11 Paddling on Both Sides of the Canoe …
217
On Integrating Diverse Worldviews
Although unique in many ways, the Pacific region provides an exemplar of escalating
vulnerabilities faced around the world as a result of climate variability and change.
Smaller increases in global mean temperature are now projected to lead to significant
negative consequences for most regions. Examining Pacific Islanders’ responses to
existing climate challenges can provide clues about how a host of psychological,
social, and cultural factors may influence adaptation in other regions.
The merging of Christian ideologies and indigenous lifeways can often cause
agonising ethical and social conflicts for recent converts, though this is not always
the case. Often a false dichotomy between the arrival of a “Christian” way of life and
previous lifeways and social forms is drawn, and though conversion can be a break
with the past, it does not automatically and completely replace previous beliefs and
lifeways in converted people. I would argue that the peoples of the Pacific have been
selective, skilled and creative in the process of appropriating Christian scriptures and
themes into Oceanian worldviews that serve their own ends in a spiritual context, as
well as in political and economic contexts.
Through fostering consilience of science with traditional environmental knowledge—much like if one is to imagine a double-hulled canoe—a higher potential for
long-term climate change adaptation is attained. Further, if one considers the rich
tradition of deep sea voyaging and navigation in Oceania, we realize that Pacific
Island peoples have been successfully navigating climatic variability for centuries,
such as with the El Niño–Southern Oscillation. One contemporary example can be
found in the Polynesian Voyaging Society and the M¯ alama Honua (“to care for our
Earth”) Worldwide Voyage, where the traditional voyaging vaka H¯ ok¯ ule‘a (“Star of
Gladness”) without the aid of any modern instrumentation circumnavigated the globe
from 2013 through 2017 (Polynesian Voyaging Society 2020). Further examples can
be found in studies with Samoan elders which have documented a high awareness of
weather and climate knowledge, and the elders’ ability to forecast extreme weather
events (Lefale 2003). Still another example is the traditional Hawaiian practice of the
ahupua‘a
1 (“a large traditional climatic, geologic and socioeconomic subdivision of
island land”), as a highly integrated watershed management system (Chirico 2015).
That is not to say that integrating traditional knowledge with scientific and technological knowledge is easily achieved. It can be challenging. For instance, difficulty
can arise in finding scientific terminologies and descriptors for indigenous knowledge and words. One simple example in which I achieved parity while working
at the Bishop Museum—The Hawai‘i Museum of Cultural and Natural History—
was through creating activities and educational materials for school children and the
general public that named and described biological data and the natural world through
a trilingual approach, where the local or common name, scientific or Latin name, and
1 If you are not familiar with ahupuaas it may prove useful to imagine a high island as a roughly
circular “pie” where each slice of the pie represents an ahupua‘a or integrated ecosystem that is
holistically viewed from the centre uplands or highlands of the island to the coastal area terminating
in the shore at the outer edge or “crust” of the pie.
217
On Integrating Diverse Worldviews
Although unique in many ways, the Pacific region provides an exemplar of escalating
vulnerabilities faced around the world as a result of climate variability and change.
Smaller increases in global mean temperature are now projected to lead to significant
negative consequences for most regions. Examining Pacific Islanders’ responses to
existing climate challenges can provide clues about how a host of psychological,
social, and cultural factors may influence adaptation in other regions.
The merging of Christian ideologies and indigenous lifeways can often cause
agonising ethical and social conflicts for recent converts, though this is not always
the case. Often a false dichotomy between the arrival of a “Christian” way of life and
previous lifeways and social forms is drawn, and though conversion can be a break
with the past, it does not automatically and completely replace previous beliefs and
lifeways in converted people. I would argue that the peoples of the Pacific have been
selective, skilled and creative in the process of appropriating Christian scriptures and
themes into Oceanian worldviews that serve their own ends in a spiritual context, as
well as in political and economic contexts.
Through fostering consilience of science with traditional environmental knowledge—much like if one is to imagine a double-hulled canoe—a higher potential for
long-term climate change adaptation is attained. Further, if one considers the rich
tradition of deep sea voyaging and navigation in Oceania, we realize that Pacific
Island peoples have been successfully navigating climatic variability for centuries,
such as with the El Niño–Southern Oscillation. One contemporary example can be
found in the Polynesian Voyaging Society and the M¯ alama Honua (“to care for our
Earth”) Worldwide Voyage, where the traditional voyaging vaka H¯ ok¯ ule‘a (“Star of
Gladness”) without the aid of any modern instrumentation circumnavigated the globe
from 2013 through 2017 (Polynesian Voyaging Society 2020). Further examples can
be found in studies with Samoan elders which have documented a high awareness of
weather and climate knowledge, and the elders’ ability to forecast extreme weather
events (Lefale 2003). Still another example is the traditional Hawaiian practice of the
ahupua‘a
1 (“a large traditional climatic, geologic and socioeconomic subdivision of
island land”), as a highly integrated watershed management system (Chirico 2015).
That is not to say that integrating traditional knowledge with scientific and technological knowledge is easily achieved. It can be challenging. For instance, difficulty
can arise in finding scientific terminologies and descriptors for indigenous knowledge and words. One simple example in which I achieved parity while working
at the Bishop Museum—The Hawai‘i Museum of Cultural and Natural History—
was through creating activities and educational materials for school children and the
general public that named and described biological data and the natural world through
a trilingual approach, where the local or common name, scientific or Latin name, and
1 If you are not familiar with ahupuaas it may prove useful to imagine a high island as a roughly
circular “pie” where each slice of the pie represents an ahupua‘a or integrated ecosystem that is
holistically viewed from the centre uplands or highlands of the island to the coastal area terminating
in the shore at the outer edge or “crust” of the pie.