On You Give
p. 147 · Read in the full issue
Lanesian Natives—
On You Give Them a Name?
IE difficulty of finding a name for the natives of Papua and New Guinea was emphasised ly in a Sydney newspaper article Stuart Inder, recently on ABC : in Port Moresby. :om Dutch New Guinea east 1s through Australian New aea, the Bismarck Archipelago, Solomons, New Hebrides and Caledonia there are people of jwhat similar type, loosely called mesians. But, in detail, they ide a very wide variety of types ick, brown and reddish; negroid, c-nosed and Mongoloid: giant, ium and pigmy; and they k an extraordinary variety of uages—there are 700 in the Aus an Territories alone, le natives in Papua usually are d Papuans (although “Papuan” ally is applied to a distinct .ological type, which is not by means restricted to Papua—there ably are more Papuans in Aus an New Guinea than in Papua'). ving to the old-time jealousy een Australian Papua and Aus an New Guinea (now being run inistratiyely in double harness) Mew Guinea folk will not agree le simple proposition that their fes be called Papuans. Yet it is that the natives of the Aus an Territories be given some e other than “New Guinea re” ew Guineaite” is favoured by ■, but it is a harsh and un iant appellation, ey have the same general of native Melanesians —in
Solomons, New Hebrides and New Caledonia; and a similar difficulty in naming them. “New Caledonian” and “New Hebridean” gets by. but not “Solomonite” or “Solomon Islander.”