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talks:sanguma:aaa [2019/10/21 22:40] – [References] Ryan Schram (admin)talks:sanguma:aaa [2020/01/25 15:28] (current) – external edit 127.0.0.1
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 Ryan Schram   Ryan Schram  
 University of Sydney   University of Sydney  
-October 20, 2019+October 25, 2019
  
-To be presented in the session "Making the occult public" at the 2019 meeting of the American Anthropological Association. (Please do not cite or quote without permission from the author.)+To be presented in the session "Making the occult public" at the 2019 meeting of the American Anthropological Association on Saturday, November 23, 4:15–6 p.m. (Convention Center West, Room 306)
  
-Available at http://anthro.rschram.org/talks/sanguma/aaa+{{ :talks:sanguma:schram_sanguma_script_22oct19.pdf |Paper}} and [[|slides]] available at http://anthro.rschram.org/talks/sanguma/aaa. (Please do not cite or quote without permission from the author.)
  
 **Abstract:** In Papua New Guinea, people's political participation takes place in contact zones among many different cultures, and public discourse circulates only when people create interfaces between disparate languages, systems of knowledge, and value orientations. Citizenship rests on one's capacity to translate oneself; yet translations are not treated equally in mass print media. In the same way that the national creole language Tok Pisin is subject to competing ideological evaluations about the nature of multilingualism, Tok Pisin public discourse is characterized by competing tendencies toward epistemic inclusion and exclusion. In this paper, I present several different frames found in Tok Pisin public discourse which privilege different epistemological positions on sorcery and other occult topics. In each case, talk of the occult involves both an openness to differences in knowledge and a tendency to treat particular knowledge claims as beliefs (*bilip*) to be overcome. While *bilip* has become the dominant way to constrain public talk about the occult, I also show that the *bilip* can be reinterpreted to index a moral stance of mutual recognition of differences as well. Competing tendencies of inclusion and exclusion in Tok Pisin discourse also feed into and reinforce each other. The struggle over ontological recognition will thus always be a part of creole cosmopolitanism in PNG. **Keywords:** occult, belief, creoles and pidgins, media, citizenship.  **Abstract:** In Papua New Guinea, people's political participation takes place in contact zones among many different cultures, and public discourse circulates only when people create interfaces between disparate languages, systems of knowledge, and value orientations. Citizenship rests on one's capacity to translate oneself; yet translations are not treated equally in mass print media. In the same way that the national creole language Tok Pisin is subject to competing ideological evaluations about the nature of multilingualism, Tok Pisin public discourse is characterized by competing tendencies toward epistemic inclusion and exclusion. In this paper, I present several different frames found in Tok Pisin public discourse which privilege different epistemological positions on sorcery and other occult topics. In each case, talk of the occult involves both an openness to differences in knowledge and a tendency to treat particular knowledge claims as beliefs (*bilip*) to be overcome. While *bilip* has become the dominant way to constrain public talk about the occult, I also show that the *bilip* can be reinterpreted to index a moral stance of mutual recognition of differences as well. Competing tendencies of inclusion and exclusion in Tok Pisin discourse also feed into and reinforce each other. The struggle over ontological recognition will thus always be a part of creole cosmopolitanism in PNG. **Keywords:** occult, belief, creoles and pidgins, media, citizenship. 
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 * It embraces Tok Pisin as a grassroots language for a new nation. * It embraces Tok Pisin as a grassroots language for a new nation.
-* It strives to conform to the model of mass journalism as an anonymous voice from nowhere,+* It strives to conform to the model of mass journalism as an anonymous voice from nowhere, and thus tends to favor official sources as "authorized knowers" (Tuchman 1978; Fishman 1978).
  
 ## A 2012 article in Wantok ## A 2012 article in Wantok
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 ## A 1988 Simbu Nius article ## A 1988 Simbu Nius article
  
-### "Masalai kilim man indai [Spirit kills man]" (Daka 1988)+### Lead paragraph of "Masalai kilim man indai [Spirit kills man]" (Daka 1988)
  
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 * The children take the victim to the nurse; the nurse finds nothing wrong. * The children take the victim to the nurse; the nurse finds nothing wrong.
-* At his home, people outside see a group of spirits at the door; the people inside see nothing.  +* The man dies. 
-* The man dies+* At his home, people outside see a //lain masalai// (group of spirits) at the door; the people inside see nothing.
 * Two other unrelated examples of sudden, unexplained deaths are mentioned * Two other unrelated examples of sudden, unexplained deaths are mentioned
  
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 ## Conclusion: PNG's complex civic competences ## Conclusion: PNG's complex civic competences
  
-* Ontological micropolitics (Straight 2008)  +* Ontological micropolitics (Straight 2008) 
-* Or, the alienation of people's epistemological labor+* Epistemic exclusion (Daukas 2006) 
 +  * e.g. the normative, "information-based model of civic competence" excludes people's experiences (Cramer and Toff 2017) 
 +* In PNG, one also finds that exclusion entails the alienation of people's epistemological labor
  
  
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 Arnold, Michael. 2017. “Community Rallies to Weed out Sorcerers.” The Papua New Guinea Post-Courier, November 7, 2017. https://postcourier.com.pg/community-rallies-weed-sorcerers/. Arnold, Michael. 2017. “Community Rallies to Weed out Sorcerers.” The Papua New Guinea Post-Courier, November 7, 2017. https://postcourier.com.pg/community-rallies-weed-sorcerers/.
 +
 +Cramer, Katherine J., and Benjamin Toff. 2017. “The Fact of Experience: Rethinking Political Knowledge and Civic Competence.” Perspectives on Politics 15 (3): 754–70. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1537592717000949.
  
 Daka, Agua. 1988. “Masalai Kilim Man Indai.” Simbu Nius, June 1988. Daka, Agua. 1988. “Masalai Kilim Man Indai.” Simbu Nius, June 1988.
 +
 +Daukas, Nancy. 2006. “Epistemic Trust and Social Location.” Episteme 3 (1–2): 109–24. https://doi.org/10.3366/epi.2006.3.1-2.109.
 +
 +Fishman, Mark. 1978. Manufacturing the News. Austin: University of Texas Press.
  
 Gibbs, Philip. 2015. “Wok Long Painim Gutpela Sindaun Long Bogenvil.” Wantok Niuspepa, July 30, 2015. Gibbs, Philip. 2015. “Wok Long Painim Gutpela Sindaun Long Bogenvil.” Wantok Niuspepa, July 30, 2015.
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 Robbins, Joel. 2007. “Continuity Thinking and the Problem of Christian Culture: Belief, Time, and the Anthropology of Christianity.” Current Anthropology 48 (1): 5–38. https://doi.org/10.1086/508690. Robbins, Joel. 2007. “Continuity Thinking and the Problem of Christian Culture: Belief, Time, and the Anthropology of Christianity.” Current Anthropology 48 (1): 5–38. https://doi.org/10.1086/508690.
 +
 +Tuchman, Gaye. 1978. Making News: A Study in the Construction of Reality. New York: Free Press.
  
 Straight, Bilinda. 2008. “Killing God: Exceptional Moments in the Colonial Missionary Encounter.” Current Anthropology 49 (5): 837–60. https://doi.org/10.1086/591423. Straight, Bilinda. 2008. “Killing God: Exceptional Moments in the Colonial Missionary Encounter.” Current Anthropology 49 (5): 837–60. https://doi.org/10.1086/591423.
talks/sanguma/aaa.1571722846.txt.gz · Last modified: 2019/10/21 22:40 by Ryan Schram (admin)