Encyclopedia of world cultures 10 volume set 2 oceania (1991)

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF WORLD CULTURESDavid Levinson Editor in Chief North America Oceania South Asia Europe and the Middle East East and Southeast Asia Soviet Union and China South America Midd

Encyclopedia of World Cultures

OCEANIA

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF WORLD CULTURES

David Levinson

Editor in Chief

North America Oceania

South Asia Europe and the Middle East East and Southeast Asia Soviet Union and China

South America

Middle America and the Caribbean

Africa Bibliography

The Encyclopedia of World Cultures was prepared under the auspices and with

the support of the Human Relations Area Files at Yale University HRAF,

the foremost international research organization in the field of cultural pology, is a not-for-profit consortium of twenty-three sponsoring members and

anthro-300 participating member institutions in twenty-five countries The HRAF

archive, established in 1949, contains nearly one million pages of information

on the cultures of the world.

Encyclopedia of World Cultures

MEASUREMENT CONVERSIONSWhen You Know Multiply By To Find

AREA square feet 0.09 square meters

square yards 0.8 square meters

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i 1991 bythe HumanRelationsAreaFiles, Inc

Firstpublishedin 1991

byG.K Hall&Co

1633Broadway, New York, NY 10019,6785

Allrights reserved

No partofthis bookmaybereproduced inany formorby any means, electronicor

mechanical, including photocopying, recording, orbyanyinformationstorage or

retrieval systemwithoutpermission in writingfrom the publisher

20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12

Libnry ofCongress Catalog in-Publication Data

(Revised for vol 2)

Encyclopediaof world cultures

Includesbibliographicalreferences and index

Filmography: p

Contents:v. 1 NorthAmerica / Timothy 1 O'Leary,

David Levinson, volumeeditors v.2.Oceania / Terence E Hays, volume ed

ISBN 0-8161-1809-4 (v 2)

The paper usedin thispublication meets the minimumrequirements of American

National Standard for InformationSciences-Permanence ofPaper forPrinted Library

MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Project Staff Editorial Board

Fernando Cimara Barbachano

Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia, Mexico City

Middle America and the Caribbean

Editorial and Production

University of Illinois at Chicago South and Southeast Asia

Robert V Kemper

Southern Methodist University

Middle America and the Caribbean

Kazuko Matsuzawa

National Museum of Ethnology, Osaka

East Asia

John H Middleton Yale University

Africa

Timothy J O'Leary Human Relations Area Files North America

Amal Rassam Queens College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York

Philadelphia GeriatricCenter

Institut furValkerkunde und Afrikanistik

Universitit MiInchen

Munich

Germany

Department of Anthropology and Sociology

University of British Columbia

Vancouver, British Columbia

Canada

Department ofSociology andAnthropology

GustavusAdolphus College

Saint Peter, Minnesota

United States

Department ofAnthropology

Hawaii Loa College

Kaneohe, Oahu, Hawaii

StateUniversity ofNewYork atStony Brook

StonyBrook, NewYork

UnitedStates

Boazi;Kiwai

Mark Busse

PapuaNewGuinea National Museum

Boroko, National Capital District

Papua New Guinea

FairhavenCollege

WesternWashington University

Bellingham, Washington

United States

MarjorieTuainekore Crocombe

Universityof the South Pacific

University Museum ofArchaeology/Anthropology

Department ofSociology and Anthropology

MountAllison University

Sackville, NewBrunswick

Canada

Departmentof Sociology and Anthropology

Kent State University

Kent, Ohio

United States

Arizona State Museum

James G Flanagan Wovan

DepartmentofSociology andAnthropology

UniversityofSouthern Mississippi

Hattiesburg, Mississippi

United States

Summer Instituteof Linguistics

UkarumpaviaLae

Papua NewGuinea

x Contributors

DepartmentofAnthropology

Bryn MawrCollege

Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania

UniversityofCalifornia,Santa Barbara

Santa Barbara, California

Rhode Island College

Providence, Rhode Island

United States

Contributors xi

DepartmentofAnthropology

Universityof South Carolina

Columbia, SouthCarolina

United States

Committeeon Human Development

Pennsylvania State University

UniversityPark, Pennsylvania

University ofCalifornia, Los Angeles

LosAngeles, California

UnitedStates

David Levinson

Human Relations Area Files

NewHaven, Connecticut

NancyC Lutkehaus

Department ofAnthropology

University of Southern California

LosAngeles, California

Department ofAnthropologyand Sociology

University of British Columbia

Vancouver, BritishColumbia

Canada

David F Martin

Department of Prehistory and Anthropology

Australian National University

Canberra, Australian Capital Territory

Department of Human Ecology

Cook College, RutgersUniversity

New Brunswick, New Jersey

xiv Contributors

StevenNachman

DepartmentofSociology, Anthropology, SocialWork

EdinboroUniversity ofPennsylvania

Edinboro, Pennsylvania

United States

Philip L Newman

Department ofAnthropology

UniversityofCalifornia, Los Angeles

Los Angeles, California

Department of Sociology and Anthropology

OhioWesleyan University

Delaware, Ohio

United States

Nicolas Peterson

Department of Prehistory and Anthropology

Australian NationalUniversity

Canberra, Australian Capital Territory

Gururumba

Departmentof PrehistoryandAnthropology

Australian National University

Canberra, Australian Capital Territory

Australia

RobertTonkinson

Department ofAnthropology

University of Western Australia

Nedlands, Perth, Western Australia

xvi Contributors

Peter VanArsdale

GraduateSchoolof International Studies

New YorkUniversity

New York, New York

Pennsylvania State University

University Park, Pennsylvania

United States

Michael Young

Department of Anthropology

Research School ofPacific Studies

Australian NationalUniversity

Canberra, Australian CapitalTerritory

This project beganin1987with thegoalofassemblingabasic

referencesourcethatprovidesaccurate,dear,andconcise

de-scriptions of the cultures ofthe world.Wewantedtobeas

comprehensive and authoritativeaspossible: comprehensive,

byprovidingdescriptionsof all the cultures of each region of

the worldorbydescribingarepresentativesampleof cultures

for regions where full coverage is impossible, and

authori-tativeby providing accurate descriptions of the cultures for

both the past and the present

Thepublication oftheEncyclopedia ofWorldCulturesin

thelastdecadeof the twentieth centuryisespecially timely

Thepolitical,economic, and socialchangesofthe pastfifty

yearshaveproducedaworldmorecomplexand fluid thanat

anytime inhumanhistory.Three sweeping transformations

of theworldwideculturallandscapeareespecially significant

Firstiswhatsomesocialscientists arecallingthe 'New

Diaspora"-thedispersalofculturalgroupstonewlocations

acrosstheworld.Thisdispersalaffectsallnationsandtakesa

widevarietyofforms: inEastAfricannations,the formation

of newtowns inhabitedbypeople from dozensofdifferent

ethnic groups; inMicronesiaandPolynesia,themovementof

islanders to citiesinNewZealandand the UnitedStates;in

North America,thereplacementbyAsiansandLatin

Amer-cansof Europeansasthemost numerousimmigrants;in

Eu-rope, theincreasedrelianceonworkers from the Middle East

andNorth Africa; andso on

Second, andrelatedtothisdispersal,istheinternal divi

sionofwhatwere oncesingle,unifiedculturalgroupsinto two

ormorerelativelydistinct groups.This pattern of internal

di-vision ismostdramatic amongindigenousorthirdorfourth

worldcultureswhosetraditionalways oflife have been altered

by contact with theoutside world Underlyingthis division

areboth thepopulationdispersionmentioned above and

sus-tainedcontact with theeconomically developedworld The

result is that groups whoat one time sawthemselvesandwere

seen by others as single cultural groups have been

trans-formed intotwo or moredistinctgroups.Thus,inmany

cul-tural groups,wefinddeepandprobablypermanentdivisions

betweenthose who liveinthe country and those who livein

cities,thosewhofollow the traditionalreligionand those who

have converted to Christianity, those who live inland and

those wholive on the seacoast, and those who live bymeans

of asubsistence economyandthosenowenmeshedin acash

economy

The third important transformation of the worldwide

cultural landscape isthe revival of ethnic nationalism, withmanypeoplesclaiming and fighting for political freedom andterritorial integrity on the basis of ethnic solidarity andethnic-basedclaims to theirtraditional homeland Although

most attentionhas focusedrecently on ethnic nationalisminEasternEuropeand the Soviet Union, the trendisnonethe-

lessaworldwidephenomenoninvolving, for example,

Amer-can Indian cultures in North and South America, theBasques in Spainand France, the Tamil and Sinhalese in SriLanka, and the Tutsi and Hutu in Burundi, among others

Tobe informedcitizensofourrapidly changing tural world we must understand the ways oflife of peoplefrom culturesdifferentfromour own 'We" isused here in thebroadest sense, toincludenot justscholars who study the cul-

multicul-turesofthe world andbusinesspeople andgovernment

offi-cialswho work intheworldcommunitybut also the averagecitizenwho reads orhears about multicultural events in the

newseveryday and young people who are growing up in thiscomplex cultural world For all of these people-whichmeansallofus-thereisa pressingneed for information ontheculturesoftheworld.Thisencyclopediaprovides this in-formationin twoways.First, itsdescriptions of the traditionalways of life of the world's cultures can serve as a baselineagainstwhich cultural change canbe measured andunder-stood.Second,itacquaintsthereaderwith the contemporarywaysof lifethroughoutthe world

Weareable toprovide this information largely throughthe efforts of the volumeeditors andthenearly one thousandcontributors whowrote thecultural summaries that are theheart ofthe book The contributors are social scientists (an-

thropologists, sociologists, historians, and geographers) aswell as educators, government officials, and missionaries whousually have firsthand research-based knowledge of the cul-turestheywriteabout Inmanycasesthey are the major ex-pert oroneof theleading experts on the culture, and some arethemselves membersof the cultures As experts, they are able

toprovide accurate, up-to-date information This is crucialfor many partsof the world where indigenous cultures may beoverlooked by official information seekers such as govern-mentcensustakers These experts have often lived among thepeople they writeabout,conducting participant-observationswiththem and speaking their language Thus they are able toprovide integrated, holisticdescriptions of the cultures, notjust alist of facts Their portraits ofthe cultures leave thereader witharealsenseof whatit meanstobe a'Taos" or a'Rom" or a"Sicilian."

Those summaries not written by an expert on the culturehaveusuallybeen written byaresearcher at the HumanRela-

tions AreaFiles, Inc.,workingfromprimarysource materials

xvii

xviii Preface

The Human Relations Area Files, an international

educa-tional and researchinstitute,isrecognized by professionalsin

thesocial andbehavioral sciences,humanities,and medical

sciences as a major source of information on theculturesof

theworld

Uses of the Encyclopedia

Thisencyclopediais meant tobeusedbyavarietyofpeople

foravarietyof purposes.It canbe used bothtogainageneral

understandingofaculture andtofindaspecificpiece of

in-formationby lookingitup under the relevantsubheadingina

summary It can also be used tolearn aboutaparticular

re-gion orsubregion ofthe world and thesocial,economic, and

political forcesthathaveshapedthe cultures in that region

Theencyclopedia isalso aresourceguidethat leads readers

who want adeeperunderstandingofparticularcultures to

ad-ditionalsourcesofinformation.Resourceguidesinthe

ency-clopedia includeethnonyms listedineachsummary, which

canbe used as entry pointsintothe socialscienceliterature

where the culture may sometimes be identifiedbyadifferent

name; abibliographyatthe end ofeachsummary,which lists

booksandarticlesabouttheculture;andafilmographyatthe

end of eachvolume,whichlistsfilmsand videosonmany of

the cultures

Beyond being a basic reference resource, the

encyclope-dia also servesreaderswithmorefocusedneeds.For

research-ersinterested in comparingcultures,theencyclopediaserves

as the mostcomplete and up-to-datesampling frame from

which to select cultures forfurther study.Forthose interested

in international studies, theencyclopedia leadsonequickly

intothe relevant social science literature as wellasproviding

astate-of-the-art assessment of ourknowledgeofthe cultures

of aparticular region For curriculumdevelopersandteachers

seekingtointernationalizetheircurriculum,theencyclopedia

isitself abasicreference and educationalresource aswellas a

directorytoothermaterials Forgovernmentofficials, it is a

repository ofinformation not likely to be available in any

othersinglepublication or, in some cases, notavailableatall

Forstudents, fromhigh school through graduate school,it

provides backgroundandbibliographicinformation forterm

papers and class projects And fortravelers,itprovidesan

in-troductionintotheways oflifeoftheindigenous peoplesin

the area of the world theywillbe visiting

Format of the Encyclopedia

The encyclopedia comprises ten volumes, ordered by

geo-graphical regions of theworld.The order ofpublicationis not

meant to represent any sort ofpriority.Volumes 1 through9

contain a total of about fifteen hundred summaries along

with maps, glossaries, and indexes of alternate names for the

culturalgroups Thetenthand final volume contains

cumula-tive lists of the cultures of theworld, their alternate names,

and a bibliography ofselected publications pertaining to

those groups

North America covers the cultures ofCanada, Greenland,and

the United StatesofAmerica

Oceania covers the cultures ofAustralia,NewZealand,

Mela-nesia, MicroMela-nesia, andPolynesia.

