Pacific Island Cultures - Article Example

Download file to see previous pages... In 1964, Dr John Cumpston had the foresight and the stamina to devise a now standard format for listing each and every shipping arrival and departure, vessel by vessel, visit by visit.1 This has proved to be a considerable legacy, as his pioneer work has sparked off research by many others who want to get beyond weak generalisations to look at the Pacific’s maritime past in real and quantitative terms. Comparable SADs have followed not only for all the main eastern Australian ports up to 1840, but also for the Bay of Islands, Akaroa and Port Otago.2 In 2000, the Pacific Manuscripts Bureau (PAMBU) at The Australian National University and the Hawaiian Historical Society published a comparable list for Honolulu.3 The publication of a comparable list for Tahiti is forthcoming, while the Samoas, Tuvalu, Solomon Islands, Marquesas and Pitcairn have already been covered in different ways.4 Indeed the stage is set to look afresh at all Pacific Islands and their ports to draw out new substantial facts about their contact and early post-contact histories. These new lists allow the track of a ship, previously unknown, to be followed across the Pacific from island to island and to see each ship’s trade, its impact on local health, and other consequences, in time and in space, in ways that were impossible before, because no comparable ethnographic and oral records have survived. Even though some of the lists read rather like a turgid telephone book, all names and no plot, a great deal of red-blooded life can be drawn from these listings. *An earlier version of this paper was read at Te Moana-Nui-a-Kiwa, the 17th biennial conference of the Pacific History Association at Otago University on 7 December 2006. 1 J. Cumpston, Shipping Arrivals and Departures, Sydney, 1788–1825 (Canberra 1964). 2 Rhys Richards with Jocelyn Chisholm, Bay of Islands Shipping Arrivals and Departures 1803 to 1840 (Wellington 1992); ‘The SAD truth about Bay of Islands shipping 1803–1840’, The Great Circle, 15:1 (Sydney 1993), 30–5; Ian N. Church, Opening the Manifest on Otago’s Infant Years: shipping arrivals and departures Otago Harbour and Coast 1770–1860, Southern Heritage 150 Series (Dunedin 2001). 3 Rhys Richards, Honolulu, Centre of Trans-Pacific Trade: shipping arrivals and departures, 1820 to 1840 (Canberra and Honolulu) 2000. 4 R. Richards and R. Langdon, Tahiti and the Society Islands: shipping arrivals and departures 1767 to 1852 (Canberra forthcoming), based on ‘Ships at the Society Islands 1800–1852’, lists compiled in the 1980s by R. Langdon, Pacific Manuscripts Bureau, Canberra; Robert Langdon, Where the Whalers Went: an index to the Pacific ports and islands visited by American whalers (and some other ships) in the 19th century (Canberra 1984); Rhys Richards, ‘Pacific whaling 1820–1840: port visits, shipping arrivals and departures, comparisons and sources’, The Great Circle, 24:1 (2002), 25–40. ISSN 0022-3344 print; 1469-9605 online/08/030375–8; Taylor and Francis _ 2008 The Journal of Pacific History Inc. DOI: 10.1080/00223340802499641 Article 2 First Page of the Journal Article International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education Vol. 23, No. 6, November 2010, 671–690 ISSN 0951-8398 print/ISSN 1366-5898 online © 2010 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/09518390903468339 http://www.informaworld.com Family obligations in ...Download file to see next pagesRead More