Papous

One calls traditionally Papous the populations indigenous S of the New Guinea, an island divided between the province Indonesia of Papua (officially attached to Indonesia following a referendum held into 1969 pennies auspices of the United Nations, in which 1.025 voters sorted on the shutter had taken part) and of the New Guinea-News-Guinea. According to certain authors, the word would come from the language Malayan E . This assumption is debatable, because the word is not attested into Malayan traditional. The French ethnologist Christian Pelras, specialist in the south of the island of Célèbes, writes that charts established at the XVIIIe century by the Bugis mention the name of " Papua" to indicate New Guinea.

The name of " Papou" do not coincide with linguistic reality. Indeed, the spoken languages by the populations of New Guinea belong to 2 distinct families:

languages of the family Languages austronésiennes
languages known as papoues.

Conversely, one finds languages papoues apart from New Guinea:

In Indonesia, in the islands of Halmahera, Ternate and Tidore with the Moluques, in the islands Alor and the indonésienne part of the island of Timor.
With the Eastern Timor.

History

The elements known to date show that Papous go down from the first inhabitants of New Guinea, arrived at one time (in the neighborhoods of the last glaciation, is approximately 21.000 years ago) where the island was connected to the continent Australia N, forming the continental mass called " Sahul ".

Previously, Australia had been populated by migrations from the current continent of Asia which would have taken place at least 40.000 years ago, following the dispersion of humanity from Africa 50.000 years ago. These migrations towards Australia were possible because at the time, the sea level was lower than currently and than the Australian continent was then connected to the continent of Asia. Migrations also could have taken place directly of Asia towards New Guinea and the the Solomon Islands.

There are 5.000 to 6.000 years, the sea level went up to reach the current location, cutting these populations of the continent of Asia and preventing other migrations for a certain time.

There is 5 000 years (3 000 front J. - C), of the inhabitants of the littoral of the China of the South, farmers of millet and rice, start to cross the strait to settle in Taiwan. Towards 2 000 before J. - C., of the migrations take place of Taiwan towards the Filipino . New migrations start soon of Philippines towards the archipelago Indonesia N. Towards 1 500 av. J. - C., another movement carries out Filipino in New Guinea and beyond that, the islands of the Pacifique.

Papous of Indonesia

Since the Years 1960 - 1970, the army indonésienne as of the paramilitary groups is responsible for slaughters towards Papous, which assert the independence and the recognition of their cultural identity. One estimates on the whole at least 100.000 the number of dead papous during these massacres.

The special autonomy

The law bearing No 21 of 2001 " special autonomy for the province of Papua " establishes that the name of the province, in the past “Irian Jaya”, is called from now on “Papua” (article 1, subparagraph a).

“Special autonomy” is defined as being “a special authority recognized and granted to the province of Papua to regulate and manage the interests of the local population according to its own initiative on the basis of of the aspirations and basic rights of the population of Papua” (article 1, subparagraph b).

The “Conseil of the people papou” is defined as being “a cultural representation of the autochtones of Papua, which has certain an authority within the framework of the protection of the rights of the autochtones of Papua” (article 1, subparagraph G).

The law recognizes with the province the right to have emblems of the territory, “cultural symbol of the identity of Papous, in the form of a flag and an anthem which are not founded like symbols of sovereignty” (article 1, subparagraph H).

The subdivision of a Kabupaten (department) or of a Kota (city), called before kecamatan , is called from now on a “ distrik ”.

A “ kampung ” (village) or any other denomination is a “legal unit of population having authority to regulate and manage the interests of the local population on the basis of local habit recognized in the system of national government” (article 1, subparagraph L).

The habit ( adat ) is defined as being “the practices recognized, observed and institutionalized by the local population in an ancestral way” (article 1, subparagraph O).

A “traditional community” ( masyarakat adat ) is “an indigenous population of Papua which lives on a territory and is bound and obeys a certain habit in a feeling of strong solidarity between its members” (article 1, subparagraph p).

A “Autochtone” ( orang asli ) of Papua is “a person originating in the Race Mélanésien consisted the ethnicities ( suku ) originating in the province of Papua and/or a person accepted and recognized by a traditional community of Papua” (article 1, subparagraph T).

“The province of Papua, as a part of the unit State of the Republic of Indonesia, uses the Red and White like flag of State and “Indonesia Raya” like national anthem” (article 2, subparagraph 1).

Culture

Current population of New Guinea east of approximately 7 million inhabitants. It is made up of almost 1.000 different groups speaking almost as many distinct languages which are divided into two families, the Langues papoues and the languages austronésiennes.

This distinction is not only linguistic. The wars between groups played a part in the evolution of the habitat, characterized by a habitat for the adult men separated from this family home reserved to the women and to the children, to make it possible to protect itself from the other groups.

The exchange of pigs between groups and the festivals resting on the pig are a topic which Papous share with other populations of Southeast Asia and of Oceania. The majority of the companies papoues practice the Agriculture, supplemented by of hunting and the gathering.

One thus admits generally an anthropological division, founded on elements archaeological, linguistic and genetic, between Papous and of the populations arrived later on, approximately 3.500 years ago, Austronésiens. The great diversity of the populations autochtones of New Guinea results from the more or less intense contacts between these two groups, according to whether Papous lived on the littoral or in the highlands of the interior.

On the linguistic level, one calls Langues papoues the languages of the Western Pacific which are neither austronésiennes nor Australian. The languages papoues are primarily spoken in New Guinea. One still finds languages papoues on the the Solomon Islands, and of the languages papoues isolated in the middle of languages austronésienne in some islands from the archipelago Indonesia N: Alor, Halmahera, Pantar, Ternate, Tidore and Timor, of which the Eastern half forms the Republic of the Eastern Timor.

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