Tag Archives | Polynesia

Kia Orana Day

Yesterday we began a wonderous week of wanderings in the Cook Islands. Let’s start by celebrating Cook Islands culture. In other words, Happy Kia Orana Day!

Though each of the Cook Islands has its own unique shades of culture, a common strain running among them is a social organization based on chiefs, families (clan) and a lack of individuality as opposed to integration with the village or family group. The chiefdom primarily passed along the male bloodline, while land rights passed down the mother’s line. Among other duties such as leading the village in war, chiefs were responsible for the all-important sharing of food and giving of gifts; the greatest chiefs threw the best parties. Www.ck also suggests Cook Islands society has a Greek-style “heroic” strain, meaning that in the islands a man would acquire power by developing a reputation of having accomplished admirable deeds.

A Hundred Square Miles of Land in 700,000 Square Miles of Ocean

All Around This World -- Cook Islands
This week in our online class we visit the Cook Islands, a group of fifteen Polynesian volcanic islands and atolls — 93 square miles of land spread widely over 690,000 square miles of ocean. According to the history page of www.ck, “Cook Islanders are true Polynesians, the finest seafarers of the vast Pacific, voyagers on frail canoes who felt at home on the ocean and who traveled across its huge wastes in search of new lands and new beginnings.” The first record of these “true Polynesians” appearing on the Cook Islands came from about the years 600 to 800 A.D. when settlers are believed to have migrated from other Polynesian islands such as Tahiti, Samoa and Tonga.

The islands, which exist as a self-governing democracy, even as they are considered to be “in free association” with New Zealand., exist two distinct groups. The Southern Cook Islands, which include the most populous island, Rarotonga. Actually the largest population of Cook Islanders is not in Rarotonga, or anywhere in the islands themselves, but in New Zealand. In 2006 about 14,000 people lived on Rarotonga. In 2006, 58,000 in New Zealand self-identified as being of Cook Island descent.

Tahitian Himene Tarava

When Christian missionaries arrived in French Polynesia several centuries ago, most considered the music as primitive and too seductive in nature; colonial authorities regularly banned much Polynesian music, replacing it with hymns and other forms of “more appropriate” songs. French Polynesians took quickly to Christian music, called “himene” (hymns), and by the early 20th century several types of himene had developed. For example, “himene tarava” features a large choir — up to 80 singers — composed of men and women who sing in complicated multi-part, multi-tone harmonies. According to National Geographic’s writing on the music of Tahiti, “this form of singing…is distinguished by a unique drop in pitch at the end of the phrases, which is a characteristic formed by several different voices; it is also accompanied by steady grunting of staccato, nonsensical syllables.”

Drumming at Tahiti Fete

Polynesian drumming ensembles, such as those from Tahiti — like the one in this video — are composed of multiple drums of different sizes and pitches, all of which are made from materials found nearby. A drumming group will often feature instruments such as the sharply pitched to’ere, pronounced “to-eddie,” which is a narrow cylindrical drum made from a hollowed-out log and hit with a wood stick and the more resonant pahu, such as the Tahitian bass pahu, which drummers hit with padded sticks.

In Polynesia We Navigate Thousands of Miles Across the Seas

This week our online classes finally take us to Polynesia — yay Melanesia!, yay Micronesia!, but super-yay to the thousands of glorious islands of Polynesia! This week we specifically land in French Polynesia, and, even more specifically, in the French Polynesian nation of Tahiti. The first inhabitants of Tahiti arrived between about 300 and 800 CE, having traveled thousands of miles across the Pacific from other island groups, mostly Polynesian ones, like Samoa and Tonga. As on many Polynesian islands, Tahitian society is organized based upon a complex interplay of chiefdoms, clans and the power dynamics between them. In Tahiti, clan leaders were powerful but not all-powerful; they generally made decisions in consultation with general assemblies. Tahitian culture had a strong oral tradition involving an extensive mythology based on tales about various gods, as well as extensive traditions surrounding tattooing and navigation. Tahitians opposed colonization byt the French for centuries, supporting a strong succession of kings from Pōmare line. In 1880 the French forced Pōmare V, to abdicate the throne. In 1946 France made all of French Polynesia an “overseas territory” and granted Tahitians French citizenship. In 2003 French Polynesia became an “overseas collectivity” and in 2004 it transformed into “an overseas country.”

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Tag Archives | Polynesia