South Asia covers the cultures ofAfghanistan, Bangladesh,

Burma, India,Pakistan,SriLanka,and theHimalayanstates

Europe and the Middle East covers the cultures of Europe,North Africa, the Middle East, and the Near East

Eastand Southeast Asia coversthe cultures of Japan, Korea,mainland and insular Southeast Asia, and Taiwan

Soviet Union and China covers the cultures ofMongolia, thePeople'sRepublicofChina,and the Union of SovietSocial-

ist Republics

South Americacovers the cultures of South America.MiddleAmerica and the Caribbean covers the cultures ofCen-

tral America, Mexico, and the Caribbean islands

Africa covers the cultures of Madagascar and sub-SaharanAfrica

Format of the Volumes

Each volume contains thispreface, an introductory essay bythe volumeeditor, the culturalsummariesranging from afew

lines toseveral pages each, maps pinpointing the location ofthecultures, a filmography,anethnonym index ofalternate

namesfor thecultures,andaglossaryofscientific and

techni-cal terms All entries are listed in alphabetical order and areextensively cross-referenced

Cultures Covered

Acentral issue in selecting cultures for coverage in theclopedia has been how to define what we mean by aculturalgroup The questions of what a cultureis and whatcriteriacan beused to classify a particular social group (such as a reli-giousgroup, ethnic group, nationality, or territorial group) as

ency-a cultural group have long perplexed social scientists andhave yetto be answered to everyone's satisfaction Two reali-ties account forwhythe questions cannot be answereddefini-tively First, a widevarietyofdifferenttypesof cultures existaround the world Among common types are nationalcul-

tures, regionalcultures, ethnic groups, indigenous societies,religious groups, and unassimilated immigrant groups Nosingle criterion ormarker of cultural uniqueness can consis-tently distinguish among the hundreds of cultures that fitinto thesegeneraltypes.Second,as noted above,singlecul-

tures orwhatwere at one timeidentifiedassingle cultures canand do vary internally over time and place Thus a markerthat mayidentify a specific group as a culture in one location

or at one time may notworkfor that cultureinanotherplace

or atanother time For example, use of the Yiddish languagewould have been a marker of Jewish cultural identity inEast-

emEurope in the nineteenth century, but it would not serve

as a marker for Jews in the twentieth-century UnitedStates,wheremost speak English Similarly, residence on one of theCookIslands in Polynesia would have been a marker of CookIslanderidentity in the eighteenth century, but notin thetwentiethcentury whentwo-thirdsof CookIslanderslive inNewZealand and elsewhere

Given these considerations, no attempt has beenmade

todevelop and use a single definition of a cultural unit or todevelop and use a fixed list of criteria foridentifyingcultural

units Instead, the task of selecting cultures was leftto thevolumeeditors,and the criteria and procedures theyusedarediscussedin their introductory essays In general, however, sixcriteria wereused, sometimes aloneandsometimesincombi-nation to classify social groups as cultural groups: (1) geo-graphicallocalization, (2) identification in the social scienceliterature as a distinct group, (3) distinct language, (4)

Preface xix

shared traditions, religion, folklore, orvalues, (5)

mainte-nanceofgroupidentityinthe faceofstrongassimilative

pres-sures,and (6) previouslistingin aninventory oftheworld's

cultures suchasEthnographicAtlas (Murdock 1967) orthe

Outline ofWorld Cultures (Murdock 1983).

Ingeneral,we have been bumperss" rather than

"split-ters"inwritingthesummaries.That is, if thereissome

ques-tionaboutwhether aparticulargroup isreallyonecultureor

tworelated cultures,wehave moreoftenthannottreatedit as

asingleculture, with internaldifferencesnoted inthe

sum-mary Similarly, we have sometimes chosen to describe a

number ofvery similarcultures in a singlesummary rather

than in aseries of summaries that would bemostly

redun-dant There is,however,some variation fromone regionto

anotherin thisapproach,andthe rationale for each region is

discussedinthe volume editor'sessay

Twocategories of cultures areusuallynotcoveredinthe

encyclopedia First, extinct cultures, especially those that

have notexistedasdistinctcultural units forsometime,are

usually not described Cultural extinction is often, though

certainly not always, indicated by thedisappearance of the

culture's language So, for example,theAztec are not

cov-ered,althoughlivingdescendantsof theAztec, the

Nahuat-speakersofcentral Mexico, aredescribed.

Second,thewaysof life ofimmigrant groupsareusually

notdescribedinmuchdetail,unlessthere isalonghistory of

resistance to assimilation and the group has maintained its

distinctidentity,ashavethe AmishinNorthAmerica.These

cultures are,however, described in the location where they

traditionally livedand,forthe most part, continuetolive,and

migration patterns are noted For example, the Hmongin

Laos aredescribedinthe SoutheastAsiavolume,but the

ref-ugee communities in the United Statesand Canadaare

cov-ered only inthe generalsummaries on SoutheastAsiansin

those twocountriesintheNorthAmericavolume.Although

it would beidealtoprovide descriptionsofalltheimmigrant

culturesor communities oftheworld,thatisanundertaking

wellbeyond thescope of thisencyclopedia,for thereare

prob-ablymorethan fivethousandsuch communities in theworld

Finally, itshould be notedthatnotall nationalities are

covered, onlythose that are alsodistinct culturesaswellas

politicalentities Forexample,the Vietnamese and Burmese

are includedbutIndians (citizensof the RepublicofIndia)

are not, becausethelatterisa politicalentitymadeup ofa

great mix of cultural groups Inthe case of nations whose

populationsincludeanumber ofdifferent,relatively

unassim-dated groups orcultural regions, each of the groups is

de-scribedseparately Forexample,thereis nosummary for

Ital-ians as such inthe Europevolume,but therearesummares

for the regionalculturesofItaly, such as theTuscans,

Sicil-ians, and TyrolSicil-ians, and other cultures such as the Sind

Piedmontese

Cultural Summaries

The heart of thisencyclopediaisthedescriptive summaries of

the cultures, which range froma fewlinestofiveorsixpages

in length They provide a mix of demographic,historical,

so-cial, economic, political, and religious information on the

cultures Their emphasis or flavor is cultural; that is, they

focus on the ways of life of the people-both past and

present-and the factors that have caused the culture to

changeovertime and place

A key issue has been how to decide which culturesshould be described by longer summaries and which byshorter ones.Thisdecision was madeby thevolumeeditors,whohad to balance a number ofintellectual andpracticalconsiderations.Again, therationalefor thesedecisionsis dis-

cussedintheiressays But among the factorsthatweresidered by all the editors were the total number of cultures intheir region,theavailabilityofexperts to writesummaries,the

con-availabilityof information onthecultures, thedegreeof

simi-laritybetweencultures,and the importance of a culture in ascientific orpoliticalsense

TMe summary authors followed astandardizedoutline so

that eachsummaryprovides informationon acore list ics Theauthors,however, hadsome leeway indeciding how

oftop-much attention was to begiven each topic and whether tional information should be included Summaries usuallyprovide informationonthe following topics:

addi-CULTURE NAME: Thenameusedmostoftenin the socialscienceliterature torefertotheculture or the name the groupuses for itself

ETHNONYMS: Alternatenames for theculture includingnamesused byoutsiders, the self-name, and alternate spell-ings,withinreasonablelimits

ORIENTATIONIdentification Location of the culture and the derivation ofits name and ethnonyms

Location Where the culture is located and adescriptionofthephysical environment

Demography. Population historyand the most recent

reli-able population figuresorestimates

inguistic Affiliation The name of the language spokenand/or written by the culture, its place in aninternationallanguage classification system,andinternal variationin lan-guage use

HISTORYAND CULTURALRELATIONS: Atracing

of theorigins andhistoryof the culture and the past and rentnature ofrelationshipswithother groups

cur-SE9LLEMENTS:Thelocation of settlements, typesof

set-tlements,types ofstructures, housingdesignand materials.ECONOMY

Subsistenceand CounmercialActivities Theprimaryodsof obtaining, consuming, anddistributingmoney, food,and othernecessities

meth-Industrial Arts Implements and objects produced by theculture either for its own use or for sale or trade

Trade Products traded and patterns of trade with othergroups

Division ofLabor How basic economic tasks are assigned byage, sex, ability, occupational specialization, or status.Land Tenure Rules and practices concerning the allocation

ofland and land-use rights to members of the culture and tooutsiders

KINSHIP

KinGroups and Descent Rules and practices concerning

kin-based featuresofsocial organizationsuchaslineages andclans andalliances between these groups

Kinship Terminology. Classificationof thekinship nological system on the basis of either cousin terms or genera-

termi-XI Preface

don, and information about any unique aspects of kinship

terminology

MARRIAGE AND FAMILY

Marriage Rules and practices concerningreasonsfor

mar-riage, types of marmar-riage, economic aspects of marmar-riage,

postmaritalresidence, divorce, and remarriage

Domestic Unit Description ofthebasic householdunit

in-cludingtype, size, and composition

Inheritance.Rulesand practices concerningthe inheritance

of property

Socialization Rules and practices concerning child rearing

including caretakers, values inculcated,child-rearing

meth-ods, initiation rites, and education

SOCIOPOLITICAL ORGANIZATION

SocialOrganization.Rules and practices concerning the

in-ternal organization of theculture, includingsocial status,

pri-maryandsecondarygroups, and social stratification

PoliticalOrganiation.Rules and practices concerning

lead-ership, politics, governmental organizations, and decision

making

Social ControL The sourcesofconflictwithin the culture

and informal and formal social control mechanisms

Conflict.Thesourcesofconflict with other groups and

infor-mal andformalmeansofresolving conflicts

RELIGION ANDEXPRESSIVE CULTURE

Religious Beliefs. Thenature ofreligious beliefs including

beliefsinsupernaturalentities, traditionalbeliefs,andthe

ef-fects of major religions

ReligiousPractitioners.Thetypes,sourcesofpower, and

ac-tivities ofreligiousspecialists suchasshamans and priests

Ceremonies The nature, type, and frequency ofreligious

andotherceremoniesand rites

Arts.Thenature, types, andcharacteristicsofartistic

activi-ties including literature, music, dance, carving, andso on

Medicine.Thenatureof traditional medical beliefs and

prac-ticesand the influence ofscientific medicine

DeathandAfterlife.Thenatureof beliefsand practices

con-cerningdeath, thedeceased, funerals, and the afterlife

BIBLIOGRAPHY:Aselectedlist ofpublicationsabout the

culture The listusually includes publications that describe

both thetraditional and the contemporary culture

AUTHOR'SNAME:The name ofthesummary author

Maps

Each regionalvolumecontains mapspinpointingthe current

locationof the cultures described inthatvolume The first

map ineachvolumeisusuallyan overview,showingthe

coun-tries inthatregion Theothermaps providemore detailby

marking the locations of the cultures in four or five

subregions

Filmography

Each volumecontains a list of films and videos about cultures

coveredinthatvolume This listisprovidedas a serviceand

in no wayindicatesanendorsementbytheeditor,volume

ed-itor, orthesummary authors Addresses of distributors are

providedsothatinformationaboutavailabilityand prices can

be readilyobtained

Ethnonym Index

Each volume contains an ethnonym index for the culturescovered inthat volume As mentioned above, ethnonyms arealternative names for the culture-that is, names differentfrom those used here as the summary headings Ethnonymsmay bealternativespellings of the culture name, a totally dif-ferentnameused by outsiders, a name used in the past but nolonger used, or the name in another language It is not un-

usualthat some ethnonyms are considered degrading and sulting by the people to whom they refer These names may

in-nevertheless beincluded here because they do identify thegroupand may help some users locate the summary or addi-tional information on the culture in other sources Eth-nonymsarecross-referenced to the culture name in the index

Glossary

Each volume contains a glossary of technical andscientificterms found in the summaries Both general social sciencetermsand region-specific terms are included

Special Considerations

In a project of this magnitude, decisions had to be madeabout the handling of some information that cannot easily bestandardized for all areas of the world The two mosttrouble-some matters concerned population figures and units ofmeasure

Population Figures

Wehavetried to be asup-to-dateand as accurate aspossible

inreportingpopulation figures This is no easy task, as somegroupsarenotcountedinofficial government censuses, somegroups arevery likely undercounted, and insomecases thedefinitionof a cultural group used by the census takers differsfrom the definition we have used In general, we have relied

on population figures supplied by the summary authors.When other population data sources have been used in a vol-ume,they are so noted by the volume editor If the reportedfigure is from anearlier date-say, the 1970s-it is usuallybecause it is the most accurate figure that could befound

Units of Measure

In aninternational encyclopedia, editors encounter the

prob-lemof how to report distances, units of space, and ture Inmuch of the world, the metric system is used, but sci-entists preferthe International System of Units (similar tothe metric system), and in Great Britain and North Americathe English system is usuallyused We decided to use Englishmeasures inthe North America volume and metric measures

tempera-in the other volumes Each volume contains a conversion

table.

