Belonging in the Pacific, culture and history thirty years on

Abstract

It is timely in many senses to reflect on culture and history in the in the Pacific. I join colleagues in celebrating the anniversary of the 1990 publication of the landmark volume Culture and History in the Pacific, edited by Jukka Siikala. The book was the fruitful result of a 1987 international symposium sponsored by the Academy of Finland that brought together a group of western scholars of the Pacific with Soviet counterparts (Keesing 1987). Times have changed. But it is again a good time for anthropologists and historians to reflect on the importance of insights from and about the Pacific for our understanding of cultural structures and histories across the globe—particularly as we consider the culture and history of our interconnections (including nation-state belonging) and the culture and history of our encounter with the Anthropocene.