2014/07/03 by Antony Adler · 2 citations
Social Sciences · #Pacific and Southeast Asian Studies #Asian American and Pacific Histories #Island Studies and Pacific Affairs #Frontier #History #Representation (politics) #Narrative #Dozen #Negotiation #Pacific islanders #Genealogy #Anthropology #Archaeology #Sociology #Politics #Literature #Political science #Law #Art #Social science #Ethnic group
paper · doi:10.1080/00223344.2014.914623
openalex publication_date 2014/07/03 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2025/11/06
The United States Exploring Expedition into the Pacific launched in 1838 was marked, like the continental expansion westward, by violent encounters with Native peoples. By examining the record of the expedition's kidnapping of the Fijian Ro Veidovi, the fate of his body after death, and the ways his story came to be invoked in the official narrative of the expedition, the popular press, the ‘National Gallery’ and, more recently, the Fijian press, this paper demonstrates how violent contacts on the Pacific frontier were remembered, effaced, and reconceived. The changing story of Ro Veidovi permanently bridged distant locales in an emerging ‘Pacific World’, setting in motion transcultural negotiations that continue to this day.