Jean-François Zorn
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780195396447
- eISBN:
- 9780199979318
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195396447.003.0010
- Subject:
- History, History of Religion, World Modern History
This chapter explores three cases—Tahiti, the Loyalty Islands, and Madagascar—in order to illustrate how Protestants from the Société des Missions Évangéliques de Paris (or Paris Mission) negotiated ...
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This chapter explores three cases—Tahiti, the Loyalty Islands, and Madagascar—in order to illustrate how Protestants from the Société des Missions Évangéliques de Paris (or Paris Mission) negotiated working in colonies alongside French Catholics. In each situation, the Paris Mission defended a missionary internationalism against a colonial nationalism, which both the French state and Catholic missionaries sought to impose by associating Protestantism with allegiance to the British Empire. The Paris Mission viewed this association of politics and religion as a trap meant to subordinate apostolic work to a political project.Less
This chapter explores three cases—Tahiti, the Loyalty Islands, and Madagascar—in order to illustrate how Protestants from the Société des Missions Évangéliques de Paris (or Paris Mission) negotiated working in colonies alongside French Catholics. In each situation, the Paris Mission defended a missionary internationalism against a colonial nationalism, which both the French state and Catholic missionaries sought to impose by associating Protestantism with allegiance to the British Empire. The Paris Mission viewed this association of politics and religion as a trap meant to subordinate apostolic work to a political project.
MATT K. MATSUDA
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195162950
- eISBN:
- 9780199867660
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195162950.003.0005
- Subject:
- History, European Modern History
This chapter examines the seizure of Tahiti by French warships and the long resistance of Queen Pomare and chiefly leaders from around the Polynesian islands. The story focuses on the ways that the ...
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This chapter examines the seizure of Tahiti by French warships and the long resistance of Queen Pomare and chiefly leaders from around the Polynesian islands. The story focuses on the ways that the history of Tahiti, so torn by violence, civil war, and anticolonial struggle, was erased by French imperialists so that by the middle 19th century the primary representations became “islands of love.” Analyses of written and visual production, particularly the works of Pierre Loti and Paul Gauguin, demonstrate the ways that erotic loves of Tahitian “natives” came to occlude violent warfare, and the complicated implications of battles and alliances between the Queen and French Naval officers struggling for control of the Society Islands.Less
This chapter examines the seizure of Tahiti by French warships and the long resistance of Queen Pomare and chiefly leaders from around the Polynesian islands. The story focuses on the ways that the history of Tahiti, so torn by violence, civil war, and anticolonial struggle, was erased by French imperialists so that by the middle 19th century the primary representations became “islands of love.” Analyses of written and visual production, particularly the works of Pierre Loti and Paul Gauguin, demonstrate the ways that erotic loves of Tahitian “natives” came to occlude violent warfare, and the complicated implications of battles and alliances between the Queen and French Naval officers struggling for control of the Society Islands.
Andrew Lewis
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199568666
- eISBN:
- 9780191721595
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199568666.003.0003
- Subject:
- Law, Public International Law
This chapter traces the legal history of Pitcairn Island. Many of the original settlers were murdered, and their Tahitian womenfolk were ill-treated — and there was no machinery of justice, at least ...
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This chapter traces the legal history of Pitcairn Island. Many of the original settlers were murdered, and their Tahitian womenfolk were ill-treated — and there was no machinery of justice, at least of the kind that modern lawyers would recognize as such — to deal with these activities. There was much coming and going of residents, the addition of new blood from time to time, a brief forced deportation to Tahiti in 1831, and a transportation to Norfolk Island (a penal colony until 1855) in 1856. There were various assertions of authority over Pitcairn by the British Crown from 1813, and particularly from 1856. And, from about 1886, Seventh Day Adventist practices were adopted on Pitcairn. In 1898, the Crown brought Pitcairn within the operation of the British Settlements Act, and within its definition of a colony, in response to the need to try Harry Christian for the murder of two people on the island. Thereafter some measures were taken by the British to put in place a criminal justice system, at least on paper. But there was still no British presence on the island until the criminal proceedings in Christian were underway, and there were only a couple of brief visits — one by a legal adviser in 1958 and one by the Governor in 1973. This indicates a laxity on the part of the British to the point of turpitude.Less
This chapter traces the legal history of Pitcairn Island. Many of the original settlers were murdered, and their Tahitian womenfolk were ill-treated — and there was no machinery of justice, at least of the kind that modern lawyers would recognize as such — to deal with these activities. There was much coming and going of residents, the addition of new blood from time to time, a brief forced deportation to Tahiti in 1831, and a transportation to Norfolk Island (a penal colony until 1855) in 1856. There were various assertions of authority over Pitcairn by the British Crown from 1813, and particularly from 1856. And, from about 1886, Seventh Day Adventist practices were adopted on Pitcairn. In 1898, the Crown brought Pitcairn within the operation of the British Settlements Act, and within its definition of a colony, in response to the need to try Harry Christian for the murder of two people on the island. Thereafter some measures were taken by the British to put in place a criminal justice system, at least on paper. But there was still no British presence on the island until the criminal proceedings in Christian were underway, and there were only a couple of brief visits — one by a legal adviser in 1958 and one by the Governor in 1973. This indicates a laxity on the part of the British to the point of turpitude.
