~ Sustainable Seafaring from Oceania. History, Design, and Relevance ~

April 14, 2009

Pacific Studies

Above: PBY Catalina in the Marshall Islands during WWII

"Europeans have long mythologised the sea, a perception which has found famous expression in John Masefield's 'Sea Fever'. Or else the oceans have been demonised, as in Nicholas Monsarrat's enduring novel of wartime, The Cruel Sea. Either way, the sea is conceptualised as being detached from, and separate to, the land — which in one sense it is. There is little of this dichotomy in Pacific Islands cultures where, rather, the nexus between sea and land is to the forefront. In what is likely to be a seminal work, Paul D'Arcy's The People of the Sea explores these relationships within the framework of environmental history. The People of the Sea has been the subject of a book review forum in another journal (see footnote 25), and we are gratified to host another such critical forum. The Editorial Board of The Journal of Pacific History warmly thanks the three contributors for producing their searching critiques on time and to length, and the author for his considered response."

- Doug Munro, at Informaworld, Journal of Pacific History

Follow this link for more at:
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713435447
And here, another related link:
http://coombs.anu.edu.au/WWWVLPacific/Pac-Jrnl-Bibliography.html
And here - Digital Micronesia