Do you recognize this photo?
This rather ominous photo of military officers smirking and stoic Polynesians with faces smeared with white paint (or who knows what?) turned up recently in the archives of the Historic Preservation Office of Samoa. The archivists believe it to have been taken in the 1930s, but can't say what it depicts exactly. Wierd!!
posted by rschram on Jun 14, 2001 - 9 comments

The Polynesians were, undoubtedly, the greatest navigators of the ancient world. Using outrigger canoes, they were able to colonize lands spread as far apart as Madagascar and Easter Island and as far south as New Zealand. But where did they originally come from? Jared Diamond demonstrates how, by using linguistic and archaeological evidence, it's possible to reconstruct their journey from China and Taiwan to the Philippines, from there on to Borneo, Indonesia, Malaysia, New Guinea and out to the Pacific one way and Madagascar in the other. As an exercise, try comparing the numbers 1 to 10 in all Polynesian and Indonesian languages, to see how the language gradually changed as they hopped from island to island.
posted by lagado on Nov 23, 2000 - 4 comments