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.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Might be interesting to juxtapose this story with some info on lynchings in the US. Sounds like a similar social mechanism.

Pamthropologist said...

Good suggestion Anonymous. I was, also, thinking about Keith Thomas comparisons but I couldn't quite get past the whole primitive/savage meme.