Acknowledgments

In a project of this size, there are many people toacknowledgeand thank for their contributions In its planning stages,members of the research staff ofthe Human Relations AreaFilesprovided many usefulideas These included Timothy 1.O'Leary,Marlene Martin,JohnBeierle,Gerald Reid, DeloresWalters, Richard Wagner, and Christopher Latham The ad-visoryeditors, of course,alsoplayedamajor roleinplanning

Preface xi

the project,and not justfor theirownvolumes but also for

the projectas awhole.Timothy O'Leary,TerenceHays,and

PaulHockingsdeservespecial thanksfortheircomments on

this preface and the glossary, asdoes Melvin Ember,

presi-dentof the Human RelationsAreaFiles.Members of the of

fice andtechnical staff alsomustbe thanked forsoquickly

andcarefullyattendingtothemanytasksaprojectof thissize

inevitably generates They are Erlinda Maramba, Abraham

Maramba, Victoria Crocco, Nancy Gratton, and Douglas

Black AtG K.HaLl, theencyclopediahas benefited from the

wise and careful editorial management of Elizabeth Kubik

and Elizabeth Holthaus, theeditorialand production

man-agement of Michael SimsandAraSalibian, andthe

market-ing skillsofLinda May andLisa Pemstein Finally, Iwould

liketothankMelvin Emberand theboardof directors ofthe

Human Relations AreaFilesfortheiradministrative and

in-tellectual support for this project

DAVID LEVINSON

ReferencesMurdock, George Peter (1967) Ethnographic Atlas Pitts-

burgh, Penn., UniversityofPittsburghPress

Murdock, George Peter (1983) Outline of World Cultures

6th rev ed New Haven, Conn Human Relations Area Files

Ifyou turn a globejust so, all you can see is thePacificOcean,

the earth's largest geographic feature Its estimated areaof

some 181 millionsquare kilometersisgreater than that ofall

of theworld's landareascombined; however,evenwhenAus

tralia isincluded,the Pacific contains only about9 million

squarekilometersofdry land Therest consistsof morethan

halfoftheworld's volumeof freewater,withanaveragedepth

of over4,000metersandreaching depthsover10,600meters

intheMarianaTrench,justsouthof Guam From the Bering

Strait inthe north to the Antarctic Circle is adistance of

morethan 14,700kilometers, andto crossthe Pacific at its

greatest width, between Singapore and Panama, one must

travel about 19,700 kilometers A first impression of

Oceania, then, isoneofvast size and distances

Perhapsnotsurprisinginthefaceof suchimmensity

(es-peciallyto themodemair traveler), themostcharacteristic

featureof the Pacific Ocean isemptiness.Althoughit

con-tains more islandsthan are foundinall other oceans

com-bined,theoverwhelmingmajority of thetensof thousands of

islands of Oceania are in thesouthwestern quadrantof the

Pacific.Butthis isstillaverylargearea,anditincludes some

island groups that will not be considered in this volume

Japan,thePhilippines, andmostofIndonesiaarecoveredin a

latervolume ofthis encyclopedia that deals with Eastand

Southeast Asia Here wewill be concernedwith the island

continent ofAustralia,NewGuinea, and the islands of

Mela-nesia, MicroMela-nesia,andPolynesia (seemap1).Thus the scope

ofthis volume islimited,butitstillencompasses ahugearea

that isastoundinglydiverse

The Physical Environment

The diversityofOceania beginswith the physical

environ-mentof its islands Ageologistmight begintoportray this

en-vironment by drawing onamapofthe Pacific what is called

the "Andesite Line," which follows deep trenches in the

ocean floor in a southerly direction from Japan to New

Guinea,then veerseastwardalmostto WesternSamoa,where

it turns southwestand passesNewZealand West of this line

isthe great Continental AustralasiaticPlatform, composedof

metamorphic, granitic,and andesitic rock, andtotheeastis

the Pacific Basin,formedmainly of basalt.Overmillions of

years the heavierbasalticbasingraduallyhassunk untilonly

thepeaksofits mountainrangescurrentlybreach the ocean's

surface in the form ofoceanicislands; the relatively lighter

platform west of theAndesite Line correspondingly has risen.This generalprocess, together with regional upfoldings and

upliftings of the ancient continental rock, erosion, and

changesin sealevelwith theadvanceand retreatofglaciers

elsewhereintheworld,hasresultedinthe currentappearance

of continental islands and, ofcourse, the continent of traliaitself Generally speaking, the islandstothe west of the

Aus-linearelargerand closertogether thanarethoseto the east.Still,Australia(withan area of 7.7 million squarekilometers)and New Guinea (800,000 square kilometers) are excep-

tional in size, as the average Pacific island covers only 60square kilometers and many of the islands are much smallerthan that

While initially useful, a simple contrast between nental and oceanic islands does notindicate adequately thediversity ofislandtypesand itsconsequences for those whoinhabit them Geographers usually recognize three main

conti-typesofislandsinthePacific:continental islands, volcanic lands, andcoralislands

is-Examples of the firsttypeincludesuch islands as NewGuinea, theBismarck Archipelago,Bougainville,NewCale-

donia,NewZealand,and Vid Levu in the Fijigroup (see map

1).Theseislandsrepresent some ofthe portions ofthenental Australasiatic Platform that currently are above sea

Conti-level,andtheyaretheproducts ofmillions ofyears of uplift,

folding, faulting, erosion, and sedimentation Elevationscanreach over 4,000meters on anumberofpeaksinthe central

cordillera that runs the length ofNew Guinea, and about3,700 meters on MountCookinNew Zealand In themoun-

tains of continental islands onefinds the headwatersof greatriversystems,suchastheFlyandSepikrivers ofNew Guinea

The landscapes ofcontinental islands are highly diverse,ranging from the vast desertsthatcover much of Australia tobare mountain peaks, high plateaus, and lowland alluvial

plains,all ofwhich can be foundon any given island In tion, most of the continentalislandsnearer theequator are

addi-fringedwith coral reefs, the most extensive ofwhich is theGreat Barrier Reef of Australia

Volcanicislands are found throughout much of the cific, where they have been formed through volcanic intru-sionfrom the continentalplatformordirectly from the oceanfloor The Andesite Line marks the most unstable part of theEarth's crust, with thousands ofvolcanoes formingwhat issometimescalleda'ringoffire'encircling the Pacific Basin.These volcanoes tend to be of the explosive type, andtheireruptions can bespectacular,as inthe case ofKrakatoain In-donesia When it lasteruptedin 1883, thesound ofthe ex-plosion was heardinAustralia anditsasheventuallycircledthe Earth.Others,suchasManamoff the northeasterncoastxxiii

&191.Luu&L6UUI

ofNew Guinea, can be locallydestructive yet still provide

habitableenvironmentsforpeople (seethe Manam summary

in thisvolume) VolcanoesinthePacificBasin areoftheflow

type, capable oferupting dramatically, as occasionally

hap-pensonthe island ofHawaii, buttheyarealsoisland-building,

with their flows ofbasalt graduallycreatingorextendingthe

land area, as has occurredin thecreation over millions of

years of the whole Hawaiian chain, Tahiti, Kosrae, and

Pohnpei Volcanic islandsareoften called"high"islands

be-causetheycan include mountainsofconsiderableelevation

(e.g.,Mauna Kea at3,900meters inHawaii),and precipitous

cliffs plunging intothe sea orbordering large, deep valleys

Mostvolcanic islandsare alsofringed bycoral reefs

Thethirdmaintypeof islandisformed from coral The

hard,rough coralonemightfindin ashopthat sells rocksor

seashellsisactuallythe exoskeleton offleshy polypsthat live

incoloniesprotected bythe limetheyextractfrom sea water

and thensecrete.The animalscanonlyliveinwaterthatis

sa-line, clear, warm (18-22 C),and shallow (no deeperthan

about 36-45meters).Whenthe top ofanunderseamountain

or anoffshoresubmergedportionofanislandprovidesthese

required conditions, colonies ofliving coralcan form and

grow (affordingdazzlingsightsfor scubadivers).Iftheir base

then sinks too much, or rises to break the surface of the

ocean, theanimals die, leavingbehind their coral

exoskele-ton Whenthishappensinareasthatareexposedtothe air,

algaegraduallyencrustthecoral and fillitspores, and

wind-blown sand or sediment helps to create reefs, islets, and

islands

Reefs orislands basedoncoralarecalled elevatedreefs

whenthey extend 8meters or moreabovesealevel;an

exam-pleisthe island of Guam, whose limestonecliffs reach 180

meters above the ocean's surface Most coral islands are

muchlowerthanthat,withatollsaveragingonly3-4meters

attheirhighestpoints, althoughtheycanstill provideliving

space for resourcefulpeople.Coral islandsoccur in avariety

of types,basedprimarilyontheirshapesand structures, such

asfringingreefs (Rarotonga),barrierreefs (Belau),andatolls

(Truk) Even withinthese types,however,there isdiversity.

Atollsconsistof coral reefsembracingalagoon,orsheltered

bodyofsea water Most aresmall and haveasimplestructure,

suchasUlithi withitsreef andthirtytinyislets, totaling only

afew square kilometers ofland,andchannelsleadingintoits

central lagoonof about 470 square kilometers.Truk,onthe

otherhand, is morecomplex, consistingof about fortylow

coral isletsenclosingalagoonupto64kilometersin

diame-ter, insideofwhichareanotherseventeenhighislands of

vol-canicorigin.TheenormoussizeofTruk'slagoonmadeit an

ideal berthing place,first for theJapanesefleetand then that

of theAllied forces,duringWorldWar II Thus,while coral

islandscangenerallybe contrasted with continental or

vol-canicislandsin termsof their lowertopography,smallerland

area, poorersoils,and frequentscarcityof freshwater (with

theonly source,rainfall,readily percolatingthroughthelime,

stone), theystillprovide widelydiverse habitats forliving

or-ganisms,including humanbeings.

Popular images of Pacific islands seldomreflect therange

ofphysicalformsthey actuallymanifest,and thesame is true

ofOceanicclimates With the major exceptions of Easter

Is-land,NewZealand,andthesouthern two-thirds ofAustralia,

nearly all ofthe inhabited islands of Oceania are located

within the tropics, with average temperatures of18° Cinthecoldestmonth.Butclimateis afunctionofmorecomplicatedfactors,suchaselevation, topography,andwindpatterns.Inaddition, largeislands arephysically complex enoughto cre-atetheir ownweather systems Thus one canfindinAustraliasteamy, tropical zones inthe far north, 'Mediterranean cli-mates"inthesoutheast,andalargelyaridinteriorwhere ex-tremely high daytime temperatures can plunge to -10° C

nearthegroundatnight.NewGuinea, too,is aland of

con-trasts, ranging from hot and humidlowlands to temperate

highlands and even glaciers and permanent snow on thehighest mountain peaks

Theclimatesof mostofthesmallerislands of the Pacific

arelargelyaresult of their positions withinfivemajorphericcirculation regions.Onlyafewislands,but withNew

atmos-Zealand prominent among them, are subject to the coldwaves, general rains, cyclones, and cold-front stormsassoci-

ated with themidlatitudewesterlies, strong year-round windsthatpredominate north of 25° N and south of 27° S Virtu-

allynoislands are located within thelarge doldrums area, with

itslowwinds, high humidity, and nearly constant high

tem-peratures,found just south ofthe equatorinthe western cific Most of the islands with which we are concerned here

Pa-areinfluencedby the remaining threecirculation systems

In the eastern Pacific, trade winds dominate, blowingfrom thenortheast north of the equator and from the south-eastinthe south In addition to their importance to sailors(who gave them their name), the trade winds dramatically af-fect local climates.Typically the windward side of affected is-lands is cloudy and wet during most of the year, while the lee-ward side is relatively cloudless and drier.(This effect can bewitnessedclearly on the island of Hawaii, where 254 and 51centimetersof rain might fall on opposite sides of the island

in atypicalyear.) In the western Pacific, the seasonal soons replace the trade winds, generated largely by the peri-odicheating and cooling of the great landmasses of Asia andAustralia A rainy season is brought with the monsoons fromAsiainthe northern winter and spring, withadry season pre-vailing when the wind direction reversesduringthenorthern

mon-summerand autumn Finally, the typhoon zone must be

men-tioned While typhoons (or hurricanes) can occur in most gions of Oceania, theyare most common inthe northwest

re-(especiallyonBelau and the CarolineIslands)and the west(from Vanuatu to Samoa) These storms, with winds ex-ceeding 120kilometersperhour and torrential rains, can be

south-devastatingto islands and theirpopulations, and low atolls

caneasilybe swamped by temporary risesinsealevel of5or 6meters

It should be clear from the preceding discussion thatOceanic landforms, soils, and climates are too diverse toallowageneralized description, and oneshould expectthat

the differences among them have had important and variableconsequences fortheplants and animals (including humanbeings) that have been able to colonize the islands.Anaddi-

tional crucial factor hasbeenthe previouslymentionedone

ofdistances, especially therelative proximity to the great

con-tinental landmasses, with the corresponding factor of

isolation

Mostof theplantson Pacific islands, apart from those

more recentlyintroducedby people, derive from theAsian

continent, with seeds, spores,and fruits carried to thembyxxiv

Introduction xxv

wind, waves, and animals such as birds This processhas not

been simply a transference, however, since evolutionary

events (such as geneticdrift and selective reproduction) and

competition in new ecological niches has resulted over the

millennia in the development of countless new species In

general, the farther one goes out intothe Pacific away from

Asia, the fewer families, genera, and species of plants are

found and the morethe localflora (untilmodemtimes)is

en-demic (i.e., the product oflocalizedevolutionfrom ancestral

stocks) In Australia, 50 percent of the native plant species

are endemic; in New Zealand,thefigure rises to68percent;in

New Caledonia, 80 percent; and inthe Hawaiian chain, 95

percent Additional factors determining the richness and

complexity of islandfloras includethe size and topography of

a given island

On atolls and other low islands, natural vegetation

re-sembles what one would typically find on an ocean beach;

givencontinualexposure to sea air andtides,any plants must

be both water-resistant and salt-resistant Thus seacoast or

strand vegetation consists largely of grasses, sedges, woody

vines and shrubs, and a few palms On larger islands,whether

volcanic orcontinental, a wider range of vegetation

commu-nities can exist Ifrivers deposit mud along the shore, there

may be stands of mangroves lining the shore andriver

estuar-ies, and backwaters can create large swampy regions filled

with grasses, sedges, cane, and palms Farther inland there

might be grassy savannas or drained alluvial areas associated

with larger rivers, with large, buttressed trees,lianas (woody

vines), canes, and palms On the largest and highest islandsa

succession of vegetation communities will be found at varying

elevations Typically, lowland hill forest occurs up to about

1,000 meters above sea level on continental islands;

transi-tionsoccur at about one-half the elevations indicated on

vol-canic islands in the Pacific Basin This zone usually contains

many different tree and palm species, but little ground

vegeta-tion.Above this, and up to about 2,200 to 2,700 meters, one

finds the lower montane rain forest, where palms give way to

treeferns, oaks, and pines and eventually to beech, wild

bam-boo, and pandanus trees In this elevation zone, too,

espe-cially where human forest clearance has occurred, there can

be extensive grasslands, dominated by sword grass and with

few trees From about 2,700 meters to 3,000 metersone

en-ters the montane cloudforest, a low-canopied, permanently

wet and cold forest dominated by tree ferns, with a dense

floor consisting of rottingvegetation Finally, on the highest

islands, an alpine region may be identified above 3,000

me-ters; usually dry and sunny, this regionwill contain conifers,

shrubs, and heaths, as well as occasional grassy areas up to

the snow line

As far as animals areconcerned,the same factors are

im-portant as with plants, but the problems of original dispersal

are greater As with the flora, the native fauna of Oceania is

derived mostlyfrom Asia; until modem times and with the

help of people, noAmerican land vertebrates were able to

cross the vast open areas of the eastern Pacific But even in

the west, an imaginary line (called "Wallace's Line" or,

some-what modified, "Huxley's Line," after the two great

natural-ists Alfred Wallace and Thomas Huxley) drawn roughly

be-tween the Celebes and New Guinea divides the world's

richest from the world's poorest vertebrate faunas Despite

the extension of the continental platform far out into the

westernPacific,sealevelshaveneverbeenlow enough to con,

nectAsiacompletelywith Oceania.Thusnoneof thelarger

Asian and Indonesian land mammals,such as tigers, keys, and squirrels, were able to cross the interveningstretches ofdeepsea, andindeed few vertebrates atallhave

mon-been able to reach Oceania withouthuman assistance

Ingeneral, aswithplants,as one proceeds fromwesttoeastinthePacific,thefaunabecomesmoreimpoverished;for

example,ontheislandof NewGuinea there are at least 550species of land birds, while on remote Henderson Island(near PitcairnIsland, farto the east), there areonly four Inthewestern Pacific,the naturalfaunaincludesbats, rodents,

monotremes (egg-laying mammals), and marsupials as the

only mammals, althoughseabirdsandlandbirds abound Inthe central and eastern Pacific, prior to the intervention ofpeople, one would have foundonlybats, rodents, seabirds,

andsomelandbirds.Oneeffect,then,ofdistances in the cific has been reduction of faunaldiversity,wellillustratedby

