Kaluli tribe

Mt Bosavi, Southern Highlands Province of Papua New Guinea

 

The Southern Highlands Province is the home to a number of tribes, including Kaluli tribe living on the slopes of Mt Bosavi, the collapsed cone of an extinct volcano. It is one of the remotest places on earth, only accessible by small aircraft landing on a tiny grass airstrip. The first contact with the Bosavi people was made in 1935. Its isolation made Mt Bosavi the home to unique endemic species, including some recently unknown to the science.

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The people living north of the mountain refer to themselves as Bosavi kalu (people of Bosavi), and divide themselves into four culturally identical but linguistically distinct groups, the Kaluli, Ologo, Walulu, and Wisesi.

The Kaluli live in the middle of virgin rainforest, where the dense vegetation is unbroken except for some small settlement clearings. They live in scattered villages, in the longhouses, about 15 families in each, with up to 60 to 90 people per longhouse. The longhouse, built at the centre of the community, is an elevated structure, about 18 meters by 9 meters, with a veranda at front and rear. Inside, along either side of the longhouse are found the married men’s sleeping platforms alternating with cooking hearths with meat-smoking racks above.

Traditionally, married women, small children and piglets occupy narrow passages on the other side of their husbands’ partition. Older boys and bachelors sleep together at the back, and young girls sleep at the front. Although today many families live in small individual houses with two or more extended families, they use their longhouses for communal purposes.

In Kaluli tradition, children are raised by their mothers, with the help of other women and older female children of the longhouse. A young girl learns about her future role as a wife and a mother by watching and helping her mother in her daily tasks.

The Kaluli are highly egalitarian people, living without a hierarchical authority or formal leadership. While the elders have strong influence over younger men, any man can initiate a group action.

The unique Kaluli tradition is Gisaro ceremony, also called the “Burning of the Dancers”. The Gisaro dancers, who are the guests from other longhouses, perform the songs to stimulate sad emotions of the hosts by making sorrowful references to the places closely related to the people who have died, such as rivers and forests. The memories of the dead relatives provoke the feelings of sorrow and emotional suffering. When grief becomes too strong and the man bursts into tears, he runs up to the dancers and thrusts burning tree-sap torches against their back and shoulders in angry revenge. The grief is not simply about the death, it is about the sorrow of loneliness.

TRIBES OF PAPUA NEW GUINEA


Chimbu Tribes

Chimbu Tribes

Eastern Highlands Tribes

Eastern Highlands Tribes

Enga Tribes

Enga Tribes

Foi Tribe

Foi Tribe

Hewa Tribe

Hewa Tribe

Huli Tribe

Huli Tribe

Kalam Tribes

Kalam Tribes

Kaluli Tribe

Kaluli Tribe

Maprik Tribes

Maprik Tribes

Sepik Tribes

Sepik Tribes

Tambul Tribes

Tambul Tribes

Western Highlands and Jiwaka Tribes

Western Highlands and Jiwaka Tribes

FESTIVALS OF PAPUA NEW GUINEA


Gulf Mask Festival

Gulf Mask Festival

Bougainville Reeds Festival

Bougainville Reeds Festival

Baining Fire Dance

Baining Fire Dance

National Mask Festival

National Mask Festival

Enga Cultural Show

Enga Cultural Show

Sepik River Crocodile Festival

Sepik River Crocodile Festival

Melanesian Festival of Arts and Culture

Melanesian Festival of Arts and Culture


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