The objective of the paper is an analysis of selected historical events that took place in Uruwa Valley among Nungon people. The events – relocation of a village and religious conflict – still affect the life of the community. The author has partially reconstructed the events using archival materials, especially patrol reports, and printed documents. The course of reconstructed events differs from the local peoples' recollections of the same past. The article confronts different versions of the past without seeking the 'truth' of Nungon past events; rather, it aims to demonstrate the plurality of voices – local people and Australian patrol officers – and to present the importance of the past events for the life of the community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]
I explore the view that efficacy in Pentecostal healing depends on confidence, or unwavering belief. My focus is on emic notions of failure – how people explain failures of therapy in their own terms – rather than on failures in the procedure employed or the inadequacies of the healer. Although anthropologists have criticised the notion of belief, my ethnographic example suggests that it remains useful, particularly since in this case it is central to the assessment of failure. The Pentecostals discussed here see belief in a more material way, as embodied and intimately bound up with the reformative project of becoming a born again Christian. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]