Pa-the Hawaiian chain where there were no indigenous landmammals, snakes, lizards, frogs, or freshwater fish A con-trastingeffect,though,andonerelated toisolation,has beenthe evolution of many unusual forms of animal life Themonotremes (e.g., platypus) and marsupials (e.g., kangaroos,koalas, etc.) of the Australia and New Guinea regions aregood examples, as are the many species offlightless birds,

such as the cassowaries and emus of New Guinea and tralia and the kiwis and now-extinct moas ofNewZealand.Inthe absence of natural predators (and people), these birchproliferated (withoverseventeen speciesendemic to Hawaii)and sometimes grew to enormous size, as with themoa, whichreached a height of over threemeters Incontrastto theland,

Aus-of course, the seas Aus-of Oceania have always been abundantly

stocked, with fish, turtles, shellfish, and other marineanimals

The physical environment of Oceania has been scribed here insomedetail for two reasons: first, to counter-

de-act the stereotypical image of Pacific islands conveyed bytravel posters to beach-loving vacationers; and second, toprovide some general context forunderstanding thedegreetowhich Oceanic peoples have been constrained-often

severely-by thephysical settings towhich theyhave had toadapt Inthe absence of large, domesticableland mammals,pastoralism has never been a viable option in thePacific, andhuntingandgathering could only be a significant subsistencebase in Australia and on the largest continental islands.While many wild food plants continue to be utilized inOceania, as is clear from the culturalsummaries inthisvol-ume, horticulture has been feasibleon manyislands only forpeople who brought with them or subsequently obtained atleast mostof their staple crops fromelsewhere Withat leastsome generalappreciation ofthenature oftheisland environ-

ments, we can betterunderstand boththeoriginalhuman

set-tlement of the Pacific and the world of Oceanic islanderstoday

The Settlement of OceaniaWhen Europeans first entered the Pacific in the sixteenth

century, nearly all of the islands ofOceaniahadalreadybeendiscovered by the aboriginal islanders Although the size ofthe indigenous populationatthe time ofEuropeancontactisimpossible to know with precision, current estimates by an-

Xxvi IUILUU & U

thropologists suggest that perhaps as many as 3.5 million

peoplewere settledon 1,000 orfewerof the islandsbythat

time.Overthecenturies sincethen,WesternEuropeans have

speculatedregardingtheorigin (or origins) of thepeoplesof

Oceania, proposingcanoeloadsof NativeAmericans,or lost

tribesofIsrael,"orfleeing refugeesfrom thesinking mythical

continentofMu astheirancestors Fewscholarstodaywould

givecredencetoanysuchproposals.Whilesystematic

archae-ologicalresearchhasonlybeen undertakenintensivelyinthe

past few decades, thegeneral outlines of the human

settle-mentof Oceania havenow emerged,and forsome areas at

leastwe knowagreat deal about Pacificprehistory

There arenohuman fossilsorany other kind ofevidence

thatwouldsuggest that humanbeingsinthe Pacificevolved

there fromsomeprehumanancestor.Indeed,the most liberal

estimatesof howlongany of Oceania (asdefinedinthis

vol-ume) has beeninhabiteddonotexceed50,000years; that is,

theyfall within thetimeperiodwhenmodem forms ofHomo

sapienshaveexistedonearth.Obviously, then,Pacific

island-ers arederivedfrompeoplewhooriginallywent intoOceania

from someplace else Allresponsiblescholarstodaywouldsay

that, asforsomuch of thenativeflora andfauna,the initial

sourcewas Asia,including insular southeastAsia

Toget ageneralidea of how thisoccurred,wemight

fol-low somescholars and divide the PacificintoNear Oceania

and Remote Oceania Near Oceania includes the islands of

the westernPacific fromAustralia and New Guinea eastward

totheendof theSolomon Islands.Asmentionedpreviously,

theseislandstendtoberelatively largeandarefairlyclose

to-gether, often grouped in clusters (or archipelagoes) within

which at leastsomeislands aremutuallyvisible underclear

conditions Inthe remainderof thePacific,the islands of

Re-mote Oceania are separated fromNearOceaniabyat least

350-kilometer gaps of open ocean, and manyarchipelagoes

are 1,000 kilometers or more from their nearest inhabited

neighbors All available evidence indicates that Near

Oceania wasinitiallysettledby people tensofthousands of

years before anyone ventured into Remote Oceania, or at

leastbefore they leftbehind any evidence of their presence

there

Relative nearness to Asia and its large southeastern

islands-wherethehumanlineagegoesbackintime atleasta

millionyears-isonlyoneof the conditions that favored the

earliersettlementof Near Oceania Another hastodo with

globalphysical andclimaticchanges duringthe Pleistocene

epoch,beginningover2 million years ago During thatlong

period,majordropsin worldwide atmospherictemperatures

resultedintheformation ofenormous icecapsinthe

North-emHemisphere andicefieldsinthe Southern Hemisphere

Thisimpoundmentof much of theEarth's waterresultedin

significantlowering ofsea levelsand shorelines aroundthe

world Conversely,warmingperiods resultedinpartial

melt-ing of theseice caps and consequent raising of sea levels

During the later stages of this epoch, with one climax

about 53,000 years B.P (before the present) and another

about 20,000 a.P., sea levels in the southwestern Pacific

droppedtosuchan extent(byabout 120 to140metersfrom

their presentlevels) andfor suchlongperiodsthattwo

mas-sive land units were created called the 'Sunda (or Asian)

Shelf' and the 'Sahul (or Australian) Shelf." The former

connectedSumatra,Bomeo, Java,andBalitomainland Asia,

andthe latterjoinedAustraliatoNewGuineaand many of

itsnearbyislands Thesedry-landconnectionsfacilitatedthe

dispersal of Asian plants, animals, and peoples to Near

Oceania, although Sunda and Sahul were themselves still

separated by deepoceantroughs no narrower than the90

kilometer-wide gap then existing between Timor and tralia Whilesea levelswerelowered in Remote Oceaniaas

Aus-well, of course, its islands remained relatively isolated because

of theirstill-vast distances from both Sundaand Sahul

Giventheseconditions, then,itis notsurprisingthat

di-versetypes of evidencenowindicatetheearliest presence ofOceanic peoples in "Greater Australia," with generally-agreed-upondatessuchas: easternNew Guinea's HuonPen-

insulaby40,000B.P.and theinteriorofthe island from 30,000

to25,000 B.P.;NewIreland,32,000 B.P.;Buka,intheSolomon

Islands,28,000 B.P.;LakeMungo,inthewesternpartofNewSouthWalesinAustralia, 32,000to 24,000 B.P.;Keilor,nearMelbourneinsoutheasternAustralia, 45,000to 36,000B.P.;various sites in the state of Western Australia, 38,000 to35,000 B.P.; and Tasmania, thenjoinedto the rest ofAus-tralia, about 30,000 B.P.

Wedonotknowagreatdeal aboutthesepioneersettlersapart from their mainlystone andwooden tool kit and thefact thattheyallapparentlysubsisted by hunting, gathering,andfishing Theywerecertainly highlymobile, as can be seen

by their rapid colonization of thewhole continent of tralia, and at least the initial arrivals must have possessedvia-

Aus-blewatercraft Whileprehistorians debatemanyof the details

ofearlysettlement,all would agreethatitwasagradual ess,undoubtedly involvingnumerous separatelandfalls andmanydifferent small groups The apparentlack of any clear

proc-relationship between Australian Aboriginal languages andthose ofNew Guinea ortherestof Oceania is but one indica-tion that the diversity of the native peoples of the Pacific

begana verylong time ago

New arrivals of human groups in Near Oceania (andlocaldiversification withinit) unquestionably continued tooccur overthousands of years,perhaps slowingwiththe finalmajorrise insealevels at about 7,000B.P.In any case,the next

large-scale humanincursions intothe Pacific, aswellas

ex-pansion into Remote Oceania, seem to have begun about4,000B.P.

During a period lasting for 1,000 to 1,500 years, newgroups ofpeople colonized Oceania,initiallysailing from the

islandsofeasternIndonesiaalongthe northern coast of NewGuinea into Near Oceania,where they settled on the sea-

coastsand offshoreislandsamid the descendants of the

ear-lier arrivals By about 3,500B.P.theywereestablished in theBismarck Archipelagoand hadexpanded to the Santa Cruz

Islands, the NewHebrides (Vanuatu), and New Caledonia

(see map 1) Soon afterward some oftheir representativesmoved ontobecome the first settlers of Fiji, Tonga, and Sa-

moa(byabout 3,000B.P.) and smaller islands such as Futunaand Uvea

These newOceanians areconsidered by most rians to have been the bearers of the 'Lapita Culture' (sonamed after a site in New Caledonia), and archaeologistshave been able totracetheir influence andprobable move-ments thanksto discoverieson numerousislands of a rela-

prehisto-tivelysudden andwidespreadappearanceof their trademark

a distinctive kind of pottery,characterized by small dentate

Introduction xvvii

toothlikee)patterns stamped into theclayandsimpleline

in-cisions,oftenincomplexgeometricdesigns.Thepeoplewho

madethispottery appeartohave beenvillage-dwelling

horti-culturalists with atool kitthat,like their ornamentation,

em-phasizedthe use of shells.They clearlyhadimpressive

naviga-tional and sailingskills, enablingthemtoengageinextensive

interisland tradeand tospreadoutwellintothe central

Pa-cific Byabout 500 B.C (or 1,500 B.P.) the distinctiveLapita

pottery largely disappears from archaeological sites in the

westernPacific Ratherthan seeing thisdisappearanceasthe

resultofmassiveextinctionsor someothercataclysm, most

scholarsinterpret itsimplyas areflection of localchange,

co-inciding with the development of what would become the

classic"Polynesian" wayof life (see below).

Both duringandafter the Lapitaperiod,further

expan-sion into Remote Oceania continued with the Pacific serving

lessas abarrierthanas ahighway.TheCookIslands,the

So-ciety Islands, and theTuamotuArchipelagoweresettledby

about2,500 B.P.; the Marquesas Islands andremotevolcanic

islandssuch as Rapa, within thenext500years;and,remotest

ofall,EasterIsland,by 1,500B.P.Not all movements were in a

simple easterly direction, however By 1,500 B.P., people

(probably from theMarquesas) had settledinthe Hawaiian

chain andit islikelythat theFiji-Samoa-Tonga*triangle"was

amajor staging area for movementstothesouthwest

(reach-ing NewZealand byabout 1,000B.P.) and northwestwardinto

the Ellice Islands (Tuvalu), the Gilbert Islands, the

Mar-shalls, and the Carolines during the period from 2,000 to

1,500 B.P Newimmigrants also continuedto enterOceania,

withgroups originating in Indonesia and thePhilippinesfirst

settling areas such asBelau and Yap

Manyof thedetailsofthe settlementofOceania are not

yet known, and mostof thosewedo knowcannotb included

in abriefoutline such asthatofferedhere Moreover,thereis

much thatwe will neverbe able toknow forsure sincethe

originalinhabitantsof thePacificislands-like their

descen-dants today-were theagents oftremendouschangesinthe

islands themselves,therebycomplicatingthe tasks of

histori-calreconstruction Theintroductionofnewplants and

ani-mals,deforestation through fire andland-clearingactivities,

and the depletion and extinction of many naturalspecies

began to alter the Pacific landscapes from the beginning.

