Islands of the World IX
Sustainable Islands - Sustainable Strategies, Maui , Hawai`i , 2006

The ninth Islands of the World conference was held on Maui Island , Hawai`i , on July 29 - August 3, 2006. The conference marks yet another success for ISISA. Attended by 150 participants, many of the papers presented at the conference are now in various stages of publication. Conference proceedings are available at: http://maui.hawaii.edu/isisa2006/ConferenceProceedings.pdf (file is 20 mb)

ISISA acknowledges the great amount of effort that went into arranging the conference, and thanks the Hawaiian conference organizers, University of Hawai`i & Maui Community College for a job well done.

Islands of the World X
Globalizing Islands; Sustainable Culture and Peace
Jeju Island , South Korea , 25 - 31 August 2008

Discussions are underway for the organization of the tenth Islands of the World Conference to be hosted by the Cheju National University and the International Small Island Studies Association. Please put the dates in your diaries. Watch this space for more information.

General News & Events

Island Tourism Research Centre formally launched at University of Kent

Story by Dr Mark Hampton

In October 2006 CENTICA, the Centre for Tourism in Islands and Coastal Areas (www.kent.ac.uk/kbs/centica), was officially launched at the University of Kent 's new Chatham campus. The Director of CENTICA is Dr Mark Hampton, who also runs the University's Tourism Management BA and MSc courses. CENTICA one of a new suite of applied research centres at Kent Business School (KBS).

The new venture was officially launched by the University of Kent 's Vice-Chancellor Professor David Melville. The event was attended by senior figures from the tourism industry, representatives from local government, travel writers, academics from several other universities and Tourism Management students from the University.

The launch was an international occasion with a stimulating Inaugural Lecture on cold water versus warm island tourism by Professor Godfrey Baldacchino from the University of Prince Edward Island , Canada . Other guests included academics from the Université du Littoral in France .

CENTICA's mission is to study the challenges facing tourism in coastal and island resorts - for example, to examine how such places can manage a growth in tourist numbers without harming fragile natural environments - and to carry out research for governments and the private sector.

The CENTICA team, led by Dr Hampton including Research Fellow Vijay Reddy (an expert on the tourism in the Andaman and Nicobar Islands ) and other academics from KBS offers consultancy, short courses, seminars and training in tourism management. In addition CENTICA is developing projects with the University of Kent 's well-regarded Durrell institute of Conservation Ecology (DICE).

Dr Hampton is currently working on a £50,000 (US $94,000) research project on the economic impacts of backpacker tourism in Malaysia with Professor Amran Hamzah of Universiti Teknologi Malaysia in Johor Bahru. It is the first such research to be commissioned by the Malaysian Ministry of Tourism and involved fieldwork in Malaysia , Thailand and Vietnam in July and August.

ISISA colleagues from around the world are warmly invited to contact CENTICA when planning to visit the UK as there may be possible collaborative ventures that can be discussed. Chatham , where the CENTICA office is located, is only 45 minutes from London 's Victoria station and ISISA members and others with an interest would be most welcome to visit. Please contact: Dr Mark Hampton: m.hampton@kent.ac.uk.

An Historic Day in Ka`u: Ka`u Preservation Announces Plans for Punalu`u Cultural Preserve

Excerpts taken from speech by Pele Hanoa, President of Ka`u Preservation, Sept., 29th, 2006 - Punalu`u, Kau , Hawai`I , provided by Danny Miller, Director of Media, Ka`u Preservation

Thursday, Sept. 28th, marked a historic day in Ka`u, as over 250 people gathered from across Ka`u and the state to see our plan and vision to create THE PUNALU`U CULTURAL PRESERVE that will protect the entire Ahupua`a of Punalu`u as a LIVING CLASSROOM and where educators from around the world can come to teach in a natural setting, in outdoor classrooms and provide students with a life changing experience. The feedback was overwhelmingly positive and is the beginning of a new united front to protecting Punalu`u.

The People of Ka`u are calling for support to help them protect Punalu`u from the development of a luxury "eco" five star resort with 1,500 to 1,800 homes, a shopping centre and hotel.