Neil Rennie
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198186274
- eISBN:
- 9780191674471
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198186274.003.0004
- Subject:
- Literature, American, 18th Century and Early American Literature
The ‘Terra Australis’ of Joseph Hall's Mundus and of the French 18th-century utopists was, in geographical theory, no fiction. In 1765, Charles de Brosses's Histoire des navigations aux terres ...
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The ‘Terra Australis’ of Joseph Hall's Mundus and of the French 18th-century utopists was, in geographical theory, no fiction. In 1765, Charles de Brosses's Histoire des navigations aux terres australes took the form of a manifesto, with detailed plans for the exploration and colonization of the southern continent, and the next year there appeared the first of the three volumes of John Callander's Terra Australis Cognita (1766–8), pirating de Brosses's work and translating the argument for a French colony into an argument for a British colony — no mere utopia. In 1766, the British Admiralty took up the search for the southern continent officially, sending out Captain Samuel Wallis in what had been Captain John Byron's ship, the Dolphin, accompanied by Philip Carteret in the unseaworthy Swallow, with which Wallis parted company on entering the Pacific Ocean. Wallis sailed from the history of geographical theory into the history of discovery when he reached Tahiti. Louis–Antoine de Bougainville sighted the high volcanic peak of Tahiti on April 2, 1768.Less
The ‘Terra Australis’ of Joseph Hall's Mundus and of the French 18th-century utopists was, in geographical theory, no fiction. In 1765, Charles de Brosses's Histoire des navigations aux terres australes took the form of a manifesto, with detailed plans for the exploration and colonization of the southern continent, and the next year there appeared the first of the three volumes of John Callander's Terra Australis Cognita (1766–8), pirating de Brosses's work and translating the argument for a French colony into an argument for a British colony — no mere utopia. In 1766, the British Admiralty took up the search for the southern continent officially, sending out Captain Samuel Wallis in what had been Captain John Byron's ship, the Dolphin, accompanied by Philip Carteret in the unseaworthy Swallow, with which Wallis parted company on entering the Pacific Ocean. Wallis sailed from the history of geographical theory into the history of discovery when he reached Tahiti. Louis–Antoine de Bougainville sighted the high volcanic peak of Tahiti on April 2, 1768.
Neil Rennie
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198186274
- eISBN:
- 9780191674471
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198186274.003.0005
- Subject:
- Literature, American, 18th Century and Early American Literature
Louis-Antoine Bougainville reached Saint–Malo on March 16, 1769, and was soon with Aotourou in Paris, France. More than a year before the publication of Bougainville's Voyage, the tale of Tahiti was ...
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Louis-Antoine Bougainville reached Saint–Malo on March 16, 1769, and was soon with Aotourou in Paris, France. More than a year before the publication of Bougainville's Voyage, the tale of Tahiti was being told. In Voyage, Bougainville narrated that Aotourou's great passion in Paris was for the opera, that he was very fond of Voltaire's correspondent, the Duchesse de Choiseul, and that his knowledge of French was elementary. But even if Aotourou could not manage ca da fa ga sa za, there were others who would speak for him, and to understand why they said what they did it is necessary to turn from the reality of Aotourou to the theory of ‘l' Homme Sauvage’. This chapter examines in particular the ruminations of Jean-Jacques Rousseau at Saint-Germain in November 1754, focusing on his revolution: to place natural man in a state of nature which was not simply the culture of savages, but ideally natural, and therefore pre-cultural, prehistorical, and — inevitably — hypothetical. This chapter also looks at the story of Omai.Less
Louis-Antoine Bougainville reached Saint–Malo on March 16, 1769, and was soon with Aotourou in Paris, France. More than a year before the publication of Bougainville's Voyage, the tale of Tahiti was being told. In Voyage, Bougainville narrated that Aotourou's great passion in Paris was for the opera, that he was very fond of Voltaire's correspondent, the Duchesse de Choiseul, and that his knowledge of French was elementary. But even if Aotourou could not manage ca da fa ga sa za, there were others who would speak for him, and to understand why they said what they did it is necessary to turn from the reality of Aotourou to the theory of ‘l' Homme Sauvage’. This chapter examines in particular the ruminations of Jean-Jacques Rousseau at Saint-Germain in November 1754, focusing on his revolution: to place natural man in a state of nature which was not simply the culture of savages, but ideally natural, and therefore pre-cultural, prehistorical, and — inevitably — hypothetical. This chapter also looks at the story of Omai.
