Activities per year
Abstract
The Gulf of Papua, Papua New Guinea, is a rapidly changing geomorphic and cultural landscape in which the ancestral past is constantly being (re)interpreted and negotiated. This paper examines the importance of subsurface archaeological and geomorphological features for the various communities of Orokolo Bay in the Gulf of Papua as they maintain and re-construct cosmological and migration narratives. The everyday practices of digging and clearing for agriculture and house construction at antecedent village locations bring Orokolo Bay locals into regular engagement with buried pottery sherds (deposited during the ancestral hiri trade) and thin strata of ‘black sand’ (iron sand). Local interpretations and imaginings of the subsurface enable spatio-temporal interpretations of the ancestors' actions and the structure of ancestral settlements. These interpretations point to the profound entanglement of orality and material culture and suggest new directions in the comparative study of alternative archaeologies.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 279–306 |
Number of pages | 28 |
Journal | Journal of Social Archaeology |
Volume | 19 |
Issue number | 3 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2019 |
Keywords
- hiri
- Indigenous archaeology
- memory work
- oral tradition
- Pacific
- Papua New Guinea
- social memory
Prizes
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Postgraduate Publication Award
Urwin, Chris (Recipient), Jan 2019
Prize: Prize (including medals and awards)
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Postgraduate Publication Prize
Urwin, Chris (Recipient), 19 Oct 2020
Prize: Prize (including medals and awards)
Activities
- 1 Contribution to conference
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Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology
Chris Urwin (Organiser)
12 Apr 2018Activity: Participating in or organising an event types › Contribution to conference