For more information about how you can help, visit the Save Punalu`u website:

http://www.savepunaluu.org/index2.html

Union 76 goes "full circle" to provide alternative fuel to customers

Excerpts taken from press release provided by Kelly King, Marketing and Communications Director, Pacific Biodiesel, Maui , email: ktk@biodiesel.com

Union 76 Service Station is Hawaii 's first retail brand name gas station to offer pure biodiesel, produced by Hawaii 's own Pacific Biodiesel, Inc. . Used cooking oil from island restaurants is sent to Pacific Biodiesel's Sand Island plant where it is processed and converted into biodiesel fuel. "It's the right thing to do," said Richard Parry , President of Mid Pac Petroleum, LLC, who licenses the 76 brand in Hawaii . "We are excited to offer our customers a premium product that is locally-produced and beneficial to our community." . Parry states, "We are very pleased to be part of the statewide and national movement to utilize alternative fuels. It is especially rewarding where our (Carl's Jr.) used cooking oil is recycled and is sent to Pacific Biodiesel's Sand Island plant where it is processed and converted into biodiesel. In our island community, this has a greater significance."

Biodiesel is a non-hazardous material, non-petroleum readily usable by most petroleum diesel customers without costly engine modifications. Pure biodiesel has been used both on Oahu and on Maui in the past 10 years since Pacific Biodiesel built the first biodiesel plant in the Pacific Rim in Maui back in 1996. The Maui operation also marked the first time in the U.S. that biodiesel was available to the public at a pump station. The Oahu refinery began making biodiesel in 2002 and can process over one million gallons per year.

Pacific Biodiesel, Inc. uses a single stage process to convert used vegetable oil and animal fats into fuel usable in any diesel engine. Among the many benefits of biodiesel fuel are lower toxic emissions, safer handling requirements and 100% biodegradability. Because the Oahu plant processes used cooking oil into biodiesel, add recycling to the list of positive aspects of its renewable fuel production. In fact, Pacific Biodiesel has just become the 2006 recipient of the National Recycling Coalition "Innovations in Recycling Award". For more information on biodiesel, visit www.biodiesel.com.

Mid Pac Petroleum, LLC is a Hawaii based petroleum marketing and distribution company. Mid Pac has the exclusive license to use the Union 76 brand for petroleum fuels in Hawaii and owns 34 of the 54 sites that are branded 76 in Hawaii .

Local Biodiesel Company Scores National Recycling Award

Excerpts taken from press release provided by Kelly King, Marketing and Communications Director, Pacific Biodiesel, Maui , email: ktk@biodiesel.com

Hawaii 's Pacific Biodiesel's process of recycling used cooking oil into renewable fuel was awarded the 2006 Outstanding Recycling Innovation Product or Process Award. In a ceremony in Atlanta on October 23, Pacific Biodiesel Vice President Kelly King accepted the award on behalf of the company.

PB was the first company in the country to process used cooking oil into biodiesel in a commercial operation and also had the first retail biodiesel pump available to the public. The Maui plant, although relatively small, also has the distinction of being the longest continually operating biodiesel production facility in the nation.

Now in its tenth year of operation, Pacific Biodiesel has improved and adapted its biodiesel production technology for many different feedstocks and focused on small, community-based fuel production. "In this way, communities benefit environmentally and economically," says PB President Robert King. "It's an excellent way of supporting local agriculture and family farmers as well as recycling. Ours is a whole different philosophy from the large, corporate petroleum oil structure."

Pacific Biodiesel is currently building its tenth biodiesel plant, this one in Gonzalez , California for Environmental Alternative Solutions, Inc., and is planning at least three expansions of its existing refineries in the next year. PB is also developing a business plan for a biodiesel production facility on the Big Island it hopes to build within the next year. Currently the company ships biodiesel in bulk from Oahu to the island of Hawaii , but supply is limited and new customers are currently being waitlisted.

Pacific Island World Heritage Workshop

Feb 18, 2007 - Feb 23, 2007
Tongariro National Park , New Zealand

http://whc.unesco.org/en/events/345

A World Heritage Workshop is planned for delegates from Pacific Island nations in Tongariro National Park, New Zealand . This is a follow up to the 2004 workshop where the Pacific 2009 Action Plan was developed.

