Countering poisonous stories: an example of sorcery in Papua New Guinea

A tape deck (Image credit: Joybot (Flickr))

This blog is the first in a series examining narration and renarration as regulation from the School of Regulation and Global Governance (Regnet) at ANU. Here, Miranda Forsyth and Philip Gibbs tell us what we can learn from attempts to curb sorcery accusation related violence in PNG.

 Narratives of sorcery take many forms in Papua New Guinea.  They are both distinctive to the particular locale, and change over time.  For instance, in Enga Province the narrative is that some women are sangumas/sorcerers who “eat” the hearts of others.  In Jiwaka province, both men and women are accused of transforming into bats and sucking people’s blood.  In Bougainville, it is predominantly men who are said to “poison” others by using their leftover food scraps or fingernail cuttings.

These narratives are at their most powerful at times of death, when people are gathered together in mourning, often affected by extreme grief and sometimes alcohol.  Then the question is asked: Who caused this death? Talk turns to identifying individuals responsible. 

The regulatory force of narratives

In this way, we see that the narratives themselves have regulatory force.  In other words, they help to steer the course of events in particular ways.  One way they do this is by placing events into particular categories, thus setting the framework for particular behavioural responses.  In the case of sorcery (as with climate change), the relevant categories are what Goffman calls a “blind effect of nature” or a “guided doing” of man:  “When the sun comes up, a natural event; when the blind is pulled down in order to avoid what has come up, a guided doing.”  The sorcery narrative puts a particular event, such as a death, into the “guided doing of man” category, as it connects it firmly to human agency.  The regulatory force of this is to encourage identification of the individual responsible, in order for them to face justice, or to reverse the magic, or to simply stop them doing it again.

Such talk can often turn into extreme violence.  We have documented cases of women forced to hold dead babies and “put its heart back” whilst being burnt with hot irons. 

Yet, this is not always the case.  Sometimes individuals stand up and rebut attempts to go down the accusation path.  They say things like: “have you seen anything with your own eyes?”, “it is just “tingting”(thoughts/imagination), and “you cannot “bagarap”(ruin) another person’s name with this “hevi”(responsibility)”, to use some evocative tok pisin expressions.

PNG police, civilian males and a child stand outside a building

What can counter the regulatory force of narratives?

One question the research team has asked is what causes people to take such a defiant stance?  To resist the very powerful regulatory force of the narrative of the sanguma or the poisonman?  One explanation commonly given (predominantly by those in the global North) is that it is just a matter of education, that if more education is given, then people will turn away from such narratives and favour “rational” explanations of death, sickness and misfortune. 

But our research suggests the reality is more complicated.  We have documented cases of educated people living in towns who have instigated and financed sorcery accusation related violence in their home village, when their child is sick, or some other grave misfortune has befallen them.  In one case, a senior police officer decided that some people in his village were responsible for his swollen leg that refused to heal and sent several of his officers to beat them up. 

Another argument is that people will desist from blaming death and sickness on sorcery if they are provided with proper medical explanations of death in the form of autopsies and medical certificates.  Yet, in many cases we have documented, medical certificates are presented, but they are disregarded, sometimes outright as being lies, but often as providing only partial explanation.  One member of our research team explains, “People affirm that they trust the doctors and nurses. People believe their words, when they explain the medicines and their effects on the sickness, but not so much on the reality of cause of death.”  In other words, these explanations may still not explain why one person got cancer rather than another, particularly when the person is young or appears well.  In order to understand these more imponderable questions, people turn to spitiual considerations.

So what is it that will cause individuals to reject the regulatory force of an explanation of death or misfortune based on sorcery?  There are of course multiple factors, such as fear of legal consequences (limited due to widespread impunity), and unwillingness to face the social consequences of making an accusation (such as triggering family conflict or a tribal fight).

But the worldview of an individual and the group also plays a role. 

Papua New Guineans dressed in ceremonial outfits and make-up

The influence of worldviews on the narrative force of sorcery

We have come to the hypothesis that in PNG (and most likely much more broadly), many people have at least three worldviews, and that these often co-exist, despite their mutual incompatability:

(1) a magical worldview where the supernatural has actual effect in the physical world and can be directed by human agency;

(2) a Christian worldview that also accepts the possibility of communication between natural and supernatural dimensions of reality, but sees it as always mediated through either God or Satan (PNG is 98% Christian); and

(3) a scientific worldview that uses causal reasoning based on physics, biology and psychology.

The critical question is which of the different worldviews becomes dominant in a particular context, or at least exerts some moderating influence on the causal reasoning and behaviour driven by a particular worldview.

We have found three factors in particular highly influential:

First is the experiential factor; i.e. the lived experiences of individuals. This can both make a narrative more entrenched, and also provide a reason to prefer another world-view.  For instance, some people recount having had supernatural experiences as children, such as seeing a person turning into an animal.  These experiences are based on phenomenalistic perceptions that are clearly subjectively real and meaningful, and can make it hard to accept any other explanation than a magical one.  On the other hand, many of the advocates against sorcery accusation related violence have either been accused themselves or have experienced close friends or family accused when they are convinced they were not sorcerers.  This experience makes them more confident to argue against magical explanations for death.

Second, is the place-based factor, which encompasses both the physical place and emotional context of the communication of the narrative is influential.  It is far easier to reject the idea of a blood sucking sanguma in a training session done at a local NGO, than at a funeral where emotions are running high.  Similarly university students explain that whilst they favour scientific explanations in the classroom, they tend to turn to a magical worldview in the home village.

Third is the leadership factor, namely the authority of those speaking for or against the narrative.  Authority may come from the person having the right to speak in a particular context, such as being the close relative of the deceased.  It also depends upon the trustworthiness of the individual, and this often requires the individual to be an “insider.”  Outsiders speaking out have their role - particularly through offering networked support to insiders - but they may be dismissed: “these people do not understand about our sangumas.”

These findings suggest that countering the regulatory force of particular narratives requires a move away from an exclusive focus on provision of new knowledge (such as Western education or medical certificates).  It is necessary also to identify specific motives and mechanisms that make it profitable and safe for individuals to use causal reasoning drawn from different worldviews.  For instance, in times of peace, some communities have created their own community laws in which they agree not to accuse others of sorcery.  These often draw upon the authority of the rational state and the Christian bible, two different worldviews. These community laws can be important sources of inside authority to follow at times of stress such as funerals.  Indeed, our research suggests they are often highly effective.

PNG forest and mountain scenery

Broader implications for countering poisonous stories

We suggest this research has broader implications into how to counter the regulatory force of poisonous narratives in the global North.  These narratives are increasingly relevant today as shown through the demonization of various groups, such as African “gangs” in Melbourne, and those resisting anthropocentric climate change.   The categorisation achieved by these narratives (who is “us” and who is “them”; and “we are responsible” vs “no-one is responsible”) preconditions and shapes behavioural responses, thereby exerting regulatory force.

In countering such narratives, our research suggests that it is necessary to give regard to the competing worldviews in a particular audience, and to determine what factors can cause one to become more influential.  People are seldom purely “a racist”, but are also “a father or brother or grandmother” or “a Christian.”  In paying attention to which worldview is likely to dominate, we have identified three factors as relevant: an experiential factor (having explicit regard to the lived experiences of the audience); a place-based factor (the emotional context and physical place the narrative or counter-narrative is transmitted); and a leadership factor (authority of who is transmitting it).  As many Papua New Guineans have demonstrated, such an approach can break down walls, even those as seemingly solid as belief in sorcery.