Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Introduction to the Geography of Small Islands

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Geography of Small Islands

  • 1274 Accesses

Abstract

This chapter introduces the phenomenon of islands as an object of geographical research. It focuses on the specialities and singularities of islands, opening up a field of tension between internal and external views and questioning existing stereotypes on vulnerability and romantic ascriptions to islands within this. Space is a significant factor of influence in terms of the mutual relationship between space and society , in the sense of analysing and assessing the significance of space for society and, in return, the significance of societal relations for the development of space. The development of islands is influenced by the spatial categories of isolation , distance/remoteness , size/smallness and insularity /islandness , as well as networking/connectedness , and not only within the context of ongoing globalisation .

We are defined by the places we hold in the web of others’ lives.

Ken Liu 2016

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    Exceptions are, e.g. Stephen A. Royle (2001), A Geography of Islands; Stephen A. Royle (2014), Islands: Nature and Culture; Andreas Mieth and Hans-Rudolf Bork (2009), Inseln der Erde: Landschaften und Kulturen; Nathalie Bernardie-Tahir (2011), L’usage de l’île.

  2. 2.

    The editors of Encyclopædia Britannica 2015: ‘island, any area of land smaller than a continent and entirely surrounded by water. Islands may occur in oceans, seas, lakes, or rivers. A group of islands is called an archipelago’ .

  3. 3.

    Vaniček (1877: 1159), Griechisch-lateinisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Band 2, offers the interpretation ‘das schwimmende Land’ (floating land); Hofmann (1950: 218), Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Griechischen, s.v. νῆσος, Darmstadt, refers to Doric (another greek dialect) νᾶσος and a likely connection to the verb νήχω (to swim); and Frisk (1970: 317), Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, Band 2, s.v. νῆσος, Heidelberg, indicates that the origin is unclear; however, νῆσος mainly is derived from ‘to swim’.

  4. 4.

    Walde and Hofmann (1938: 707f.), Lateinisches etymologisches Wörterbuch, s.v. insula, Heidelberg, traces ‘insula’ back to ‘das vom Wasser Umflossene’ and declines the connection to the Greek νῆσος.

  5. 5.

    Seebold (1993: 402), Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, s.v. Insel, Berlin, New York, additionally adds that the origin of the Latin term insula is also ambiguous.

  6. 6.

    Up until it was driven to extinction by the Maori , New Zealand was home to the Moa , the largest flightless bird on Earth that could grow to more than 3 metres in length. Other examples of island gigantism are the Komodo dragon, the largest living lizard species with a length of 2 metres (occurring on the Lesser Sunda Islands), and the giant tortoises on the Seychelles and Galapagos Islands (see Quammen 1996).

  7. 7.

    A preliminary edition of this Island Directory was published by UNEP in its Regional Seas Directories and Bibliographies series, No. 35 (573 pp.), in 1991, but is now out of print. A new Global Island Database based on Google maps and new satellite data sets will be launched in 2010 by the UNEP/WCMC; see http://glispa.org/commitments/11-commitments/39-global-island-database.

  8. 8.

    The island project of the Institute of Geography at Hamburg University has added further information on islands to the isolation index, creating the Integrated Island Database (IIDAB ); see http://www.island-database.uni-hamburg.de/about.php

  9. 9.

    Nauru total population, 9591 (CIA 2016, July 2016 est.)

References

  • Anderson, Atholl. 2007. Island archaeology. In A world of islands. An island studies reader, ed. Baldacchino, Godfrey, 237–266. Charlottetown, P.E.I/Luqa: Institute of Island Studies in collaboration with Agenda Academic.

    Google Scholar 

  • Baldacchino, Godfrey. 2004. The impact of bridges and other “fixed links” on island communities: When small islands are connected to mainlands. In ISLANDS of the WORLD VIII International Conference “Changing Islands – Changing Worlds” 1-7 November 2004, ed. K. J. Lee, and Huei-Min Tsai, Kinmen Island (Quemoy), 99–110. Taiwan. Digital version available at: http://island.giee.ntnu.edu.tw/ISISA2004/ISISA8/013 4-1-A-2 Godfrey Baldacchino.pdf

  • ———. 2005. The contribution of ‘social capital’ to economic growth: Lessons from island jurisdictions. The Round Table 94 (378): 31–46.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2007. Introducing a world of islands. In A world of islands. An island studies reader, ed. Godfrey Baldacchino, 1–29. Charlottetown, P.E.I/Luqa: Institute of Island Studies in collaboration with Agenda Academic.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2008. Studying islands: On whose terms? Some epistemological and methodological challenges to the pursuit of island studies. Island Studies Journal 3 (1): 37–56.

