Just did a Uni course in Pacific Island Archaeology - not once did we discuss Nan Madol or Easter Is

Most of the course was spent ensuring we could recognise various types of fish hooks and fish species and how the hooks were made, and the geology of different types of pacific islands and their rainfall patterns and agricultural practises of the early inhabitants...

Not saying this isn't important stuff too, but having finished the course, i am pretty sure that most of the young students have still absolutely NO IDEA that the pacific is full of amazing ancient RUINS, the building of many of which has never been adequately explained by archaeologists. The reason WHY the full class of archaeology students graduated in this area with no idea about most of these ruins is this:

we just somehow 'didn't get round to studying them'...but we had ALL the time in the world for fish hooks, and mounds of discarded shells. those we discussed and went through with a fine tooth comb...

The only ruins we discussed in the Pacific were the temples of Hawaii and other buildings there (all made with fairly small and easily EXPLAINABLE stones) and one temple mound on Samoa (ALSO made with small and easily EXPLAINABLE stones).

Here are some of the things the course either DID NOT MENTION AT ALL; or just 'never got around to' discussing because we conveniently 'ran out of time'.

* Easter Island and its amazing and massive stone statues and temple platforms, one of which the Vinapatu (scuse spelling there) strongly resembles the masonry in Peru/Inca areas of Sth America and would have been incredibly difficult to build.

*MASSIVE ruins of ancient canal city of NAN MADOL in the carolines and LELU ruins on Kosrae also in Carolines.
Built on artifically reclaimed land from the sea, some stones weigh 50 tonnes, huge towering walls, no real idea how it was built - attempts to recreate moving the stones with rafts have failed. Building efforts of these two resemble the building of the great pyramid in scale and achievement. yet not a mention was made during the entire course by our lecturer, who was also the head of the archaeology school incidentally...

* Massive stone pyramidal platforms of Tongatapu on island of TONGA and the ancient megalithic stone wharf and the massive stone trilithon

* The carved hills (ancient fortress hills) of Rapa Iti

*Megalthic stone ruins on Fiji

* The massive stone columns of the House of Taiga on Guam islands - all those similar stone structures on these islands...

*and various other ancient megalithic stone ruins, standing stones, and temple platforms and ancient stone roads that dot the pacific islands.

From the course, any student would have assumed none of this stuff even existed. Since they studied a whole archaeology course and it wasn't mentioned by our lecturer, who acted like there wasn't much in teh pacific except some shell mounds and fish hook remains to look at.... apart from a few stone ruins on hawaii and samoa made with little hand sized stones...

So, was the omission deliberate?

Or did our lecturer not know about this stuff either? He DID know, because some of the many heaps of papers referenced DID mention a few of these ruins. However very few (if any) students would have looked for these papers or known to look for them since the focus of the course wasn't on these areas, it wasn't even mentioned, and they had too much extra reading about fishooks to do anyway, plus other subjects....

I looked them up - the few that were there - because i knew they had to be in there

But WHY was none of the above mentioned during the lectures?

interested to hear your opinions....

I think my first question would be what the Syllabus said at the start of the semester? Was the class supposed to get into all of that?

My second semester, I took Illustration I which is Adobe Illustrator. We made ads, copy and page layout. Alot of photograph placement. The whole deal. It's a 101 level so he knew we didn't know more yet. Many things we were doing, I learned in the 3rd semester...would have been MUCH easier in Photoshop. He was so skilled an instructor though, I honestly didn't know he was also expert in photoshop or even used it ...until the Semester ended and we talked for an hour or so after a review of my term project.

Now I had actually wondered while taking the class, why all the photo working and no photoshop? I assumed the way he always dodged that ..He didn't know the program. Looking at the Syllabus though, he was just that good at following it and .....ever seen the movie Karate Kid? "Wax on....Wax off"

Originally posted by rapunzel222

But WHY was none of the above mentioned during the lectures?

interested to hear your opinions....

What I take away from your post is that you entered the course having expectations that have nothing to do with the course itself. Fish hooks are important for archaelogists. The course was not labeled mysteries of the Pacific. If you are telling me he specifically said there's no archaelogy in the Pacific I will say I think you are lying. Archaelogy can be really cool, but it's very boring work.

