Repatriation, Exchange, and Colonial Legacies in the Gulf of Papua

Book excerpt: This book explores the people of the Kikori River Delta, in the Gulf of Papua, as established historical agents of intercultural exchange. One hundred years after they were made, Frank Hurley’s colonial-era photographic reproductions are returned to the descendants of the Kerewo and Urama peoples, whom he photographed. The book illuminates how the movement, use, and exchange of objects can produce distinctive and unrecognised forms of value. To understand this exchange, a nuanced history of the conditions of the exchange is necessary, which also allows a reconsideration of the colonial legacies that continue to affect the social and political worlds of people in the twenty-first century.