scholarly journals Can There Be Conversion Without Cultural Change?

2017 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-52 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joel Robbins
Keyword(s):  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
Cultural Change ◽  
Critical Reflection ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
Cultural Changes ◽  
Cultural Formation ◽  
Anthropology Of Christianity ◽  
Anthropological Approach ◽  
To Come ◽  
The Relationship

This article takes a sociocultural anthropological approach to conversion. It asks not about the causes of conversion, but about the kinds of cultural changes conversion produces and the mechanisms by which it brings about such changes. Drawing on the author’s research among a recently converted group in Papua New Guinea and on other work produced by scholars working in the anthropology of Christianity, the article argues that Christianity is a culture of secondarity, designed to come after another culture that previously guided its converts. Moreover, Christian converts tend to engage their prior cultures not by completely rejecting them, but by evaluating their components critically in relation to new Christian values. This produces a duplex cultural formation that regularly fosters critical reflection and ongoing cultural change. This model of change is briefly distinguished from more common models of syncretism, suggesting a new understanding of the relationship between conversion and cultural change.本文从社会文化人类学的角度探讨转化这课题。所问的问题不是转化的原因，而是由转化而产生的文化转变，及带来这种转变的机制。从作者对巴布亚新几内亚最近信主的群体的研究，及其他基督教人类学学者的著作， 本文论证基督教乃是第二类文化，是在之前引导人信主的文化之后才进入的文化。而且，信主的人倾向与前文化继续接触，不是完全地拒绝，而是以基督教新的价值观来衡量原文化的各个因素。这就形成了双层文化，促进尖锐的反思和不断的文化转变。这种转变模式不同于常见的融合主义的模式，而是带出一种对转化与文化改变之间的关系的新的认识。El artículo adopta un enfoque sociocultural antropológico sobre la conversión. No trata las causas de la conversión, sino los tipos de cambios culturales producidos por la conversión y los mecanismos por los cuales se producen tales cambios. Se toma como punto de partida la investigación hecha entre un grupo de recién convertidos en Papúa Nueva Guinea y en otro trabajo realizado por profesionales en el área de antropología del cristianismo; el artículo sostiene que el cristianismo es una cultura de secundariedad que aparece luego de que otra cultura haya antes guiado a los ahora convertidos.Además, los cristianos convertidos se relacionan con sus culturas anteriores evaluando críticamente sus componentes en relación a los nuevos valores cristianos pero no las rechazan completamente. Esto produce una doble formación cultural que fomenta, en forma regular, la reflexión crítica y los cambios constantes. Este modelo de cambio se lo distingue brevemente de los modelos más comunes de sincretismo, y sugiere una nueva comprensión de la relación entre la conversión y el cambio cultural.This article is in English.

scholarly journals Exogenous Cultural Change in the Background of the Generational Change: The Case from Papua New Guinea

2019 ◽  
Vol 67 (2) ◽  
pp. 216-230
Author(s):  
Martin Soukup ◽  
Jan D. Bláha
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Ethnic Group ◽  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
Cultural Change ◽  
Local Community ◽  
School Attendance ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
Local History ◽  
Cultural Changes ◽  
First Time

Abstract An analysis of cultural change and generation gaps in the local community of the Nungon ethnic group in the state of Papua New Guinea will be the subject of the study. This ethnic group came into contact with Europeans for the first time in the mid-1930s. The pace of cultural changes within the community has been gradually increasing. For example, the local animistic cult has been replaced with Christianity, school attendance has been introduced in the villages of Nungon, travel opportunities have become more accessible, and as the mobile signal has recently been introduced, Nungon residents can now connect to the internet and access information about the globalised world. Those who remember the colonial period still live in the community and many of them are still illiterate, with only limited knowledge of Pidgin English, the lingua franca of Papua New Guinea. On the other hand, the youngest generation can study in cities or experiment with social media and share information there. The aim of the paper is not only to show intergenerational differences, but also to document the local history and its ties to particular generations and show the role the generational memory played in illiterate societies with unwritten history. The only existing written and photographic documents were created by colonial officers. The study will show the transformation of the Nungon community from the time of photographs kept in boxes to the youngest generation, which keeps photographs in mobile phones and shares them on social media.

Topography and Culture: The Case of the Changing Cage

1957 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 16-20 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cara Richards ◽  
Henry Dobyns
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cultural Change ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Other ◽  
Insurance Company ◽  
Work Unit ◽  
Cultural Changes ◽  
The Relationship

This paper deals with a problem long debated by anthropologists—the relationship between environment and culture. We analyze effects of topography on cultural change in situations of contact between two social systems, one more powerful than the other and inclined to enforce its behaviors on the weaker. We do this by examining cultural changes in one work-unit within a large insurance company in the United States.

scholarly journals Enacting the Absent State: State-formation on the oil-palm frontier of Pomio (Papua New Guinea)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tuomas Tammisto
Keyword(s):  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
State Formation ◽  
Oil Palm ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
The State ◽  
Rural District ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Active Worker ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
New Britain

