Working Out What to Wear in Papua New Guinea: The Politics of Fashion in Stella

In this article I discuss Stella, a new women’s magazine in Papua New Guinea. Noting that Stella provides a context for celebrating new Pacific femininities, I argue that the magazine’s representations of fashion are a crucial way in which this refiguring of the feminine occurs. Discussing the significance of what women wear through reference to anthropological insights about the relationship between clothing, gender, and status, I suggest that in PNG, clothing is a focal point of cultural debate. Through its playful politics, Stella intervenes in this debate, thus smuggling a deeply political message between its glossy pages. In addition, I demonstrate that through its selective aestheticization of the “local” and the “traditional,” the magazine acknowledges educated, young Papua New Guinean women’s desire to reconfigure “culture” in more inclusive ways.In this article I discuss Stella, a new women’s magazine in Papua New Guinea. Noting that Stella provides a context for celebrating new Pacific femininities, I argue that the magazine’s representations of fashion are a crucial way in which this refiguring of the feminine occurs. Discussing the significance of what women wear through reference to anthropological insights about the relationship between clothing, gender, and status, I suggest that in PNG, clothing is a focal point of cultural debate. Through its playful politics, Stella intervenes in this debate, thus smuggling a deeply political message between its glossy pages. In addition, I demonstrate that through its selective aestheticization of the “local” and the “traditional,” the magazine acknowledges educated, young Papua New Guinean women’s desire to reconfigure “culture” in more inclusive ways

Developing Young Women's Collective Action in Vanuatu

Over the past year, I have conducted 38 interviews with young, educated women in Papua New Guinea (PNG), Solomon Islands and Vanuatu. Two important findings have already emerged. The first is that young women in Melanesia are subject to intimate forms of control. However educated and able they may be, family members continue to exert or seek to exert control over their behaviour and choices. The second is that young, educated Melanesian women derive solidarity and support from one another. This peer group support appears to be particularly important for women who have made countercultural ‘choices’ – for example, to remain single, leave violent partners or bring up children on their ownAusAI

Emerging Women Leaders in Solomon Islands: The Aims and Activities of the Young Women's Parliamentary Group

My current research seeks to build a profile of young Melanesian women identified by their peers and fellow national citizens as playing leading roles in their families, communities and beyond. There is an enormous amount of attention given to getting women into politics, but we know comparatively little about how young women think about politics, and the ways in which they choose to engage with the formal political system. It is important to be alert to the ways in which young women demonstrate leadership outside the formal political system, for example, as entrepreneurs or through community or volunteer work. This In Brief discusses preliminary findings from recent fieldwork in Solomon Islands, where I interviewed young women leaders. I was fortunate to be able to contact these dynamic women through the Young Women's Parliamentary Group (YWPG).AusAI

"We only Get the Daylight Hours": Gender, Fear and 'Freedom' in Urban Papua New Guinea

Traditional discussions of security are state-centric and ignore individual experience. Presenting a counter-perspective, this article extends existing literature about violence and insecurity by representing the perspectives of those for whom security is a daily concern: young educated Papua New Guinean women living in Papua New Guinea�s towns and cities. Drawing on thirty interviews conducted between 2007 and 2013, I explore how young women in Port Moresby and Goroka talk about violence and insecurity. The article highlights the frustration they experience because of their limited mobility and the ways they are forced to manage their sense of security in these context

Transforming Workplace Norms in PNG: The Role of the Business Coalition for Women

Announcing Australia's 'new aid paradigm' in June 2014, Foreign Minister, Julie Bishop, said: 'We will focus in particular on women's economic empowerment — on promoting women's leadership in politics, business, communities and families and on eliminating violence against women and children'. The link between women's economic empowerment and the elimination of violence is pertinent in Papua New Guinea (PNG). Significant and persistent gender disparities limit the capacity of all Papua New Guineans to benefit from the country's wealth of natural and human resources.AusAI