What we can saywithsomecertaintyisthat thePacificwas

colonizedover a longperiodof time, atmanydifferent

peri-ods in time (with some places settled much more recently

dtanothers), probablyfor many different reasons(including

both accidental andpurposefulventures), andbymany

dif-ferent groups of people, whovaried among themselves in

physicaltypes,languages, andcultures.Much ofdtisdiversity

has beensubsequentlyenhancedand redirectedthrough both

mixingandisolating ofpopulations andas aresult oflocal

adaptations to circumstances that were themselves highly

diverse

Languages and Cultures of Oceania

To appreciate better the linguistic and cultural diversity of

Oceania, both in thepast and the present, it will be useful

onceagain to divide this immense field of interest into more

manageable regions Since theearly nineteenthcentury,

ge-ographers, anthropologists, and others have divided Oceania

intomajor"ethnicregions"or'cultureareas"in termsof

per-ceivedphysicalandculturalsimilaritiesandcontrasts amongitspeoples The most commonly used categorization is based

ononeproposed in 1831 by the French navigatorJulesS-CDumontd'Urville, and is represented in general on map 1

and in moredetail on maps 2-6

Australia (from the Latinaustralis,or"southern")is

sin-gularinbothitsvast size(nearly 7.7 million square ters)and itsAboriginalpopulation,whose cultures developed

kilome-inways largelyisolated from the rest of Oceania North ofAustralia is New Guinea, which,with its land area of more

than800,000 squarekilometers, is thesecond-largest island

intheworld(after Greenland).New Guinea isusuallysideredapart of Melanesia (from theGreekmelas, or"black,"and nesos, "island"), but on the maps in this volume (seemaps 3 and4) what may be called"IslandMelanesia" is pre-

con-sentedseparately, encompassing the Bismarck Archipelago,

theSolomonIslands,Vanuatu(formerly the New Hebrides),

and New Caledonia The 5 million square kilometers ofoceaninthe northern Pacificdemarcated as Micronesia (fromthe Greek mikros, meaning "small") includes only about2,800 square kilometers ofland,with approximately 2,000 is-

lands (many of which are indeed tiny) in four main groups:the Mariana, Caroline, Marshall, and Gilbert islands (seemap 5) Finally, there is the great "triangle" of Polynesia(from the Greekpolys,meaning"many"),whichincludes theHawaiian group, Easter Island, and New Zealand at its cor-nersand over 39 million squarekilometers of ocean Scat-tered overthatlarge area of water are such majorarchipela-

goes as theMarquesasIslands,theTuamotu Archipelago, theSocietyIslnds,the CookIslands,Samoa, Tonga, and theFiji

Islands, totalingonly some 8,260 square kilometers of land

(see map 6)

Thesedemarcations, whileusefulfor purposes of

orien-tation, must beunderstoodasartificialconstructsratherthanreflections of natural, discrete groupings of peoples Indeed,some anthropologists today would recommend abandoningthemaltogether,inpartbecausetheyvastlyoversimplify real-

ity,but also because from thebeginning they have been

asso-ciated with ethnocentric and racist assumptions For ple, whend'Urville published his division ofOceania into

exam-"Malaysia" (includingwhat is now calledIndonesia),nesia," "Micronesia," and "Melanesia" (which for him in-

"Poly-cludedAustralia), hisclassificationwas as muchevaluative as

itwas descriptive Thus, he speculated that the Pacific hadbeensettledby two distinct human "stocks,"one giving rise

toMalaysians,Polynesians, and Micronesians, the other ducing theMelanesians He noted, approvingly, the"yellow

pro-tocopper" skin coloroften found in the inhabitants of theformer regions and considered their bodies "well-

proportioned"; these "traits," together with the widespreadoccurrence of rigid socialstratification andinstitutionalized

chieftainship, led him to regard these peoples as relatively

"civilized."Certainly, to him,theydiffered strikingly from the

"dark-skinned" and "uncouth" Melanesians, who he

sus-pected were of"lowintelligence."

Physical traits have played animportant part in shapingtheimages of Pacific islanders held both by earlytravelers and

bythe modern general public One example concerns the

is-landof NewGuinea,named 'NuevaGuinea"in the sixteenthcentury by the Spanish voyager YnigoOrtizdeRetesbecause

he thought the people he saw there physically resembled

xxviii Introduction

thoseheknew from the 'Guinea Coast' ofWestAfrica We

nowknow fromblood-group data andother genetic studies

that any resemblances between Africans andNewGuineans

(or any other Pacific islanders) are the result of common

adaptive responsesandnotrecent commonancestry.Infact,

modernscholarsfind little basis for any"racial"classification

of the peoples ofOceania It is undeniable that a traveler

landingonTruk(inMicronesia)orTahiti (in Polynesia) will

tendto seemanypeoplewithlightbrownskin andstraightor

wavyhair, justas inPapuaNewGuineaor Vanuatu(in

Mela-nesia) a person is likely to seemanydarker-skinned people

with'frizzy"hair However,such traits,aswellasbody build

and stature, varyenormouslyinthePacific (as theydo

else-whereintheworld) andare notdistributedneatly by island,

island group,orregion.Moreover, manyphysicaltraits(such

asapparentskincolor,hair colororform,andbodybuild)are

influenced by nongenetic, cultural factors and practices

Whenwe use termslike"Melanesia," 'Micronesia,"and

"Pol-ynesia," then,wemustbecarefulnot topresumeorimply that

these refertodifferent 'races"inthePacific;nor, as weshall

seebelow,dotheyreferinanysimplewaytohomogeneous

"culture areas."Wehavealreadyseenthat thePacificwas

set-tled over avery longperiod oftime andby manydifferent

groupsofpeople;the legacyisoneofhumandiversityinall

respects-physically, culturally, andlinguistically

Before considering furtherthe major "culture areas" of

Oceania, itwill be useful to outlinebriefly the linguistic

diver-sity foundin the islands, which have been hometo about

one-fourthof theworld's totallanguages MostPacific

lan-guageshavenotyet beenstudiedsystematically,and

classifi-cations based on theirpresumed genetic relationships (i.e.,

connectionsthroughcommonancestrallanguages) are

con-tinuallybeing modified aswelearn more about them (In the

cultural summaries for thisvolume,adegree of

standardiza-tionhasbeenattempted byfollowingin most casesthe

group-ings showninthe Language AtlasofthePacificArea,edited by

S.A WurmandS.Hattori.) Virtuallyalllinguistsagree,

how-ever, that thelanguagesof Oceaniacanbeassignedtothree

major groups,eachof whichisunrelatedtothe others:

Aus-tralian, Austronesian, and Papuan

The smallestof these groups consists of about 200

lan-guagesthat werespokenby AboriginalAustralians Perhaps

50, orone-fourth, of these are now considered to be extinct

and many more are on the path to extinction as increasing

numbers ofAboriginesadopt Englishandfailtopass ontheir

traditional languages to their children Virtually all ofthe

Australianlanguagesarethoughttobegeneticallyrelated to

eachother, but theirclassificationintolanguage families and

other groupingsisstill debated.Atpresent,noclearlinkages

have been demonstrated between any Australian language

and others in the Pacificorelsewhere in the world

The second-largest groupconsists of the Austronesian

(formerly called 'Malayo-Polynesian") languages After the

Indo-European Family, Austronesian languages are the most

numerousandmostwidely dispersedinthe world, with more

than 800 languages spread acrosstwo-thirds of the Earth's

circumference, from Madagascartosoutheast Asia, Taiwan,

thePhilippines,andthroughoutmostof the Pacific.Perhaps

as many as 450 ofthesearefoundinOceaniaasdefinedin

this volume Nearly 250,000 people speak Fijian, and

Sa-moanhas about 200,000speakers; however,most

Austrone-sianlanguagesinOceaniacurrentlyhave fewerthan 10,000

speakers. Most linguists consider these languages tobe

de-rivedfromalanguage (called Proto-Oceanic)associatedwiththeLapitaculture discussedearlier Overtime,itisthought,

this single ancestrallanguage community dispersed and

di-verged;nowmembers of the OceanicSubgroup of

Austrone-sian languages are found along the northern and eastern

coasts ofNew Guinea and throughout most ofMelanesia,

Polynesia, and allofMicronesia,exceptforPalauan,Yapese,and thelanguageof the Chamorros ofGuam (these beingaf-filiated with SoutheastAsianAustronesianlanguages).The

Austronesianlanguagesofthe Pacificare incontinualtion,influencedinpartby dynamicinteractionwithspeakers

evolu-ofPapuan languages, andthere ismuch controversy among

linguistsregardinglower-level groupings,especiallyfor those

Austronesianlanguages spoken inMelanesia

Thelargestandmostcomplexmajor groupoflanguages

inOceaniaconsistsof thePapuanlanguages Thereare over

700 distinct Papuan languages (with uncounted dialects),

butfewer than 50 of theseareadequatelydocumented.Morethan60languagefamilies have beenproposedtobring order

tothisdiversity, butcurrentevidence suggests that not all ofthe Papuan languages aregeneticallyrelatedto each other

Indeed,untilrecently, theyweredesignated simplyasAustronesianlanguages," alabel still usedby many scholars,

"Non-toindicate thisfact;that is,it wasclearfromtheircalstructuresand otherfeaturesthattheywerenotrelated to

grammati-Austronesian languagesor to those of Australia, but it wasdoubtedthattheyformeda single higher-levelgroup SomePapuanlanguages arefoundin easternIndonesia, but most

arespoken bythepeoplesofNewGuinea, the Bismarck

Ar-chipelago, and the islandofBougainville.Given their

distri-bution,andespeciallytheirpredominanceinthe interiors ofMelanesianislands, mostscholars suppose that the first set-tlersof NearOceania(see above)werespeakersof a language

(or languages) ancestraltoPapuanlanguages,with the

cur-rentdiversityandcomplexity developing subsequentlywithinthe region Whileafewlanguages,suchasChimbuandEnga

inthehighlandsofPapuaNewGuinea,havenearly200,000

speakers each, mostPapuan languagesarespokenby onlya

few hundreds or thousandsofpeople. Extensive borrowingfromAustronesian-speaking neighborsandthe influence of

lingua francas andintrusive languages such as English andIndonesianmake thesituationeven moredynamicand com-

plex today

Indeed, asif the linguisticpicture inOceania were not

complex enough,oneresult of that very complexity has beenthecreationofnumerouspidgin languages,withsomearisingamong Pacificislandersthemselvesastheytraded and other-

wiseinteractedacrosslanguage boundaries,and others ring in the context of the colonial period when islandersvastly expandedtheircontactswith others, especially through

occur-plantationlabor(see below).Apartiallist wouldinclude

Mi-cronesianPidgin English,HawaiianPidgin, Samoan

Planta-tion Pidgin, Queensland PlantationPidgin, Chinese Pidgin

English, Sandalwood English, Macassarese Pidgin, TorresStraitBroken, HimMotu, BahasaIndonesia,and Melanesian

Pidgin English, the lastwith threemain dialects: TokPisin

(inPapuaNewGuinea),Solomons Pijin, and Bislama (or

Bi-chelemar, inVanuatu)

Oceania'slinguistic diversity, with about 1,500 distinct

Introduction XX=X

languages traditionally spoken and probably most islanders

fluent in at least one ofthepidginsjustmentioned, parallels

at least as much diversity in cultures A few cultural traits

could be said to have beenshared throughout thetraditional

Pacific (e.g., subsistence-based life in domestic households,

land typically owned bykinship-basedunits, and the absence

ofdraft animals and the wheel) But differences far

outnum-ber similarities, and the'culture areas" into which Oceania is

conventionally divided must themselves be appreciated as

broad regions possessing some general shared characteristics

but also much diversity, as is evident from the 151 cultural

summaries included in this volume These cultureshavebeen

selected for inclusion on the basis of their representativeness

of this range as well as for their prominence in the literature

on the Pacific

When they first met Europeans there were perhaps as

many as 300,000 Aborigines, divided into about 600 tribes,

living in Australia Tribes varied considerably in size

(averag-ing about 450 members) and consisted of intermarry(averag-ing

"hordes," each of which claimed a common territory and

shared a language, name, and certain cultural practices A

horde comprised the members of a clan (based on either

ma-trilineal or pama-trilineal descent) and their in-married spouses;

the clan was considered to be the collective owner of an area

identified by the presence of sacred places, established by

an-cestralbeings during "the Dreamtime" (or 'the Dreaming"),

when they gave form to the Earth and established traditional

customs Throughout Aboriginal Australia, subsistence was

based on hunting and gathering and tribal boundaries were

ecologically based Vast and intricate networks of tracks and

paths crisscrossed the continent, through which intertribal

trade was conducted and joint ceremonialundertakingswere

facilitated While coastal regions offered somewhat richer

and more various food resources than did the deserts of the

interior, wild game and plant food in general were seasonal

and scattered, requiring frequent traveL In the desert areas,

people engaged in what has been called "restricted

wander-ing" within a prescribed, though often huge, area; some

coastal peoples practiced "centrally based wandering,"

peri-odicallyfanning out from semipermanent home bases In this

volume, the diversity of Aboriginal cultures is well

repre-sented by seventeen summaries (see map 2), including the

major desert peoples (e.g., Aranda, Mardudjara, Ngatatjara,

Pintupi, and Warlpiri), those of the more varied northern

re-gions (e.g., Murngin, Tiwi, and Wik Mungkan), and island

dwellers as different from each other as the Torres Strait

Is-landers and the Tasmanians

The island of New Guinea is home tospeakersof more

than 700 languages and its environmental and cultural

diver-sity defy easy generalization Perhaps 2 million people lived

there at the time offirst contactwith Europeans (which for a

few groups in the interior occurred as recently as the 1960s),

and thevarietyof their traditional ways of life is conveyed by

sixty-ninecultural summaries in this volume (see map 3)

