Peopling the Plains
Peopling the Plains

Author: James R. Shortridge

Publisher:

Published: 1995

Total Pages: 280

ISBN-13:

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This engaging and richly annotated atlas illustrates the distribution of Kansas settlers from diverse cultural and ethnic origins in America and around the world. James R. Shortridge explores how frontier settlement patterns were influenced by railroad routes and promotion; land prices and speculation practices; homesteading laws; U.S. and international social, economic, and political conditions; terrain; weather; and pioneer perseverance. He also demonstrates that many legacies of the original settlers have endured and are apparent today in social, political, agricultural, and religious customs throughout the state. Providing new and enlightening insight into a unique cultural heritage, Peopling the Plains is an invaluable building block for anyone interested in the people and places of Kansas, past and present.

The Tree and the Canoe
The Tree and the Canoe

Author: Joël Bonnemaison

Publisher: University of Hawaii Press

Published: 1994-01-01

Total Pages: 402

ISBN-13: 9780824815257

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This personal observation of Tanna, an island in the southern part of the Vanuatu archipelago, presents an extraordinary case study of cultural resistance. Based on interviews, myths and stories collected in the field, and archival research, The Tree and the Canoe analyzes the resilience of the people of Tanna, who, when faced with an intense form of cultural contact that threatened to engulf them, liberated themselves by re-creating, and sometimes reinventing, their own kastom. Following a lengthy history of Tanna from European contact, the author discusses in detail original creation myths and how Tanna people revived them in response to changes brought by missionaries and foreign governments. The final chapters of the book deal with the violent opposition of part of the island population to the newly established National Unity government.