The global climate threat has intensified Sweden’s ambitions to build wind power stations. This thesis explores the planning of, and opposition to, wind power in the inland rural and forest regions of Sweden. It is in these autonomous communities that the plans are implemented and the aim of the thesis was to, from a local perspective, understand and analyse the planning and acceptance challenges that large-scale wind power development faces in places that are both sparsely populated and have good wind conditions. This thesis is based on qualitative methods and was conducted as two studies. The case study area comprises four municipalities in Dalarna County. The first study analyses the planning and establishment process in three municipalities using interviews and an analysis method called process tracing. The second study analyses one wind power establishment, in which the interviews form the basis for a discourse analytical approach. One striking finding highlights the relationship between the global and the local. Global environment and energy aspects are absent in the local process, and wind power becomes a technical land issue that clashes with other local land interests. Another finding of the study reveals that planning for wind power establishment follows a rational planning tradition. The feelings and memories of the individual – different views regarding the landscape – play a background role in the formal permit process, while measurable observable conditions have a more prominent role. Wind power developers thereby acquire a more significant position than what they probably would have had if the planning had included local residents’ views on wind power in the landscape at an early stage.

Cette thèse articule géographie et fait religieux, ce dernier n’étant pas seulement étudié en creux mais constituant au contraire l’objet central de l’étude. Les recherches menées partent d’un paradoxe contemporain particulièrement observable dans les sociétés dites occidentales. Leur sécularisation de plus en plus forte, impliquant un effacement progressif de toute référence religieuse dans l’espace public, s’accompagne pourtant, depuis une vingtaine d’années, d’un regain de fréquentation des lieux de pèlerinage, qui touche, certes, les sanctuaires les plus connus, à forte valeur historique et culturelle (le Mont-Saint-Michel, Saint-Jacques-de-Compostelle, par exemple), mais également les plus récents et confidentiels (L’Ile-Bouchard, entre autres). Les pratiques des visiteurs oscillent, au cours d’une même visite, entre pèlerinage et tourisme, remettant en cause les catégories, jusqu’ici restées relativement étanches dans la littérature scientifique francophone, de « pèlerin » et « touriste ». Cette hybridation des pratiques et des publics invite à envisager, comme effet de la sécularisation, une remonétisation de la valeur sacrée et des espaces considérés comme investis de cette valeur. Il s’agit ici, à partir d’une étude comparative des pratiques spatiales dans plusieurs lieux de pèlerinage catholiques en France, en Bosnie-Herzégovine, en Espagne, en Irlande, en Italie, au Mexique et au Portugal, de questionner à nouveaux frais la catégorisation des pratiques pèlerines et touristiques et d’entrer dans l’étude de la valeur spatiale. Les pratiques permettent en effet d’accéder aux représentations de l’espace construites par les visiteurs, qui elles-mêmes trahissent les valeurs dont ces mêmes visiteurs investissent les lieux. Ici est en jeu, dans un contexte de sécularisation, l’évolution, qui oscille entre résistance et résilience, de l’inscription de la valeur sacrée dans l’espace. / This thesis links up geography and religion. Religion, here, is not just a footnote in the analysis but constitutes the central matter of this work. The research work done here, starts from a contemporary paradox, particularly intense in western societies. The latter are under a growing secularization which implies the progressive obliteration of any religious reference in public space. Yet, for twenty years or so, the number of visitors in places of pilgrimage is increasing. This rise concerns not only the most famous pilgrimage centers such as Le Mont-Saint-Michel or Santiago de Compostela, invested with high historical and cultural values, but also some places of pilgrimage more recent and confidential (for instance L’Ile-Bouchard shrine). During a visit, the visitors’ spatial practices fluctuate between pilgrimage and tourism. These variations challenge the categories of “tourism” and “pilgrimage” which are usually kept separated in the French scientific literature. This hybridization of audiences and practices leads to consider the remonetization of the sacred value and the sacred spaces as a consequence of secularization. This thesis is based on a comparative study of spatial practices in several catholic places of pilgrimage in France, Bosnia Herzegovina, Spain, Ireland, Italy, Mexico and Portugal. The purpose here is to question once again the categorization of the practices of pilgrimage and tourism. This work also aims to study the spatial value. Spatial practices allow indeed to grab the representations of space built up by the visitors and these representations betray the values granted to the places by the same visitors. The evolution of the spatial form taken by the sacred value in a secular context, between resistance and resilience, is at stake here.

