24-1 Problems in Paradise: Sovereignty in the Pacific

Taulasea And Cultural Continuity In Samoa

Nineteen ninety-nine was undoubtedly a year of great upheaval for Samoa. The political assassination of the Minister of Public Works, Luagalau Levaula Kamu, in a country that prides itself on its Christian heritage caused much pain, sorrow and confusion. While many Samoans cope with such confusion by relying on their deeply held Christian beliefs, negative emotions are also dealt with in…

Unrest in the Solomons

Last year violence erupted in the Solomon Islands, disrupting a history of relative peace in the Pacific archipelago. Since September of 1998 an armed militia group called the Guadalcanal Indigenous Revolutionary Army has terrorized mostly Malaitan inhabitants on Guadalcanal province. The militants have attacked villages and driven more than 40,000 Malaitans off the island. Following an attack by…

Tourism and The prostitution Of Hawaiian Culture

Thanks to American imperialism, the ideology that the United States has no overseas colonies and is, in fact, the champion of self-determination the world over, holds no greater sway than in the United States itself. To most Americans, then, Hawai'i is theirs: to use, to take, and, above all, to fantasize about long after the experience. Just five hours away by plane from California, Hawai'i is a…

The Struggle For Hawaiian Sovereignty - Introduction

Modern Hawai'i, like its colonial overlord, the United States of America, is a settler society. Our Hawaiian people, now but a remnant of the nearly one million Natives present at contact with the West in the 18th century, live at the margins of our island society. Less than 20% of the current population in Hawai'i, our Native people have suffered all the familiar horrors of contact: massive…

The Next Step Toward Sovereignty: Project Hawaiian Justice

Ka L…hui Hawai'I is committed to sovereignty and the right to self-determination of the Native Hawaiian people. There are varying degrees of sovereignty to be exercised, ranging from where we are at present to total and complete independence of the nation. The next step on the road to sovereignty is federal recognition of our sovereign rights and claims to the land. Ka L…hui is committed to a…

The Hawaiians: Health, Justice, And Sovereignty

Hawai'i was one of the last large-scale Indigenous societies to be encountered by Western adventurers. At daybreak on January 18, 1778, in the midst of a voyage from Tahiti to the western coast of North America, sailors aboard two British ships sailing under the command of Captain James Cook unexpectedly Sighted the smallest of the high islands in the Hawaiian chain. In retrospect, it is not…

Tentative Steps in Tahiti

Te Ao Maohi (known to most as French Polynesia) is comprised of five distinct island chains, the Society Islands (both "Windward" and "Leeward"), the Marquesas Islands, the Tuamotu Islands, the Austral Islands, and the Gambier Islands. In all, French Polynesia's 118 islands and atolls constitute only 1,359 square miles of land-mass, but the archipelagos are scattered over one million square miles…

Internships At Cultural Survival

Now celebrating it's 28th year, the internship program at Cultural Survival (CS) is an integral part of the organization's success. As Pia Maybury-Lewis, co-founder and Intern Coordinator states, "Interns are an invaluable resource to our operations". Throughout the year, interns gain a better understanding of indigenous peoples and exposure to the human rights issues that affect them. Interns…

Tibetan Rug Weaving Project Builds Schools in Nepal and Northern India

Chris Walter, the Tibetan Rug Weaving project coordinator, first became involved with Cultural Survival over a decade ago. On his extensive travels to Asia to study the art of rug weaving, Chris made connections with refugee communities all over Central Asia. Many of these refugees continued their traditional rug-weaving as a means of economic support and, in light of the success he had selling…

Siberians Visit The Six Nations Indian Museum

On Friday, October 8, 1999, the Six Nations Museum in upstate New York had the unique pleasure of being visited by fourteen Mongolian people from the Republic of Buryatia in Russian Siberia. Buryatia is located in central Asia and is about the size of Germany. On the north west edge of the republic is Lake Baikal, the largest lake in the world, holding about one-fifth of the world's fresh water…

Seeking Compensation for Radiation Survivors in the Marshall Islands: the contribution of anthropology

