Home | Business News | Browse by Publication | T | The Geographical Review

The Growth and Collapse of Pacific Island Societies.

Publication: The Geographical Review
Publication Date: 01-APR-09 		Format: Online
Delivery: Immediate Online Access
Full Article Title: The Growth and Collapse of Pacific Island Societies.(The Growth and Collapse of Pacific Island Societies: Archaeological and Demographic Perspectives)(Book review)

Article Excerpt
THE GROWTH AND COLLAPSE OF PACIFIC ISLAND SOCIETIES: Archaeological and Demographic Perspectives. Edited by PATRICK V. KIRCH and JEAN-LOUIS RALLU. xvi and 390 pp.; maps, diagrs, ills., bibliog., index Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2007. $37.00 (paper), ISBN 9780824831486.

Throughout the vast realm of Oceania, along the beaches and coastlines of countless islands that manifest rock outcrops there may often be found boulders notched with bowl-shaped depressions or a series of nearly parallel grooves. These marks are the telltale imprint left by generations of precontact cultivators who sharpened and polished stone adzes, one of the main tools in traditional Pacific Islands cultural ecology and one that empowered human populations to transform terrestrial environments into productive agroecosystems, to craft long-distance voyaging canoes, and consequently, to enhance social reproduction and political complexity. In many ways The Growth and Collapse of Pacific Island Societies can be viewed as the virtual equivalent of those boulders, for the editors make it clear that they have an adze...

View this article FREE - Now for a Limited Time, try Goliath Business News
Free for 3 Days!



More articles from The Geographical Review
Leprosy and Empire.(Leprosy and Empire: A Medical and Cultural History..., April 01, 2009
Emotional Geographies.(Book review), April 01, 2009

Looking for additional articles?
Search our database of over 3 million articles.

Looking for more in-depth information on this industry?
Search our complete database of Industry & Market reports by text, subject, publication name or publication date.

About Goliath
Whether you're looking for sales prospects, competitive information, company analysis or best practices in managing your organization, Goliath can help you meet your business needs.

Our extensive business information databases empower business professionals with both the breadth and depth of credible, authoritative information they need to support their business goals. Whether it be strategic planning, sales prospecting, company research or defining management best practices - Goliath is your leading source for accurate information.