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Abstract
This article reflects upon the disciplinary and ethical challenges I have navigated as an ethnographer in the academic ‘no-man’s land’ of West Papua-related research. I contend that the peace and conflict studies concept of conflict transformation articulates productively with a critical ethnographic methodology, assisting me in charting a research path. Using examples from my own research relating to West Papua’s independence movement I argue that the ethnographer’s role is powerful and carries attendant responsibilities to research participants and to the world of knowledge for increasing peace with justice. This article provides a case study example of how researching the ways the vulnerable interpret the world can be an act of justice, arguing that emergent critical interpretations are essential to preparing the world for long-lasting, positive change.
Notes
[1] The New Guinea island territory located west of the independent country of Papua New Guinea has undergone numerous name changes subject to the political agendas of its successive colonial occupiers. In this article I use the term ‘West Papua’ to denote solidarity with West Papuans who chose this name for their land in 1961.
[2] It is difficult to reliably quantify how many West Papuans have died at the hands of Indonesian security forces or as a result of the Indonesian occupation since 1963. Figures cited by activists and NGOs have ranged from 100,000 to 500,000. Braithwaite et al. (Citation2010) contest these figures, stating that ‘since 1985, there has been no year in which more than 1000 Papuans have reportedly been killed by the military and in most years that number seems to have been much less than 100’.
[3] The Malind people in the south of West Papua are often referred to as Marind or Marind-Anim in the anthropological literature.