bus kanaka

plural bus kanakas · alternative bush kanaka · alternative bush-Kanaka

1. Papua New GuineaAn uncivilized person; a person who follows a traditional rather than a modern lifestyle.

   Do you see development here? Are you living like white men? No! We’re still living like bus kanaka.

   2005 November 5, Nancy Sullivan, “My Weblog: Stories about living in Papua New Guinea”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name)

   4 more examples

   […] for some more sophisticated coastal people there was merely the shame at being led by a bush kanaka, […]

   1965, The Papua-New Guinea Elections 1964

   Fuyuge men recount with humor their initial encounters with life in Port Moresby during the 1950s. They speak of travelling to the coast in their bark-cloths and realising upon their arrival that they were inappropriately dressed: “We immediately felt bus kanaka [wild, uncivilized].”

   1999, Eric Hirsh, “Colonial Units and Ritual Units: Historical Transformations of Persons and Horizons in Highland Papua”, in Comparative Studies in Society and History, volume 41, number 4

   Sam’s blues and boots disappeared into his small backpack, his beret was pushed back onto the head at a very jaunty angle and the .303 was slung carelessly over the shoulder. A torn pair of shorts completed the ensemble. In the twinkling of an eye, the immaculate policeman was transformed into a ragged bush kanaka […]

   2002, Terry O'Farrell, Behind Enemy Lines: An Australian SAS Solider in Vietnam

   Manam islanders knew Mambu: but they could not admit to being led or influenced by a mere bush-Kanaka.

   2004, K. O. L. Burridge, Mambu: A Melanesian Millennium