The intention and objectives of the workshop are to:

• Develop a Pacific position paper to be presented at the 31st session of the World Heritage Committee meeting in Christchurch , New Zealand ; discuss progress with the 2009 Action Plan; and hold practical capacity-building workshops for participants.
• Develop a Communication Plan to showcase the natural and cultural heritage of the Pacific. This may involve the development of a website and publications, and developing a video presentation for the World Heritage Committee meeting showing highlights from the Tongariro workshop and illustrating the key themes and issues for World Heritage in the Pacific.
• Assist each Pacific country in reviewing its own progress toward the enhancement of World Heritage and highlighting its priorities.
• Workshop the theme of Indigineity as it applies to 'Outstanding Universal Value of World Heritage in the Pacific'.
• Discuss specific opportunities for the application of serial sites in the Pacific.

The event will be jointly hosted by the Department of Conservation (DOC) New Zealand and Department of Environment and Heritage (DEH) in Australia.

Call for papers and Conferences

Culture and the Construction of Islandness

The 3rd International Conference on Small Island Cultures
University of Prince Edward Island
Canada in late June29 - July 2 2007

The Third International Conference on Small Island Cultures (ICSIC 3) invites papers that dwell on the construction of islandness as produced, reproduced, celebrated, mediated, and scripted in and by island cultures. Papers on other aspects of island cultures will also be considered for inclusion.

Abstracts of up to 300 words each will be reviewed by an interdisciplinary academic panel.

Presenters will be from a variety of academic backgrounds, including linguistics, literature, tourism, cultural studies, anthropology, human and cultural geography, sociology, music, and history. The conference will be co-hosted by the Small Island Culture Research Initiative (SICRI) and the Institute of Island Studies at the University of Prince Edward Island .

All paper presenters are required to be members of SICRI. Membership is free and can be obtained by completing the online application form on the SICRI membership page: www.sicri.org

The deadline for submission of maximum 300-word abstracts is February 28, 2007.

Paper presentations will take a maximum of 20 minutes.

Paper proposals should be sent to the conference chair:

Dr Danny Long
Tokyo Metropolitan University
Tokyo , Japan
dlong@bcomp.metro-u.ac.jp

Postcolonial Islands: Geographic, Theoretical and Human

Queen's Postcolonial Research Forum
1st International Conference
Queen's University Belfast, Northern Ireland
21-23 September 2007

The conference seeks to bring critical focus to three areas: the current realities of formerly colonized island nations; the existence of theoretical perspectives that are critical of or run counter to prevailing theories of the postcolonial; and the phenomenon of "foreign" communities living within a dominant host community, whether of migrants, refugees or others who have left their countries of origin.

For more information:

• visit the website www.qub.ac.uk/qprf
• download the preliminary call for papers
• contact Dr Anthony Soares a.soares@qub.ac.uk

Abstracts of 250 words due 16 March 2007.

Small Island Cultures

Prof Shensuke Nagashima, Center for the Pacific Islands, Kagoshima University is planning an international conference on small island cultures for 1-3 July 2009, Sado Island, Japan .

Watch this space for more information.

Nissologising

In this section we hope to contribute to communication among island scholars, by keeping ISISA members informed of current research projects. The success of this section will rely on you providing the editor with short summaries of your most current research projects.

Island Ethnobotany

Dolores Levangie, Intern
Institute of Island Studies
University of Prince Edward Island
Canada

The Institute of Island Studies has given me a once in a lifetime opportunity that will open many doors for my future as an anthropologist. I have received an international internship through the Atlantic Council of International Cooperation and the IIS through which I will help identify potential uses of seaweed for indigenous economic development. This internship allows me to work among the Mi'kmaq people on Prince Edward Island and the Williche people on the Island of Chiloe, Chile. Both of these indigenous groups have traditionally used marine plants as a form of medicinal healing and food. Unfortunately many Canadian aboriginals have not been able to hold onto their traditional knowledge for various reasons. This is why a partnership between indigenous people in the north and south, and from one island to another, is so significant for the preservation of traditional indigenous knowledge.