Localizada a aproximadamente 60 km da capital, Palmas-TO, está Porto Nacional, uma das cidades do estado do Tocantins que possui um significativo valor histórico, artístico, cultural e religioso para o antigo “norte goiano”, assim chamada a região norte para os que residiam na região sul, hoje estado de Goiás. Como podemos observar nos estudos de alguns autores que trataram sobre várias temáticas em Porto Nacional, como educação, patrimônio, história, a gênese da cidade de Porto Nacional se deu por três acontecimentos: a chegada dos Dominicanos, o surgimento de três jornais e a chegada de um médico à cidade. Vários são os motivos para ser considerada uma das cidades mais representativas do Estado, um deles é o fato de contar com uma forte tendência à religião, mas especificadamente o Catolicismo. Outro dado importante foi o tombamento, que aconteceu no ano de 2008, sendo a segunda cidade a ser tombada no Estado do Tocantins, e a primeira em território tocantinense. Traz uma retrospectiva sobre o processo de evolução do patrimônio com destaque as Cartas Patrimoniais de Atenas, em (1931), Carta de Veneza, de (1964), a Convenção Relativa à Proteção do Patrimônio Mundial Cultural e Natural, de (1972), e a declaração de Amsterdã, em (1975). Essas cartas foram de fundamental importância para a consolidação do Patrimônio Histórico e Cultural nos dias atuais. O estudo propõe discutir e refletir sobre ações que norteiam o Turismo Cultural na cidade. A primeira etapa que compõe o estudo foi a aplicação de um questionário aos turistas que visitaram a Catedral Nossa Senhora das Mercês e o Museu Histórico e Cultural no período de férias referente ao mês de julho e dezembro de 2013, e o processo de patrimonialização do Centro Histórico, segundo os argumentos e entrevistas feitas com os moradores. Foram aplicados aos turistas alguns questionários semiestruturados como primeira etapa da pesquisa. Um dos principais objetivos é discutir o desenvolvimento do turismo cultural na cidade para o desenvolvimento da atividade turística na cidade. A segunda etapa consiste em verificar a percepção dos moradores na poligonal de tombamento do centro histórico quanto ao processo de patrimonialização com base em documentos formais que constituem a Ata de Tombamento do Centro Histórico e o Dossiê de Tombamento. Faz-se uma reflexão sobre o atual contexto que a cidade se encontra. Assim, teremos duas visões, do turista e do morador, a fim de responder se o tombamento da cidade de Porto Nacional corresponde às expectativas do turista e do morador. Considerado o berço cultural do Patrimônio Histórico do Estado, com base em algumas questões contidas no questionário, surge a reflexão para o questionamento: a existência o Turismo cultural na cidade de Porto Nacional-TO bem como a participação dos moradores para o tombamento do centro histórico. / Placed close to 60 km from the state district, Palmas-TO, there is Porto Nacional, one of the Tocantins`state cities well known for its historical, artistic, cultural and religious value to the old times known as “norte goiano”, which is the north region for those who lived in the south, this last one is now called Goiás state. As we can observe through the study of some authors dedicated to several subjects on Porto Nacional, like Education, Historical heritage and History, Porto Nacional city genesis was set by three start points: the Dominicans arrival, the dawn of three newspapers and lastly the arrival of a physician to the city. There are many reasons why it is one of the most representative cities in the state, one of them is the strong tendency to religion, most of all the catholic one. Another important aspect was its landmarking by the historical heritage, which occurred in 2008. It is also needed to mention that it was the second city to be listed as historical heritage on the state and also the first in its territory. It carries an eventful hindsight of the historical heritage evolution process whereas it includes the Historical Heritage Chart of Athenas (1931), Venice Chart (1964), Convention for World Cultural and Natural Historical Heritage (1972) and the Amsterdan Declaration (1975). These charts were weighty to the historical heritage landmarks consolidation in our times. This study suggests to discuss and reflect on the actions that give north to the city cultural tourism. The first step of this study consisted in the application of a poll to the tourists that visited the city`s church and museum during the last 2013 July and December, as well as this part points out the historical heritage process of Porto Nacional`s historical center according to the arguments and interviews done upon the city dwellers. Some semi-structured polls were applied on the tourists as first step of this research. One of the standard points of this work is to measure cultural tourism importance to the city tourism as a whole. The second step of this work is to verify the perception of the nearby inhabitants of the city’s historical center on the historical heritage process based on formal documents as the Historical Center Heritage Landmarking Minute and the Historical Heritage Landmarking Dossier. This study drifts a reflection upon the actual context of the city. After all, this study contains two vision, the dweller and the tourist one, in order to answer if the city historical heritage listing replies to their expectations. Having in mind the fact that the city is considered the cultural birthplace of the state, and also based on some issues enlightened by the poll, a reflection arises: the existence of cultural tourism in Porto Nacional and the participation of its dwellers to the historical center landmarking.

