Transforming Skins: Kwermin Sequences of Growth

This book is about the Kwermin people living in the Mountain Ok sphere of Papua New Guinea. Its focus is on Kwermin notions of how proper social persons are produced, and the similarity and recurrence of certain themes, referred to as 'sequences of growth', in both origin myths and rituals of initiation. As a counterpoint to this discussion of growing social beings, narratives that seek to explain death are presented. It is shown that even though accounts of growing and killing differ, they nevertheless have certain features in common, importantly, the notion of knowledge and the association of knowledge with skin. The discussion of growth, death and knowledge is finally brought together and considered in the context of Kwermin cosmological ideas and social practice.