Oc-cupying the high valleys of the centralcordilleraof mountains

running likea spine almost the length of New Guinea are the

highlanderss," represented here by nineteen summaries

These peoples still tend to live in either densely settled

vil-lages or scattered homesteads orhamlets,mostly organized in

terms of patrilineal descent with clans and tribes as major

po-liticalunits and the'big-man"style ofleadership (as is

gener-ally truefor New Guinea,withexceptionssuch asMekeo, theTrobriand Islands, and Wogeo) Mosthighlanders continue

to be sweet-potato cultivators, with domestic pigs being ofcentral importance in ceremonial exchange systems andother intergroup transactions The Sepik River is another

majorgeographical featureof the island, and on itsbanks andtributaries are found numerous groups who depend on

riverine resources, sago, and yams as primary food sources

Both matrilineally and patrilineally organized societies arefound here and across the northern part of theisland,andthe

region is justifiably world-famous for its massive traditional

ceremonial houses and elaborate art styles Sepikand

north-emlowlandpeoples are extremely diverse, however,ascan be

appreciated through the seventeen cultural summaries from

this region.The southern lowland and coastalareas are also

diverse,with yams, taro, or sago usuallycomplementing ingand fishing as food sources Patrilinealdescent is themostcommon basis for social organization, andsettlementsranged

hunt-traditionally from large riverine or coastal villages in thesouthwestand southeastto enormous communallonghouses

in the Papuan Gulf region and the interior, withthecoastal

gulf peoples rivaling those of the Sepik intheirstunningwork and ceremonial structures.Anothermajorregionforart

art-production is the Massim, consisting of a number ofislands

and island groups off the southeastern tip ofNew Guinea.The peoples of the Massim, most ofwhom are organized in

terms of matrilinealdescent, are also well known fortheir ticipationin thekula system, whichlinksnumerous islandsin

par-acomplex networkof ceremonial exchange, trade,andcal alliance

politi-Apart from New Guinea,Melanesia(seemap4) had

per-haps one-half million inhabitants when European contact

began Twenty-nine cultural summaries inthisvolume make

it clear that there are no traits that areuniversal intheregion

or that are uniquely "Melanesian." Indeed, in the Solomon

Islands area are found several "Polynesianoutliers"

(includ-ing Anuta, Ontong Java,RennellIsland, andTikopia), where

Polynesian languages are spoken and basically Polynesian

cultures (see below) are found in themidst ofquitedifferent

peoples As is true of the rest ofOceania, nowhere were

Mela-nesians dependent on cereal crops; rather, treeandrootcrops

were the traditional staples, with taro (Colocasia esculenta)

being the most widespread of these Communitiesofvarying

sizes are still organized either matrilineally or patrilineally,

and, except onthe Polynesian outliers, leadership andstatus

in general are largely acquired rather than hereditary monial exchange and prestige displays of garden produce

Cere-continue to be generally important facetsofintercommunity

relations, and secret societies and cults were traditionally

something of a Melanesian hallmark Associated with these

latter groups were highly developed plastic and graphic arts

(now largely devoted to the tourist trade), especiallyinNew

Britain, New Ireland, and the New Hebrides (now called

Vanuatu) Despite thesegeneral features, there was and still

is considerable cultural diversity in Melanesia, as one can

readily see from the cultural summariesforVanuatusocieties

alone (Ambae, Malekula, Nguna, Pentecost, and Tanna)

The range of societies found inMicronesia iswell

repre-sented by fourteen cultural summaries in this volume (see

map 5) Perhaps 180,000 people lived onNauru andin theMariana, Caroline, Marshall, andGilbertislandswhen Euro-

peans firstentered the region Most ofthesepeople livedin

smallhamlets on small islands oratolls,with sociopolitical

organizationbasedonthecontrol ofland,whichwasusually

vested in matrilineal descent groups Systems ofhereditary

ranking and stratification were universal, and some island

groups were linked in extensive empires Overseas trading,

using single-outriggercanoes, was also a feature that

con-nectedthefar-flung islandsinthis region.Aswellasserving

asa 'highway," theseaalsowasand stillis astorehouse of

food for Micronesianpeoples, whoseisland homes have

al-ways had a verylimited landfauna.Staplecropstraditionally

includedtaro, yams,breadfruit, pandanus fruits, and

coco-nuts Underlying these broad similarities is diversity, with

threemainregions oftendistinguished the Westerngroups of

theMarianas (seeChamorrossummary),Palau (Belau),and

Yap; Central,includingKosrae,Pohnpei,Truk,and the

Poly-nesianoutlier of Kapingamarangi; andEastern Micronesia,

consisting of Nauru, theMarshall Islands, andtheGilbert

Is-lands (Kiribati)

Polynesia,withperhaps500,000inhabitantsatfirst

con-tact with Europeans, displayed general cultural unity,

al-though the SocietyIslands (Tahiti) and therestof Eastern

Polynesia differed somewhat from Western archipelagoes

suchasSamoa, andevenmorefrom Fiji (seemap6).These

broaddifferences, aswell asotherparticulars, canbe

ascer-tained from thetwenty-twocultural summariesofPolynesian

groupsinthis volume Ingeneral,scholarsconsiderwhatthey

callthe 'classical" Polynesianculture to have derived from

the Lapita Culture (see above section on the settling of

Oceania), takingitsmajorshapearound500B.C This

classi-cal form consisted of settlements inlargevillages, with kin

groups tracing descentcognatically Everywhere political

au-thority was hereditary, and elaborate religions, withpriests

andmultitudes ofgods,werealsohighly organized.Taroand

breadfruitweremajorstaples obtained throughshifting

culti-vation, andfishing was of major importance, as it is today

Polynesians are famous for their navigational and sailing

skills, ornate body decoration (especially tattooing), and

wood-carving However, as the summaries in this volume

make clear (especially those for the Cook Islands, Futuna,

and Rapa), the past two centuries have broughtenormous

changesto Polynesia, astheyhaveto therestof Oceania

Oceania in the Modem World

According to archaeological and other evidence, insular

southeast Asiantraders, slavers,trepangcollectors,and bird

ofparadise plumehuntersregularly sailedthewatersand

vis-ited the coasts of western New Guinea and northern

Aus-tralia for centuries before the first Europeans arrived there

While their impact on the nativepeoples of the southwestern

Pacific was doubtlesssignificant,they left littleintheway of

writtendocumentation of theculturestheyencounteredorof

their dealings with the people The historical record, and

Oceania's emergence into the modem world, effectively

began in theearlysixteenth century

Starting in the late thirteenth century, 'the East' (i.e.,

Asia and the islands of modern Malaysia and Indonesia)

lured Europeans seeking spices and continuing the long

search forTerraAustralis Incognita,the'southern continent"

that many thought must exist to balance the known land

masses of the northernhemisphere In the late fifteenth

cen-tury,land routes to the East were dominated by the Turks and

nolongeropentoEuropeans,sothelatterlookedto the sea.The Catholic church, through the Agreement of Tordesillas

in1491, divided the world (arrogantly)at aline370 leagueswest of the Cape Verde Islands; all to the west"belongedto"Spain, withPortugal'sdomain encompassingthat half of theglobe east of theline Thuswas set in motionSpain's voyages

tothe Western Hemisphereinsearchofspices and gold anditsdiscovery of the New World in theprocess

The first Spaniard to see the PacificOcean was Vasco

Nuniez de Balboa,who viewed it lookingsouth from what isnow Panama and named it, accordingly, the 'South Sea."Throughout the sixteenth century Spanishexplorers sailedsouthwest from Europe, rounding Cape Homand scouringthe Pacific seeking riches Thefirst of thesewas FerdinandMagellan, who named the ocean"Pacific"because it seemed

so calmcompared to his stormy passagethrough what wouldlater be called the Straits of Magellan Itisyetanother indica-tion of the emptiness of the Pacific, referredtcat the begin-ning of this essay, that Magellan sailed across the entireocean before touching land in the MarianaIslands ofwesternMicronesia in 1521 Contemporaneous withthe Spanish voy-agers, Portuguese ships sailed to the southeast, around theCape of Good Hope in Africa, and enteredthe Pacific fromthe west, landing at Yap in the 1520s and New Guinea in the1540s Iberianscontinued to explore the ocean for another

half-century, 'discovering" such islandgroups as the mon Islands (named in 1568 by Alvaro de Mendafia, who

Solo-hopedhe had found the fabled source of thegold of King

Sol-omon), the Marshall Islands, the Ellice Islancs, the quesas Islands, and the northern Cook Islands Their questformaterial riches was largely unfulfilled, buttheysought theglory of God as well as ofkings,andCatholicism was estab-lished early, especially in Micronesia

Mar-Followingthe defeat of the SpanishArmada in 1588 and

otherpolitical changes in Europe, thehegemony of the ish and Portuguese in the Pacific was drastically reduced.Such explorers as Pedro de Quir6s and LuisViezdeTorres

Span-continued to make important "discoveries" (e.g., the New

Hebrides, the Gilbert Islands, and the Torres Strait, all in1606) but, apart from western Micronesia, the Pacific in theseventeenth century was largely the province of the Dutch.Theirprimarymotivation wasbusiness, particularly in spices,and in 1602 they established the Dutch United East India

Company From their bases in the 'DutchEast Indies"

(Ma-laysia and Indonesia), Dutch ships probed to the east, withWillem Schouten and Jacob le Maire sailingalong the north-

em coast of New Guinea and eastwardtoFutunaand Tonga

in 1616, and Abel Tasman exploring much of the southerncoast of Australia as well as Tasmania, which now bears hisname, and as far east as Fiji in 1643 Little ofwhat the Dutchfound was made public due to their concernwith secrecy forpurposes of trade monopoly, but sketchy reports trickled back

to Europe andinspired such fancifulworks of literature asGulliver'sTravels

Further power struggles in Europeintheeighteenth tury resulted in significant new presences in Oceania Occa-

cen-sional Dutchexplorers still made new'discoveries," such as

Jacob Roggeveen, who sighted Samoa and Easter Island in

1722, but it was the French and English ship captains whocame to dominate the Pacific in the 1700s Some were bucca-mX

Introduction xxxi

neers, preying on the Spanish galleonsthatby thenregularly

sailed betweenthePhilippinesandSouthAmerica,but

oth-ers were in searchof colonies orscientific knowledge.French

navigatorssuch asPhilip Carteret and Louis Antoinede

Bou-gainville exploredthe Solomon Islands,and theEnglishman

SamuelWallis visited the Marshall Islands, Tahiti, and other

parts of Micronesia and Polynesia But the major European

figure inthe Pacific from 1768to 1779wasthe greatBritish

navigator CaptainJamesCook

Cook's first voyage, from 1768 to 1771, wasundertaken

primarilyforscientific knowledge (althoughBritishcolonial

ambitions were a significant factor as well) He was

commis-sioned to observe thetransit of Venus before the sun, with

Tahiti identified as the best location for the necessary

astro-nomical measurements, and to find Terra Australis He

re-turned with detailed charts and new information regarding

Tahitiand New Zealand, aswell as otherislands, but nonews

of a southern continent From 1772to 1775, hecovered

al-most the whole ofthePacific, including the coast of Antarc,

tica, and established that Australia was large, but not the

continent that had been imagined, and indeed that Terra

Australiswas only imaginary On afinal voyage, from 1776 to

1779, hisgoal was another illusion-to find the 'Northwest

Passage" that would connect the North Atlantic and North

Pacific oceans What he found included theHawaiian Islands

(which he named the Sandwich Islands after his friend and

patron, the Earl of Sandwich), where he was killed by native

Hawaiians in 1779 The list of islands and island groups

'dis-covered" or"rediscovered"by Cook islong,induding the

Ha-waiian group, Christmas Island, New Caledonia, the Cook

Islands, the GilbertIslands, Fiji, Tonga, the Solomon Islands,

Easter Island, and part of the TuamotuArchipelago In

addi-tion, his carefully drawn charts proved finally that New

Guinea, New Zealand, and Australia were not joined

to-gether, as many had supposed Cook's accomplishments,

in-cluding a vast quantity of scientific specimens and

observa-tions,have never beenequaled, in the Pacific or elsewhere in

the world By the conclusion of Cook's voyages, the main

outlines of the island groups of Oceania were charted, and

only locally systematic exploration would be undertaken in

the future From the Europeans' point of view,now was the

time forexploitationof the resources and people ofthis vast

new realm

The War of 1812 effectively disrupted the American

whaling industry in the Atlantic Ocean, butworldwide

de-mand forwhaleoil forlamps andwhalebone forcorsets and

other uses continued unabated Until marketschanged and

whale populationsdwindled in the 1850s, hundreds of

whal-ing ships prowled the central Pacific, introducing Western

goods andWesterndiseases in the process The continuing

trade in spiceshadcreated increasingdemands byAsians for

furs, pearl shells, trepang, andsandalwood, the last being an

aromaticwood taken from treesthat, as was soon discovered,

covered vast tracts of the islands of theNew Hebrides, Fiji,

andmuch of the rest of Polynesia During the heyday of the

whalersand traders (1780-1850) there was virtually no

offi-cial European colonial presence in Oceania, and reports of

atrocities in the islands fanned the flames of evangelical

movements then popular in Europe and the United States

Missionaries were quick to see a need for their influence, and

few parts of the Pacific were left untouched by them The

London MissionarySocietysentthe first wave, in 1797, toTahiti, Tonga, and the Marquesas Islands, and additionalgroupstoFijiin 1835 and theNewHebridesin1839 Con-gregationalists from the United States arrivedintheHawai-ianIslands in1820, and other Protestant groups fanned outintotheCook Islands(1821), Tonga(1822),Fiji and Samoa

(1830), the Caroline Islands (1852), and the GilbertsandMarshalls (1857) In addition to other, smaller, missiongroups, Catholic missionaries soonwereestablishedinTahiti

(1836),New Caledonia(1840),andFiji(1844).To thisday,new groups of missionaries are arriving and expandingthroughoutOceania,but thoseearlyrepresentatives were es-peciallysignificant, notonlyin terms oftheireffectsonthecustomsand beliefs of Pacific islanders but also because theirpresence constituted a major factor in the development ofcommerce andaccompanyingdemands for the establishment

of colonialgovernments and services

From the middle of the 1840s to the beginningoftheFirst World War, newcomers began systematically to stripOceania ofits resources, bothnatural andhuman In 1847the first laborers were'recruited"from theNewHebridesandtheLoyaltyIslands,andsoonblackbirderswerescouringthePacific,offeringtrinkets andoften-false promises of goodpay

andpromptrepatriation afteratermof serviceonAustraliansugar plantations, in theguano minesofPeru, or wherevercheap labor was needed Thousands of malePacificislanderswere thusshippedoff todistantplaces, often undercoercionand treated as virtual slaves Many died ofdiseasesor othercauses,and countlessindividualswereneverreturnedtotheir

homes,sometimessimplybeingdroppedoff atwhateverportwas convenientfor the laborrecruiters In part due to pres-sure from Pacificmissionaries,GreatBritainpassed ananti-blackbirdingact in 1872, whichlargely,but notcompletely,

ended this traffic in human cargo

As if in reciprocity for those who wereremoved, pean powers also came to regard Oceania as a dumpinggroundfortheir"undesirables," with NewCaledoniachosen

