The Pacific Horizon: Oceania, Asia, and the Americas

Catalog description

The Pacific Horizon is a long one; it stretches from Chile west across the world's largest ocean to places such as Australia and Japan, and then back across the ocean again to North America. All the while it beckons to oceanian islanders, from Rapa Nui to Oahu, from Chuk to Vanuatu. In this class we will look at the Pacific as a unitary whole, as well as through the sum of a number of its component parts, often classified as regions. Yet always, the sea connects -- and we will try to get at connection with nearly every turn in this course. We are interested in looking at the breadth and width of this ocean through historical time, and how connections were made across wide, maritime spaces.