Indigenous peoples of Oceania

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The indigenous peoples of Oceania are Aboriginal Australians, Papuans, and Austronesians (Melanesians, [note 1] Micronesians, and Polynesians). These indigenous peoples have a historical continuity with pre-colonial societies that developed on their territories. With the notable exceptions of Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii, New Caledonia, Guam, and Northern Mariana Islands, indigenous peoples make up the majority of the populations of Oceania.

Contents

This differs from the term Pacific Islanders , which usually excludes Indigenous Australians, and may be understood to include both indigenous and non-indigenous populations of the Pacific Islands alike.

History

Moai in Ahu Tongariki, Rapa Nui AhuTongariki.JPG
Moai in Ahu Tongariki, Rapa Nui

Australia and most of the islands of the Pacific Ocean were colonized in waves of migrations from Southeast Asia spanning many centuries. European and Japanese colonial expansion brought most of the region under foreign administration, in some cases as settler colonies that displaced or marginalized the original populations. During the 20th century several of these former colonies gained independence and nation-states were formed under local control. However, various peoples have put forward claims for indigenous recognition where their islands are still under external administration; examples include the Chamorros of Guam and the Northern Marianas, and the Marshallese of the Marshall Islands, and the Native Hawaiians of Hawaii. [1]

In the pre-Columbian era, humans never reached the handful of oceanic eastern Pacific islands beyond Easter Island, [2] [3] [4] [5] which itself was settled by the Polynesian Rapa Nui people. Eastern Pacific islands such as the Galápagos and Juan Fernández Islands, while inhabitable, did not have a population of Indigenous Americans or Indigenous Oceanians, which helped them form their own unique ecosystems. [6] Author Don Macnaughtan wrote in 2014, "The last places to be reached were in the southwest Pacific, and in the far eastern Pacific. Settlers reached all the way to Easter Island, 2,300 miles from the coast of South America, by about 700 AD. In the southwest Pacific, voyaging canoes reached New Zealand around 1250 AD, and the remote, cool and windy archipelago of the Chatham Islands around 1500 AD (New Zealand was in fact the last major land mass on the planet settled by humans – Iceland was settled about 800 AD, and Madagascar some hundreds of years earlier.) After New Zealand, the Pacific was full, and long-range voyaging began to decline quite rapidly. A few habitable Pacific islands were never found until Europeans entered the ocean – they rank as amongst the last places on earth discovered by humans. These include the Galápagos Islands, Cocos Island, the Revillagigedos Archipelago, and the Juan Fernández Islands off the coast of South America; Lord Howe Island in the Tasman Sea between Australia and New Zealand; and Midway Island, northwest of Hawaii. They are some of the few places on the planet which have never had an 'indigenous' population." [6] Lord Howe Island was politically integrated into the Australian state of New South Wales, despite being nearly 800 kilometers removed, and Midway is now an unincorporated territory of the United States. [7] All oceanic islands of the eastern Pacific (excluding Clipperton) were eventually annexed by Central America and South America, after going unclaimed for a few hundred years following their initial discoveries. [8] They are now politically associated with those regions, [3] in addition to sometimes being associated with Oceania. [9] The sparse number of current inhabitants are primarily Spanish-speaking Mestizos. [10] A percentage of Easter Islanders have race-mixed with Mestizo settlers from their current political administrators, Chile, and it has gradually become a bilingual island, where both Spanish and their native language is spoken. [11] [12] [13] Despite this, the inhabitants still view themselves as Polynesians, and by extension Indigenous Oceanians, not South Americans. [14] [3] Linguistics in Oceania (1971) and Island Realm: A Pacific Panorama (1974) both have broad definitions of Oceania, and define eastern Pacific settlers and post-colonial Easter Islanders as making up a Spanish-speaking segment of Oceania. [15] [16]

Maori child learning the haka in a painting by Gottfried Lindauer Maori Girl Learning the Haka, by Gottfried Lindauer.jpg
Māori child learning the haka in a painting by Gottfried Lindauer

