Category Archives: Culture “Development” in Papua New Guinea is a double-edge sword. It is hard to imagine how the country could be more diverse! This rugged land of rivers teeming with crocodiles and jungle-clad, mosquito-infested mountains, is home to about 8.5 million people. Predominantly Papuans and Austronesians, the population also includes Negritos, Micronesians, and Polynesians. Papua New Guinea only gained […]  The Mursi people of Ethiopia’s Omo Valley have been called “one of the most fascinating tribes in Africa.” A pastoralist group originating in the Nile Valley, the roughly 7,500 Nilo-Saharan Mursi live in an isolated corner of southwestern Ethiopia, close to the border with South Sudan. Even today with improved roadways, their villages are remote: I was on […]  It takes a lot of time to prepare for a Papua New Guinean sing-sing. Ancient masks and costumes – some pieces carved from wood and others woven from leaves and grasses: all decorated with paint, shells or feathers – have to be checked and repaired. New costume details need to be fashioned from leaves and grasses. And […]  According to the guide books, the Mursi people have “an aggressive reputation”. This fierce reputation is probably what helps them maintain their cultural traditions and their animist practices in the face of the “artificial” geographic boundaries enforced by the Ethiopian state, the tensions between themselves and other tribes, and the onslaught of modern tourism. That reputation, […]  According to a myth in the Kaningara area of the Sepik region of Papua New Guinea (PNG), men used to give birth to children while the women controlled the spirit houses. The women had a set of magic flutes with which they communicated with the spirits, and this is how men were created. One night when the […] |
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