Yabar: The Alienations of Murik Men in a Papua New Guinea Modernity

by David Lipset

Overview

This book analyses the dual alienations of a coastal group rural men, the Murik of Papua New Guinea. David Lipset argues that Murik men engage in a Bakhtinian dialogue: voicing their alienation from both their own, indigenous masculinity, as well as from the postcolonial modernity in which they find themselves adrift. Lipset analyses young men’s elusive expressions of desire in courtship narratives, marijuana discourse, and mobile phone use—in which generational tensions play out together with their disaffection from the state. He also borrows from Lacanian psychoanalysis in discussing how men’s dialogue of dual alienation appears in folk theater, in material substitutions—most notably, in the replacement of outrigger canoes by fiberglass boats—as well as in rising sea-levels, and the looming possibility of resettlement. 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9783319510767
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan
Publication date:	03/27/2017
Series:	Culture, Mind, and Society
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	253
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

David Lipset is Professor of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, USA. He has done long-term fieldwork in Papua New Guinea. His previous books include Gregory Bateson: Legacy of a Scientist and Mangrove Man: Dialogics of Culture in the Sepik Estuary. 

Table of Contents

1. Introduction: Modernity, Masculinity, Papua New Guinea
Part I: Dialogics of Masculine Alienation 

2. Desire in Young Men’s Courtship Stories3. Marijuana, Youth, and Society4. Mobile Telephony in a Peri-urban Setting
Part II: In the Time and Space of the Other

5. Folk Theater and the Signifier6. Money and other Signifiers7. In the AnthropoceneAfterword: Dual Alienation in other Pacific Modernities

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“This is a highly sympathetic account of how an anthropologist can find common kinship in unexpected places, in this case with men in Papua New Guinea facing predicaments that mirror the predicaments of simply being in the world. The view it offers on ... existence encountered as inherently multiple also makes it an unusual and insightful commentary on processes ordinarily understood as (societal) ‘change’.” (Marilyn Strathern, Cambridge University, UK)

“This book combines ... rich ethnography of Murik men with innovative theory, deploying Bakhtin and Lacan. Anchored in decades of research ...it constructs a dialogue ... articulating men’s dual alienation from indigenous and postcolonial masculinities. Analyzing scintillating stories, ... quotidian conversations and theatrical performances, Lipset offers a compelling culmination to his distinctive corpus on Murik masculinities and modernities.” (Margaret Jolly, the Australian National University, Australia)

“[T]his remarkable book point[s] the way toward a vital new phase of ethnographic writing on the painfully liminal situations of many indigenous people in a runaway world.” (Andrew Strathern and Pamela J. Stewart, University of Pittsburgh, USA)