The Bonin Islands, located about 1,000 to 2,000 kilometers from Tokyo, are commonly thought to have been uninhabited during pre-Columbian times, even though there may have possibly been a Micronesian presence on the islands approximately 2,000 years ago. [17] The islands are still sometimes associated with Oceania, despite now having become politically integrated into Japan. Today, they are sparsely inhabited by Japanese citizens, with a proportion having European and European American ancestry. [16] The European proportion are not recent immigrants, but rather descendants of early settlers, as the islands were not always within the sphere of Japanese colonial influence. [18] Islanders primarily speak Japanese, and like with those in the eastern Pacific, they could be interpreted as one of the smaller linguistic groups in Oceania. [16]

Remoter and more uninhabitable islands adjacent to Micronesia may have had fleeting contact with Indigenous Oceanians, with Howland Island and Wake Island being examples. [19] Norfolk Island (adjacent to Melanesia) and Pitcairn Islands (adjacent to Polynesia) were uninhabited when discovered by Europeans, but there is substantial evidence of prehistoric Indigenous Oceanian settlement. [6] Pitcairn currently have a population of around 50, who are entirely mixed-race Anglo Euronesians. They are descended from an initial group of Anglo and Polynesian settlers in the 18th century. Pitcairn was later annexed by Britain, while Norfolk Island became an external territory of Australia, who are over 1,500 kilometers removed. Norfolk's present population is mostly European Australian, some are also Euronesians; these individuals are descended from Pitcairn Islanders that were relocated to Norfolk in 1852 because of overpopulation. [20] The Micronesia adjacent islands became unincorporated territories of the United States, and they all have no permanent residents. The United States government restrict access to outsiders on some islands. [21]

Decolonization

Oceania is generally considered the least decolonized region in the world. In his 1993 book France and the South Pacific since 1940, Robert Aldrich commented:

With the ending of the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, the Northern Mariana Islands became a 'commonwealth' of the United States, and the new republics of the Marshall Islands and the Federated States of Micronesia signed compacts of free association with Washington. Britain's high commissioner in New Zealand continues to administer Pitcairn, and the other former British colonies remain members of the Commonwealth of Nations, recognizing the British Queen as their titular head of state and vesting certain residual powers in the British government or the Queen's representative in the islands. Australia did not cede control of the Torres Strait Islands, inhabited by a Melanesian population, or Lord Howe and Norfolk Island, whose residents are of European ancestry. New Zealand retains indirect rule over Niue and Tokelau and has kept close relations with another former possession, the Cook Islands, through a compact of free association. Chile rules Easter Island (Rapa Nui) and Ecuador rules the Galápagos Islands. The Aboriginals of Australia, the Māori of New Zealand and the native Polynesians of Hawaii, despite movements demanding more cultural recognition, greater economic and political considerations or even outright sovereignty, have remained minorities in countries where massive waves of migration have completely changed society. In short, Oceania has remained one of the least completely decolonized regions on the globe.

Robert Aldrich (1993), [1]

Demographics

Dani people from the central highlands of New Guinea Papua 20160808 0449.jpg
Dani people from the central highlands of New Guinea

In New Zealand, according to the 2018 census, 16% of the population identified as being of Māori descent. Many of those same people also identified as being descended from other ethnic groups, such as European. [22]

The indigenous peoples of Australia are the Indigenous Australians, who account for 2.5% of the total population according to 2011 census figures. The term 'Indigenous Australians' refers to both the Aboriginal peoples of mainland Australia and Torres Strait Islander peoples. Of the total 'Indigenous Australian' population, 90% identified as Aboriginal only, 6% identified as Torres Strait Islander and the remaining 4% identified as being of both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander origin. [23]

Papua New Guinea (PNG) has a majority population of indigenous societies, with some 700+ different tribal groups recognised out of a total population of just over 5 million. The PNG Constitution and other Acts identify traditional or custom-based practices and land tenure, and explicitly sets out to promote the viability of these traditional societies within the modern state. However, several conflicts and disputes concerning land use and resource rights continue between indigenous groups, the government and corporate entities.[ citation needed ]

