In Pacific societies, local knowledge, which has been accumulated over thousands of years and is irreplaceable, is rapidly disappearing. With the extinction of languages, the ability to observe and interpret the world from varying perspectives is also being lost. At the same time, an enormous body of knowledge about nature, plants and animals is vanishing. However, in parallel with this, the people of the Pacific are confronted with new modes of knowledge and newly introduced technologies through imported educational systems, missions of various denominations, and the media. They do not passively assimilate this knowledge but adopt, adapt, and apply it in a syncretistic way.These changes will have permanent effects on the individual lives of people in the region and their knowledge about themselves and their surrounding 'world'. This stimulating book tracks the course of these developments and offers revealing insights into the complexity of Pacific peoples' responses to the process of globalization.

How can more of us protect and create waiwai, value, for coming generations? Culturally-rich education. Holistic health systems. Organic farming and aquaculture. Creative and conscious urban development. Caring for one another across difference. Telling our stories. Continuing the conversation of The Value of Hawai‘i: Knowing the Past, Shaping the Future, this new collection offers passionate and poignant visions for our shared futures in these islands. The fresh voices gathered in this book share their inspiring work and ideas for creating value, addressing a wide range of topics: community health, agriculture, public education, local business, energy, gender, rural lifestyles, sacred community, activism, storytelling, mo‘olelo, migration, voyaging, visual art, music, and the ‘āina we continue to love and mālama. By exploring connections to those who have come before and those who will follow after, the contributors to this volume recenter Hawai‘i in our watery Pacific world. Their autobiographical essays will inspire readers to live consciously and lead as island people. Contributors: Jeffrey Tangonan Acido, U‘ilani Arasato, Kamana Beamer, Makena Coffman, Donovan Kūhiō Colleps, Sean Connelly, Elise Leimomi Dela Cruz-Talbert, Noelani Goodyear-Ka‘ōpua, Consuelo Agarpao Gouveia, Tina Grandinetti, Hunter Heaivilin, Sania Fa‘amaile Betty P. Ickes, Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner, Bonnie Kahape‘a-Tanner, Kainani Kahaunaele, Joseph Keawe‘aimoku Kaholokula, Haley Kailiehu, Hi‘ilei Kawelo, Keone Kealoha, Emelihter Kihleng, James Koshiba, Derek Kurisu, Dawn Mahi, Brandy Nālani McDougall, Mailani Neal, Ryan Oishi, Jamaica Heolimeleikalani Osorio, Eri Oura, Faith Pascua, Mark Patterson, Prime/John Hina, No‘u Revilla, Hāwane Rios, Darlene Rodrigues, Cheryse Julitta Kauikeolani Sana, Dean Itsuji Saranillio, Lyz Soto, Innocenta Sound-Kikku, Cade Watanabe, Jill Yamasawa, Aiko Yamashiro, Matt N. Yamashita, Aubrey Morgan Yee.

The essays in this book explore the vital role translation has played in defining, changing and redefining linguistic, cultural, ethnic and political identities in several nations of the South Pacific. While in other parts of the world postcolonial scholars have scrutinized the role and history of translation and exposed its close relationship with the colonizers, this has not yet happened in the specific region covered in this collection. In translation studies the Pacific region is terra incognita. The writers of this volume of essays reveal that in the Pacific, as in all other once colonized parts of the world, colonialism and translation went hand in hand. The unsettling power of translation is described as it effected change for better or for worse. While the Pacific Islanders' encounter with the Europeans has previously been described as having a 'Fatal Impact', the authors of these essays are further able to demonstrate that the Pacific Islanders were not only victims but also played an active role in the cross-cultural events they were party to and in shaping their own destinies. Examples of the role of translation in effecting change - for better or for worse - abound in the history of the nations of the Pacific. These stories are told here in order to bring this region into the mainstream scholarly attention of postcolonial and translation studies.

1. Food from the land, the ocean shores and the tree canopy2. The lagoon3. The reef4. The open sea5. Omens, stars, singing and other valuable things.

Although historic sources provide information on recent centuries, archaeology can contribute longer term understandings of pre-industrial marine exploitation in the Indo-Pacific region, providing valuable baseline data for evaluating contemporary ecological trends. This volume contains eleven papers which constitute a diverse but coherent collection on past and present marine resource use in the Indo-Pacific region, within a human-ecological perspective. The geographical focus extends from Eastern Asia, mainly Japan and Insular Southeast Asia (especially the Philippines) to the tropical Pacific (Micronesia, Melanesia, and Polynesia) and outlying sites in coastal Tanzania (Indian Ocean) and coastal California (North Pacific). The volume is divided thematically and temporally into four parts: Part 1, Prehistoric and historic marine resource use in the Indo-Pacific Region; Part 2, Specific marine resource use in the Pacific and Asia; Part 3, Marine use and material culture in the Western Pacific; and Part 4, Modern marine use and resource management.

Were there major population collapses on Pacific Islands following first contact with the West? If so, what were the actual population numbers for islands such as Hawai‘i, Tahiti, or New Caledonia? Is it possible to develop new methods for tracking the long-term histories of island populations? These and related questions are at the heart of this new book, which draws together cutting-edge research by archaeologists, ethnographers, and demographers. In their accounts of exploration, early European voyagers in the Pacific frequently described the teeming populations they encountered on island after island. Yet missionary censuses and later nineteenth-century records often indicate much smaller populations on Pacific Islands, leading many scholars to debunk the explorers’ figures as romantic exaggerations. Recently, the debate over the indigenous populations of the Pacific has intensified, and this book addresses the problem from new perspectives. Rather than rehash old data and arguments about the validity of explorers’ or missionaries’ accounts, the contributors to this volume offer a series of case studies grounded in new empirical data derived from original archaeological fieldwork and from archival historical research. Case studies are presented for the Hawaiian Islands, Mo‘orea, the Marquesas, Tonga, Samoa, the Tokelau Islands, New Caledonia, Aneityum (Vanuatu), and Kosrae.