Neil Rennie
- Published in print:
- 1998
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198186274
- eISBN:
- 9780191674471
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198186274.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, American, 18th Century and Early American Literature
Early in 1787, Joseph Banks convinced the British government of the advantages for transplanting breadfruit from Tahiti to the West Indies. He believed that this almost paradisal plant could usefully ...
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Early in 1787, Joseph Banks convinced the British government of the advantages for transplanting breadfruit from Tahiti to the West Indies. He believed that this almost paradisal plant could usefully feed the slaves in the West Indies, who would produce cheaper sugar for the planters and merchants in the West Indies. There would inevitably be more trouble initially, but Banks persuaded British officials of the ultimate benefits of an expedition and in May the government instructed the Admiralty accordingly. The Bounty sailed on December 27, 1787, under the command of Lieutenant William Bligh, and anchored in Matavai Bay, Tahiti, on October 26, 1788. Bligh had found the carpenter ‘insolent’ and the Master ‘troublesome’ on the voyage out, and he had also been frustrated by bad weather at the Horn, which had forced the Bounty to turn back and take the passage to the Pacific via the Cape of Good Hope. On arrival at Matavai Bay, Bligh asked immediately for news of Omai, and heard that Omai was no more.Less
Early in 1787, Joseph Banks convinced the British government of the advantages for transplanting breadfruit from Tahiti to the West Indies. He believed that this almost paradisal plant could usefully feed the slaves in the West Indies, who would produce cheaper sugar for the planters and merchants in the West Indies. There would inevitably be more trouble initially, but Banks persuaded British officials of the ultimate benefits of an expedition and in May the government instructed the Admiralty accordingly. The Bounty sailed on December 27, 1787, under the command of Lieutenant William Bligh, and anchored in Matavai Bay, Tahiti, on October 26, 1788. Bligh had found the carpenter ‘insolent’ and the Master ‘troublesome’ on the voyage out, and he had also been frustrated by bad weather at the Horn, which had forced the Bounty to turn back and take the passage to the Pacific via the Cape of Good Hope. On arrival at Matavai Bay, Bligh asked immediately for news of Omai, and heard that Omai was no more.
Charles Forsdick
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198160144
- eISBN:
- 9780191673795
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198160144.003.0004
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature
The role of Polynesia in the French Empire was more strategic than economic, but its sensitive location was of great interest. Victor Segalen's own first ...
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The role of Polynesia in the French Empire was more strategic than economic, but its sensitive location was of great interest. Victor Segalen's own first major literary work, Les Immémoriaux, has been recognized as one of the only early twentieth-century attempts to analyse Tahitian difference and to strive towards textual recreation of that very difference. For Segalen, the aesthetic attraction of exoticism is in the struggle to maintain difference rather than in the acceptance of the inevitability of its decline. Segalen's attitude to the role of Empire in the transformation of Polynesian culture and society is muted not only by its displacement into the context of early nineteenth-century evangelism, but also by the author's tendency to consider the processes of colonialism in the wider context of Westernization. The narrative of Les Immémoriaux is both obviously prescriptive and latently normative, suggesting a specifically Maori omniscience without any claims to universality.Less
The role of Polynesia in the French Empire was more strategic than economic, but its sensitive location was of great interest. Victor Segalen's own first major literary work, Les Immémoriaux, has been recognized as one of the only early twentieth-century attempts to analyse Tahitian difference and to strive towards textual recreation of that very difference. For Segalen, the aesthetic attraction of exoticism is in the struggle to maintain difference rather than in the acceptance of the inevitability of its decline. Segalen's attitude to the role of Empire in the transformation of Polynesian culture and society is muted not only by its displacement into the context of early nineteenth-century evangelism, but also by the author's tendency to consider the processes of colonialism in the wider context of Westernization. The narrative of Les Immémoriaux is both obviously prescriptive and latently normative, suggesting a specifically Maori omniscience without any claims to universality.
Vanessa Smith, Nicholas Thomas, and Maia Nuku (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824836764
- eISBN:
- 9780824871130
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824836764.003.0006
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Pacific Studies
This chapter describes the island of Tahiti. The place consists of two peninsulas—both of which are circular with an isthmus of low land about two or three miles long. The larger peninsula is called ...
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This chapter describes the island of Tahiti. The place consists of two peninsulas—both of which are circular with an isthmus of low land about two or three miles long. The larger peninsula is called Tahiti Nui or Great Tahiti, which is about 80 miles in circumference, while the smaller one is called Tahiti Iti or Taiarapu, which is about 30 miles in circumference. Tahiti is, in most parts, defended by a reef of corals in some places, which are a mile or two from the shore, and within which lie several small black and white beaches. In addition, both peninsulas are mountainous and covered with different trees.Less
This chapter describes the island of Tahiti. The place consists of two peninsulas—both of which are circular with an isthmus of low land about two or three miles long. The larger peninsula is called Tahiti Nui or Great Tahiti, which is about 80 miles in circumference, while the smaller one is called Tahiti Iti or Taiarapu, which is about 30 miles in circumference. Tahiti is, in most parts, defended by a reef of corals in some places, which are a mile or two from the shore, and within which lie several small black and white beaches. In addition, both peninsulas are mountainous and covered with different trees.
