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Provincialising Lakatoro: Orienting sociality through a state institution in Vanuatu
Author(s) -
Rousseau Benedicta
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
the australian journal of anthropology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.245
H-Index - 25
eISSN - 1757-6547
pISSN - 1035-8811
DOI - 10.1111/j.1757-6547.2012.00181.x
Subject(s) - sociality , institution , state (computer science) , population , space (punctuation) , sociology , political science , media studies , social science , demography , computer science , ecology , algorithm , biology , operating system
Focusing on Lakatoro, a provincial centre in Vanuatu, this article explores the ways in which a state institution may allow kastom‐based sociality to proceed for the local population. Rather than considering kastom and the state as necessarily separate, it is demonstrated that the institutions of the state can provide the objective forms needed for kastom to exist in urban space. The article discusses three ways in which this happened—through a staff handbook, daily prayer meetings, and a court case—arguing that ‘the province’s’ polyvalence provided a means by which Lakatoro could be experienced as a place. And that this, in turn, provided a way in which the local population could understand the town to be imbued with appropriate sociality, as measured by kastom.