Firstly employing the methodology of story as critique of research assumptions and secondly, extend on the process of story work to suggest storying as a novel but relatable research methodology. We extend on current understanding in two ways.
We explored the development of pasin and luksave and the ways the conceptual claims served a dual function of developing a methodological and epistemic pathway toward an ethical assurance of meaningful relationality. We identified with two conceptual notions: “pasin” and “luksave” as distinct Austronesian language ideas derived from Tok Pisin-a creolisation of English utilized as a lingua franca throughout the country. Yet for the three PNG authors this assumed coherency between epistemes and method highlighted specific conceptual challenges for us as researchers and participants.
Scholarship within the Melanesian region employs sociality to interrogate forms of social life and the different ways research methods account for the understanding of interactions between individuals and communities. In Oceania, Papua New Guinea (PNG) appears large in the consciousness of exploring social life through the notion of sociality. On whose terms do contemporary Papua New Guinean women get to decide how to dress: their own, or in accordance with community norms and standards? What are the contemporary and historical contexts of whiteness and colonial power that have influenced these norms and standards? This article brings together the experiences and perspective of a young professional Papua New Guinean woman, and her relatives, in dialogue with a young English–Iranian woman anthropologist. What women wear in PNG is embroiled in ideas of collective morality plays out at intersections of class, age, race and gender and demonstrates tensions between ideas of autonomy and collectivity. Yet young women confront their peers in much the same way older women do.
Increasingly, younger generations of women believe it is an individual woman’s right to wear what she wants in Papua New Guinea (PNG). The article shows that adherence to social norms is policed by women in the public sphere and that one person’s choices are enmeshed in ideas of responsibility and obligation to others. This article brings Papua New Guinean women’s perspectives on fashion, gender and morality into conversation with questions of colonial histories and global consumerism.
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