Migration between countries and territories in Oceania

Hawaii boasts a large Micronesian population (including Guamese Chamorros), with many Micronesians having experienced discrimination at the hands of the native Polynesian Hawaiians. Migrants from areas such as the Federated States of Micronesia have also faced discrimination in Guam itself, despite both being ethnoculturally Micronesian. [24]

New Zealand has the largest population of Polynesians in the world; it consists not only of their native Māori population, but also of immigrants from other Polynesian islands, including the Cook Islands, Samoa and Tonga. [25] [26] Australia has the third largest Polynesian population, in addition to having the largest Fijian population outside of Fiji. Australia's Polynesian population consists of Māoris, as well as immigrants who originate from the same countries as the ones who migrated to New Zealand. [27] In 2022, there was controversy over proposals to build a traditional Māori meeting house (known as a Marae) in Sydney. This was seen as disrespectful to Aboriginal Australian landowners, as the Māori are not indigenous to Australia. [28]

List of countries and islands by ethnocultural grouping

Indigenous Australian

Thomas Baines with Aborigines near the mouth of the Victoria River Thomas Baines, Thomas Baines with Aborigines near the mouth of the Victoria River, N.T, 1857.jpg
Thomas Baines with Aborigines near the mouth of the Victoria River

Melanesian

Micronesian

Polynesian

None (uninhabited or unused prior to European discovery)

See also

Notes

  1. Including Torres Strait Islanders
  2. Also ethnoculturally grouped as Australasian with New Zealand, since both have large non-Indigenous populations from Europe and elsewhere.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Uninhabited when discovered by Europeans; believed to have once been inhabited by Indigenous Australians.
  4. 1 2 Uninhabited when discovered by Europeans; believed to have once been inhabited by Polynesians.
  5. Believed to have been known about by Polynesians from Easter Island, but there is no evidence that it was ever inhabited.
  6. Uninhabited when discovered by Europeans; believed to have been visited by Polynesians.
  7. Also ethnoculturally grouped as Australasian with Australia, since both have large non-Indigenous populations from Europe and elsewhere.
  8. Uninhabited when discovered by Europeans; believed to have once been inhabited by Polynesians. The island is more commonly grouped with Melanesia, which it is geographically adjacent to, or Australasia, which it is politically a part of.
  9. Uninhabited when discovered by Europeans; believed to have been known about by Polynesians from New Zealand.
  10. 1 2 May have possibly been inhabited by Polynesians.
  11. May have possibly been inhabited by Micronesians.
  12. 1 2 Australian external territory; often considered a part of Asia due to geographic proximity.
  13. May have possibly been inhabited by an Indigenous Oceanian group.
  14. May have possibly been visited by Micronesians.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of Oceania</span>

The history of Oceania includes the history of Australia, Easter Island, Fiji, Hawaii, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Western New Guinea, and other Pacific island nations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oceania</span> Geographical region in the Pacific Ocean

Oceania is a geographical region comprising Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Spanning the Eastern and Western Hemispheres, at the centre of the water hemisphere, Oceania is estimated to have a land area of about 9,000,000 square kilometres (3,500,000 sq mi) and a population of around 44.4 million as of 2022. When compared to the other continents, Oceania is the smallest in land area and the second-least populated after Antarctica.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Melanesia</span> Subregion of Oceania

Melanesia is a subregion of Oceania in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It extends from New Guinea in the west to the Fiji Islands in the east, and includes the Arafura Sea.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oceanian realm</span> Terrestrial biogeographic realm

The Oceanian realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms and is unique in not including any continental land mass. It has the smallest land area of any of the WWF realms.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pacific Islander</span> Person from the Pacific Islands

Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, Pacificans or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the Pacific Islands. As an ethnic/racial term, it is used to describe the original peoples—inhabitants and diasporas—of any of the three major subregions of Oceania.