Seeking Compensation for Radiation Survivors in the Marshall Islands: the contribution of anthroplogy When the Marshall Islands gained its independence from the United States in 1986, the U.S. Government provided a one-time settlement for all past, present and future damages incurred during the nuclear weapons testing program from 1946 to 1958. A portion of this settlement was set aside to…

Polynesian Voyaging & Pacific Self-Determination

Anachronistic and divisive colonial and post-colonial policies, senseless destructive nuclear testing and hazardous waste dumping, over-exploitation of natural resources, the threat of global warming and island inundation - these are some of the issues that haunt the vast Pacific, a region that covers a third of the earth's surface area. But so rarely are Polynesian, Micronesian or Melanesian…

Pacific Islands and the Internet

"The internet is the fastest growing industry in the world, and with changes taking place every day, the Pacific cannot afford to be left behind." This sentiment, expressed in Pacific Islands Monthly, embodies the hope of many island nations. Access to the internet presents a number of possibilities. Fast, cheap communication is now widely available to smaller island states. The hope is that this…

New Hope For Papua?

December 1, 1999 marked the Organisasi Papua Merdeka's (OPM/the Free Papua Organization) declaration of independence for the former Indonesian Province of Irian Jaya (Papua). Tribal protestors in Timika raised the outlawed Papuan `Morning Star' flag on December 1 to commemorate the anniversary of the day in 1961 when Holland granted independence to the Melanesian population. December 3 saw the…

Native Burials: Human Rights And Sacred Bones

Traditional Native Hawaiians believed n... iwi (the bones) to be the primary physical embodiment of a person. Following death, only n... iwi were considered sacred, for within the bones resided the person's mana (spiritual essence). Mana was greatly valued, and Native Hawaiians spent their lives maintaining and enhancing their mana. Thus, supreme care was accorded to iwi following death.…

Nation Under The Gun: Militarism and Resistance in Hawai'i

Militarism and colonialism are inseparable forces which have shaped modern Hawai'i. Over a hundred years since the U.S. military participated in the overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawai'i in 1893, militarism continues to distort the cultural and political environment like a magnet pulling at particles of iron. Militarism in Hawai'i is the product of "manifest destiny," the racist ideology which…

Jaguar

An effort to make ethnology more accessible, this novel is extremely successful. The story easily holds the interest of academic and layman alike, and the depictions of life in West African Sahelian countries (Niger in particular) and of the immigrant's experience in America are unfailingly accurate as well as insightful. As an attempt to make ethnology more personal, however, Jaguar is somewhat…

Inundation: How Real A Threat For Small Island Nations?

Global warming, long in the media forefront, has recently become a speculation-fueled debate. Recent efforts by such international, and interrelated, organizations as the United Nations Environmental Program, the World Meteorological Organization, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), have helped create essential standards for discussion, unequivocally establishing the present…

Immediate Future Issues

The Twenty-First century does not hold large promise for Native Hawaiians. Given that the power of the United States, both militarily and economically, is now unchallenged in the world, the prospects for land restitution and some form of self-government for Hawaiians are depressingly poor. As Hawaiians link up with other Native people who have managed some form of control over their lives and…

Hopi Fight for Survival and Peace in the next Millennium

High on the mesas in northeastern Arizona, surrounded by majestic views, is the heart and center of the Hopi homeland. It is also the final battleground for the survival of this ancient tribe. The Hopi, peaceful by nature, have carried on their ancient way of life and culture for more than 2000 years. Hopi villages are regarded as the oldest continuously occupied settlements on the North American…

Hawaiian Sovereignty

On August 12, 1998, over five thousand Native Hawaiians and non-Hawaiian supporters gathered at `Iolani Palace to mark the 100th Anniversary of the illegal annexation of Hawai'i by the United States. The event was not celebratory, but was significantly political. The Indigenous Hawaiian people had gathered to voice their strong opposition to the overthrow of their Kingdom in 1893 by armed…

Hawai'i and the United Nations

Chapter XI of the Charter of the United Nations deals with Non-Self-Governing Territories, and calls for international accountability regarding peoples who have not achieved a full measure of self-government. Article 73 reads in part as follows: "Members of the United Nations which have or assume responsibilities for the administration of territories whose peoples have not yet attained a full…

