IAN SAEM MAJNEP was born about 1948 in Papua New Guinea, in the Kalam-speaking region of the Kaironk Valley, near Simbai Patrol Post, Madang Province, an area that first came under Government administration in 1959. In 1963 he began a long-term association with the University of Auckland's interdisciplinary research program among the Kalam and Kobon peoples, as an expert on local animals and plants and Kalam culture. From 1968-1977 he worked as a technician in the Department of Anthropology and Sociology at the University of Papua New Guinea. He and the anthropologist, the late Ralph Bulmer, coauthored several works on Kalam knowledge and use of animals and plants including "Birds of my Kalam Country" (1977) and "Kalam Hunting Traditions" (1990). In 1989 the University of Papua New Guinea awarded him an honorary doctorate in science. At present he is collaborating with the linguist Andrew Pawley and botanist Rhys Gardner on a book, "Kalam Plant Lore", and a dictionary of Kalam. He still lives in the Kaironk Valley.
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