Esta dissertação procura comparar a mídia exterior das cidades de São Paulo e Buenos Aires. Para tanto se vale de métodos e procedimentos interdisciplinares de duas grandes áreas: geografia e comunicação. O objeto de estudo é compreendido no contexto do desenvolvimento das cidades e, dessa forma são apresentados elementos mínimos sobre os processos de desenvolvimento urbano e posteriormente as principais questões relativas ao tema no período contemporâneo. Na cidade de São Paulo a mídia exterior foi proibida no ano de 2006 enquanto Buenos Aires, embora possua complexa legislação, apresenta grande quantidade de mídia exterior em sua paisagem. Ao analisar profundamente os tipos de painéis, as normas e os atores, se elencam os principais paradigmas contemporâneos sobre a temática nas cidades em questão. Relacionando essas questões de modo comparativo conclui-se que existem evidências que tanto as normas para existência quanto para inexistência da mídia exterior podem priorizar interesses pessoais, de grupos empresariais locais ou internacionais. Em São Paulo, sob o discurso da cidade limpa e em Buenos Aires sob a premissa da criação de uma zona de turismo a partir de uma região repleta de painéis em Led (Times Square Sul-americana) os governantes criam meios e métodos para validarem seus interesses. / The aim of this work is compare outdoor advertising of the cities of Sao Paulo (Brazil) and Buenos Aires (Argentina). For that relies on interdisciplinary methods and procedures of two major areas: geography and communication. The object of this study is understood the context of the development of cities and thus minimal elements are presented on the processes of urban development and subsequently main issues relating to the theme in the contemporary period. In Sao Paulo the outdoor advertising was banned in 2006 while Buenos Aires, even having a complex legislation, features lots of outdoor media in your landscape When you do a thorough analysis of the types of panels, the rules and characters, if we list the major paradigms in contemporary cities on the topic in question. Combining these issues in a comparative way it is concluded that there is evidence that both the rules for existence and for lack of outdoor media can prioritize personal interests, business groups locally and internationally. In São Paulo, the discourse of Cidade Limpa (clean city) and in Buenos Aires under the premise of creating a tourist area from a region full of Led panels (the Times Square of the South America) governments create means and methods to validate their interests.

Submitted by Natalie Mendes (nataliermendes@gmail.com) on 2015-07-25T01:26:05Z No. of bitstreams: 1 Disserta??o de Eduardo O MIranda.pdf: 3983498 bytes, checksum: 9f4b8c2b28cd1c0e3cc1e804b85f84e1 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2015-07-25T01:26:05Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Disserta??o de Eduardo O MIranda.pdf: 3983498 bytes, checksum: 9f4b8c2b28cd1c0e3cc1e804b85f84e1 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2014-08-20 / This work aims to analyze the graph-visual elements outlined by bodies-territories Afox? Pomba de Mal?, with emphasis on parades during Micareta of Feira de Santana, Bahia. To do this, have made every effort to answer the following problem: How does the design of the bodies-territories evidenced by Afox? Pomba de Mal?? In this scenario, we resorted to the Design, Planning and Territory Body-category associated with methodological crossroads between the Hermeneutics of Visuality with Oral History. Weaving the historical trajectory of Afox? Pomba de Mal? entailed analyzing the constitution of New Street, city originally occupied by black populations derived from Reconcavo Baiano, under the permission of Mrs. Pomba, who held possession of the land district. The participation of blacks in that area provided an opportunity to ritualize the African Legacy, identified during this research as one of the factors responsible for the founding of Afox? in vogue. In the quest for understanding of the visual elements scrawled by bodies-found territories of pombalenses to setup Projetual design, with leads in design-to-artifact and design-for-communication. Desenh?sticos such aspects, they provide the dimensions outlined in the Quilombo territorialities Area as well as the appropriation of the public space of the larger party Feirense street. Develop this work with looks of Geography becomes an embryonic action, since the category of analysis-Body Territory, until the ending of this thesis, has received contributions from other geographers. Thus, I see this as an important starting point in provocative tessitura as well as collaboratively