La terre-mer , enjeu de territoires et de légitimités en Nouvelle-Calédonie

Abstract

Le concept de la terre-mer reflète l’absence de discontinuité entre la terre et la mer en Océanie. En Nouvelle-Calédonie, territoire ultra-marin français dans un processus de décolonisation négociée, la terre-mer , habitée et pratiquée par les Kanak ainsi que d’autres communautés, est aujourd’hui l’objet de nouvelles problématisations environnementales génératrices de nouveaux dispositifs aux spatialisations diverses (aires marines protégées, règles de gestion d’espèces emblématiques…). En s’appuyant sur des données ethnographiques collectées entre 2013 et 2019, cet article propose d’examiner comment les formes de territorialisations kanak plutôt réticulaires, révélant les manières d’être en lien chez les Kanak, s’arrangent ou se confrontent avec les dispositifs de politiques publiques touchant le lagon et l’océan.

“Draw the sea…”: Children’s representations of ocean connectivity in Fiji and New Caledonia

“…Children who represented the land in their drawings did so by including different types of terrestrial elements: high islands, islets, or sandy beaches; vegetation (mangroves, coconut and other trees, plantations); houses and other buildings (e.g., a church, a lifeguard station, a restaurant); and/or coastal infrastructures (such as a seawall, a pontoon, a jetty, a road). These children’s representations of the sea as inextricably tied to the land—or, in other words, of land-sea territories—reflect the local worldviews we encountered in our ethnographic work with adults as well as in the scientific literature on the iTaukei concept of vanua (Tuwere 2002 ; Nabobo-Baba 2006 ) and on how Kanak people dwell and engage in the environment (Dégremont and Sabinot 2020 ).…”

“…More specifically, we examine to what extent children frame these relationships along a land-sea continuum, as embedded in Fiji in the iTaukei (Indigenous Fijian) concept of vanua , and in New Caledonia in Kanak terms such as hnyei (in iaai language) or manaha (in fagauvea language). The first refers to a holistic and complex set of social-ecological and socio-cosmic relationships (Tuwere 2002 ; Nabobo-Baba 2006 ), while the latter refer to a land-sea country or territory traversed by networks of alliances, customary paths connecting both individuals and clans, and trails used by both the living and the dead (Dégremont and Sabinot 2020 ). We also explore to what extent children articulate these relationships and networks with fisheries, including their own fishing practices (usually starting at a very young age; e.g., Kronen 2004 ; Sabinot et al 2022 ), as well as with other uses of marine places and resources.…”

A social-ecological engagement with reef passages in New Caledonia: Connectors between coastal and oceanic spaces and species

“…The roots of the Kanak world and all its elements are indeed based on myths. In these myths, all human and other-than-human elements from the sea and land areas are interconnected (Dégremont and Sabinot 2020 ). The origin of many essential elements of Kanak culture is found in the sea, such as the remedies to heal oneself or the Kanak currency (Leblic 2008 ).…”

Il mondo sotto la superficie. L’ontologia liquida delle isole Belep (Kanaky Nuova Caledonia)

“…Le conoscenze e le pratiche kanak stabiliscono un continuum tra terra e mare (Le Meur et al 2009;Sabinot, Herrenschmidt 2019;Dégremont, Sabinot 2020). Tuttavia, come sottolinea Tamatoa Bambridge (2014) per le isole del Pacifico in generale, nella letteratura tecnica e scientifica terra e mare sono stati a lungo trattati come separati, dando luogo ad analisi specifiche dei sistemi di gestione, proprietà, ordinamento fondiario che si sono concentrate sull'una (Ward, Kingdom 2009) o sull'altro (Hviding 1996).…”