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UNIQUE MELANESIAN SOCIETY – ‘BIG MAN’ AND POLITICAL ORDER
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Melanesian region includes 4 countries; Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea (PNG) and numerous smaller islands.
Melanesian society is organized tribally into groups of people who trace...
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Melanesian region includes 4 countries; Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea (PNG) and numerous smaller islands.
Melanesian society is organized tribally into groups of people who trace...
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... their descent to a common ancestor.
The social fragmentation that exists in Melanesia is extraordinary.
PNG hosts more than 900 mutually incomprehensible languages, nearly 1/6th of all of world's extant tongues.
Solomon Islands, with a population of only 500,000,...
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The social fragmentation that exists in Melanesia is extraordinary.
PNG hosts more than 900 mutually incomprehensible languages, nearly 1/6th of all of world's extant tongues.
Solomon Islands, with a population of only 500,000,...
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... nonetheless has over 70 distinct languages.
Most residents of the PNG highlands have never left the small mountain valleys in which they were born; their lives are lived within the wantok and in competition with neighboring wantoks.
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Most residents of the PNG highlands have never left the small mountain valleys in which they were born; their lives are lived within the wantok and in competition with neighboring wantoks.
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Wantoks are led by a ‘BIG MAN’. No one is born a Big Man, nor can Big Man hand that title down to his son.
Rather, the position has to be earned in each generation.
It falls not necessarily to those who are physically dominant but to those who have earned community's...
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Rather, the position has to be earned in each generation.
It falls not necessarily to those who are physically dominant but to those who have earned community's...
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... trust, usually on the basis of ability to distribute pigs, shell money, and other resources to members of the tribe.
The parliaments of PNG and the Solomons have no coherent political parties; they are full of individual leaders, each striving to bring back ...
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The parliaments of PNG and the Solomons have no coherent political parties; they are full of individual leaders, each striving to bring back ...
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... as much pork as possible to his or her narrow base of supporters.
Property has not only an economic but also a spiritual significance, since dead relatives are buried in certain spots on the wantok's land, and their spirits continue to inhabit that place.
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Property has not only an economic but also a spiritual significance, since dead relatives are buried in certain spots on the wantok's land, and their spirits continue to inhabit that place.
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No one in the wantok, including the Big Man, has the exclusive right to alienate title to the land to an outsider.
A mining or palm oil company seeking a concession has to negotiate with 100s or sometimes 1000s of landowners, and there is no statute of limitations...
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A mining or palm oil company seeking a concession has to negotiate with 100s or sometimes 1000s of landowners, and there is no statute of limitations...
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... on land claims under traditional rules.
From the standpoint of many foreigners, the behavior of Melanesian politicians looks like political corruption. But from the standpoint of the islands' traditional tribal social system, the Big Men are simply doing what Big Men...
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From the standpoint of many foreigners, the behavior of Melanesian politicians looks like political corruption. But from the standpoint of the islands' traditional tribal social system, the Big Men are simply doing what Big Men...
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... have always done, which is to redistribute resources to their kinsmen.
It takes only a couple of hours to fly from Port Moresby, PNG's capital, to Brisbane in Australia, but in that flight ...
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It takes only a couple of hours to fly from Port Moresby, PNG's capital, to Brisbane in Australia, but in that flight ...
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one is in some sense traversing several thousand years of political development.
Australia granted independence to PNG and Britain to the Solomons in the 1970s.
#History #Traditions #Geography #development
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Australia granted independence to PNG and Britain to the Solomons in the 1970s.
#History #Traditions #Geography #development
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