As for the rest, Wrabbit summed it up nicely.

Education curriculum's always seem to have this inexplicable tendency to avoid teaching about anything which cannot be readily explained by mainstream science. It's probably because they don't want to teach about things they don't really understand themselves, and they fear how some students may react to that sort of mind-boggling information. I often contemplate going back through school just so I can put the teachers in tough positions by asking them something I know they are advised to avoid.

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000
.....ever seen the movie Karate Kid? "Wax on....Wax off"

I was flipping through the channels the other day and Karate Kid was on at the part where he says that, and I was like "omg so that's where that saying comes from! Lol!". Good times.

Originally posted by ChaoticOrder
Education curriculum's always seem to have this inexplicable tendency to avoid teaching about anything which cannot be readily explained by mainstream science. It's probably because they don't want to teach about things they don't really understand themselves, and they fear how some students may react to that sort of mind-boggling information. I often contemplate going back through school just so I can put the teachers in tough positions by asking them something I know they are advised to avoid.

If the professor says "we found these cool heads on Easter Island and we don't know much about them" what is being taught? The point of the course is not to go go over all the things we don't know yet. If your professors never challenged you then you went to a sucky college, mine did. 101 coureses are not the place for that usually.

reply to post by rapunzel222


might i suggest that you signed up for the " wrong " course to learn about easter island statury , or are attending the " wrong " university ?

if you pass the right prerequisite courses hawaii university does an on site graduate program

reply to post by rapunzel222


How about telling us what the specific course was?

Was it this one offered by UQ?

www.uq.edu.au...

If so, it is a single semester introductory course into pacific island archaeology.

Hell you only need to be in class for 3 hours!

What do you expect to learn in a 3 hour lecture a week???

Originally posted by Chadwickus
reply to post by rapunzel222

 

What do you expect to learn in a 3 hour lecture a week???

edit on 30/12/12 by Chadwickus because: (no reason given)

Although I understand your point, my view would be different:

First hour: A brief summery of all the things we already know
Next two hours: And here is the interesting part, the things we don't (fully) understand

You want repeaters or explorers?

reply to post by EartOccupant


Definitely explorers.

But if this is the course the OP is talking about, and I'm fairly certain it is because it's titled exactly the same as he titled it, and I know he's Australian, then this one course is only a small part of a 3 year full time course.

I would say it's recommended to do the whole 3 years...

Its well known that universities or any educational institute doesn't teach anything to do with ancient mysteries. Most people believe the ancients were very primitive non-intelligent barbaric beings. We are not taught about any of the symbolism. Which is unfortunate because there is so much interesting stuff to learn, and we just might learn something about our own origins. But it seems the orgins of humanity are being kept a secret for some reason unknown. Universities won't teach anything they can't prove, so when it comes to history, much gets omitted because it is unexplainable, and teachers don't want to have to answer questions they can only speculate on.

I can only imagine how much humanity would learn if we did actually put effort into studying the ancients. Instead we'll have to rely on the odd ball specialist that has the balls to come up with theories and make documentaries on their findings.

Originally posted by EartOccupant

Originally posted by Chadwickus
reply to post by rapunzel222

 

What do you expect to learn in a 3 hour lecture a week???

edit on 30/12/12 by Chadwickus because: (no reason given)

Although I understand your point, my view would be different:

First hour: A brief summery of all the things we already know
Next two hours: And here is the interesting part, the things we don't (fully) understand

You want repeaters or explorers?

I'd rather they teach archaeology like it really is and not glamorize it. Why fool people into getting involved in a field that really is about examining fish hooks.

reply to post by OccamsRazor04


All true!

But still i think NOT mentioning those subjects is a missed opportunity.

It will also motivate the students, get them to think and play a little with their minds.
Become alive!

Originally posted by ChaoticOrder
Education curriculum's always seem to have this inexplicable tendency to avoid teaching about anything which cannot be readily explained by mainstream science. It's probably because they don't want to teach about things they don't really understand themselves, and they fear how some students may react to that sort of mind-boggling information. I often contemplate going back through school just so I can put the teachers in tough positions by asking them something I know they are advised to avoid.

