The Cultural and Historical Openness of Bernard Narokobi’s ‘Melanesian Way’

ABSTRACT

Narokobi’s call for a distinctive ‘Melanesian Way’ was not rigid traditionalism. Narokobi understood Melanesian indigeneity as agentively engaging the foreign, seeking and welcoming it, as opposed to merely acquiescing to it as an unbidden, external force. This understanding was informed by Narokobi’s Arapesh cultural background and his experience of a historic movement led by the visionary Arapesh leader Sir Pita Simogun in the 1950s to modernize the distinctive cultural institution of the Arapesh ‘roads’, which were practical travel passageways as well as valued channels of exchange and social relationships. The modernized Arapesh road facilitated Narokobi’s passage to advanced education just as new scholarships and opportunities were created by Australia’s acceleration of decolonization, positioning him to study law in Sydney and play a central role in planning for PNG’s constitution. It was also a potent Indigenous model that Narokobi built upon in his famous concept of the ‘Melanesian Way’.