Polynesians are an ethnolinguistic group of closely related ethnic groups who are native to Polynesia, an expansive region of Oceania in the Pacific Ocean. They trace their early prehistoric origins to Island Southeast Asia and form part of the larger Austronesian ethnolinguistic group with an Urheimat in Taiwan. They speak the Polynesian languages, a branch of the Oceanic subfamily of the Austronesian language family. The Indigenous Māori people constitute the largest Polynesian population, followed by Samoans, Native Hawaiians, Tahitians, Tongans and Cook Islands Māori

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Melanesians</span> Indigenous inhabitants of Melanesia

Melanesians are the predominant and indigenous inhabitants of Melanesia, in an area stretching from New Guinea to the Fiji Islands. Most speak one of the many languages of the Austronesian language family or one of the many unrelated families of Papuan languages. There are several creoles of the region, such as Tok Pisin, Hiri Motu, Solomon Islands Pijin, Bislama, and Papuan Malay.

European exploration and settlement of Oceania began in the 16th century, starting with the Spanish (Castilian) landings and shipwrecks in the Mariana Islands, east of the Philippines. This was followed by the Portuguese landing and settling temporarily in some of the Caroline Islands and Papua New Guinea. Several Spanish landings in the Caroline Islands and New Guinea came after. Subsequent rivalry between European colonial powers, trade opportunities and Christian missions drove further European exploration and eventual settlement. After the 17th century Dutch landings in New Zealand and Australia, with no settlement in these lands, the British became the dominant colonial power in the region, establishing settler colonies in what would become Australia and New Zealand, both of which now have majority European-descended populations. States including New Caledonia (Caldoche), Hawaii, French Polynesia, and Norfolk Island also have considerable European populations. Europeans remain a primary ethnic group in much of Oceania, both numerically and economically.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pacific Islander Americans</span> Ethnic classification

Pacific Islander Americans are Americans who are of Pacific Islander ancestry. For its purposes, the United States census also counts Aboriginal Australians as part of this group.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oceanian art</span> Artistic traditions of Oceania

Oceanic art or Oceanian art comprises the creative works made by the native people of the Pacific Islands and Australia, including areas as far apart as Hawaii and Easter Island. Specifically it comprises the works of the two groups of people who settled the area, though during two different periods. They would in time however, come to interact and together reach even more remote islands. The area is often broken down into four separate regions: Micronesia, Melanesia, Polynesia and Australia. Australia, along with interior Melanesia (Papua), are populated by descendants of the first waves of human migrations into the region by Australo-Melanesians. Micronesia, Island Melanesia, and Polynesia, on the other hand, are descendants of later Austronesian voyagers who intermixed with native Australo-Melanesians; mostly via the Neolithic Lapita culture. All of the regions in later times would be greatly affected by western influence and colonization. In more recent times, the people of Oceania have found a greater appreciation of their region's artistic heritage.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Boundaries between the continents</span>

Determining the boundaries between the continents is generally a matter of geographical convention. Several slightly different conventions are in use. The number of continents is most commonly considered seven but may range as low as four when Afro-Eurasia and the Americas are both considered as single continents. An island can be considered to be associated with a given continent by either lying on the continent's adjacent continental shelf or being a part of a microcontinent on the same principal tectonic plate. An island can also be entirely oceanic while still being associated with a continent by geology or by common geopolitical convention. Another example is the grouping into Oceania of the Pacific Islands with Australia and Zealandia.

Oceanianliterature developed in isolation from the rest of the world and in a unique geographical environment. This allowed the development of a unique literature to thrive. Oceanian literature was heavily influenced by religion and ritual. This can be seen by the large amount of religious symbolism featured in it.

