ABSTRACT
Among the Duna people of Papua New Guinea, ideas about the dead and the living are intertwined through cosmological perceptions of, and ritual interactions with, the landscape. Nowadays the winds of change coming into the Duna area of Papua New Guinea include the social and environmental impact from oil drilling and gold mining companies. The Duna have an intimate relationship with their landscape, which they see as the marker of their historical memory and of the contemporary legitimacy of their land-holding. The local landscape is marked by both the living and the dead. The Duna are situated in the Southern Highlands Province of Papua New Guinea. Australian explorers entered the territory of the Duna from the 1930s onward. Both individual explorers and government-led patrols were often in search of gold or oil resources, so that from the beginnings of contact the people were made aware of the wealth that the Outsiders were seeking.
