The morality of mweki: Performing sexuality in the ‘Islands of Love’

Abstract

Trobriand dance is a key cultural expression and a means of communicating subjectivity in a number of ways: it expresses aspects of kinship, gender, morality, and ideas about modernity and primitivity. In a region with a long history of Christian missions, coupled with a recent ‘Revival’ brought about by the arrival of Pentecostal forms of worship, certain dances come to be key markers of particular moral positions. Primary among these is the Tapioca Dance, famed far beyond the Trobriands, but problematic in local discourses and practice. This paper examines the ways in which such dances make sexuality public, and why this is such a concern for ‘Revived’ (and other) Christian Trobriand Islanders.

Going to ‘Pentecost’: how to study Pentecostalism – in Melanesia, for example

“…In Fresh Wota, a neighbourhood just on the outskirts of city centre Port Vila, the Holy Spirit is everywhere. This is a place that could as easily be in Papua New Guinea (MacCarthy ; Robbins ), or in Angola (Blanes ), or perhaps anywhere where Pentecostal forms of Christianity are growing rapidly. In Fresh Wota, the ‘impact’ of the Holy Spirit can be observed while walking along the streets where signposts such as ‘Holy Spirit church meets here’, or ‘AOG church of Fresh Wota’, or ‘Living Water church being built here’, or ‘Second‐hand store of the Holiness church’ are highly visible from the road.…”