After last week’s somewhat depressing post, I promised to find a more cheerful subject for this week. I have mined my memories for the most pure moments of happiness that I can recall, and one of them prompted me to select these swimming goggles for […]
All posts filed under: Oceania
Meeting your ancestors: Two young men, one hundred years apart
Do you know that strange realisation you have, when you see old pictures of your grandparents, or even great grandparents? And you realise that they too were young once; that they had this whole life that you know very little about? And that their world […]
The importance of representation: Ghanaian doll
When I was a girl, I wasn’t much into dolls. I was the kind of kid who fell asleep with my box of books next to me in my bed (along with about a 75 stuffed animals). When I, at the age of two, had […]
The colours of autumn: An ethnographic selection
What does a weaved bag and a skirt from Dutch New Guinea, a Burmese man’s hat, a mask from Australian New Guinea, an ancestor skull from New Guinea, a rice sieve from Malaysia, a pair of Indonesian sandals, a Qatari gold earring, and a Latin […]
Why Moesgaard Museum is my Tardis (one for the Doctor Who nerds)
Do any of you watch Doctor Who? The brilliant British TV series about an alien called a Time Lord, who travels in time and space in his time machine (shaped like a blue Police Box), usually accompanied by a human sidekick or two. It is […]
WINTER IS COMING – but Moesgaard is ready…
(Just to be on the safe side: a mild SPOILER ALERT for Game of Thrones series 1-6) Today, the penultimate series of Game of Thrones begins. The thrillingly enjoyable bloodbath is slowly coming to an end, as the White Walkers, with their ever expanding army […]
Talking to the dead: The ’Bridge Phone’
Imagine being able to talk to your dead loved ones. No, this is not a rhetorical question; try to imagine actually being able to answer your mobile phone and talking to your dead husband, mother, wife, or child at the other end of the line. […]
Size matters: Yams mask from Papua New Guinea
Size matters… at least when it comes to yams, the edible tubers grown by the Abelam people in Paupa New Guinea, where they can grow to be several meters long. Among the Abelam, the cultivating and displaying of yams is of great importance to a […]
Garamut Slit-Drum – Baluan Island
Reite people on the Rai Coast of Papua New Guinea describe a large ceremonial drum (a garamut) as a man. In its construction, a garamut is the focus of a process which brings forth a form of social relations, as well as the object […]
Swimming Goggles – Solomon Islands
Fancy going spearfishing in the Solomon Islands? YES PLEASE! Let’s just admit it right away – one of the absolute coolest things about being an anthropologist, is that you get to go to beautiful places, where you’ll hang out and meet some nice people, and […]
Tetepeku – Papua New Guinea
Tetepeku – one of the rare female ancestor figures from Papua New Guinea, of great importance to the Abelam people of Wosera. As a central part of male initiation rites, the novice is to crawl between the legs of Tetepeku, placed inside the ceremonial house, haus tambaran. […]
Bisj Poles – Papua New Guinea
You might be familiar with the colourful totem poles of Native Americans, with carved out masks and animals – but have you ever seen a Papua New Guinean bisj pole like the ones here? Collected by Aksel Bojsen-Møller in 1955, these poles tell the story of an old […]
