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Chanted Tales from Highland New Guinea
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Chanted tales from Highland New Guinea:
a comparative study of oral performance traditions and their role in contemporary land politics

Paul Pepa, composer-performer on tracks 1 and 2
Paul Pepa

Across a broad, east-west band within Highland Papua New Guinea (see Map below), there are ways of telling stories which make use of special intonational and rhythmic patterns different from those of ordinary speech. Often dealing with relationships between people and land, these sung narratives or ‘chanted tales’ are a highly valued cultural resource. Based at Australian National University, and funded by the Australian Research Council, this project brings together an interdisciplinary team of investigators to analyse the wide range of styles in which these narratives are performed, and further the understanding of their implications for cross-cultural study of verbal art and the politics of land ownership in present-day Papua New Guinea.

Paulus Konts, composer-performer on track 4
Paulus Konts

Teya Hiyawi, composer-performer on track 16
Teya Hiyawi
Senior researchers on the project include:
  • linguistic anthropologist Alan Rumsey (ANU), working in the Ku Waru region towards the eastern end of the project area;
  • anthropologist Nicole Haley (ANU), working in the Duna region near the western end of the project area;
  • ethnomusicologist Don Niles (Institute of Papua New Guinea Studies), working on the comparative musicological aspects of the project.

There are also two ANU PhD students working in association with the project:

  • linguist Lila San Roque, studying the Duna language;
  • ethnomusicologist Kirsty Gillespie, studying Duna musical genres including pikono chanted tales;

Other researchers who have worked in association with the project include:

  • anthropologist Laurence Goldman who works with the Huli people of the Southern Highlands;
  • anthropologist Anna Lockwood, who has done some work with with the Bogaia at the far western end of the project area;
  • anthropologist Jessica Kemp, who has done some work with the Hewa in the northwestern part of the project area.

Project area

  (click map to enlarge)
Project Area
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[Photos: Don Niles]

Page last updated: August 16 2006 17:25:25.
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