Gogodala Canoe Festivals, customary ways and cultural tourism in Papua New Guinea

Abstract

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title><jats:p><jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">G</jats:styled-content>ogodala <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">C</jats:styled-content>anoe <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">F</jats:styled-content>estivals, held in the <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">W</jats:styled-content>estern <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">P</jats:styled-content>rovince of <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">P</jats:styled-content>apua <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">N</jats:styled-content>ew <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">G</jats:styled-content>uinea, are important and recurrent regional events that constitute as well as reiterate and reconfigure local relatedness as sites of potential engagement between <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">G</jats:styled-content>ogodala villagers and foreign tourists. <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">C</jats:styled-content>anoe races have been part of <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">G</jats:styled-content>ogodala practice since before the 1900s, when early colonial administrators noted the presence of magnificently painted and carved racing canoes. Since then, racing canoes have been part of local and exogenous discourses about culture and identity in colonial and postcolonial <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">PNG</jats:styled-content>. This paper explores the extent to which <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">G</jats:styled-content>ogodala <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">C</jats:styled-content>anoe <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">F</jats:styled-content>estivals, while primarily regional events concerned with relationships between people, groups and villages, are also designed to attract foreign tourists and as such constitute moments of potential relatedness outside of the region. In a wider sense, the paper explores these festivals as one way in which <jats:styled-content style="fixed-case">G</jats:styled-content>ogodala engage global others through the establishment of a network of potential relationships based on ‘customary’ practices and objects.</jats:p>