While in PEI and Chiloe I will be collecting information on how these cultures have traditionally used and still use seaweed today through interviews and participant observation. A focal point of this internship is to collect the traditional knowledge from these communities, for these communities. contributing to this study the Mi'kmaq involved will be able to take pride in the knowledge they have shared, and know that it will be there for their future generations. The Mi'kmaq will also help me develop skills in documentation of traditional indigenous uses of marine plants. With these skills I will be able to help the Williche as well. The Williche people still have a large amount of traditional knowledge on their uses of marine plants but want to be able to educational displays and cultural exchanges. There is also the potential to develop a cottage scale industry in Chiloe where the Williche would be able market value added food, health, beauty, or agricultural products. Many different benefits for both the Mi'kmaq and the Williche will come out of this internship and one of the most important is the international bond these two cultures will have. Through this partnership the Mi'kmaq and Williche will learn from each other and share their traditional knowledge, not just about marine plants but also for sustainable forest management, holistic medicine, and cultural survival.

Island Commentaries

Climate Change and Islands : Scientists Serving Society?

By Ilan Kelman
http://www.ilankelman.org

Economic and population centers of many islands and island groups, from the Maldives to Alaska , are being affected by climate change, through extreme weather events plus longer-term creeping environmental changes. Sea-level rise is not the only possible scenario that could cause island destruction or, at minimum, uninhabitability. Ocean acidification, the changing cyclone regime, and ecosystem changes especially to marine resources are forcing the potential for abandoning isles onto the international scientific, development, and sustainability agendas.

In addition to continual islander movements over the millennia, recent precedents exist for island evacuations, mainly due to volcanic eruptions. In most examples, long-term relocation was unsuccessful because the islanders chose to return, even when the volcano continued menacing. That could be considered a positive long-term result from cultural or sociological perspectives. If people wish to remain, fully understanding the consequences, should they be forced to leave their homes and identities merely to save individual lives?

With respect to climate change, how should researchers contribute to a situation where islanders wish to stay on their climate change affected island until they must run or die? Should the scientists actively promote debate on possible impacts given their knowledge of possible impacts? Or should they stay with science and let others--for instance, development agencies and politicians amongst others--lead the way? What would the social impact be, on islanders and on scientists, from formally investigating, publicizing, and being operationally involved in island abandonment decisions?

Physical and social science researchers have an immense amount to contribute to these ethical and policy debates. Naturally, care is essential when becoming involved, but as human beings, should we consider our responsibility to each other? Should scientists consider their first duty to be serving society, even if at times that might mean sacrificing peer-reviewed journal articles and citation counts?

Publications

Chinese Islanders: Making a Home in the New World

Hung-Min Chiang
Island Studies Press 2006

Copies can be ordered from
UPEI Bookstore e-mail: bookstore@upei.ca/bookstore

Chinese Islanders: Making a Home in the New World tells the story of some of Prince Edward Island 's first Chinese settlerswho came to the Island as early as 1850. They were subjected to the infamous "head tax," as well as the more severe Chinese Immigration Act (also known as the Chinese Expulsion Act). But through it all, they and their descendants have largely adapted to and succeeded in mainstream Island society, and are proud today to be recognized as true Islanders.

Bridging Islands : The Impact of Fixed Links (Acorn Press, PEI, Spring 2007).

Edited by Godfrey Baldachinno
Available from Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Bridging-Islands-Impact-Fixed-Links/dp/1894838246

What happens when bridges, causeways, tunnels -- fixed links -- irrevocably connect islands to mainlands? Are "islandhood" and island ways of life threatened? Or are they saved by their stronger integration with the world at large? Good questions for Confederation Bridge 's 10th anniversary. Bridging Islands is a critical interdisciplinary scoreboard of the pros and cons of bridging islands to mainlands. Among the internationally recognized contributors are Jean Didier Haché, Rennes, France; Stephen Royle, Queen's University, Belfast, Ireland; and Philip W. Conkling, founder and director, Island Institute, Rockland, Maine. They review the sociocultural, economic, and political impacts of fixed links on small island communities, with essays on Prince Edward Island 's Confederation Bridge , Cape Breton 's Canso Causeway, and islands in Quebec and Newfoundland , the Florida Keys, Ireland , France , Scotland , Sweden , and Singapore .

A World of Islands: An Island Studies Reader ( Malta & Canada , January 2007).