You'd be surprised what college professors of today are doing, and how the class is responding, when my anthropology teacher brought up 9/11 and talking about folklore and Christianity came up the room became full of chuckles, and a few shocked faces that 9/11 could have been done by their government.

Originally posted by ChaoticOrder

Originally posted by Wrabbit2000
.....ever seen the movie Karate Kid? "Wax on....Wax off"

I was flipping through the channels the other day and Karate Kid was on at the part where he says that, and I was like "omg so that's where that saying comes from! Lol!". Good times.

edit on 30/12/2012 by ChaoticOrder because: (no reason given)

well now I just feel 20 years older !!!!

that's insane, everyone knows that!!!!! *looks around*

O.o

reply to post by xxshadowfaxx


"Universities won't teach anything they can't prove, so when it comes to history, much gets omitted because it is unexplainable, and teachers don't want to have to answer questions they can only speculate on."

The link to the U of Hawaii course site yielded quite a bit of new information, at least to me. In the haste to vilify mankind as the root of all evil & promote their "environmentalist" drivel, it seems that they were delighted to push the "conclusion" that the Polynesian settlers had committed "ecocide" by de-foresting Easter Island, leading to extinctions & even cannabilism among these settlers; using them as an example of the self-destructive ignorance of the masses.
This has been proven by the teams at the U of Hawaii to be patently false & the dating was incorrect by about 400 years.
I would correct your statement, xxshadowfaxx (no fault to you) to say that universities- in any course of study, will only teach their agendas; feeding their students what they want them to believe, whether it's true, proven, or not (or maybe it's the adage that poopie rolls downhill).
In any case, the originators of such theories/ conclusions will fight, viciously, to protect their narratives when someone comes along to correct their misguided thinking. (Caral is another example)

It's a fascinating link. Those who are interested should check it out.
Star & flag for you, rapunzel. Thank you for a most enjoyable read & good luck with your studies.
I've forgotten who posted the U of Hawaii link, but thank you & a star for you, too. (edit to add: You're misnamed.)

reply to post by rapunzel222


That is truly incredible, Nan Madol is one of the key sites imo. It is the key to unlocking many ancient mysteries. This might explain the current disinterest in academic history and the rise of the alt circuit.

Its up to ppl like yourself to change the board game.

Will

Originally posted by OccamsRazor04
I'd rather they teach archaeology like it really is and not glamorize it. Why fool people into getting involved in a field that really is about examining fish hooks.

^^this^^

The greatest insights into the collapse of the ecosystem on Easter Island have come about through the studies of an archaeologist called David Steadman (New York State Museum at Albany). He sent several years picking through, and cataloguing bones, from ancient garbage heaps on the island working out how the islanders' diets had changes through the centuries.

His hard field work (not sitting in front of Google) showed that, as the enviroment collapsed, different species died out and the islanders started eating different things (including each other!).

Extracts from a Jared Diamond article:

Steadman's expectations for Easter were conditioned by his experiences elsewhere in Polynesia, where fish are overwhelmingly the main food at archeological sites, typically accounting for more than 90 percent of the bones in ancient Polynesian garbage heaps. Easter, though, is too cool for the coral reefs beloved by fish, and its cliff-girded coastline permits shallow-water fishing in only a few places. Less than a quarter of the bones in its early garbage heaps (from the period 900 to 1300) belonged to fish; instead, nearly one-third of all bones came from porpoises.

Nowhere else in Polynesia do porpoises account for even 1 percent of discarded food bones. But most other Polynesian islands offered animal food in the form of birds and mammals, such as New Zealand's now extinct giant moas and Hawaii's now extinct flightless geese. Most other islanders also had domestic pigs and dogs. On Easter, porpoises would have been the largest animal available-other than humans. The porpoise species identified at Easter, the common dolphin, weighs up to 165 pounds. It generally lives out at sea, so it could not have been hunted by line fishing or spearfishing from shore. Instead, it must have been harpooned far offshore, in big seaworthy canoes built from the extinct palm tree.

.....

Steadman identified bones of at least six species, including barn owls, herons, parrots, and rail. Bird stew would have been seasoned with meat from large numbers of rats, which the Polynesian colonists inadvertently brought with them; Easter Island is the sole known Polynesian island where rat bones outnumber fish bones at archeological sites. (In case you're squeamish and consider rats inedible, I still recall recipes for creamed laboratory rat that my British biologist friends used to supplement their diet during their years of wartime food rationing.)