    Google Scholar 

  • Barnett, Jon, and John Campbell. 2010. Climate change and small island states: Power, knowledge, and the South Pacific, 218 pp. London: Earthscan.

    Google Scholar 

  • Barnett, Jon, and W. Neil Adger. 2003. Climate dangers and atoll countries. Climatic Change 61 (3): 321–337. https://doi.org/10.1023/B:CLIM.0000004559.08755.88.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bernardie-Tahir, Nathalie. 2011. L’usage de l’île. Paris. Coll. «Des îles», 510 pp. Paris: Éditions Pétra.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2014. French geographers and islands: from the idealization of the field to the denial of the object epistemological approaches. Unpublished paper, ISISA Conference 2014. A contribution to sub-theme 10. A4 Nissology – study of islands on their own terms, 12 pp. Penghu, Taiwan

    Google Scholar 

  • Bertram, Geoff, and Bernard Poirine. 2007. Island political economy. In A world of islands. An island studies reader, ed. Godfrey Baldacchino, 325–375. Charlottetown, P.E.I/Luqa: Institute of Island Studies in collaboration with Agenda Academic.

    Google Scholar 

  • Billig, Volkmar. 2010. Inseln – Geschichte einer Faszination, 302 pp. Berlin: Matthes & Seitz.

    Google Scholar 

  • Brookfield, H.C. 1990. An approach to islands. In Sustainable development and environmental management of small islands, ed. William S. Beller, Pier Giovanni D’Ajala, and Philippe Hein, 23–34. Paris: UNESCO.

    Google Scholar 

  • Campbell, John. 2009. Islandness. Vulnerability and resilience in Oceania. Shima: The International Journal of Research into Island Cultures 3 (1): 85–97.

    Google Scholar 

  • CIA – Central Intelligence Agency. 2016. The CIA World Factbook 2017. Skyhorse Publishing, 1114 pp. New York. Digital version available at: https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/index.html. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • Clark, Eric. 2009. Island development. In International encyclopedia of human geography, ed. Rob Kitchin and Nigel J. Thrift, 607–610. Amsterdam: Elsevier Science.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Clark, Eric, and Thomas L. Clark. 2009. Isolating connections – Connecting isolations. Geografiska Annaler. Series B, Human Geography 91 (4): 311–323. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0467.2009.00324.x.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Dahl, Arthur Lyon. 1986. Review of the protected areas system in Oceania, 239 pp. Cambridge/Gland: IUCN/UNEP

    Google Scholar 

  • Dahl, Arthur. 1998. Island Directory. Basic environmental and geographic information on the significant islands of the world. United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). Digital version available at: http://islands.unep.ch/isldir.htm. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017. Content last updated 14 September 2004.

  • de St Exupéry, Antoine. 1943. The little prince. New York: Reynal & Hitchcock.

    Google Scholar 

  • Debarbieux, Bernard. 1995. Le lieu, le territoire et trois figures de rhétorique. L’Espace géographique 24 (2): 97–112.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Depraetere, Christian. 2008. The challenge of nissology: A global outlook on the world archipelago part I: Scene setting the world archipelago. Island Studies Journal 3(1): 3–16. Digital version available at: http://www.islandstudies.ca/sites/vre2.upei.ca.islandstudies.ca/files/ISJ-3-1-2008-Depraetere1-FINAL_0.pdf. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • Depraetere, Christian, and Arthur L. Dahl. 2007. Island locations and classifications. In A world of islands. An island studies reader, ed. Godfrey Baldacchino, 57–105. Charlottetown, P.E.I/Luqa: Institute of Island Studies in collaboration with Agenda Academic.

    Google Scholar 

  • Dicken, Peter. 2011. Global shift. Mapping the changing contours of the world economy. 632 pp. New York/London: SAGE Publications Ltd.

    Google Scholar 

  • DOALOS – United Nations Division for Ocean Affairs and the Law of the Sea. 2001. United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea of 10 December 1982. Office of Legal Affairs, United Nations. Digital version available at: http://www.un.org/Depts/los/convention_agreements/texts/unclos/closindx.htm. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • Fischer, Steven Roger. 2012. Islands. From Atlantis to Zanzibar, 336 pp. London: Reaktion Books.

