Can the subaltern listen? Self-determination and the provisioning of expertise in Papua New Guinea

Abstract

Voice is a major concern in contemporary liberal‐democratic politics, one that stresses the political importance of speaking (“giving voice,” “speaking up”). But in the Yopno valley of Papua New Guinea, where NGO and government projects are expanding, people's sense that they are losing control of their future has led them to worry about their capacity to listen, not their capacity to speak. In largely acephalous villages, people's self‐determination seems particularly threatened by their ignorance of the true nature of their own actions. From a perspective in which the antecedents and the consequences of action are deeply unclear—a perspective stressed in the provisioning of expertise prevalent in political discourse—self‐determination hinges on listening and gaining the understanding needed to shape one's future. [political communication, expertise, self‐determination, voice, listening, Papua New Guinea, Melanesia] Long tingting bilong planti saveman bilong demokratik politiks na arapela manmeri tu, toktok em i as bilong paua bilong ol manmeri. Tasol, ol manmeri i stap long Yopno veli, wanpela hap bilong Papua Niugini, ol i no save wari tumas long tokaut. Maski gavman na NGO i laik wokim planti samting long hap, ol i no tingting planti long toktok tumas. Tasol, ol i wari planti long harim: ol inap long harim toktok na i stap fri o nogat? Long hap, ol lida bilong ples na gavman, ol i nogat paua long bosim ol manmeri bilong ples. Ol manmeri i ken bihainim laik bilong ol. Tasol, ol i wari olsem, nogut tingting bilong mipela i paul na mipela i no save gut long wei bilong kamapim ol samting mipela laik kamapim. Ol i lukim olsem paul tingting na nogat save em i wanpela kain kalabus. Olsem na, ol save tok olsem, ol mas harim gut toktok bilong ol saveman na kisim save. Dispela em i rot bilong bihainim tru laik bilong ol na kamapim samting ol i laik kamapim bihain. [toktok, saveman, bihainim laik, tokaut, harim toktok, kisim save, Papua Niugini]

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“…In this context, political empowerment is equated with ‘giving a voice to’ individuals, making them into modern Lockean liberal subjects who are capable of using language to advance their own independent self-interests (Bauman & Briggs 2003). Aside from a few exceptions (Slotta 2015, 2017), most anthropologists concerned with political language tend to focus on speakers, analyzing performance genres and the ‘effectiveness of speaking’ (Brenneis & Myers 1984:3; see also Bloch 1975; Brenneis 1978; Irvine 1979; Hull 2010). While similar metaphors of voice as political action are also common in Norway—as in most Germanic languages, the same word, stemme in Norwegian, means both ‘voice’ and ‘vote’—my interlocutors flipped the focus of language and political subject formation, focusing less on the citizen as speaker and more on the government as listener.…”