......

Such evidence lets us imagine the island onto which Easter's first Polynesian colonists stepped ashore some 1,600 years ago, after a long canoe voyage from eastern Polynesia. They found themselves in a pristine paradise. What then happened to it? The pollen grains and the bones yield a grim answer.......

.....The destruction of the island's animals was as extreme as that of the forest: without exception, every species of native land bird became extinct. Even shellfish were overexploited, until people had to settle for small sea snails instead of larger cowries. Porpoise bones disappeared abruptly from garbage heaps around 1500; no one could harpoon porpoises anymore, since the trees used for constructing the big seagoing canoes no longer existed. The colonies of more than half of the seabird species breeding on Easter or on its offshore islets were wiped out.

In place of these meat supplies, the Easter Islanders intensified their production of chickens, which had been only an occasional food item. They also turned to the largest remaining meat source available: humans, whose bones became common in late Easter Island garbage heaps. Oral traditions of the islanders are rife with cannibalism; the most inflammatory taunt that could be snarled at an enemy was "The flesh of your mother sticks between my teeth." With no wood available to cook these new goodies, the islanders resorted to sugarcane scraps, grass, and sedges to fuel their fires.

Read the whole article here.

So learning how to painstakingly pick through piles of evidence (like fish hooks and bones) would be excellent training, should you ever become an archealogist. If you just want to learn the history of Easter Island then do a history course that covers it - or read some of the thousands of scientific papers that have been written about it. Jared Diamond's book - Collapse - is also excellent.

Also OP, why don't you ask your lecturer about course design, instead of getting us to guess?

I think Wrabbit summed it up nicely (having had archaeology courses.)

They don't teach about known ruins, because as an archaeologist your job is NOT to go to the same ruins that have been explored and turned into touristy spots. Those are well-excavated, touristy spots. There's teams working there already.

Archaeologists aren't THAT interested in going to the same old place and excavating the same old thing. They love to discover NEW places and find what's there and put it into context (and write papers and books and become experts on the site.)

In order to be that kind of researcher and expert, you have to know the "keys" to who lived where and what kind of diet they had and how long ago it happened.

Furthermore, courses HAVE to focus on only a small area because of the amount of material available. We had the archaeology of Texas, and it was fairly specific to NORTH Texas. In the lab associated with the course, we worked on cataloging and identifying material from just one site... and believe me, a discussion of the Mound Builders of Cahokia and the Inuit and Inupiat and the famous log houses of the Tlingit would NOT have been any use at all. So our course focused just on the archaeology of the northern area of Texas.

To get the other material, we would have to take additional courses and then take field courses and then go out into the fields and start doing fieldwork (and when we do that, we would have to start reading a lot on that specific site.) You'd also take courses from the history department (which would get into some of the sites if they're doing the history of that area) and the anthropology department (for culture of the area, if that's offered.)

In general, an archaeology department (as has been said) will focus on the archaeology of a certain area (though they will mention other areas.) So, here in Dallas, SMU (Southern Methodist University) focuses on Egyptology and has a gazillion courses in Egyptian artifacts and history and so forth along with opportunities to go on digs in Egypt. However, the University of North Texas focuses more on the archaeology of North Texas, so there's not a single course (beyond the history course) that mentions hieroglyphs, Egyptian rituals, deities, etc, etc.

If you wanted an "ancient Mysteries" course, you should have skipped university courses and just watched Youtube.

reply to post by rapunzel222


Hi rapunzel,
Shell mounds and fishhooks can be pretty un exciting but they can tell you more about the people who lived there than the rocks they piled up.
In fact the basic "tool kit of a culture is one of the best ways to determine who was living there and fish hooks will absolutely tell you who was there.
The course could probably have had a better title and description.
The pacific is a big place and people have been roaming around its western portion for at least 50,000 years, and 20 ish for the eastern pacific and at least that long in south America.
There's so much to cover.

But here's a link to a good discussion about polynesian history and a well thought out counter theory of polynesian origins. Along with some other stuff that 5 years ago would have been questionable but are now being backed up by newer work in genetics.

www.polynesian-prehistory.com...