Edited by Godfrey Baldachinno

A pan-disciplinary celebration of what island studies has to offer - intended as the first global reader in the study of islands to be published in 2007.

A World of Islands is a thoroughly referenced, comprehensive and pluri-disciplinary overview of the study of islands. Over 40 scholars and other contributors from all over the world, and from numerous disciplinary backgrounds, extend their expertise and ideas to highlight insights from, and for, the study of islands and island life. Material is as jargon-free as possible to facilitate understanding across specialisations.

You are here - Personal Geographies and the Other Maps of the Imagination

Katharine Harmon
Princeton Architectural Press 2004

Described by Iain Orr as a book for every nissologist's and cartographer's library, the book includes many classic island maps, including San Serriffe from The Guardian of 1 April 1978 (page 162).

Iain requests that anyone who now buys the book send a recommendation for publication in the ISISA newsletter for another precious island book.

Pieces of the Continent: An Island Anthology

James Lewis
Available at http://www.islandvulnerability.org/anthology.html

The following is an excerpt from the website

"This anthology began as an experimental inquiry. The selected extracts relate, perhaps inevitably but with one or two significant exceptions, to identifiable, emphasised or extreme events and experiences. Everyday normality does not very often become a topic for record anywhere.

The anthology . is comprised as five groups. The first, 'fantasy?' indicates that islands have been an object of romantic curiosity from as early as the eighth century BC; the second, 'diversity and comparisons' describes the multifarious nature of "given" contexts; the third group is of expressions and observations of social, as distinct from physical, contexts; the fourth group has to do with impacts of external forces of various kinds; and the fifth and final group is of some consequences and outcomes."

Resources for historians and ecologists interested in the southwestern Pacific Islands

From Bruce Potter
Island Resources Foundation
bpotter@irf.org

A recent housecleaning at Island Resources Foundation unearthed the following documents which may be especially useful to historians and ecologists to document some "baseline" conditions and issues in the southwestern Pacific Islands and especially New Guinea . For the cost of mailing, Island Resources Foundation will be happy to pass on the following documents which have historic and environmental baseline significance for researchers in the South Pacific/SE Asia.

WALLACEANA: an Ecology Newsletter for Southeast Asia, published by J. I. Furtado, Head of the Division of Ecology of the School of Biological Sciences, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, MALAYSIA, from 1974 to 1979. "This newsletter is designed to promote dialogue among ecologists working, involved or interested in this region." In mimeographed, legal sized (well, sort of: 8"x13") pages, each edition is about 40 pages, and Island Resources Foundation has volumes #1

POLITICS in PARADISE . narrated by Sophie Kili, Keith Jackson, and Liz Abel. The mimeographed transcriptions of ten "National Broadcasting Commission," (probably New Guinea ?) from 1974. Interviewees include Ron Crocombe.

Two miscellaneous papers:

"Indigenous Particpation in the Economy of French Polynesia," a paper read at a seminar on " New Guinea in Transition," at the University of Papua-New Guinea, Port Moresby , May, 1967.

"Land Use on West New Britain, Conservation Areas, Joint Field Report on Lake Hargy, West New Britain." Published by the National Parks Board, Wildlife Section, Port Moresby , 1972. This document includes a sketch map of land cover/land use in West New Britain .

In May, 1968, there was a major conference in Port Moresby at the University of New Guinea, sponsored by the University of Papua and New Guinea, the Australian National University, the Administrative College of Papua and New Guinea, and the Council on New Guinea Affairs, entitled "The 1968 Waigani Seminar" or "The Second Waigani Seminar: The History of Melanesia" on the history of Melanesia in general and Papua [New Guinea] specifically.

Then, in May, 1975, there was a Second major conference in Port Moresby at the University of New Guinea, entitled "The 1975 Waigani Seminar" or "The 7th Waigani Seminar" on the environment and development in Melanesia in general and Papua [New Guinea] specifically.

Following are the mimeographed papers that we have for these two meetings (note that in 1975, a certain young "R. R. Thaman" was one of the authors).

