Friday, May 8, 2009
PNG Witchcraft Accusations and Teachable Moments
An interesting (and, as expected, nasty) discussion is brewing over The Independent's coverage of witchcraft killings in Papua New Guinea at a story posted up today, entitled "Witch Hunts,Murder, and Evil in Papua New Guinea (interesting choice of words, non?). Too bad we are not, actually, teaching at the moment because I think it would be a good spark for student discussion. Since, I show First Contact in the cultural class every semester, students have some context for understanding the potential issues.
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News You Can Use,
Teachable Moments
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2 comments:
Might be interesting to juxtapose this story with some info on lynchings in the US. Sounds like a similar social mechanism.
Good suggestion Anonymous. I was, also, thinking about Keith Thomas comparisons but I couldn't quite get past the whole primitive/savage meme.
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