| Navigation and voyaging in Oceania contribute to a domain of knowledge that is highly specialized and powerful. Cultural experts developed elaborate mental representations of space and embodied knowledge of the ocean to guide their canoes toward land. A decline of voyaging has threatened the survival of this specialist knowledge while maintaining its prestige. In this ethnography of navigation and voyaging, I examine indigenous ways of knowing and cultural revival in the Republic of the Marshall Islands.;Unique throughout Oceania, Marshallese navigators guide their canoes by observing how islands disrupt the flow of swell and current steams. With a virtual cessation of voyaging, there have been very few ethnographic studies of Marshallese navigation and there has yet to be an oceanographic study to understand the physical basis of navigation. I collaborated with the few surviving navigation experts, University of Hawai'i-Manoa anthropologists and oceanographers, and a community canoe building organization to synergistically research, re-learn and revive navigation and voyaging. This collaborative endeavor centered on how Marshallese construct, use and value their knowledge of the ocean.;I describe and reflect on the development of, and my participation in, the cultural revival of voyaging. Despite the challenges and complexities of the project, one individual re-learned aspects of navigation he had not acquired in his youth and successfully conducted a navigation test to become a titled navigator. This allowed me to investigate indigenous conceptualizations, explanations and models of the ocean, sensory perceptions of motion, and navigation in practice. Drawing from several theoretical approaches to navigation, I developed an array of methods and forms of analysis to develop a robust cognitive model of navigation. I learned through explicit instruction, demonstration, personal observations and practical experience, conducted a variety of interviews, and recorded and analyzed naturally occurring discourse and local communication patterns. Drawing from oceanography, I also explain the physical basis of navigation. In summary, Marshallese navigation is a system of wave piloting, in which the navigator experiences a continual flow of perceptual information from swell and currents that indicate the distance and direction toward land. |