Euro-in 1864by the French as a place to get rid ofconvictsfromhomejustasAustralia hadbeenfoundedas acolonybytheBritish in 1788 forthe samepurpose Asians began topourinto thePacific, with ChineseandJapanese laborers(in 1865and1878,respectively) beingbroughttoworkonplantations

in Hawaii.People were alsobroughtfrom India to work in the

burgeoningsugarindustry ofFiji; the first group arrived in

1879, and today their descendants constitute the majoritypopulationin the FijiIslands

Thedemand for labor on Pacificislands wasnearly

limit-less as European-owned plantations began to occupy vasttracts ofland.While sugarcanewas themajor plantationcrop

in Queensland, Australia, and Fiji, the copra trade had abroaderandlonger-lasting influence The driedmeatofthecoconut(copra) washighlyvaluedasasource ofoil for cook-

ing, soaps, cosmetics, and otherproductsinworldwide mand,and millions ofcoconut palms were planted and man-

de-aged throughout the Pacific Missionaries saw copra as alimitless source ofcash, andcommercial firms obtained rights

tocountlesshectares of coastal andislandland.Forexample,

from1884 to 1899, the NeuGuinea Kompagnie turnedmost

of thecoastline ofnortheasternNewGuinea intoplantations

forcopra, as well astobaccoandothercrops,and,beginning

in1905,the firm ofLever BrothersestablishedLever's Pacific

xxxii Introduction

Plantations, Ltd.,inmuch of Fiji and the Solomon Islands

Copracontinues to bethemajor commercial export ofmany

islanders

American, Australian, British, French, and German

businessinterestsalsocametodominate the mercantile trade

that blossomed throughout Oceania to supply plantation

managers, itineranttraders,and smallstorekeepers,whonow

seemed to beeverywhere Prominentamong theseweresuch

companiesastheGerman-ownedGodeffroyandSon,which

established its headquarters in Apia (Western Samoa) in

1856 and soonmonopolized Micronesia andspreadout to

New Britain Anothercompany, and still a major presence

throughout the Pacific, was the British firm Burns Philp

(SouthSeas)Company,Ltd.,which soon after thebeginning

of the twentieth century controlled much of the shipping

business and countless tradestores inlocationsrangingfrom

port towns to tinyislands.Suchprospects, combined with the

strategic importance of Pacific islands ascoaling depotsand

naval stations and the discovery of mineral resources (e.g.,

nickel in New Caledonia in 1863, gold in New Guinea in

1889, andphosphateon Nauru in 1899),made Oceania an

increasingly desirable part of theworldforEuropean colonies

in the latter half of the nineteenth century Australia had

been established as acolonyoftheBritishin1788, andlong

before, in 1565, Spainhad claimedpart ofthe Mariana

Is-lands andextendeditsinfluence inMicronesia Butit was in

themiddleand late1800sthat the Europeancolonialpowers

rushedto expandtheirempires

TheDutch,formalizing theirlong-standinghegemonyin

the 'EastIndies,"claimed the westernhalfof NewGuineain

1848, and in 1884Germany annexed thenortheastern

quad-rantof theisland (plus Manus, New Britain,NewHanover,

New Ireland, and Bougainville), towhich Great Britain

re-sponded in the same year with the proclamation that the

southeastern quarterwasBritishNew Guinea(laterrenamed

Papua andtransferredtoAustralian controlastheTerritory

of Papua in 1906) Elsewhere in Melanesia, France seized

NewCaledonia in 1853 and the NewHebridesin1882,only

to reach a compromise with Great Britain in1906 by forming

thejointly administeredAnglo-French Condominiumof the

New Hebrides Duringthisperiodthe Frenchalso annexed,

in Polynesia, the Marquesas Islands, Tahiti, the Wallis

Is-lands,and theAustral Islands FijiwascededtoGreat Britain

in 1875, and in 1892 the latter established the Gilbert and

El-lice Islands Protectorate.Atthevery dose ofthecentury, the

United Statesannexedthe HawaiianIslands and New

Zea-landacquired the CookIslands In Micronesia, the United

Statesseized Guam in 1898, and in thefollowingyear the rest

ofSpain's interests were dissolved with their sale of the

north-ernMarianas, the Carolines, and the Marshalls to Germany

In the midst of all these maneuvers, Pacific islanders

were little more than pawns Guamanians had revolted

against their Jesuit missionaries in 1670, and the

Spanish-Chamorros War lasted from 1672 to 1700, but Spain,

pre-dictably, won New Caledonians stagedan uprising against

the French in 1878, as did Caroline Islanders opposed to

their overlords in 1887and WesternSamoans in 1908 But

therecould be little hope for success against the

nineteenth-centurysuperpowers, andnonewould be achieved until

glo-balpolitics changed with twoworld wars

While WorldWar I was fought far from the Pacific

is-lands, itbrought about major realignments of the colonialpowers' positions in Melanesia and Micronesia Germany lostitscoloniesimmediatelyin 1914 at theoutbreak ofthe war,with Japan taking over the Mariana Islands (except Guam),the Carolines, and the Marshalls and with Australia seizingGerman New Guinea and Nauru.Following the war, the new

shufflingswereformalized, with the League ofNations ing the MandatedTerritoryofNew Guinea to Australia and acomparable mandate inMicronesia to Japan

award-The nextbig political changes came with World War II

In 1941 Japan seized Guam from the United States, but attheend of the war it lost all of its Micronesianholdings, as all

ofthose islands became the TrustTerritoryofthePacific

Is-lands, administered for the United Nations by the UnitedStates Australia's mandate became the United NationsTrustTerritoryof NewGuinea, whichmergedin 1949 withPapua to become theTerritory ofPapua and New Guinea,and NewCaledoniabecame an overseasterritoryof France

Tobe sure,World War 11 brought many other changes as well,

asthe Pacificbecameabattleground, with fierce fighting astating New Guinea andtheislands of Melanesiaand Mi-cronesia, in the course ofwhichmilitary forces also intro-duced vast quantities ofWestern goods and influences InNewGuinea and Melanesia,one of themanifestationsof thisimpact was the flowering, during the war and in the postwar

dev-years,ofnumerous'cargocults," nativistic movements

focus-ing onprophecies of the magical arrival of vast amounts ofmaterialgoods("cargo") andnativestaking control over theirown affairs

Whileindependence from colonial rule was not as nent as theprophetshadhoped, thepostwarperiod has in-deed seen a"newPacific" emerge;today,Franceremains theonly major colonial power in Oceania Contributors of the in-dividualculturalsummariesinthisvolumehave ably chartedthese politicalchanges,as wellasproviding localized exam-ples ofthebroad social and culturalchangesthatcould only

immi-besketchedhere I dose this introductory essay with a briefsurvey of the current status of the islands of Oceania as politi-calentities (see map 1) and some basicdemographic infor-mation Byorganizing that survey by "culture areas," I showthat these distinctions, whatever qualified value they mayhave in subdividing "traditional" Oceania, are poor guide-lines in understanding the complexity that characterizes thepeoples of the Pacific today

Australia isanindependent state and a member of theBritishCommonwealth, federated in 1901, with its capital inCanberra (seemap 2) Its nearly 7.7 million square kilome-ters had apopulation of a little over 16 million in 1986, onlyabout 1 percent ofwhomwere Aborigines Australian Ab-origines are represented by sixteen cultural summaries in thisvolume, in addition to theTorresStraitIslanders,whonum-bered about 6,100 in 1980; the islands of theTorres Strait,with a capital on Thursday Island, are an Australianpossession

The island of New Guineaisdivided into twopolitical

entities (seemap 3) The western half, with an area of about

422,000 square kilometers, was Dutch New Guinea until

1963, when it was awardedbytheUnited Nations to sia andbecame Irian Barat, or WestIrian.In 1969, itbecame

Indone-IrianJaya,aprovince ofIndonesia,withits capital inJayapura

and a population of about 1.2 millionpeople in 1980 In this

Introduction xxxjii

volume, the peoples of Irian Jaya, who have not been studied

asextensively as havetheireasternneighbors,arerepresented

by tencultural summaries The eastern half of the island

con-stitutes the main portionof Papua New Guinea (capital, Port

Moresby), anindependent state and member of the British

Commonwealth since 1975 with a total land area of about

462,000 squarekilometers(see maps 3 and 4) In 1984, a

na-tional census estimated apopulationof 3,350,000,which

in-cluded theinhabitantsofthe'mainland" (representedinthis

volume by fifty-nine summaries) and the islands of

Bougainville (two summaries), Buka (Kurtatchi), Manus

(one), New Britain (four),andNew Ireland (three)

Elsewhere inMelanesia (see map 4), the Territory ofNew

Caledoniaand Dependencieshas beenanoverseas territoryof

France since 1946,with Noumea asthe capital city Its land

area of about 19,000 squarekilometerswas home to 145,400

people in 1984 on New Caledonia itself and the Loyalty

Is-lands (see Ajii and Loyalty Islands summaries in this

vol-ume) The SolomonIslandsbecame anindependent state and

member of theBritishCommonwealthin 1978 Its 1984

pop-ulation of 251,000 (represented by ten cultural summaries)

was distributed across about 30,000 square kilometers of

land,includingsuch major islands as Choiseul, Guadalcanal

(where the capital, Honiara, islocated),Malaita, New

Geor-gia, San Cristobal, the Santa CruzIslands, and SantaIsabel

Finally, the former New Hebrides became the Republic of

Vanuatu, an independent state, in 1980 It consists of about

eighty islands and islets, totaling about 13,000 square

kilome-ters oflandandincluding most prominently Ambrym,Aoba

(Ambae), the Banks Islands, Efate (home of the capital,

Port-Vila), Erromanga, Espiritu Santo, Malekula, Pentecost,

Tanna, and theTorresIslands The 132,000 ni-Vanuatu

(in-digenous citizens of Vanuatu) censused in 1984 are

repre-sented in this volume by six cultural summaries

In December 1990 theUnited NationsSecurityCouncil

officially terminated the Trust Territory of the PacificIslands

established under U.S administration at the end of World

War11.That former region now consists of five political

enti-ties (see map 5) The Commonwealth of the Northern

Man-anas, with its capital on Saipan, became an American

com-monwealth in 1975 Its 1980 population of about 18,000

people lived on 471 squarekilometers ofland. At the

south-ern end of the Mariana Islands, Guam is an unincorporated

territory of the United States,with aland area of about 550

square kilometers Most ofitsinhabitants live in or near the

capital city of Agana, and a cultural summary of its native

Chamorrospeople is provided in this volume The Federated

States of Micronesia, established as an independent state in

free association with the United States in 1979, includes

most of the Caroline Islands It consists of four

states-Kosrae; Ponape (or Pohnpei), site of the capital, Kolonia;

Truk, and Yap-totaling about 1,200 square kilometers of

land Its population was estimated at a little more than

77,000 in 1980, and it is represented by eight cultural

sum-maries in this volume The Republic of the Marshall Islands

(with two cultural summaries, Bikini and Marshall Islands)

has been an independent state in free association with the

United States since 1979, and the 1980 census enumerated

about 32,400 residents Its capital is on Majuro Atoll, one of

thirty-four major islands in the group, which total only 181

square kilometers of land spread over more than 1,100 islands

and islets The Republic of Palau (Belau) wasestablishedin

1981, but it isstillnegotiatingitsfree-association status Itssix major islands, with the capital town of Koror onBabelthuap, total 461 square kilometers ofland and had apopulation of about 14,800 in 1980 Apart fromthe former

trust territory, Micronesia includes two more political

enti-ties, each of which has a cultural summary inthisvolume

The Republic ofKiribati, with its capital onTarawa, has been

an independent state and member of the British

Common-wealth since 1979, andincludesBanaba, the GilbertIslands,

Line Islands, and Phoenix Islands Its 1984 population of

61,400lived on thirty-three tiny islandswithatotalland area

of only 690 square kilometers, but claiming 3.5-5 million

square kilometers of thesea.TheRepublicofNauru, an

inde-pendent state and member of the British Commonwealth

since 1968, has only about21 square kilometersofland,but

includes 320,000 square kilometersof ocean.Most ofits

pop-ulation of 8,600 in 1984 residedinornearthecapital cityofYaren

Finally, although Polynesia presented perhaps the least

cultural diversity intraditionalOceania, todayitincludesthewidest range of politicalentities tobefound there (see map

6) American Samoa (combined with Western Samoa for a

culturalsummary in this volume),withitscapital cityofPago

Pago, is anunincorporatedUnitedStatesterritory.Itconsists

of seven major islandswith 36,400 people living in 1984 onabout 200 square kilometers of land and exploiting a390,000-square-kilometer area of the sea Thepolitical state

of Cook Islands has been self-governing, in free association

with New Zealand, since 1965 In 1984 itsestimated 16,000

people (representedbyfourculturalsummaries) livedon240

square kilometers of land spread overnumeroussmallislands,

such as Mangaia, Manihiki, Pukapuka, Rarotonga (with the

capital town ofAvarua), andTongareva

Easter Island is a province of Chile; the kilometerisland's populationwascountedas 1,867 in 1981,

