University, February 13--15, 2019. Slides and paper are available at: http://anthro.rschram.org/talks/payback.
  
 ### Abstract ### Abstract
  
-Unlike many postcolonial nations, Papua New Guinea defines itself through ethnographic citizenship in which members of its population are united in the empirical fact that they have an origin in some kind of indigenous society, rather than a common cultural tradition. In order to have standing in the PNG public sphere, people are required to produce knowledge of themselves as subjects of a integrated, functional social order. This poses an acute dilemma: one's inalienable belonging and enduring obligations to fellow members of a rural community---typically grounded in forms of kinship---are matters of public discourse, yet the preeminent value of relationships underlying these modes of sociality are potentially disqualifying stigmata in a liberal order. In this paper, I examine journalism for rural audiences in PNG as a site where alternative public discourses of collective life emerge. In *Simbu Nius*, a provincial news magazine, rural clans figure prominents as agents in local news events, yet in the recognition of their reciprocal interrelationships is always haunted by the stereotype of tribal retaliation and so they remain precariously situated on the edge of the liberal public sphere. **Keywords:** media discourse, newsgathering, journalism, violence, stereotypes, Tok Pisin+Unlike many postcolonial nations, Papua New Guinea defines itself through ethnographic citizenship in which members of its population are united in the empirical fact that they have an origin in some kind of indigenous society, rather than a common cultural tradition. In order to have standing in the PNG public sphere, people are required to produce knowledge of themselves as subjects of a integrated, functional social order. This poses an acute dilemma: one's inalienable belonging and enduring obligations to fellow members of a rural community---typically grounded in forms of kinship---are matters of public discourse, yet the preeminent value of relationships underlying these modes of sociality are potentially disqualifying stigmata in a liberal order. In this paper, I examine journalism for rural audiences in PNG as a site where alternative public discourses of collective life emerge. In *Simbu Nius*, a provincial news magazine, rural clans figure prominently as agents in local news events, yet the recognition of their reciprocal interrelationships is always haunted by the stereotype of tribal retaliation and so they remain precariously situated on the edge of the liberal public sphere. **Keywords:** media discourse, newsgathering, journalism, violence, stereotypes, Tok Pisin
  
 ===== The love gift ===== ===== The love gift =====
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 In response to a murder in Mount Hagen town in the Highlands of Papua New Guinea (PNG), the Western Highlands Peace Committee was formed to raise funds for a “love gift.” They claimed that it was based on Highlands tradition, but stressed that it was not compensation. In response to a murder in Mount Hagen town in the Highlands of Papua New Guinea (PNG), the Western Highlands Peace Committee was formed to raise funds for a “love gift.” They claimed that it was based on Highlands tradition, but stressed that it was not compensation.
  
-{{talks:payback:love-gift.png?600| “Love Gift,” a display advertisement placed in the PNG //Post-Courier// in response to the killing of Alan Mourilyan on April 2, 2004 (Western Highlands Peace Committee 2004).}}+{{ :talks:payback:love-gift-small.png |“Love Gift,” a display advertisement placed in the PNG //Post-Courier// in response to the killing of Alan Mourilyan on April 2, 2004 (Western Highlands Peace Committee 2004).}} 
  
 ===== Ethnographic citizenship in PNG ===== ===== Ethnographic citizenship in PNG =====
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 ===== Asking for compensation from the government ===== ===== Asking for compensation from the government =====
  
-Another article on the “compensation page” reports a roadblock erected by a hauslain outside of Kundiawa, the capital of the province. It first quotes the “spokesman” for the //hauslain//:+Another article on the “compensation page” reports a roadblock erected by a //hauslain// outside of Kundiawa, the capital of the province. It first quotes the “spokesman” for the //hauslain//:
  
   * “Mipela askim gavman long wokim kompensaisen long dispela graun bruk tripela (3) yia igo pinis. Tasol dispela askim bilong mipela igo nating na ino gat bekim ikam yet inap nau.”   * “Mipela askim gavman long wokim kompensaisen long dispela graun bruk tripela (3) yia igo pinis. Tasol dispela askim bilong mipela igo nating na ino gat bekim ikam yet inap nau.”
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   * News of compensation and fights take place in an alternative, Simbu modernity.   * News of compensation and fights take place in an alternative, Simbu modernity.
-  * Readers are not only addressed as Simbu, but as themselves members of hauslain who are likewise enmeshed in cycles of obligation and conflict.+  * Readers are not only addressed as Simbu, but as themselves members of //hauslain// who are likewise enmeshed in cycles of obligation and conflict.
   * Yet bringing kinship into the public sphere also entails the dematerialization of reciprocity. Compensation is a valid form of political action, but as a symbol of a claim to a relationship based on equivalence and mutual obligation.   * Yet bringing kinship into the public sphere also entails the dematerialization of reciprocity. Compensation is a valid form of political action, but as a symbol of a claim to a relationship based on equivalence and mutual obligation.
   * Alternative modernity and double-counsciousness are both steps in the same process of producing liberal subjects as ethnographic citizens.   * Alternative modernity and double-counsciousness are both steps in the same process of producing liberal subjects as ethnographic citizens.
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-Western Highlands Peace Committee. 2004. “Love Gift.” //Papua New Guinea Post-Courier//, April, 8.+Western Highlands Peace Committee. 2004. “Love Gift.” //Papua New Guinea Post-Courier//, April 2, 8.
  
  
talks/payback.1548392741.txt.gz · Last modified: 2019/01/24 21:05 by Ryan Schram (admin)