Halabja: After Ten Years Saddam's Gas Attack on the Kurds

This terse but powerful program provides a first hand look at the conditions of life in Halabja, a small village in northern Iraq which was carpeted with nerve gas laden bombs ten years ago under Saddam Hussein's orders in response to the village's support of Iran during the Iraq-Iran war. International relief agencies had launched no investigations into the current medical needs of the Kurdish…

God Created the Heaven and the Earth, Including Me

Alaska native Denny Akeya - whose Eskimo name is Yava - offers us "a recipe for cultural survival" in his latest offering God Created the Heaven and the Earth, Including Me, says Ian Mcintosh, Director of Cultural Survival. This short book is a girl for future generations of Alaskans - so they will not forget the old ways. The illustrated text describes how skin clothing is made, how green plants…

Family Ties And Corporate Land Ownership In Micronesia

Throughout Oceania, colonial legal policies, cash cropping, the incorporation of island societies into the Western market economy and the rising tide of privatization, are washing away the corporate ownership of land in Pacific island societies. The decline of `traditional' kin-based ownership is notable in places such as Fiji, the Solomon Islands, Tonga, Vanuatu, Kiribati, and New Zealand. On…

Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples

In this important book, Linda Tuhiwai Smith meets a formidable challenge. In 200 pages she presents a cogent critique not only of anthropology, but of the cultural evolution of the entire Western concept of research. The author describes the devastating effects of such research on indigenous peoples and articulates a new Indigenous Research Agenda which aims to replace former Western academic…

Conflicting Visions Of Hawaiian Sovereignty

The Hawaiian Sovereignty movement emerged as the political manifestation of the Hawaiian Renaissance of the late 1970s. While the movement developed a political basis, it was the socio-economic conditions of Native Hawaiians that formed its catalyst. The articles in this issue of the Cultural Survival Quarterly focus on these social and economic conditions. The economic basis of the movement…

Cannibalism and the Colonial World

I doubt if there is another book quite like this one. An international team specializing in anthropology, literature, and art history discuss the historical and cultural significance of the west's fascination with cannibalism - not so much ritual, survival, or mortuary practices, but the rabid and insatiable hunger for human flesh - in a categorization designed to dehumanize and subdue the exotic…

Australia's Indigenous Cultural Heritage Continues To Be Threatened

When Queensland elected a Labor government in July 1998, Aborigines and Islanders hoped and expected that the new Premier would replace existing cultural heritage legislation. During 1999 the new Government undertook extensive negotiations with the Queensland Indigenous Working Group (QIWG) on proposed new legislation and negotiators were hopeful of a positive outcome. However, when the Draft…

A Letter To Cultural Survival: The Botswana Book Project

Soon after Botswana peacefully obtained independence from the British in 1966, the newly formed Ministry of Education established an educational network of free schools throughout the country. Students enter primary school at age 7, move to junior secondary school at age 14 and, if they qualify, they move on to senior secondary school at age 17. Attendance in primary school is high, estimated at…

A Foot In Two Worlds...

Ledama Olekina, a twenty-five year old Maasai from Kenya, is using his feet to raise money for a school he's hoping to build in Kenya. The Maasai Educational Discovery Foundation (MEDF) has been established to help the Maasai people improve their education standards in order for them to adapt to fast changing lifestyles, while maintaining their culture. Ledama also hopes that the school will be…

The Suya Indian Project

The Suyá Indian Project Today, the Suyá Indians are struggling to maintain their lands, their livelihood, and their culture in the midst of tremendous economic and ecological changes in the northeastern part of the state of Mato Grosso, Brazil. During the past quarter century I have watched, and occasionally assisted with their transformation from an isolated community familiar only with other…

Introduction: The Internet and Indigenous Groups

The Internet, the network of networks that was originally created to link weapons research labs in the 1970s, has spread to more than 170 countries. The growth of users and connections, as well as new products and services continues to expand at an explosive rate. However, Internet coverage is uneven. Some places, like Silicon Valley in California, are very well connected while many areas in…