Jennifer Newell
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824832810
- eISBN:
- 9780824870744
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824832810.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Pacific Studies
When Captain Samuel Wallis became the first European to land at Tahiti in June 1767, he left not only a British flag on shore but also three guinea hens, a pair of turkeys, a pregnant cat, and a ...
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When Captain Samuel Wallis became the first European to land at Tahiti in June 1767, he left not only a British flag on shore but also three guinea hens, a pair of turkeys, a pregnant cat, and a garden planted with peas for the chiefess Purea. Thereafter, a succession of European captains, missionaries, and others planted seeds and introduced livestock from around the world. In turn, the islanders traded away great quantities of important island resources, including valuable and spiritually significant plants and animals. What did these exchanges mean? What was their impact? The answers are often unexpected. They also reveal the ways islanders retained control over their societies and landscapes in an era of increasing European intervention. This book explores the effects of “ecological exchange” on one island from the mid-eighteenth century to the present day. The book uncovers the potency of trading in nature. It uncovers the cultural and ecological impacts of cross-cultural exchange. The story progresses from the first trades on Tahiti's shores for provisions for British and French ships to the contrasting histories of cattle in Tahiti and Hawai‘i. Two key exportations of species are analyzed: the great breadfruit transplantation project that linked Britain to Tahiti and the Caribbean and the politically volatile trade in salt-pork that ran between Tahiti and the Australian colonies in the nineteenth century. In each case, the book explores the long-term impacts of the exchanges on modern Tahiti.Less
When Captain Samuel Wallis became the first European to land at Tahiti in June 1767, he left not only a British flag on shore but also three guinea hens, a pair of turkeys, a pregnant cat, and a garden planted with peas for the chiefess Purea. Thereafter, a succession of European captains, missionaries, and others planted seeds and introduced livestock from around the world. In turn, the islanders traded away great quantities of important island resources, including valuable and spiritually significant plants and animals. What did these exchanges mean? What was their impact? The answers are often unexpected. They also reveal the ways islanders retained control over their societies and landscapes in an era of increasing European intervention. This book explores the effects of “ecological exchange” on one island from the mid-eighteenth century to the present day. The book uncovers the potency of trading in nature. It uncovers the cultural and ecological impacts of cross-cultural exchange. The story progresses from the first trades on Tahiti's shores for provisions for British and French ships to the contrasting histories of cattle in Tahiti and Hawai‘i. Two key exportations of species are analyzed: the great breadfruit transplantation project that linked Britain to Tahiti and the Caribbean and the politically volatile trade in salt-pork that ran between Tahiti and the Australian colonies in the nineteenth century. In each case, the book explores the long-term impacts of the exchanges on modern Tahiti.
Vanessa Smith and Nicholas Thomas (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824836764
- eISBN:
- 9780824871130
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824836764.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Pacific Studies
The mutiny on the Bounty was one of the most controversial events of eighteenth-century maritime history. This book publishes a full narrative of the events by one of the participants, the ...
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The mutiny on the Bounty was one of the most controversial events of eighteenth-century maritime history. This book publishes a full narrative of the events by one of the participants, the boatswain's mate, James Morrison, who tells the story of the mounting tensions over the course of the voyage out to Tahiti, the fascinating encounter with Polynesian culture there, and the shocking drama of the event itself. In the aftermath, Morrison was among those who tried to make a new life on Tahiti. In doing so, he gained a deeper understanding of Polynesian culture than any European who went on to write about the people of the island and their way of life before it was changed forever by Christianity and colonial contact. Morrison was not a professional scientist but a keen observer with a sympathy for Islanders. This is the most insightful and wide-ranging of early European accounts of Tahitian life. It is based directly on a close study of Morrison's original manuscript, one of the treasures of the Mitchell Library in Sydney, Australia. The book assesses and explains Morrison's observations of Islander culture and social relations, both on Tubuai in the Austral Islands and on Tahiti itself. The book fully identifies the Tahitian people and places that Morrison refers to and makes this remarkable text accessible for the first time to all those interested in an extraordinary chapter of early Pacific history.Less
The mutiny on the Bounty was one of the most controversial events of eighteenth-century maritime history. This book publishes a full narrative of the events by one of the participants, the boatswain's mate, James Morrison, who tells the story of the mounting tensions over the course of the voyage out to Tahiti, the fascinating encounter with Polynesian culture there, and the shocking drama of the event itself. In the aftermath, Morrison was among those who tried to make a new life on Tahiti. In doing so, he gained a deeper understanding of Polynesian culture than any European who went on to write about the people of the island and their way of life before it was changed forever by Christianity and colonial contact. Morrison was not a professional scientist but a keen observer with a sympathy for Islanders. This is the most insightful and wide-ranging of early European accounts of Tahitian life. It is based directly on a close study of Morrison's original manuscript, one of the treasures of the Mitchell Library in Sydney, Australia. The book assesses and explains Morrison's observations of Islander culture and social relations, both on Tubuai in the Austral Islands and on Tahiti itself. The book fully identifies the Tahitian people and places that Morrison refers to and makes this remarkable text accessible for the first time to all those interested in an extraordinary chapter of early Pacific history.
