This paper examines how the new material value of land in postcolonial Vanuatu intensifies people's shaping and re-shaping of claims to autonomy and dependence. Ahamb, like many other villages in Melanesia, originated as a mission community with people moving in from various original homelands. The mix of people from different places facilitated new kinship bonds and senses of community. However, it has also sparked disputes over land rights and leadership, fuelled by the postcolonial government's incentives for converting customary land into registered titles and leases for wealthy investors. The possibility of leasing out land, and preventing others from leasing out land, creates a dynamic where groups increasingly define themselves in terms of landowner clans that exclude outsiders rather than the wider kin networks that include them. Redefinitions of social boundaries generate secondary disputes over dependence and autonomy where care of kin, Christian commitment and future aspirations sometimes prove to be incompatible and in need of negotiation.

中文翻译：

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主张土地，疏远亲属：论瓦努阿图的竞争依赖关系

本文考察了后殖民时期瓦努阿图土地的新物质价值如何强化人们对自治和依赖要求的塑造和再塑造。与美拉尼西亚的许多其他村庄一样，Ahamb 起源于一个传教社区，人们从不同的原始家园迁入。来自不同地方的人的混合促进了新的亲属关系和社区意识。然而，这也引发了土地权利和领导权的争议，这是由于后殖民政府将传统土地转变为富裕投资者的注册所有权和租约的激励措施。出租土地并阻止其他人出租土地的可能性创造了一种动态，在这种情况下，团体越来越多地根据排除外人的土地所有者氏族而不是包括他们在内的更广泛的亲属网络来定义自己。