The Second Waigani Seminar, 1968

• Barrett, D. The Pacific Islands Regiment.
• Biskup, Peter. Hahl at Herbertshoehe, 1896-8: The Genesis of German Native Administration in New Guinea .
• Cannon, G.D. Executive Training for Commercial Operators.
• Chatterton, Percy. The History of Delena.
• Cleland, Sir Donald. An Administrator Reflects.
• Davidson, J.W. Understanding Pacific History: the Participant as Historian.
• Dutton, T.E. Linguistic Clues to Koiarian Pre-History. (two copies)
• Elworthy, G.C. Trends in the Plantation Industry.
• Fenbury, D.M. Meeting the Mokolkols.
• Giles, E. Human Biology and Melanesian History.
• Hudson , W.J. New Guinea Mandate: The View from Geneva .
• Joyce, R.B. William MacGregor: The Role of the Individual. (two copies)
• Lampert, R.J. Some Archaeological Sites of the Motu and Koiari Areas.
• Latekafu, S. The Methodist Misssion and Modernization in the Solomon Islands .
• Mayo, J. The Protectorate of British New Guinea , 1884-1888: an Oddity of Empire.
• McNicoll, Maj.-Gen. R.R. The Administration of Sir Walter McNicoll.
• Moses, J. The German Empire in Melanesia , 1884-1914: A German Self-Analysis.
• Oram , N.D. Taurama - Oral Sources for a Study of Recent Motuan Pre-History.
• Panoff, M. The Notion of Time among the Maenge People of New Britian.
• Robbins, R.G. Plant History in Melanesia .
• Sack, P. Land, Law, and Land Policy in German New Guinea .
• Sankoff, Gillian. Namasu: The Village Perspective.
• Ward, R.G. Land Use and Land Alienation in Fiji to 1885.
• White, J.Peter. The "Neo-lithic Revolution" in Papua-New Guinea: Non Documentary Approaches.
• Wilson , W.S. The History of Melanesia : Periods in Kusaien History.

SEVENTH WAIGANI SEMINAR, 1975.

• Allsopp, W. Herbert. L. Tropical Fisheries Development: Contemporary Problems and Perspectives.
• Baines, G.B.K. The Melanesian Environment: Change and Development: The Natural Resource Demands of Tourism in Fiji .
• Bulmer, Susan. Between the Mountains and the Plain: Prehistoric Settlement and Environment at Wanlek, A Site in the Bismarck-Schrader Range .
• Carey, S. Warren . Gulf of Papur - a Future Megopolis.
• Daws, Gavan. Hawaii as a Tourist Destination: A Terminal Case?
• Douglas, Ian. The impact of Mining and Hydro-Electric Development on the Humid Tropical Environment.
• Gilles, P.J. Environmental Development and Planning at Bouganville Copper, Limited.
• Hill, M.A. National Parks and Conservation Areas in Papua New Guinea .
• Kairi, J. The Melanesian Environment: Change and Development.
• Kearney, R. E. The Prospects for Fisheries Development in Papua New Guinea .
• Kwapena, Navu. Conservation of Wildlife and its Habitat Management in Papua New Guinea .
• Lamb, K. P. Copper Mining and the OK Tedi and Upper Fly Rivers .
• Liem, David. Wildlife Utilization in the Proposed Garu Wildlife
• Management Area, West New Britian, Papua New Guinea .
• Maenu'u, Leonard P. Notes on Traditional Farming.
• Murphy, Garth I. Fishing in an Emerging Economy.
• Oram , N.D. Environmental Factors Determining Migration and Site Selection in the Port Moresby Coastal Area.
• Philemon, Bart. Tourism - A Blessing in Disguise?
• Power, A.P. Appropriate Technology and Development in Papua New Guinea .
• Tago, Hon. S. Environmental Concern in Papua New Guinea .
• Thaman, R.R. Urban Gardening in Papua New Guinea and Fiji : Present Status and Implications for Urban Land Use Planning.
• Ulufa'alu, Bart. The Effects of Colonialism, Christianity, Education, and Development on the Customary Land Tenure in the Solomon Islands .
• White, K.J. Constraints on the Development of Forest Industries in Papua New Guinea .
• Wyatt, G.B. Health in the Melanesian Environment.