to Cultural Geography. Moreover, African ancestry brought valuable in terms of the perception of immaterial energy potential motivators contributions, which, at various times, were found in the surveyed areas. / Este trabalho prop?e analisar os elementos gr?fico-visuais tra?ados pelos corpos-territ?rios do Afox? Pomba de Mal?, com ?nfase nos desfiles durante as Micaretas de Feira de Santana, Bahia. Para tal, intentamos responder a seguinte problem?tica: Como se d? o desenho dos corpos-territ?rios evidenciados pelo Afox? Pomba de Mal?? Nesse cen?rio, recorreu-se as categoria Desenho, Territ?rio e Corpo-Territ?rio associadas ? encruzilhada metodol?gica entre a Hermen?utica da Visualidade com a Hist?ria Oral. Tecer a trajet?ria hist?rica do Afox? Pomba de Mal? implicou analisar a constitui??o do bairro da Rua Nova, localidade inicialmente ocupada pelas popula??es negras oriundas do Rec?ncavo Baiano, sob a permiss?o de Dona Pomba, a qual detinha a posse das terras. A participa??o das popula??es negras nesse espa?o oportunizou a ritualiza??o do Legado Africano, identificado durante essa pesquisa como um dos fatores respons?veis pela funda??o do Afox? em voga. Na busca pela compreens?o acercados elementos visuais rabiscados pelos corpos-territ?rios dos pombalenses verificou-se a configura??o do Desenho Projetual, com as deriva??es em desenho-de-artefato e desenho-de-comunica??o. Tais aspectos desenh?sticos, aportam dimens?es nas territorialidades delineadas no Espa?o Quilombola, assim como, na apropria??o do espa?o p?blico da maior festa de rua feirense. Desenvolver esse trabalho com olhares da Geografia torna-se uma a??o embrion?ria, posto que a categoria de an?lise Corpo-Territ?rio, at? o findar desta disserta??o, n?o recebeu contribui??es de outros ge?grafos. Destarte, entendo esse ponto de partida como relevante na tessitura provocativa, bem como colaborativa para a Geografia Cultural. Ademais, a ancestralidade africana trouxe contribui??es valorosas no que tange a percep??o das potencias dinamizadoras das energias imateriais, as quais, em diversos momentos, foram verificadas nos espa?os pesquisados.

Esta dissertação procura comparar a mídia exterior das cidades de São Paulo e Buenos Aires. Para tanto se vale de métodos e procedimentos interdisciplinares de duas grandes áreas: geografia e comunicação. O objeto de estudo é compreendido no contexto do desenvolvimento das cidades e, dessa forma são apresentados elementos mínimos sobre os processos de desenvolvimento urbano e posteriormente as principais questões relativas ao tema no período contemporâneo. Na cidade de São Paulo a mídia exterior foi proibida no ano de 2006 enquanto Buenos Aires, embora possua complexa legislação, apresenta grande quantidade de mídia exterior em sua paisagem. Ao analisar profundamente os tipos de painéis, as normas e os atores, se elencam os principais paradigmas contemporâneos sobre a temática nas cidades em questão. Relacionando essas questões de modo comparativo conclui-se que existem evidências que tanto as normas para existência quanto para inexistência da mídia exterior podem priorizar interesses pessoais, de grupos empresariais locais ou internacionais. Em São Paulo, sob o discurso da cidade limpa e em Buenos Aires sob a premissa da criação de uma zona de turismo a partir de uma região repleta de painéis em Led (Times Square Sul-americana) os governantes criam meios e métodos para validarem seus interesses. / The aim of this work is compare outdoor advertising of the cities of Sao Paulo (Brazil) and Buenos Aires (Argentina). For that relies on interdisciplinary methods and procedures of two major areas: geography and communication. The object of this study is understood the context of the development of cities and thus minimal elements are presented on the processes of urban development and subsequently main issues relating to the theme in the contemporary period. In Sao Paulo the outdoor advertising was banned in 2006 while Buenos Aires, even having a complex legislation, features lots of outdoor media in your landscape When you do a thorough analysis of the types of panels, the rules and characters, if we list the major paradigms in contemporary cities on the topic in question. Combining these issues in a comparative way it is concluded that there is evidence that both the rules for existence and for lack of outdoor media can prioritize personal interests, business groups locally and internationally. In São Paulo, the discourse of Cidade Limpa (clean city) and in Buenos Aires under the premise of creating a tourist area from a region full of Led panels (the Times Square of the South America) governments create means and methods to validate their interests.

