Rapa Nui Journal Volume 28 Issue 2
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Item Song in the Spotlight(2014-10-01)Item Featured EIF Publication: Easter Island Settlement Patterns in the Late Prehistoric and Protohistoric Periods(2014-10-01) McCoy, Patrick CarltonItem News(2014-10-01) Padgett, AntionetteItem Getting To Know You: Burkhard Vogt(2014-10-01)Item Book Reviews(2014-10-01) Aliaga, José Miguel Ramírez; Lee, Georgia; Mason, Peter; Shepardson, Britton; Vorbrich, Christopher; Davies, BenThe hydrogeologic conditions and water supply of Rapa Nui have recently become a matter of concern since the island has become more readily accessible by plane. This has increased resident and tourist populations, which has heightened the demand on the island’s groundwater supply. Another threat to the future of Rapa Nui is pollution of its freshwater resource. Three possible pollution sources are seawater intrusion, the Orito Landfill, and the lack of a septic waste system. Seawater intrusion is a potential threat for Rapa Nui because the aquifer becomes shallower near the coast and groundwater pumping occurs near the coast. The unlined Orito Landfill sits atop a groundwater divide, increasing the potential for chemical compounds to disperse in various directions. The lack of a centralized septic waste system also poses a growing threat from potential seepage into the groundwater supply. Increased understanding of the hydrogeologic conditions and sources of groundwater pollution need to be a priority for the government of Chile and the municipality of Rapa Nui to help sustain the fresh groundwater supply. This research focuses on the groundwater conditions in the southeastern part of the island near the town of Hanga Roa, where most residents live and where groundwater is the sole source of potable water. This report attempts to combine general hydrogeologic knowledge with observed data from various sources in order to create a baseline assessment of the current groundwater situation. Current knowledge of groundwater pumping wells and pollution sources needs to be expanded in order to manage the water supply sustainably for future generations. An investment in a hydrologic monitoring program, compatible with improved waste management, would help lead to a safe, reliable drinking water source for the people of Rapa Nui.Item Impacts to tourism and loss of cultural heritage from climate change and adaptation recommendations(2014-10-01) Campbell, Peter; McCall,Grant; Easton, AngeliqueDespite the high relief of this isolated volcanic island, Easter Island (or indigenous name of land and people – Rapanui1) is susceptible to the impacts of climate change through higher frequency storm surges with increasing coastal inundation and beach shoreline recession (Quilliam et al. 2014). The iconic cultural heritage2 monuments (moai) play a determining role in securing tourist income, and in turn local economic injection. These moai and other ancient features are at great risk of damage with a great number located on the coastline and cliff faces. Other key risks for the island include water security and consequent food security. A strong role for local tourism operators is proposed as part of coordinated action with other similar places in Oceania and the rest of the island world.Item Representations of Rapa Nui in Chilean literature: The case of Pablo Neruda(2014-10-01) Galilea,MarisolThe following article invites readers to think about Rapa Nui from the perspective of literature questioning the representations we have inherited since the island received its Christian name, Easter Island. This paper focuses on the work of Chilean Nobel Prize winning poet Pablo Neruda and his book The Separate Rose.Item Terevaka Archaeological Outreach 2014 field report: Meeting community objectives(2014-10-01) Shepardson, Britton; Shepardson, Dylan; Droppelmann, Gonzalo; Briggs, Kelsey; Larrick, Tate; Ramirez, Rocio; Atá, Beno; Pakarati, Gina; Wilkins, Mahanua; Fuentes, Jannis; Ika, HaȠarau, Ika; Moncada, Carla; Paoa, Hana; Pérez, Franco; Tuki, Ioani; Tuki, Jorge; Tuki, Tahira; Tuki, Teatahero; Valdebenito, MauriceWork completed in July of 2014 marks the eleventh year that Terevaka Archaeological Outreach (TAO) has offered educational opportunities for high school students local to the Rapa Nui community. Fifteen Rapanui students enrolled in this year’s program, representing La Aldea Educativa and Colegio Hermano Eugenio Eyraud—two of the high schools on the island. Five of those fifteen students were returning students, having successfully completed their first year of the TAO curriculum in July of 2013. The goals of the TAO program have remained the same since its inception in 2003. First, our work aims to utilize archaeology as a foundation for education and opportunity within Rapa Nui’s island community. Second, our projects promote awareness of and expertise in archaeology and cultural conservation. And third, we document, study, and conserve the remarkable treasures of the past that remain on Rapa Nui today. In order to fulfill these goals, TAO staff and students have undertaken a variety of innovative projects on the island and presented findings through various media (Rutherford et al. 2008; Shepardson 2006, 2010; Shepardson & Torres Hochstetter 2009; Shepardson et al. 2004, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013; Torres Hochstetter & Shepardson 2005). As TAO becomes a more established institution on the island, one of our challenges is to make sure that projects are closely aligned with the everevolving community objectives in sustainable development. Our 2014 program focused on two specific projects: (1) non-invasive archaeological site documentation and surveillance, and (2) raising awareness of Rapanui artifacts that currently reside in museums overseas.Item Reports and Commentaries:The Fritz Felbermayer legacy(2014-10-01) Haoa Rapahango, Betty; Basterrica Borckman, TaniaFritz Felbermayer Blecha, an Austrian man who lived in Chile, was a great philanthropist and benefactor of the Rapanui people. In his travels to Easter Island, he collected more than two thousand objects of the Rapanui culture, which are currently in the collection of the Fonck Museum in Viña del Mar, Chile. His memory and his work are preserved through the exhibition of these objects in the museum and through the support he provided for young people from the island who came to the continent to study, becoming professionals.Item More on Hoa Hakananai‘a: Paint, petroglyphs, and a sledge, and the independent value of archaeological and historical evidence(2014-10-01) Pitts, MikeIt was a privilege to be able to study Hoa Hakananai‘a in the British Museum, in the quiet of the Wellcome Trust Gallery at night. My hope was not just to learn new things, but also to encourage debate about one of the museum’s under-appreciated exhibits. I was delighted to see responses in the Rapa Nui Journal, one to my article in the same edition (Pitts 2014), and the other to an earlier magazine feature (Pitts et al. 2013). The editor offered me the chance to comment on these, but I preferred to wait until more of our peer-reviewed articles had been published, which they have now been (Miles et al. 2014; Pitts et al. 2014; see also Miles et al. in press). Jo Anne Van Tilburg (2014) has usefully traced the buyer of the photo I reproduced, taken in 1868 (Pitts 2014:Figure 3). Georgia Lee and colleagues have made a significant contribution in finding an original print of the second 1868 photo (Lee et al. 2014:Figure 3). I agree with Van Tilburg (2014:50) that the identity of the photographer remains uncertain.Item A new manuscript of Pua Ara Hoa ‘a Rapu from the archives of William Mulloy, Part 1: Description of the manuscript(2014-10-01) Horley, Paul; López Labbé,LilianA set of photographs and negatives of a previously unknown manuscript attributed to Pua Ara Hoa ‘a Rapu was found among Mulloy’s papers at the Biblioteca William Mulloy at the Museo Antropológico P. Sebastián Englert on Easter Island. The manuscript shows the same handwriting as that observed in other manuscripts attributed to Pua Ara Hoa. The text contains three sections – the list of rongorongo signs copied from the tracings of the Santiago staff published by Philippi, the list of place names composed by Mako‘i ‘a Hua Tava (one of the seven explorers to Rapa Nui), and the list of the kings from Hiva and Easter Island. The discovered manuscript ends with two pages filled with manutara drawings – a unique large-scale graphic design not observed in other manuscripts.Item Kinship predicaments in Rapa Nui (Easter Island): Autochthony, foreign and substantial identities(2014-10-01) Muñoz, DiegoIn this paper, I analyze adaptations of the Rapanui kinship system to a series of social changes that have occurred in the last 40 years. First, I will study the local terms of hua‘ai and haka‘ara, concepts used to describe the relationship of kinship that are fundamental in the construction of the group of relatives. Second, I analyze the influence that migration, a tourism-oriented economy, and the application of a particular legislation for indigenous people have on Rapanui kinship. I propose that today, Rapanui society cannot be analyzed without considering these aspects, since they have been instrumental in changing the definitions of kinship. In this process of adaptation to social changes, kinship is the main criterion used to define Rapanui identities in terms of what or who is considered foreign or autochthonous.Item The dressed stone manufacturing technology of Rapa Nui: A preliminary model based on evidence from the Rano Kau, Maunga Tararaina, and Ko Ori quarries(2014-10-01) McCoy, Patrick C.Purposefully shaped building stones, also known as dressed or cut stones, were used in various parts of Polynesia, but nowhere was the craft as fully developed as Rapa Nui (Easter Island), where quarried stones called paenga were commonly used in the construction of ceremonial platform (ahu) walls and in the foundations of houses called hare paenga occupied by chiefs and priests. The cultural origins of the dressed stone technology of Rapa Nui has been the subject of considerable debate because of the similarities between some of the finest examples on the island and mortarless block masonry in the Andean highlands of South America. Virtually nothing is known, however, about the manufacturing technology, including the primary sources of stone, reduction strategies and sequences, the methods and tools used in the manufacturing process, the social status of the stone cutters, and the mechanisms involved in the distribution of dressed stones. In an effort to redress this problem, data from five dressed stone quarries, recorded on the southwestern end of the island in 1968, are used in developing a preliminary model of the manufacturing process. The data from these quarries, combined with archaeological and ethnographic information on the varied utilitarian, symbolic, and ritual uses of dressed stones, suggest that paenga manufacture may have developed at some point in its history into a craft specialist “industry” involving production for exchange. The ethnographic period socio-political context of the five quarries suggests that they may have been under the control of one clan, the Marama, except for the summit area of Rano Kau, where multiple clans may have had open access to what appears to have been one of the best sources of building stone on the island.