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Ordinary houses have extraordinary stories to tell. For more than a century, anthropologists have been recording these sagas in an attempt to uncover humanity's relationship with the common dwelling. Fundamental to the interaction of humans and housing is the way people shape their living spaces, even redefining their purposes and meanings; their houses, in turn, influence how people live their lives and perpetuate the cultural structures that produced a given form of shelter. The stories draw attention to colonial and missionary agendas, local and global economies, environmental disasters, cultural identities, social connections, and family continuity, as well as personal choices. And, as the chapter on homeless Hawaiians shows, even those without houses have stories to tell. Anthropologists, architects, environmental designers, geographers, and historians will welcome this diverse volume on a neglected yet important aspect of change in the lives of Pacific Islanders.
Suva Stories explores a fascinating tapestry of histories in one of the Pacific’s oldest and most culturally diverse urban centres, the capital of Fiji. Charting the trajectory of Suva from indigenous village to colonial hub to contemporary Pacific metropolis, it draws on a rich colonial archive and moving personal memoirs that bear witness to their time. The diverse contributions in this volume form a complex mosaic of urban lives and histories that contribute fresh insights into historical and ongoing debates about race, place and belonging. Suva Stories is a valuable companion to those seeking to engage with the city’s pasts and present, and will prompt new conversations about history and memory in Fiji.
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Pacific Islander Americans constitute one of the United States' least understood ethnic groups. As expected, stereotypes abound: Samoans are good at football; Hawaiians make the best surfers; all Tahitians dance. Although Pacific history, society, and culture have been the subjects of much scholarly research and writing, the lives of Pacific Islanders in the diaspora (particularly in the U.S.) have received far less attention. The contributors to this volume of articles and essays compiled by the Pacific Islander Americans Research Project hope to rectify this oversight. Pacific Diaspora brings together the individual and community histories of Pacific Island peoples in the U.S. It is design...
Islanders of the South is an ethnography of the kingdom of Tonga in the South Pacific. This is the first book to examine the interplay of Polynesian and Western ideas within contemporary social and economic practices, not from the point of view of Tongan aristocracy, but from that of the common people. The first describes contemporary Tongan society and the main means of subsistence: agriculture, fishing, and manufacturing. An analysis of the kinship system, with its economic, political, and ideological dimensions, is intertwined with a discussion of Tongan attitudes on life and death, marriage and divorce, social rights and obligations, migration and remittances. Later chapters deal with th...
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