Submitted by Rosivalda Pereira (mrs.pereira@ufma.br) on 2017-05-25T19:59:55Z No. of bitstreams: 1 MilenaCoelhoLima.pdf: 1176529 bytes, checksum: 735b42c7337885216e46fdbdf16dfbb4 (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-05-25T19:59:55Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 MilenaCoelhoLima.pdf: 1176529 bytes, checksum: 735b42c7337885216e46fdbdf16dfbb4 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2015-11-27 / One Hundred Years of Solitud (1967), novel by Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez, is a masterpiece of love and loneliness, in which reality and mysticism are enlaced to illustrate the miraculous history of Latin America through the tropical and fictitious settlement of Macondo, enlarged by the fantasy of its author. This research, integrating science and literary text, examines spatiality of the above-mentioned novel based on human and cultural geography and emphasizes space of human sociality by the categories of location, space, landscape and lived experiences. Hence, narrative space represents an essential category to comprehend subjective and intersubjective relations, as well as different feelings such as topophilia and topophobia that man establishes with locations. Research Methodology is based on phenomenology and the results reveal space as a protagonist of this novel, underlining the importance of its meaning in the narrative. / Cem anos de solidão (1967), do autor colombiano Gabriel García Márquez, é uma obra prima de amor e solidão, em que realidade e mito se entrelaçam para mostrar através do povoado tropical e fictício de Macondo, a história maravilhosa da América Latina, alargada pela fantasia do seu autor. Esta pesquisa que entrelaça ciência e texto literário, objetivou estudar a espacialidade na referida obra à luz da Geografia Humanista Cultural. Tal estudo põe em relevo o espaço das convivências humanas, através dos conceitos de lugar, espaço, paisagem e experiências vividas. Sob esta ótica, o espaço narrativo se constitui uma categoria essencial para se compreender as relações subjetivas, intersubjetivas e os diferentes sentimentos que o homem estabelece com o lugar, entre os quais estão os sentimentos de topofilia e topofobia. A base metodológica da pesquisa é a fenomenologia. Os resultados desta pesquisa apontaram o espaço como protagonista da obra, o que confirma a importância que semelhante categoria assume na narrativa.

Throughout the Spanish poetic production of the 20th century, cities have developed a relevant role as a recurring space at the same time as society urbanized and an exodus took place from agricultural areas to the work centers offered by the cities. Since the second half of the 19th century the city has been the meeting place for people from different backgrounds where the poet found, from his exclusive point of view, a new universe to develop in his work. However, the evolution of capitalist society sponsored the poet's transition from an artist to a worker in the service sector, now able to describe the everyday life through that "other voice" that Octavio Paz so well exhibited in his work (Paz 1990). This way, I argue that with the passage of time and the disappearance of the romanticized figure of the poet, writers who describe the daily commute of the inhabitants of the cities emerged among the working classes through a simple style that has come to be related with other transcultural artistic movements such as Minimalism or Dirty Realism. My dissertation studies the representation of the urban working class in three contemporary Spanish poets: Karmelo C. Iribarren, Itziar Mínguez Arnáiz, and Fernando del Val. I analyze their shared poetics of the city with a focus on the omnipresent common objects that seem to represent the urban everyday life. In Chapter One, I develop a conceptual “trialectic” lens through which to approach all three poets based on the convergence of urban studies, the analysis of poetic form in relation to the artistic current of Minimalism, and the imprint that U.S. author Raymond Carver-as both literary persona and style-left on Spain since his publication in translation in the late 1980s. In Chapter Two, I analyze how the processes of gentrification and privatization of public spaces reflect an experience of suffering by the working class in Iribarren's poetry. In Chapter Three, I study gender-space relations as I analyze what it means for working class women to walk the city and occupy public spaces traditionally reserved for men in Mínguez Arnáiz’ poetry. In Chapter Four, I follow Spanish expatriates across the Atlantic Ocean in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis to explore resistance movements against spatial exploitation that force working classes into geographical oblivion in Del Val's “New York trilogy.” To carry out this project, I propose to analyze the works of these three authors emphasizing not only the common characteristics that each one of them presents but also those that make them unique. With this, I intend to find out the paths Spanish poetry is taking and how this realist-style poetry differs from the realistic trends of "the poetry of experience" and the "dirty realism" so popular in the 80s and 90s. I argue that with the entry of the new millennium and especially with the extensive implementation of neoliberal policies that led to the economic crisis of 2008, there is a boom in the poetry of resistance that seeks to prove that an egalitarian right to the city is more urgent than ever.

