Thank you Nick Enfield and colleagues for the invitation and interesting discussion on kinship, gestures, and meaning! A very welcoming research group at the University of Sydney. I was also honored by the presence of uan onak Johnny Obed, a Paamese man living in Sydney, who came to the talk on Paamese kinship. It was truly special to have someone in the audience who could fact-check our “etic” interpretation of the results and enrich the discussion with his “emic” perspective. I wish emic/etic collaborations were more the rule than the exception, and that indigenous people would be more systematically included in research on indigenous languages and cultures.
Simon Devylder 