Ben Finney
- Published in print:
- 1994
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520080027
- eISBN:
- 9780520913059
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520080027.003.0002
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter suggests the case that it would have enabled canoes in Polynesia to sail much better than Andrew Sharp and other critics allowed. Long voyages to windward made by tacking directly ...
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This chapter suggests the case that it would have enabled canoes in Polynesia to sail much better than Andrew Sharp and other critics allowed. Long voyages to windward made by tacking directly against the wind may have been out of the question for Polynesian mariners, but it seemed to the author that their canoes sailed well enough to windward to have cut obliquely across the wind to destinations which would have been beyond their reach if they could only sail before the wind. The chapter discusses a way to test the ability of a Polynesian double canoe to sail long slants across and slightly into the trade winds: the legendary voyaging track between Hawai'i and Tahiti by the catamaran Rehu Moana. In 1967, after completing the Nālehia tests, an article outlining how a traditionally navigated voyaging canoe could be sailed from Hawai'i to Tahiti and back was published.Less
This chapter suggests the case that it would have enabled canoes in Polynesia to sail much better than Andrew Sharp and other critics allowed. Long voyages to windward made by tacking directly against the wind may have been out of the question for Polynesian mariners, but it seemed to the author that their canoes sailed well enough to windward to have cut obliquely across the wind to destinations which would have been beyond their reach if they could only sail before the wind. The chapter discusses a way to test the ability of a Polynesian double canoe to sail long slants across and slightly into the trade winds: the legendary voyaging track between Hawai'i and Tahiti by the catamaran Rehu Moana. In 1967, after completing the Nālehia tests, an article outlining how a traditionally navigated voyaging canoe could be sailed from Hawai'i to Tahiti and back was published.
Ben Finney
- Published in print:
- 1994
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520080027
- eISBN:
- 9780520913059
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520080027.003.0003
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter explains that the purpose in building Hōkūle'a and then sailing her to Tahiti was actually twofold. In addition to resolving issues about seafaring in Polynesia, the canoe and the voyage ...
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This chapter explains that the purpose in building Hōkūle'a and then sailing her to Tahiti was actually twofold. In addition to resolving issues about seafaring in Polynesia, the canoe and the voyage were intended to serve as vehicles for the revitalization of the culture of Hawai'ians and other Polynesians. In the centuries that have followed their disastrous encounter with the outside world and its epidemic diseases, weapons, and institutions, Hawai'ians, and to a greater or lesser extent other Polynesian groups, have become more and more alienated from their heritage of oceanic exploration and voyaging. Before the project, the great majority of Hawai'ians knew little or nothing about sailing canoes, traditional navigation methods, or the rich oral literature about voyaging back and forth between Hawai'i and Tahiti that inspired the voyagers' plan. It was this estrangement from seafaring skills and traditions that the voyage was intended to reverse.Less
This chapter explains that the purpose in building Hōkūle'a and then sailing her to Tahiti was actually twofold. In addition to resolving issues about seafaring in Polynesia, the canoe and the voyage were intended to serve as vehicles for the revitalization of the culture of Hawai'ians and other Polynesians. In the centuries that have followed their disastrous encounter with the outside world and its epidemic diseases, weapons, and institutions, Hawai'ians, and to a greater or lesser extent other Polynesian groups, have become more and more alienated from their heritage of oceanic exploration and voyaging. Before the project, the great majority of Hawai'ians knew little or nothing about sailing canoes, traditional navigation methods, or the rich oral literature about voyaging back and forth between Hawai'i and Tahiti that inspired the voyagers' plan. It was this estrangement from seafaring skills and traditions that the voyage was intended to reverse.
Ben Finney
- Published in print:
- 1994
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520080027
- eISBN:
- 9780520913059
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520080027.003.0005
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter addresses the third basic adaptation for oceanic expansion by analyzing how, in 1986, Hōkūle'a sailed eastward across Polynesia from Samoa to Tahiti by utilizing westerly wind shifts. In ...