Euronesian is an umbrella term and portmanteau for people of mixed European and either Polynesian, Melanesian or Micronesian descent. The term is most commonly used in Samoa and Fiji. Most Euronesians are descended from British or French colonizers, missionaries and traders and with some from Spaniards and Polynesians in Easter Island and from Spaniards and Micronesians in Guam, Northern Marianas, Marshall Islands, Caroline Islands, and Palau. ʻAfakasi is the common turn of reference for euronesians in Samoa.In Fiji, the term Kailoma is usually used.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Outline of Oceania</span> Overview of and topical guide to Oceania

The following outline is provided as an overview and topical guide to Oceania.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Demographics of Oceania</span>

Oceania is a region centered on the islands of the tropical Pacific Ocean. Conceptions of what constitutes Oceania vary, with it being defined in various ways, often geopolitically or geographically. In the geopolitical conception used by the United Nations, International Olympic Committee, and many atlases, the Oceanic region includes Australia and the nations of the Pacific from Papua New Guinea east, but not the Malay Archipelago or Indonesian New Guinea. The term is sometimes used more specifically to denote Australasia as a geographic continent, or biogeographically as a synonym for either the Australasian realm or the Oceanian realm.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oceanic cuisine</span> Cuisine native to the South Pacific

The cuisines of Oceania include those found on Australia, New Zealand, and New Guinea, and also cuisines from many other islands or island groups throughout Oceania.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Oceanian culture</span> Cultural traditions of Oceania

Oceanian culture encompasses the collective and diverse customs and traditions of art, architecture, music, literature, lifestyle, philosophy, politics and religion that have been practiced and maintained by the many ethnic groups of the geographical region of Oceania since prehistory. Cultures of Oceania reflect not only that of the region's indigenous peoples, but also the cultures brought by European colonisation and the United States, particularly through mass culture such as cinema and TV. Oceania is commonly divided into four geographic sub-regions, characterized by shared cultural, religious, linguistic, and ethnic traits: Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Most Oceanian countries are multi-party representative parliamentary democracies, and tourism is a large source of income for the Pacific Islands nations.

References

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  9. Review of the Protected Areas System in Oceania (PDF). International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources. 1986. Retrieved 17 January 2022. Easter Island on the east has been included on the basis of its Polynesian and biogeographic affinities even though it is politically apart. The other islands of the eastern Pacific (Galapagos, Juan Fernandez, etc.) have sometimes been included in Oceania.
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  15. Sebeok, Thomas Albert (1971). Current Trends in Linguistics: Linguistics in Oceania. the University of Michigan. p. 950. Retrieved 2 February 2022. Most of this account of the influence of the Hispanic languages in Oceania has dealt with the Western Pacific, but the Eastern Pacific has not been without some share of the presence of the Portuguese and Spanish. The Eastern Pacific does not have the multitude of islands so characteristic of the Western regions of this great ocean, but there are some: Easter Island, 2000 miles off the Chilean coast, where a Polynesian tongue, Rapanui, is still spoken; the Juan Fernandez group, 400 miles west of Valparaiso; the Galapagos archipelago, 650 miles west of Ecuador; Malpelo and Cocos, 300 miles off the Colombian and Costa Rican coasts respectively; and others. Not many of these islands have extensive populations — some have been used effectively as prisons — but the official language on each is Spanish.
  16. 1 2 3 Todd, Ian (1974). Island Realm: A Pacific Panorama. Angus & Robertson. p. 190. ISBN   9780207127618 . Retrieved 2 February 2022. [we] can further define the word culture to mean language. Thus we have the French language part of Oceania, the Spanish part and the Japanese part. The Japanese culture groups of Oceania are the Bonin Islands, the Marcus Islands and the Volcano Islands. These three clusters, lying south and south-east of Japan, are inhabited either by Japanese or by people who have now completely fused with the Japanese race. Therefore they will not be taken into account in the proposed comparison of the policies of non - Oceanic cultures towards Oceanic peoples. On the eastern side of the Pacific are a number of Spanish language culture groups of islands. Two of them, the Galapagos and Easter Island, have been dealt with as separate chapters in this volume. Only one of the dozen or so Spanish culture island groups of Oceania has an Oceanic population — the Polynesians of Easter Island. The rest are either uninhabited or have a Spanish - Latin - American population consisting of people who migrated from the mainland. Therefore, the comparisons which follow refer almost exclusively to the English and French language cultures.
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Further reading