180-square-with most peoplelivinginornear the capital townofHanga

Roa Fiji, which is asoftenconsideredapart ofMelanesia as it

is of Polynesia,hasbeenanindependent stateandmemberofthe British Commonwealth since 1970 Administered from

the capital city of Suva ontheislandofVitiLevu, Fiji's area

of over 18,000 square kilometers of land is scattered over

more than 300 islands Indians nowconstitutea majority ofthepopulation,estimated at 680,000in 1984; traditionalFi-

jian groups, including Rotumans, are represented in three

cultural summaries inthisvolume Over5 million square

ki-lometers ofthe Pacificare occupiedby FrenchPolynesia, anoverseas territory of France granted internal autonomy in

1977, withits capitalin Pape'eteonTahitiin theSociety

Is-lands In 1984, 159,000residentswerecountedonabout 130

islands, totaling about4,000 square kilometers ofland Five

cultural summaries are included here, representing major

is-land groups such as the Society Islands (Tahiti), the

Mar-quesas Islands, theAustrals (Rapa), and theTuamotu

Archi-pelago (Mangareva and Raroia) Hawaii has been a state of

the United States since 1959, with its capital city ofHonolulu located onOahu,oneofeight majorislands, withatotal landareaofalmost 17,000 square kilometers.The 1980

censusincluded 964,691 residents, only a minorityofwhom

are of native Hawaiian descent

New Zealand, an independent state and member of the

BritishCommonwealth, consists oftwomajorislands,with

thecapitalcity ofWellingtonlocatedonthe North Island

Thetotal landarea isalmost270,000 squarekilometers, and

its 1981 populationofalittlemorethan3 millionwas

esti-matedtobe about 9 percentMaori,2 percent other Pacificis

landers, and therestof European descent The small island of

Niue,having only258 squarekilometers of land butclaiming

390,000 squarekilometers of sea, is aself-governingstatein

affiliation with New Zealand since 1974, with fewer than

3,000 inhabitants (mostly in the capital town ofAlofi) in

1984 While notrepresented byacultural summary inthis

volume, PitcairnIslandiswellknowntothe generalpublic as

the refuge of the mutineers from CaptainWilliam Bligh's

ship, H.M.S.Bounty Itis aBritishcolonywithonly 45

resi-dents in 1983,descendantsof themutineersandTahitians;

Adamstownisthecapitalof this tiny (5squarekilometers),

remoteisland Tokelauis aterritory ofNewZealand,

adminis-tered from ApiainWestern Samoa Its 1981populationof

about 1,500 livedonthree atollstotaling only 10square

Id-lometers of land.Nuku'alofaisthe capitalof theKingdom of

Tonga, amember of the British Commonwealth since 1970

Tonga consistsof about 170islands,withatotal land area of

670 square kilometerswithin 700,000 square kilometers of

ocean,whichwere hometo about 104,000 peoplein 1984

Tuvalu(formerly theEllice Islands), withits capitalon the

small atoll of Funafuti, became an independent state and

member of theBritish Commonwealthin1978 Its1984

pop-ulation of 8,200livedon 26 squarekilometersoflandand

claimed 900,000 square kilometers ofsea.TheTerritoryof the

Wallisand Futuna Islandshas beena French overseas

terri-tory since1959,withMata Uta as itscapital (see Futuna

cul-tural summary) In 1983, about 11,800 people lived onits

twenty-five islands totaling 255 square kilometers of land

Last is theIndependentStateofWesternSamoa,an

indepen-dent state andmemberofthe British Commonwealthsince

1962 Its eightislands,with thecapitalof Apiaontheisland

of Upolu, comprisealmost 3,000 squarekilometersofland,

andthe 1983 populationwasestimated at 159,000

Reference Resources

The vastness of the literatureonOceaniaisproportional to

that of the ocean itself Thefollowingsuggestionsand

refer-ences,includingthe sourcesonwhich this essayisbased,are

intendedtodirect the readertothemajorsources,which will

lead in turn to the rest

General Works

The mostcomprehensivescholarlysurveyofOceaniaforthe

generalreader is Oliver's ThePacificIslands (1989b).Agood

nonnarrativecollection ofentriesbyspecialistscovering the

whole of the Pacific is the Historical Dictionary ofOceania

(Craig and King1981).Good, up-to-dateatlases of Oceania

do not exist, butahelpfulrecentguideisMotteler (1986)

The only attempt at a comprehensive bibliography of the

older scholarly literature is Taylor's A Pacific Bibliography

(1965).For ausefullistingofmorespecializedbibliographies,

seeFry and Mauricio(1987) Manyexcellent filmsonthe

Pa-cific are nowavailable for classroom use,a partiallisting of

which isfound at theendofthisvolume.More extensivelists

and orderinginformationcanbe foundinHamnett (1986)

and Heider (1983)

The Physical Environment

Nogeneral worksonthe Pacificas awholeareavailable,butthe firstchapter in Oliver(1988) is very useful as an overview,andBarrau'smonographs (1958, 1961) onsubsistence agri-culture survey theeconomically important plants of Oceania.Brookfield with Hart (1973) are thorough with respect to

Melanesia and New Guinea, and Brookfield's (1973) andWard's (1972) editedcollections includegood treatmentsofspecific cases ofgeographic change For amodern, somewhatpessimistic,accountofecologicaldevastationinthecontem-

porary Pacific, see Mitchell (1989)

The Settlement of Oceania

ReconstructionsofPacific prehistory are continually ingwith new dataandnew perspectives Goodgeneral over-views canbe found in Bellwood (1978), Irwin (1990), andTerrell (1986) Fascinating studies of the navigational skills

chang-involved in settlement of the Pacific have beenwritten byLewis (1972, 1978) Moreregionally focused recent studies

include J. Allen (1989) and Jones (1989) for Australia;White and O'Connell (1982) forSahul;Jennings (1979) on

PolynesiaandMelanesia;andAllen and White(1989) on theLapitaCulture

Languages and Cultures of Oceania

Agoodoverviewof Pacificislandersfrom the viewpoint of aphysicalanthropologististhebook by Howells (1973); morerecentgenetic studies are collected inHill and Serjeantson(1989) The LanguageAtlasofthe Pacific Area (Wurm andHattori 1981)has been usedas acommonreference for thecultural summaries in thisvolume More specialized studies

includeDixon(1980)onAustralianlanguages; Foley(1986)

on Papuan languages; Pawley (1981) on Austronesian guages; and Keesing (1988) andMihlhiusler (1986, 1988)

lan-onpidgins and creoles

Oliver's (1988) comprehensive survey of Oceanic tureshas been issued (1989a) in anabridged form Generalcollections ofarticlesbyspecialists on particular culturesin-clude Harding and Wallace (1970) and Vayda (1968).Thomas(1989) critically examines the notion of "culture ar-eas," especially forMelanesiaandPolynesia AustralianAbo-riginal cultures are surveyed in Berndt and Berndt (1985)and Tindale (1974); the Tasmanians are the subject of abook for the general audience by Davies (1974) No compre-hensive survey of theculturesofNew Guinea is available, but

cul-acollection editedbyHastings (1971) isuseful, and Souter(1963) provides a highly readable overview Chowning

(1977)usefully surveysMelanesia,andcollections ofarticles

by specialists include Langness and Weschler (1971) andMay andNelson (1982).Allire'sbooks (1972,1978) on Mi-cronesia areexcellent general works, as are those by Goldman(1970),Howard (1971), Howard andBorofsky (1989), andKirch (1984) for Polynesia More sources on particular cul-tures will be found atthe end of each cultural summary

Oceania in the Modern World

The history of Pacific exploration and settlement by ans has been thesubjectofcountlessbooks forthe generalreader Among the best ofthese are Daws (1980), Furnas(1946), Michener and Day (1957), Moorehead (1966), and

Europe-oawv

Grattan,C Hartley (1963b).The SouthwestPacificto 1900:

AModern History.AnnArborUniversityofMichiganPress

Gunson, Neil (1978).Messengers ofGrace:Evangelical

Mis-sionaries in the South Seas, 1797-1860 New York Oxford

University Press

Hamnett, Judith D.(1986).AGuidetoFilms about thePacific

Islands Working Paper Series Honolulu: University of

Ha-waii, Center for Asian and Pcific Studies, Pacific Islands

Studies Program

Harding,Thomas G.,andBenJ Wallace, eds (1970).

Cul-tures of the Pacific:Selected Readings NewYork Free Press

Hastings, Peter, ed (1971). PapualNew Guinea: Prospero's

OtherIsland Sydney:Angus &Robertson

Heider, KarlG (1983) FilmsforAnthropological Teaching

Special Publication no 16 Washington, D.C.: American

Anthropological Association

Hill, AdrianV.S., and Susan W Serjeantson,eds (1989)

The ColonizationofthePacific:AGeneticTrail.Oxford:

Cla-rendonPress

Howard, Alan,ed (1971) Polynesia: Readingson aCulture

Area Scranton, Pa.:Chandler

Howard, Alan,and Robert Borofsky, eds (1989).

Develop-ments inPolynesian Ethnology Honolulu: University of

Ha-waii Press

Howe, K R (1984) Where the WavesFall: A NewSouthSea

Islands History from First Settlement to Colonial Rule

Honolulu: Universityof Hawaii Press

Howells, William (1973) The Pacific Islanders New York:

Charles Scribner's Sons

Hughes, Robert(1986).The Fatal Shore.NewYork: AlfredA

Knopf

Irwin, Geoffrey (1990).'Human Colonisation andChange

in the Remote Pacific." Current Anthropology 31:90-94

Jennings,J.D.,ed (1979).ThePrehistoryof Polynesia

Cam-bridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press

Jones,Rhys(1989).'East of Wallace'sLine: Issuesand

Prob-lems in the Colonisationof theAustralian Continent." In

The Human Revolution: Behavioural and Biological

Perspec-tives ontheOriginsofModern Humans, editedby PaulMellars

and Chris Stringer, 743-782 Princeton: Princeton

Univer-sity Press

Keesing, Roger M (1988).MelanesianPidginandtheOceanic

Substrate Stanford: Stanford UniversityPress

Kirch, Patrick V (1984) The Evolution of the Polynesian

Chiefdoms NewYork: CambridgeUniversity Press

Langness,L.L.,andJohnC.Weschler, eds (1971)

Melane-sia: Readingson a CultureArea Scranton, Pa.:Chandler

Lewis, David (1972) We, theNavigators: TheAncient Artof

LandfindinginthePacific Wellington, N.Z.:A H.&A W.Reed

Lewis, David (1978) The Voyaging Stars Sydney: William

Di-Michener,James A., andA Grove Day (1957) Rascals in

Paradise NewYork Random House

Mitchell, Andrew (1989) A Fragile Paradise: Nature andMan in thePacific London: Collins

Moorehead, Alan (1966) The Fatal Impact: AnAccount of

the Invasion ofthe South Pacific, 1767-1840 New York:

Harper & Row

Motteler, Lee S (1986) Pacific Island Names: A Map andName Guideto the NewPacific Honolulu: BishopMuseumPress

Miihlhiusler, Peter (1986) Pidgin and Creole Linguistics

London: Basil Blackwell

Miihlhiusler,Peter(1988).'Towardsan Atlas ofthe Pidgins

and Creoles of the Pacific Area." International Journal of the

Sociology ofLanguage 71:37-49

Oliver, Douglas(1988).Oceania:TheNativeCultures oftraliaandthePacific Islands 2vols Honolulu: UniversityofHawaii Press

Aus-Oliver, Douglas (1989a) Native Cultures of the Pacific

Is-lands Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press

Oliver, Douglas (1989b) The Pacific Islands 3rd ed

Honolulu: UniversityofHawaiiPress

Pawley, Andrew (1981) 'Melanesian Diversityand sian Homogeneity: A UnifiedExplanation for Language." In

Polyne-StudiesinPacific Languages and Cultures in Honour of BruceBiggs,edited byJimHollymanandAndrew Pawley, 269-309

Auckland: Linguistic Society of New Zealand

Smith, Bernard (1969) European Vision and theSouth cific, 1768-1850: A Study in the History ofArt and Ideas NewYork: Oxford University Press 2nd ed New Haven, Conn.:

Pa-Yale University Press, 1985

Snow, Philip, andStefanie Waine (1979).ThePeople from the

Introduction xxxv

Snow(1979).Scholarly analysesofexplorationinclude

Bea-glehole (1966), Dodge(1976),FisherandJohnston (1979),

Friis(1967),Grattan(1963a, 1963b), Howe(1984),Maude

(1968), and Spate's authoritativetrilogy(1979,1983,1988)

More specialized but still readable studies include Hughes

(1986)onAustralia and Smith (1989)onPolynesia Recent

studies by scholars on missionaries in the Pacific include

Boutilier et al (1978), Gunson (1978), and Whiteman

(1983)

WorldWar 11 as seenbyPacific islandersispresentedin a

fascinatingcollection byWhite and Lindstrom (1989). An

excellent reference work on modem Oceania is the area

handbook editedby Bunge andCooke (1984).

Acknowledgments

The contributors, who includemore than 100

anthropolo-gists,historians,andotherscholars,aswellasmembers ofthe

Human RelationsAreaFiles (HRAF) researchstaff,cannot

bethankedenough forsharing their knowledge in the

cul-tural summaries in this volume For assistance and advice

(butnotfinalresponsibility)inselectingthe culturestobe

in-cluded and theauthoritiesto writethesummaries, I am

grate-ful to Renie Heyum, Mac Marshall, Douglas Newton,

WilliamRodman,PaulRoscoe,RichardScaglion,andRobert

Tonkinson Patricia HurleyHays made valuablesuggestions

regardingthisintroductoryessay

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Allen,Jim, andJ. PeterWhite (1989) "The Lapita

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Daws, Gavan (1980) A Dream ofIslands: Voyages of

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Thomas,Nicholas (1989) "TheForceofEthnology:Origins

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White, Geoffrey M., and Lamont Lindstrom, eds (1989)

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Honolulu: Universityof Hawaii Press

White,J Peter,andJames F.O'Connell (1982).APrehistory

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Whiteman, DarrellL (1983) Melanesians andMissionaries:

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TERENCE E HAYS