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- Convenor:
-
Niki Alsford
(University of Central Lancashire)
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- Format:
- Panel
- Sessions:
- Tuesday 26 October, -
Time zone: Europe/London
Short Abstract:
The vastness of the Pacific means that no two experiences of climate change are the same. The aim is to document climate change through local voice. Its results will foster an ethnographic understanding of climate change and conservation via cross-sectional research.
Long Abstract:
Climate change represents humanity's greatest threat. The vastness of the Pacific means that no two experiences are the same. The main objective of this panel is to identify research that highlights the local impact of climate change on Pacific Island reefs and local fisher communities, This will be achieved through three interdisciplinary strands:
(1) Scientific
(2) Ethnographic
(3) Deep History
The scientific is literal: it addresses how the impacts of climate have manifested in the composition of highly diverse and endemic reef communities in the Pacific. Reef diversity is linked to increased long-term resilience. Due to their importance in terms of ecosystem services and as local sources of food and income, understanding the species and changes in species in these diverse communities is crucial in conservation efforts. Effectively identifying community composition and monitoring future changes will be essential to mitigating habitat degradation.
The ethnographic follows the cultural insights into climate change. Oceanic spaces for the peoples of the Pacific are not barriers, they are highways. Changes in these highways have been expressed in a range of historical, cultural, and political contexts.
Finally, this research will consider the Deep History; a long durée of Austronesian migration and a representation of traditional maritime knowledge and practice and international boundaries within the Pacific prevent the free movement of people.
The panel is driven toward evidence-based research that utilises indigenous knowledge in order to generate evidence that exists in a local context by taking into consideration specific cultural norms, values, and classifications.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Tuesday 26 October, 2021, -Paper short abstract:
Reviving traditional navigation in Fiji is not only for re-learning oceanic way finding. Autoethnography of novice navigators and cultural heritage curators reveals how cultural identity, linked with traditional sailing, is connected with marine conservation and adaptation to climate change.
Paper long abstract:
While metaphorical navigation attracts growing interest in complex systems research, navigation in its literal sense is under-researched, especially in relation to conservation and climate change. This paper argues the anthropology of traditional marine navigation has valuable contribution to understanding the coupled ocean-atmosphere system, and highlights the methodological merits of navigators’ autoethnography. Autoethnography can reveal embodied and embedded change experiences that would be otherwise difficult to access. The reflexive process of autoethnography offers insight also into the nexus of cultural identity and sailing traditional vessels, like camakau and drua in Fiji.
Documenting traditional navigation knowledge typically features the teachers, master navigators, elders and their observations of changes over time in ecological and social processes. This paper shifts the focus and gives voice to the learners, who are expected to be silent archetypically. University students’ reflections on their learning to navigate show the possibilities of autoethnography in the anthropology of traditional marine navigation. Their reflections draws on a wide range of experiences including learning the ropes of sailing the camakau and drua, listening to, transcribing and reading archival resources, wondering about the integration of pre-instrumental skills and modern technologies, and the personal-cultural entanglement of their various identities as novice navigators, cultural heritage curators, members of various island communities in Fiji, university students, researchers, aspiring archivists, historians and linguists.
Reviving navigation does not only enable re-learning oceanic way finding and sustainable inter-island transport but also contributes to coping with local consequences of unfolding global changes.
Paper short abstract:
Pacific island states are particularly at risk from the catastrophic impacts of the climate emergency. To what extent do those, particularly from former British and French colonies, understand and are able to respond to the challenges of ocean level rise and more extreme weather?
Paper long abstract:
The International Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) reports the question is no longer whether sea-level rise will exceed 0.8 m, but rather when this will happen. Even if national governments meet their Paris agreement GreenHouse Gas emissions (GHGs) pledges, a global mean temperature rise of between 2.1°C and 3.3°C by 2100 is predicted. These climate predictions and models are constantly being revised as impacts of the climate emergency accelerate. Small Island Developing States (SIDS) are recognised by the UN as particularly at risk from catastrophic climatic effects. Pacific island populations are generally concentrated along coastlines, due to transportation ease, reliance on tourism for income, and livelihoods tied to marine resources. The majority of Pacific SIDS are low-lying islands, leaving them more vulnerable to increasingly extreme weather and rising sea levels. Estimates suggest that up to 1.7 million people in the region will migrate or be displaced by 2050 in planned relocation of communities, migration from rural to urban areas (or to main islands), and cross-border migration.
This study uses existing literature to investigate the impact on Pacific SIDS populations, building a comprehensive picture determining the extent island to which communities understand the unprecedented changes happening around them, analysing their sense of agency and empowerment concerning effective response options. It will focus on former British and French overseas territories, investigating to what extent these former colonial territories bear the brunt of climate change impacts, caused by GHG emissions and practices of their former rulers and others in the Global North.
Paper short abstract:
By combining environmental DNA and local ecological knowledge from fisherfolk and traditional navigators, the impacts of the anthropogenic pressures on the composition of reef communities in Pacific Islands will be assessed.
Paper long abstract:
Accurately monitoring marine communities remains a challenge. Yet with rapidly changing marine diversity it is key to understand how marine systems are changing in response to anthropogenic pressures to mitigate the species decline and habitat degradation.
Environmental DNA is a way of assessing the species in an area and has rapidly gained traction as a way to non-invasively track marine biodiversity in recent years. The use of eDNA will be evaluated by considering the benefits and drawbacks of this method for monitoring marine ecosystems in remote Pacific Islands. Additionally, this monitoring method will be combined with local ecological and traditional navigational knowledge. The knowledge from traditional navigators will be incorporated by studying important oceanic features (surface slicks) to attempt to understand their ecological role and how they influence ecological processes in the island reef communities.
The aim of this study is to explore the diverse marine communities in the waters of Pacific Islands, establish baseline communities and assess how they are being affected by climate change. Comparing the differences between the islands will be key in pinpointing areas of higher impact and vulnerability to species declines in the future. Trends of species shifts will be compared to trends recorded by local fisherfolk through surveys. This project will build on previous studies evaluating environmental DNA and its potential for large scale citizen science use, specifically on sailing vessels.