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This chapter addresses the third basic adaptation for oceanic expansion by analyzing how, in 1986, Hōkūle'a sailed eastward across Polynesia from Samoa to Tahiti by utilizing westerly wind shifts. In making his case for the origin in America of the Polynesians, Thor Heyerdahl claimed that the islands of Polynesia could not have been colonized directly from the west because “the permanent trade winds and forceful companion currents of the enormous Southern Hemisphere” would have prevented canoe sailors from the Asian side of the ocean from sailing through tropical latitudes to the east. Instrumented sailing trials with the Hawai'ian double canoe Nālehia, and the long slant across and slightly into the trade winds made by Hōkūle'a when sailing from Hawai'i to Tahiti in 1976, indicate that a double canoe progresses most efficiently to windward when she is sailed “full and by.”Less
This chapter addresses the third basic adaptation for oceanic expansion by analyzing how, in 1986, Hōkūle'a sailed eastward across Polynesia from Samoa to Tahiti by utilizing westerly wind shifts. In making his case for the origin in America of the Polynesians, Thor Heyerdahl claimed that the islands of Polynesia could not have been colonized directly from the west because “the permanent trade winds and forceful companion currents of the enormous Southern Hemisphere” would have prevented canoe sailors from the Asian side of the ocean from sailing through tropical latitudes to the east. Instrumented sailing trials with the Hawai'ian double canoe Nālehia, and the long slant across and slightly into the trade winds made by Hōkūle'a when sailing from Hawai'i to Tahiti in 1976, indicate that a double canoe progresses most efficiently to windward when she is sailed “full and by.”
Ben Finney
- Published in print:
- 1994
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520080027
- eISBN:
- 9780520913059
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520080027.003.0007
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
The voyage Hōkūle'a made in 1976 from Hawai'i to Tahiti and back set a new standard in experimental voyaging, for it was the first time a reconstructed craft had sailed both ways over a long oceanic ...
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The voyage Hōkūle'a made in 1976 from Hawai'i to Tahiti and back set a new standard in experimental voyaging, for it was the first time a reconstructed craft had sailed both ways over a long oceanic course. Hōkūle'a's passage to Tahiti and back in 1980 replicated the 1976 voyage and extended its significance in that both legs were navigated without instruments. Considered together, the first leg of the Voyage of Rediscovery from Hawai'i to Tahiti in 1985 and the last leg from Tahiti back to Hawai'i in 1987 comprise the canoe's third roundtrip between these two centers of Polynesia. To have made not one but three roundtrip crossings between such distantly separated islands stands as an accomplishment unparalleled in the field of experimental voyaging, particularly since Hōkūle'a was guided by noninstrument navigation techniques on all legs except the return one to Hawai'i in 1976.Less
The voyage Hōkūle'a made in 1976 from Hawai'i to Tahiti and back set a new standard in experimental voyaging, for it was the first time a reconstructed craft had sailed both ways over a long oceanic course. Hōkūle'a's passage to Tahiti and back in 1980 replicated the 1976 voyage and extended its significance in that both legs were navigated without instruments. Considered together, the first leg of the Voyage of Rediscovery from Hawai'i to Tahiti in 1985 and the last leg from Tahiti back to Hawai'i in 1987 comprise the canoe's third roundtrip between these two centers of Polynesia. To have made not one but three roundtrip crossings between such distantly separated islands stands as an accomplishment unparalleled in the field of experimental voyaging, particularly since Hōkūle'a was guided by noninstrument navigation techniques on all legs except the return one to Hawai'i in 1976.
Ben Finney
- Published in print:
- 1994
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520080027
- eISBN:
- 9780520913059
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520080027.003.0009
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
This chapter states that there was something special, Nainoa Thompson went on to say, about those who sailed Hōkūle'a back to Hawai'i on the last, homecoming leg of the voyage. In addition to veteran ...
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This chapter states that there was something special, Nainoa Thompson went on to say, about those who sailed Hōkūle'a back to Hawai'i on the last, homecoming leg of the voyage. In addition to veteran sailors from Hawai'i, the crew included representatives from all over Polynesia. This transformation of Hōkūle'a into a symbol of resurgent pride, and the way this voyage galvanized Hawai'ians and other Polynesians, demonstrates how far the revival of culture has progressed since the idea of combining experimental and cultural goals had first been floated a decade and a half earlier. As an effort in cultural revival, the project shares much with other initiatives around the world wherein people consciously seek to re-create and elaborate ancestral ways for contemporary purposes. The chapter also explores the legendary basis behind the choice of the Hawai'i–Tahiti route as the seaway over which Hōkūle'a was initially tested.Less
This chapter states that there was something special, Nainoa Thompson went on to say, about those who sailed Hōkūle'a back to Hawai'i on the last, homecoming leg of the voyage. In addition to veteran sailors from Hawai'i, the crew included representatives from all over Polynesia. This transformation of Hōkūle'a into a symbol of resurgent pride, and the way this voyage galvanized Hawai'ians and other Polynesians, demonstrates how far the revival of culture has progressed since the idea of combining experimental and cultural goals had first been floated a decade and a half earlier. As an effort in cultural revival, the project shares much with other initiatives around the world wherein people consciously seek to re-create and elaborate ancestral ways for contemporary purposes. The chapter also explores the legendary basis behind the choice of the Hawai'i–Tahiti route as the seaway over which Hōkūle'a was initially tested.