Journal notification

(INCLUDING SPECIAL ISSUES ON ISLANDS )

Island Studies Journal

Volume 1 No. 2 is now available online from IslandStudies.ca

http://www.islandstudies.ca/journal/ISJ-1-2-2006-Contents/document_view

The Representation of Islands

Geografiska Annaler, Series B Human Geography, Issue 4, Volume 87B, 2005
Guest editor Prof. Godfrey Baldachinno

Articles

• Editorial: Islands - Objects of representation by Godfrey Baldacchino
• Insularity, sovereignty and statehood: The representation of islands on portolan charts and the construction of the territorial state by Philip E. Steinberg
• Of navies and navels: Britain as a mental island by Alex Law
• Tuvalu and climate change: Constructions of environmental displacement in the Sydney Morning Herald by Carol Farbotko
• Fact sheet: The islands of Sweden by Anders Källgård

Book Reviews

• Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed Jared Diamond by Robert Scott
• Islands in History and Representation Rod Edmond and Vanessa Smith (eds) by Eric Clark
• Islands of the Mind. How the Human Imagination Created the Atlantic World John R. Gillis by Denis Cosgrove
• The United Kingdom Overseas Territories : Past, Present and Future David Killingray and David Taylor (eds) by Godfrey Baldacchino
• Islands of Women and Amazons: Representations and Realities Batya Weinbaum by Gillian Beer
• Full text of articles available from http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/journal.asp?ref=0435-3684

Topical Island Quotations

Generously provided by Iain Orr

Insect Diversity Conservation

Michael J. Samways Insect Diversity Conservation Cambridge 2005 pp 84-5.

Insect diversity on islands is often skewed, with some taxa not being represented. This is the result of the sweepstake effect, when only certain taxa successfully land and colonize an island. Most of those that naturally invaded new islands or were marooned in islands that became separated from the mainland developed into island endemics. This is because the island is separated from neighbouring suitable habitat by a hostile environment, the sea. Counterintuitive as it may seem, many island endemics are not more unusual than their mainland counterparts. Besides adaptive radiation, where species have evolved sympatrically into different niches and where the have acquired evolutionary stability, there is also fugitive radiation. This, according to Adsersen (1995*), is the appearance of "weak" species, which are very local and have to evolve further to avoid extinction. Many insects appear to fall into this latter category and maintain remarkably small populations (Samways 2003 a, b), which presumably are highly susceptible to changes that have not previously been encountered. This emphasises the risks of synergistic effects of global warming and invasive aliens, which are impacting severely on some island faunas.

These impacts are virtually meteoric, with many of the invertebrate introductions in the relatively unvisited Gough Island having occurred in the last 50 years (Jones et al 2002). On islands that are frequently visited, the invasion frequency of insects is extremely high. Hawaii accumulated 20-30 new insect species per year (Beardsley 1991) and Guam accumulates 12-15 new species (Schreiner and Nafus, 1986). Evidence is now accumulating that invasive insects, along with other agents of change are affecting certain island food webs, such as Nothofagus woodland in New Zealand (Clout, 1999) (Figure 4.11).

* Research on islands: classic, recent and prospective approaches in Witousek, P M, Loope, L. I. And Adsersen H. (eds) Islands: Biological Diversity and Ecosystem Function. Berlin Springer-Verlag, 1995

On Polar Bears

Robert E. Bieder Bear Reaktion Books 2005 ISBN 186189 204 7 pp 42-3.

The polar bear is the largest of all bears alive today. For the Polar Inuit of Greenland, the polar bear, U maritimus , is pisingtoog , the great wanderer. They say that if you follow the bear you will learn much. Barry Lopez, in Arctic Dreams , explains that curiosity is also incorporated into the term pisingtoog - bears wander with curiosity. According to Charles T Feazel, the polar bear is also called Nanook by many Inuit - "he who is without shadow."

As one Arctic scientist remembers with a shudder, the polar bear's sense of smell is extraordinary and they are silent pursuers, especially during a blizzard, when any chance to hear a bear's approach is cut to zero.

