EXHIBITION BOOK

Winner of the history category, NZ Montana Book Awards 2007.

The exhibition is accompanied by Vaka Moana: Voyages of the Ancestors, a lavishly illustrated book that presents the most comprehensive survey of knowledge on Oceanic voyaging. Edited by Kerry Howe of Massey University, the book draws together contributions by internationally acknowledged specialists.

Kerry Howe discusses the settlement of the Pacific in the context of the spread of modern humans across the world from their beginnings in Africa and examines early western ideas about the origins of the Pacific peoples. Rawiri Taonui, head of the School of Maori and Indigenous Studies at the University of Canterbury, shows how Polynesian oral traditions indicate a shared, migratory past. Geoff Irwin of the University of Auckland’s Department of Anthropology discusses the evidence pointing to the likely settlement routes and the likely strategies used by early voyagers. Auckland Museum’s Curator of Ethnology, Roger Neich, contributes a chapter on Pacific voyaging after the era of exploration. American anthropologist Ben Finney looks at the ocean-going canoes and navigation, and at the modern cultural renaissance which renewed interest in them has helped foster. Anne Salmond outlines the first contact between Pacific Islanders and Western explorers in the sixteenth century and what happened when these two maritime cultures met.

Vaka Moana, totals 368 pages and more than 400 photographs, drawings and maps.

Available at the Auckland Museum Shop. Our stores are open every day (except christmas day) from 10am - 5pm. We can arrange shipping overseas and throughout New Zealand.

For enquiries please phone 09 309 2580 or email shop@aucklandmuseum.com