Tammisto, Tuomas 2016. Enacting the Absent State: State-formation on the oil-palm frontier of Pomio (Papua New Guinea). Paideuma: Mitteilungen zur Kulturkunde 62: 51-68. In this article I examine the relationship between new oil-palm plantations and state-formation in Pomio, a remote rural district of East New Britain Province (Papua New Guinea). I am particularly interested in the kinds of spaces of governance produced by the new oil-palm plantations and how this contributes to state formation and territorialisation in Pomio.Plantations in Pomio do not became state-like spaces as a result of top-down processes alone, but also because of active worker initiatives. By contributing to state formation in this way, the inhabitants of Pomio also make claims on what the state should be like. While plantations become governable and statelike spaces, they do not produce simply governable subjects, nor do they produce a uniformly governable territory but an uneven space in which some places are more governable than others. The inhabitants of Pomio move between these places in their pursuit of different goals.

Spinisternum castaneipictus Willemse, 1966 (Orthoptera: Tettigoniidae: Conocephalinae) from Papua New Guinea, with description of the male and remarks on the relationship

Zootaxa ◽  
2009 ◽  
Vol 2055 (1) ◽  
pp. 61-68
Author(s):  
MUSTAFA ÜNAL
Keyword(s):  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
Similar Species ◽  
Key To Species ◽  
The Relationship

In the present paper, the male of Spinisternum castaneipictus Willemse, previously unknown is described. The similarity of Spinisternum with other genera causes confusion in identification. This problem is discussed and similar species in different genera are compared. A key to species of Spinisternum and illustrations of S. castaneipictus are provided.

Insides and emotion in Koromu

2002 ◽  
Vol 10 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 243-270 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carol Priestley
Keyword(s):  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
The Body ◽  
Linguistic Understanding ◽  
The Relationship

This paper describes several emotion expressions in Koromu, a language of Papua New Guinea. As in other languages, emotions can be expressed by reference to body events and processes. Bodily images are used for common and pertinent emotion expressions in Koromu and the alternative grammatical constructions in which some of these expressions occur enable speakers to express varying emotions while still indicating that there are shared semantic components between the expressions. In addition, as the emotion expressions are examined and their meanings explicated, a number of universal concepts and components of meaning can be observed. A study of these language specific expressions therefore contributes to a cross-linguistic understanding of the relationship between emotion and the body.

Spitting Ginger in Jesus’ Name? The Concept of Hybridity in a Lele Theology of Healing

2018 ◽  
Vol 43 (4) ◽  
pp. 345-357 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon Herrmann
Keyword(s):  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
Christian Faith ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

In the January 2018 issue of the IBMR, R. Daniel Shaw introduced the concept of hybridity to define how the Christian faith can connect meaningfully with people’s local rituals and practices. I researched how mature Lele Christians in Papua New Guinea evaluate their traditional concepts of sickness and healing. In this article I argue that hybridity provides a useful theoretical framework to understand how Lele Christians relate their Christian faith to their tradition. I also show that the concept finds good biblical precedent and is significantly moving forward the discussion about the relationship of Christianity and culture.

Gifts of grief: performative ethnography and the revelatory potential of emotion

2012 ◽  
Vol 12 (5) ◽  
pp. 528-539 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosita Henry
Keyword(s):  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
Emotional Responses ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
Emotional Engagement ◽  
Cultural Performances ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Performative Ethnography

After participation in the funeral of a beloved friend in the Western Highlands of Papua New Guinea, I was drawn to contemplate the revelatory potential of emotions such as grief. With reference to literature on the anthropology of emotions and the concept of empathy, I consider the relationship between ethnographic knowledge and deep emotional responses in the context of fieldwork. I argue that moments of intense emotional engagement, which many researchers record as having experienced during fieldwork, have the potential to lead to rich ethnographic understanding, particularly when such moments productively draw us into participatory cultural performances that help mediate the conceptual divide between meaning and feeling, observer and observed.

scholarly journals REVISION OF WORLD SPECIES OF PARATELENOMUS DODD (HYMENOPTERA: SCELIONIDAE)

1996 ◽  
Vol 128 (2) ◽  
pp. 273-291 ◽  
Author(s):  
Norman F. Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
Sister Group ◽  
Identification Key ◽  
Southern Europe ◽  
Key To Species ◽  
World Species ◽  
Tropical Asia ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractThe genus Paratelenomus Dodd is revised from a worldwide perspective. Three species are described as new: P. angor [Taiwan, Thailand], P. indivisus [Papua New Guinea, Australia], and P. matinalis [Vanuatu]. Paratelenomus bicolor (Dodd) [Australia], P. saccharalis (Dodd) [southern Europe, Africa, tropical Asia, Australia], P. ophiusa (Dodd) [Papua New Guinea, Australia], P. striativentris (Risbec) [Africa, India], and P. tetartus [Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines] are redescribed. Aphanurus graeffei Kieffer, 1917 and Asolcus minor Watanabe, 1954 are junior synonyms of P. saccharalis (Dodd), 1913. An identification key to species is provided. The relationship of Paratelenomus within Telenominae is discussed; the hypothesized sister group is Nirupama Nixon.

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