Melting Ice Sheets

Poul Cristoffersen and Michael J Hambrey ' Is the Greenland Ice Sheet in a state of collapse?' Geology Today Vol 22 No 3 May/June 2006 ISSN 0266-6979 pp 98 and 103

The Greenland Ice Sheet - positioned between 60-85 o north and 20-70 o east - contains 2.8 million cubic kilometres of ice (Fig. 1). If it were to melt completely, release of this frozen reservoir would raise the global sea level by approximately 7m. Although sea level is unlikely to rise by this much in the foreseeable future, fast sea level rise at rates of up to 80mm/year did occur in the past when the Northern Hemisphere ice sheets decayed in response to the termination of the last ice age. The present rate of sea level rise is about 1.5mm/year. A recent study shows that Greenland 's contribution to global sea-level rise increased from 0.23mm/year in 1996 to 0.57mm/year in 2005, due, in part, to the accelerated flow of coastal outlet glaciers (Fig. 2.).

The annual ice-mass loss from Greenland more than doubled between 1996 and 2005. Two-thirds of this loss appears to be caused by accelerated ice flow. The spatial extent of changes in the Greenland Ice Sheet are illustrated by widespread speed-up and thinning of glaciers below 70 o N. Current predictions of future sea-level are based on models that do not feature a dynamic interaction between fast glacier motion and climactic variability. The significance of dynamic changes is clearly demonstrated by glaciers such as Jacobshavn Isbræ on the west coast and Kangerdlugssuaq and Helheim on the east. The glaciers have all doubled their speed since 2000. The latter glacier thinned by 40m near the coast in response to ice-front retreat and speed-up. This rate of thinning is much greater than what would be expected from observation of polar glaciers elsewhere and it indicates that the Greenland Ice Sheet may be far more prone to decay than was previously estimated.

(The authors are from the Centre for Glaciology, Institute of Geography and Earth Science, University of Wales, Aberystwyth pac@aber.ac.uk

Getting off the map

Margaret Elphinston Hy-Brasil Canongate 2002 438 pp ISBN 1-84195-247-8 p7
(A novel set in the mythical Atlantic island - with a map thoughtfully provided as a frontispiece)

So as we were putting this new list together, she mentioned you. We'll need one or two names to start us off, but we want to get hold of some young writers. And some unusual places. Get off the map. That's what you can do for us. I mean, if you can get yourself to St Helena . South Georgia and Ascension Island , with no backing at all, you'll know just how to tackle this place.

The Island

George Bruce from The Island in The Collected Poems of George Bruce 1939-1970 Edinburgh University Press n.d. (1970?) 121 pp ISBN 0 85224 194 1 p 71

Yesterday we visited the island
Returned to tern, gull, rabbit and plover
After the occupation of another kind,
Righteous, bearded and blue-chinned men,
Curers and fishers and women to work at the herring.

Piers grew. Hammers split the screaming
Of terns. Barrels roistered down the braes -
Empties to be stuffed with herring
By Lil, Nell, Bell , Teenie and Jeanie.
Jew and Gentile were welcome to this island.

Fifty years ago old George Bruce
(Top hat packed, in case, just in case)
Shovel beard but gentle, a short man,
Pale eyed, considering mind,
Active on his pins, stumped this island.

In a note to this poem the author records: "My grandfather, George Bruce, was one of the earliest herring curers to set up a fishing station in Baltasound" [the capital of the northernmost large Shetland island, Unst, which used to be the centre of the northern herring industry with a seasonal population of 10,000].

Cricket

Jonathan Rice Curiosities of Cricket Pavilion Books 1993 160pp ISBN 1 85145 929 4 p 88

Probably the longest name ever given to a serious cricketer is that of the Fijian cricketer of the 1950s and 1960s, who was called Ilikena Lasurusu Talebulamaineiilikenamainavaleniveivakabulaimainakulalakelalau, a surname of 62 letters. The name roughly means "returned alive from Nakula Hospital at Lakemba island in the Lau Group." Fortunately for scorers around the South Pacific, he shortened his name to "I. L. Bula" for cricketing purposes.

Links of Island Interest

Surrealist Map of the World, 1929
http://www.public.asu.edu/~aarios/resourcebank/maps/page2.html

As noted by Iain Orr, one can look in vain for the island of California or, indeed, the USA (apart from Alaska and Hawaii ), learn that the surrealists loved Greenland, Labrador (but flunked on PEI ), Ireland , Rapanui and the Bismarck Archipelago.

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