Robert Launay
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780226575254
- eISBN:
- 9780226575421
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226575421.003.0009
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Anthropology, Theory and Practice
Lahontan’s literary dialogue with the wise and well-travelled Huron Adario pioneered a genre which pitted clever dialectical savages against slow-witted Europeans. Adario contrasts the virtues of ...
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Lahontan’s literary dialogue with the wise and well-travelled Huron Adario pioneered a genre which pitted clever dialectical savages against slow-witted Europeans. Adario contrasts the virtues of natural religion and natural equality, in the economic and political domains, with the moral decadence of contemporary France. Rousseau’s Discourse on the Origins of Inequality goes further by imagining an asocial humanity, fully free and equal but also profoundly amoral and incapable of transmitting any learned knowledge. Society, for Rousseau, contains the seeds of inequality, but property is the real driving force for social injustice. Diderot reprised the dialogue form used by Lahontan, pitting the Tahitian Orou against a French chaplain whose attempts to defend organized religion and repressive sexual morality fail miserably. These French Enlightenment thinkers all mobilize ideals of Nature to address issues of religion, politics, economics, and sexual morality.Less
Lahontan’s literary dialogue with the wise and well-travelled Huron Adario pioneered a genre which pitted clever dialectical savages against slow-witted Europeans. Adario contrasts the virtues of natural religion and natural equality, in the economic and political domains, with the moral decadence of contemporary France. Rousseau’s Discourse on the Origins of Inequality goes further by imagining an asocial humanity, fully free and equal but also profoundly amoral and incapable of transmitting any learned knowledge. Society, for Rousseau, contains the seeds of inequality, but property is the real driving force for social injustice. Diderot reprised the dialogue form used by Lahontan, pitting the Tahitian Orou against a French chaplain whose attempts to defend organized religion and repressive sexual morality fail miserably. These French Enlightenment thinkers all mobilize ideals of Nature to address issues of religion, politics, economics, and sexual morality.
Jennifer Newell
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824832810
- eISBN:
- 9780824870744
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824832810.003.0008
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Pacific Studies
This concluding chapter looks back to the lessons discussed in the previous chapters in drawing out the major themes the above scenes of ecological exchange imply. Selecting Tahiti as a focus, a ...
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This concluding chapter looks back to the lessons discussed in the previous chapters in drawing out the major themes the above scenes of ecological exchange imply. Selecting Tahiti as a focus, a place where ecological exchanges were particularly well documented, has rendered visible the processes by which ecologies and cultures alter each other. Tahitians engaged with Europeans more fully and from earlier in the eighteenth century than did other Pacific islanders, and their exchanges were complex. This chapter shows how those exchanges are still in effect even at present time, with contemporary Tahiti still engaging in the process of ecological and cultural exchange—and with the motivations behind the exchanges being as varied as ever, and continuing with nearly as little interest in the consequences as in the eighteenth century.Less
This concluding chapter looks back to the lessons discussed in the previous chapters in drawing out the major themes the above scenes of ecological exchange imply. Selecting Tahiti as a focus, a place where ecological exchanges were particularly well documented, has rendered visible the processes by which ecologies and cultures alter each other. Tahitians engaged with Europeans more fully and from earlier in the eighteenth century than did other Pacific islanders, and their exchanges were complex. This chapter shows how those exchanges are still in effect even at present time, with contemporary Tahiti still engaging in the process of ecological and cultural exchange—and with the motivations behind the exchanges being as varied as ever, and continuing with nearly as little interest in the consequences as in the eighteenth century.
Edward G. Gray
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- October 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780300110555
- eISBN:
- 9780300137811
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Yale University Press
- DOI:
- 10.12987/yale/9780300110555.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, British and Irish Early Modern History
During the course of his short but extraordinary life, John Ledyard (1751–1789) came into contact with some of the most remarkable figures of his era: the British explorer Captain James Cook, ...
