Significant Spaces: The Role of Marine Ecosystems in Pacific Island Cultures
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Abstract
Recent scholarship on the collapse of Rapanui (Easter Island) society as a result of self-inflicted environmental degradation has inadvertently raised the international profile of Pacific islands as small, bounded and vulnerable ecosystems. The history of Rapanui is not typical however. Most of the inhabitants of Remote Oceania were not bound by the sea, but rather embraced it as both habitat and pathway to resources and opportunities beyond their home islands.
Academic neglect of the sea as a factor in Pacific history ignores its central role in islander actions and narratives. Before the imposition of colonial rule, islanders spent much time in and on the ocean, drawing sustenance from it, mapping it, fighting over it, and deriving a sense of identity from it. Such a world created a wider sense of community and belonging.
Academic neglect of the sea as a factor in Pacific history ignores its central role in islander actions and narratives. Before the imposition of colonial rule, islanders spent much time in and on the ocean, drawing sustenance from it, mapping it, fighting over it, and deriving a sense of identity from it. Such a world created a wider sense of community and belonging.
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Betram, G. & Watters, R. (1985) "The MIRAB Economy in South Pacific Microstates", Pacific Viewpoint, 26(3).
D'Arcy, P. (2005) The People of the Sea: Environment, Identity and History in Oceania. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press.
Diamond, J. (25 March 2004) "Twilight at Easter", New York Review of Books.
Ellis, W. (1969) Polynesian Researches: Hawaii. Rutland, Vermont: Charles E. Tuttle Co., Publishers.
Finney, B.R. (1979) "Voyaging", in Jennings, J.D. (ed.) The Prehistory of Polynesia. Canberra: Australian National University. https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674181267.c15
Finney, B. R. (1984) "The Ocean and the Quality of Life", in Gopalakrishnan, C. (ed.) The Emerging Marine Economy of the Pacific. London: Butterworths.
Gifford, E.W. (1929) Tongan Society. Honolulu: Bishop Museum.
Gladwin, T. (1970) East is a Big Bird: Navigation and Logic on Puluwat Atoll. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Goodenough, W.H. & Feinberg, R. (1995) "Epilogue: Seafaring in the Pacific, Past and Present", in Richard Feinberg, R. (ed.) Seafaring in the contemporary Pacific Islands: Studies in continuity and change. De Kalb, Illinois: Northern Illinois University Press.
Hau'ofa, E. (1994) "Our Sea of Islands", The Contemporary Pacific, 6(1).
Henry, T. (1928) Ancient Tahiti, Honolulu: BPBM.
Hughes, H. (7 May 2003) "Aid has failed the Pacific", Issue Analysis no. 33, Centre for Independent Studies.
Irwin, G. (1992) The Prehistoric Exploration and Colonisation of the Pacific. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511518225
Kamakau, S. (1961) Ruling Chiefs of Hawaii. Honolulu: Kamehameha Schools Press.
Kirch, P.V. & Green, R.C. (2001) Hawaiki, Ancestral Polynesia: an essay in historical anthropology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511613678
Lewis, D. (1977) From Maui to Cook. The Discovery and Settlement of the Pacific. Lane Cove, New South Wales: Doubleday.
Lewis, D. (1978) The Voyaging Stars: Secrets of the Pacific Island Navigators. Sydney: Collins.
Lewthwaite, G.R. (May 1966) "Man and the Sea in Early Tahiti: Maritime Economy through European Eyes", Pacific Viewpoint, 7(1).
Lieber, M.D. (1994) More Than a Living: Fishing and the Social Order on a Polynesian Atoll. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press.
Lobban, C.S. & Schefter, M. (1997) Tropical Pacific Island Environments. Guam: University of Guam Press.
Malo, D. (1951) Hawaiian Antiquities: Moolelo Hawaii, 2nd edition (English translation by Nathanial B. Emerson). Honolulu: Bishop Museum.
Nero, K. (1997) "The Material World Remade" in Donald Denoon, D. (ed.) The Cambridge History of the Pacific Islanders. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521441957.012
Peebles, D. (2005) Pacific Regional Order. Canberra: Asia Pacific Press. https://doi.org/10.26530/OAPEN_459432
Teaiwa, T (1996) "Review of A New Oceania: Rediscovering Our Sea of Islands, Eric Waddell et al (eds.) University of the South Pacific School of Social and Economic Development, Suva, 1993", in The Contemporary Pacific, 8(1).
Teiwaki, R. (1988) Management of Marine Resources in Kiribati. Suva: University of the South Pacific.