Global Warming or Cash Economy? Discourses of Climate Change and Food in Eastern Highlands Province, Papua New Guinea

Marketplaces and Morality in Papua New Guinea: Place, Personhood and Exchange

“…Men were more involved as vendors in the early years of PNG marketplaces in the Highlands, but as they became increasingly involved in export cash cropping, they withdrew from these spaces, and marketplaces became increasingly dominated by women. Recently, men have again come to see marketplaces as good sources of income (Figure 1), most likely due to a combination of factors including a prolonged period of low prices for export cash crops (see Curry et al 2019), considerable urban growth and macro-economic changes leading to increasing urban demand and higher fresh food prices, the emergence of wholesaling and reselling (see Busse 2019;Sharp and Busse 2019), and changing gender roles (see Barnett-Naghshineh 2019).…”

“…12 But unlike contemporary marketplaces, where people of many dfferent groups transact, these trade gatherings were typically restricted to persons belonging to only two groups (Keil 1977). Another characteristic of these pre-contact forms of trade, which is reproduced in many contemporary marketplaces in PNG, is that men tended to be more involved in the exchange of prestige goods and women with subsistence items (Gewertz 1983;Salisbury 1970:177; see Barnett-Naghshineh 2019).…”

“…Male ideology rendered men out of place sitting in the marketplace. But as marketplace vending is increasingly recognised as a good source of money, and men have sought to re-enter the marketplace as vendors, they have also felt the need to present alternative moral justifications for belonging there (Barnett-Naghshineh 2019;Curry et al 2019). 18 The papers in this special issue explore the morality of transactions that occur in marketplaces as sites of trade, but they also explore the moral contestation around other activities that take place in the country's marketplaces.…”

“…The papers also describe marketplaces in several different parts of PNG. Busse and Barnett-Naghshineh further our understanding of continuity and change in the Goroka marketplace (Eastern Highlands), which (along with marketplaces on the Gazelle Peninsula) is one of the best studied marketplaces in PNG (see Barnett-Naghshineh 2015Benediktsson 1998Benediktsson , 2002Busse 2014;Epstein 1982;Jackson 1976;Jackson and Kolta 1974;Pickles 2013). The papers by Hukula and Rooney describe marketplaces in Port Moresby, with Hukula describing the large urban marketplace in Tokarara, and Rooney describing haus maket in an urban settlement.…”

“…This research has generally had a developmental, livelihoods and commodity chain focus, and much of it appears in the grey literature (see Anderson ; Allen et al ; Bonney et al ; Chang et al ; Chang et al ; Chang et al ; Chang and Be'Soer ; Chang and Spriggs ; Curry et al ; Dewey ; FPDA 2009; Koczberski and Curry ; Omot et al 2010; Mullen et al ; Underhill‐Sem et al ; UN WOMEN , ; Vinning and Galgal ; Vinning et al ). Only recently has there again been ethnographic attention given to marketplaces (see Barnett‐Naghshineh , ; Beer ; Beer and Church ; Busse ; Craig and Porter ; Pickles ; Schram ; Sharp , , , ; Sharp and Busse 2019).…”