Kinship and relatedness in urban Papua New Guinea

Abstract

Early anthropological literature on urban Port Moresby (Papua New Guinea) highlights the importance of urban-rural kin connections and the village flows into town and vice versa. While this is still important, this article focuses on contemporary kinship and relatedness in an urban settlement in Port Moresby and how relations there are made evident through everyday actions of exchange and sharing of food, time, and consideration. People in town build kin-like relations using the concept of wan, particularly wantok (same language), wanstrit (same street), and wanlotu (same religion), as they share resources, support neighbourhood marriage and funerary rituals, and as employers and employees become kin. Kinship in Port Moresby, though constrained in many ways, is acted out in forms that are rooted in urban place, space, and home.