“We Are So Happy EPF Came”: Transformations of Gender in Port Moresby Schools

In this article, we examine the work of Equal Playing Field (EPF), an organization that introduces ideas of gender equity to students in schools in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea (PNG). Drawing on interviews with students, teachers, and EPF staff and volunteers, we demonstrate that the design and implementation of the EPF program is derived from Western liberal ideas of gender difference and the desirability of an educational environment that removes gender discrimination. Without discounting the challenges of upholding these ideas and practices in Port Moresby schools, we argue that they have gained traction among students and teachers and that the potential long-term benefits of this arguably outweigh the risks and challenges entailed. Demonstrating that programs such as those run by EPF are no longer instances of external donors imposing foreign agendas for social change on uninformed or unwilling recipients, we place under scrutiny notions that the appeal to human rights is inappropriate, irrelevant, or necessarily alien in the context of urban life in PNG. Instead, we suggest that, as with other programs that promote human rights awareness in PNG, the problem for such educational projects is that they assume support services and practical solutions that simply do not exist

Reaching into the Bilum: Motherhood as a Source of Women's Power in Papua New Guinea

In this paper we focus on an important aspect of preliminary findings from two research projects conducted in Papua New Guinea. The preliminary findings note the significance of women's status as mothers and the ways in which women draw on this role to construct new paths for themselves in the political and economic spheres.AusAI

‘Food is life’: Documenting the politics of food in Melanesia

In this article, I discuss two recent examples of women’s filmmaking in Melanesia. The documentaries are Tanah Mama (2014), focused on West Papua and Café Niugini (2015), set in Papua New Guinea. Both films explore and represent food in profoundly different ways. Here, I consider their respective depictions of food, demonstrating that Tanah Mama represents food as sustenance while Café Niugini renders food as ‘cuisine’ through the ‘creative performance’ of cookery. Nevertheless, and as I argue, both documentaries reflect the filmmakers’ interest in representing issues associated with food in the Pacific, including the importance of Indigenous access to land, population management, gender roles and the impact of changing cultural values on food consumption and health

Getting comfortable: gender, class and belonging in the ‘new’ Port Moresby

Port Moresby is consistently represented as a place that is dangerous for women. While recent transformations in the city have benefited some more than others, developments in the city are allowing for the creation of new ‘spatial texts’ in a place notorious for constraining women. In this article, I explore feminist geographer Linda McDowell’s idea that the city is a place in which the active, independent woman comes into her own. Drawing on focus groups, emails and photos sent to me by educated, ‘middle class’ Papua New Guinean women living in Port Moresby, I demonstrate that the city’s new places are paradoxical, even liberating places. The article reveals both the extent of women’s subordination in the city and the emerging possibilities for middle class women to experience a degree of autonomy. Nevertheless as Radice notes, women must endlessly renegotiate their experience of comfort in relation to others, including those whose lives are less comfortable.Port-Moresby est régulièrement présentée comme un endroit dangereux pour les femmes. Même si certaines bénéficient plus que d’autres des transformations récentes qui ont eu lieu en ville, les développements en ville favorisent l’essor de nouveaux espaces urbains dans une ville qui restreint le mouvement des femmes. Dans cet article, j’explore l’idée de la géographe féministe Linda McDowell suivant laquelle la ville est un espace où la femme active et indépendante peut s’épanouir. En recourant à des groupes de discussions, des mèls et des photos envoyés par des femmes éduquées de la classe moyenne de Port-Moresby, je montre que les nouveaux espaces urbains sont des lieux paradoxaux, si ce n’est de libération. L’article montre à quel point les femmes de la ville sont contrôlées et comment les femmes de la classe moyenne peuvent obtenir un certain degré d’autonomie. Cependant, comme le montre Radice, les femmes doivent constamment renégocier l’impression de confort qu’elle acquièrent avec d’autres, y compris avec les gens dont la vie est moins confortable que la leur