Hard Work : Producing places, relations and value on a Papua New Guinea resource frontier

Abstract

For the Mengen people of Papua New Guinea, ‘hard work’ does not refer to drudgery or physically exhausting labour. Instead, it involves creating and recreating social relations through acts of care, marriages, ceremonial events, sharing, and working the land together. ‘Work’ as the Mengen see it, produces value understood as meaningful social relations. This differs significantly from the way colonial officials, loggers, and planters perceived value. Hard Work examines human-environmental relations, value production, natural resource extraction, and state formation within the context of the Mengen. It delves into how the Mengen engage with their land and outside actors like companies, NGOs, and the state through agriculture, logging, plantation labour, and environmental conservation. These practices have shaped the Mengen’s lived environment, while also sparking debates on what is considered valuable and how value is created.