Expressions of kindly feeling. The London Missionary Society collections from the Papuan Gulf

-

Gulf Province

Arriving in the Torres Straits in 1871, the London Missionary Society (LMS) commenced their attempts to convert communities along the south coast of what is now Papua New Guinea. Building upon their initial efforts in Tahiti (1797), their work in Papua was connected by belief, letter and the flow of objects to their efforts in Africa, China,
India and the West Indies. The LMS played a significant role in opening up Papua, a terra incognita for Europeans annexed by the British in 1884. Material culture was integral to engagements between LMS missionaries and local people, and influenced each party’s perceptions of the other’s performances. While the LMS called upon their
congregations for donations of clothes, tobacco, and iron implements to give to Papuans as ‘tangible expressions of their kindly feeling’, the missionaries also received items that enfolded them into local circuits of exchange and sociality (Figure 1).