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During the course of his short but extraordinary life, John Ledyard (1751–1789) came into contact with some of the most remarkable figures of his era: the British explorer Captain James Cook, American financier Robert Morris, Revolutionary naval commander John Paul Jones, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and others. He lived and traveled in remarkable places as well, journeying from the New England backcountry to Tahiti, Hawaii, the American Northwest coast, Alaska, and the Russian Far East. This biography offers not only a full account of Ledyard's eventful life but also an illuminating view of the late eighteenth-century world in which he lived. It shows that Ledyard was both a product of empire and an agent in its creation, and that through this adventurer's life, it is possible to discern the many ways in which empire shaped the lives of nations, peoples, and individuals in the era of the American Revolution, the world's first modern revolt against empire.Less
During the course of his short but extraordinary life, John Ledyard (1751–1789) came into contact with some of the most remarkable figures of his era: the British explorer Captain James Cook, American financier Robert Morris, Revolutionary naval commander John Paul Jones, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and others. He lived and traveled in remarkable places as well, journeying from the New England backcountry to Tahiti, Hawaii, the American Northwest coast, Alaska, and the Russian Far East. This biography offers not only a full account of Ledyard's eventful life but also an illuminating view of the late eighteenth-century world in which he lived. It shows that Ledyard was both a product of empire and an agent in its creation, and that through this adventurer's life, it is possible to discern the many ways in which empire shaped the lives of nations, peoples, and individuals in the era of the American Revolution, the world's first modern revolt against empire.
Sumner La Croix
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- September 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780226592091
- eISBN:
- 9780226592121
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226592121.003.0002
- Subject:
- Economics and Finance, Economic History
Understanding Hawaiʻi’s discovery, initial settlement, and ensuing rapid population growth are important for understanding the full sweep of Hawaiian history, as the effects of initial events, ...
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Understanding Hawaiʻi’s discovery, initial settlement, and ensuing rapid population growth are important for understanding the full sweep of Hawaiian history, as the effects of initial events, trends, and institutions often persist far into a society’s future. Three somewhat existential questions must be addressed: When did Polynesians voyage to the central Eastern Pacific and then to Hawaiʻi? Why did those Polynesians voyage? And why did they voyage to Hawaiʻi, far to the north of the Polynesian heartland? This chapter provides ingredients for tentative answers to these questions by bringing together material from pioneering studies of Hawaiian history recently undertaken by an array of teams of archaeologists and other social scientists. The same teams have also provided new glimpses into how the initial settlement of Hawaiʻi proceeded, and this chapter uses their materials, as well as insights gathered from other initial colonial settlements around the globe, to provide a rough and somewhat speculative sketch of Hawaiian polities and economies after 150–200 years of settlement.Less
Understanding Hawaiʻi’s discovery, initial settlement, and ensuing rapid population growth are important for understanding the full sweep of Hawaiian history, as the effects of initial events, trends, and institutions often persist far into a society’s future. Three somewhat existential questions must be addressed: When did Polynesians voyage to the central Eastern Pacific and then to Hawaiʻi? Why did those Polynesians voyage? And why did they voyage to Hawaiʻi, far to the north of the Polynesian heartland? This chapter provides ingredients for tentative answers to these questions by bringing together material from pioneering studies of Hawaiian history recently undertaken by an array of teams of archaeologists and other social scientists. The same teams have also provided new glimpses into how the initial settlement of Hawaiʻi proceeded, and this chapter uses their materials, as well as insights gathered from other initial colonial settlements around the globe, to provide a rough and somewhat speculative sketch of Hawaiian polities and economies after 150–200 years of settlement.
Bronwen Douglas
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824833664
- eISBN:
- 9780824870355
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824833664.003.0005
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology
This chapter combines an ethnohistory of encounters between Pacific Islanders and European voyagers with the history of the unstable idea of “race” by correlating voyagers' racial terminology with ...
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This chapter combines an ethnohistory of encounters between Pacific Islanders and European voyagers with the history of the unstable idea of “race” by correlating voyagers' racial terminology with their experience of particular indigenous people. It focuses on contacts, from the time of Duperrey's expedition of 1823, between French seamen and the Pacific Islanders of Tahiti and New Ireland. It considers local initiatives, actions, and demeanors—condensed as agency—as refracted through varied genres, modes, or media of travelers' representations. It interprets encounters situationally, not as a general clash of reified cultures but as ambiguous intersections of multiple indigenous and foreign agencies that were usually at cross-purposes but not necessarily opposed. It suggests that behavioral changes among the Pacific Islanders resulted from old codes and norms having to come to terms with new possibilities arising in a context of change.Less
This chapter combines an ethnohistory of encounters between Pacific Islanders and European voyagers with the history of the unstable idea of “race” by correlating voyagers' racial terminology with their experience of particular indigenous people. It focuses on contacts, from the time of Duperrey's expedition of 1823, between French seamen and the Pacific Islanders of Tahiti and New Ireland. It considers local initiatives, actions, and demeanors—condensed as agency—as refracted through varied genres, modes, or media of travelers' representations. It interprets encounters situationally, not as a general clash of reified cultures but as ambiguous intersections of multiple indigenous and foreign agencies that were usually at cross-purposes but not necessarily opposed. It suggests that behavioral changes among the Pacific Islanders resulted from old codes and norms having to come to terms with new possibilities arising in a context of change.