Abstract This study examines people-centred Thai NGOs trying to help peasants empower themselves in order to compete better in conflicts over land, water, forest, and capital, during the 1970s to 1990s. The study investigates how the NGOs contested asymmetric power relations among government officials, private entrepreneurs and ordinary people while helping raise the people’s confidence in their own power to negotiate their demands with other actors.¶ The thesis argues that the NGOs are able to play an interventionist role when a number of key factors coexist. First, the NGOs are able to understand local situations, which contain asymmetric power relations between different actors, in relation to current changes in the wider context of the Thai political economy and seize the time to take action. Secondly, the NGOs are able to articulate a social meaning beyond the dominating rhetoric of the ‘state’ and the ‘capitalists’ which encourages the people’s participation in collective activities. Thirdly, while dealing with one problem in social relations and negotiation with local environment, the NGOs are able to recognise new problems as they arise and rapidly identify a new political space for the actors to renegotiate their conflicting interests and demands. Fourthly, the NGOs are able to recreate new meanings, new actors and reform their organisations and networks to deal with new situations. Finally, the NGOs are able to effectively use three pillars of their movement, namely individuals, organisations and networks to deal with everyday politics and collective protest.¶ The case studies in three villages in Northern Thailand reveal that the NGOs were able to play an interventionist role in specific situations through their alternative development strategies somewhat influenced by structural Marxism. The thesis recommends that the NGO interventionist role be continued so as to overcome tensions within the NGO community, for instance, between the NGOs working at the grass-roots level and the NGOs working at regional and national levels (including NGO funding agencies); local everyday conflicts; and the bipolar views of a society among the NGOs expressed in dichotomous thinking between ‘rural’ and ‘urban’, ‘community’ and ‘state’, conflict and order, actor and system.¶ The fragmentation of NGO social and environmental movements showed that there is no single formula or easy solution to the problems. If the NGOs want to continue their interventionist role to help empower ordinary people and help them gain access to productive resources, they must move beyond their bipolar views of a society to discover the middle ground to search for new meanings, new actors, new issues and to create again and again counter-hegemony movements. This could be done by having abstract development theories assessed and enriched by concrete development practices and vice versa. Both theorists and practitioners need to use their own imagination to invent and reinvent what and how best to continue.

Development literature has not accorded sufficient attention to culture as a positive aspect of development until recently. Hence, in terms of using culture as a protective mechanism against gender-based violence, not much has been investigated or reported, since most studies on gender-based violence have focused more on cultural influences as the cause or effect of violence against women. However, in the case of Papua New Guinea (PNG) culture has always been the focus in regards to genderbased violence, portrayed as the cause of violence against women. Occasionally sources state there are traditional customs or beliefs that protect women from violence, but further explanation is not provided. Hence, this research investigated the question, “How can culture address gender-based violence in contemporary, rural Papua New Guinea?” This study offers an opportunity to view PNG culture as a solution to a problem, instead of as merely a problem to be solved. To investigate how culture can be used positively as a strategy to address genderbased violence, a case study was conducted among the Sulamesi people of Mt Bosavi in the Southern highlands province of PNG. This research was conducted in a rural area because in general Papua New Guineans perceive people living in the villages as the ones living a traditional lifestyle, where established cultural norms and behaviours prevail. Using a qualitative research approach, the research investigated whether there were any traditional protective mechanisms in PNG used to address gender-based violence. This thesis concludes that through the identification of culture-driven protective mechanisms, it can be demonstrated that culture can be used as a strategy to address gender based violence. However, caution must be applied, since not all the protective mechanisms identified are desirable or constructive.