    Google Scholar 

  • Fitzpatrick, Scott, Jon Erlandson, Atholl Anderson, and Patrick Kirch. 2007. Straw boats and the proverbial sea: A response to island archaeology: In search of a new horizon. Island Studies Journal 2 (2): 229–238.

    Google Scholar 

  • Foster, J. Bristol. 1964. The evolution of mammals on islands. Nature 202 (4929): 234–235. https://doi.org/10.1038/202234a0.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Frisk, Hjalmar. 1970. Griechisches etymologisches Wörterbuch Band II [κρ-ω], 1155 pp. Heidelberg

    Google Scholar 

  • FT, Financial Times Ltd. 2016. Lexicon, Definition of globalisation. Digital version available at: http://lexicon.ft.com/Term?term=globalisation. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • Ganzhorn, Jörg U., Jean-Luc Mercier, and Lucienne Wilmé. 2016. Inseln als Modelle für Evolution – Zusammenleben und Schutz von Biodiversität. In Biogeographie und Biodiversität. Hamburger Symposium Geographie, Band 8, ed. Schickhoff, Udo, 39–57. Hamburg, Institut für Geographie der Universität Hamburg.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gillis, John R. 2003. Taking history offshore: Atlantic Islands in European minds, 1400-1800. In Islands in history and representation, ed. Rod Edmond and Vanessa Smith, 19–31. London: Routledge.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2004. Islands of the mind: How the human imagination created the Atlantic World, 217 pp. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2007. Island Sojourns. The Geographical Review 97 (2): 274–287. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1931-0846.2007.tb00403.x.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2014. Not continents in miniature: Islands as ecotones. Island Studies Journal 9 (1): 155–166.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von. 1808. Faust. Eine Tragödie von Goethe, 309 pp. Tübingen: J. G. Cotta’schen Buchhandlung. http://www.deutschestextarchiv.de/book/show/goethe_faust01_1808

  • Gosden, Chris, and Christina Pavlides. 1994. Are islands insular? Landscape versus seascape in the case of the Arawe Islands, Papua New Guinea. Archaeology in Oceania 29 (1): 162–171.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Grimm, Jacob, and Wilhelm Grimm. 1971. Deutsches Wörterbuch. I-XVI. 16 Bde. in 32 Teilbänden. Band 3. Leipzig 1854-1961. Quellenverzeichnis Leipzig 1971. Leipzig. Digital version available at http://woerterbuchnetz.de/DWB/?sigle=DWB&mode=Vernetzung&lemid=GE01265 - XGE01265. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • Hau'ofa, Epeli. 2008. We are the Ocean. Selected works, 216 pp. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hay, John E. 2013a. Small island developing states: Coastal systems, global change and sustainability. Sustainability Science 8 (3): 309–326. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11625-013-0214-8.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hay, Pete. 2013b. What the sea portends: A reconsideration of contested island tropes. Island Studies Journal 8 (2): 209–232.

    Google Scholar 

  • Helliwell, John F., Richard Layard, and Jeffrey D. Sachs (eds.). 2016. World Happiness Report 2016, Update (Vol. I). Sustainable Development Solutions Network, 70 pp. New York. Digital version available at: http://worldhappiness.report/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2016/03/HR-V1_web.pdf. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • Hofmann, Johann B. 1950. Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Griechischen. Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 433 pp. Darmstadt: Darmstadt

    Google Scholar 

  • Integrated Island Database (IIDAB). 2016. Integrated Island Database (IIDAB) Search. Institut für Geographie, Universität Hamburg. Digital version available at: http://www.island-database.uni-hamburg.de/search.php - suche. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • Kelman, Ilan, and Shabana Khan. 2013. Progressive climate change and disasters: Island perspectives. Natural Hazards 69 (1): 1131–1136. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11069-013-0721-z.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lattas, Andrew. 2007. Cargo cults and the politics of alterity: A review article. Anthropological Forum 17 (2): 149–161. https://doi.org/10.1080/00664670701438407.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Liu, Ken. 2016. The paper menagerie and other stories, 449 pp. London: Saga Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • McCall, Grant. 1994. Nissology: The study of islands. Journal of the Pacific Society 17 (2): 1–14.

    Google Scholar 

  • Menard, Henry W. 1987. Inseln. Geologie und Geschichte von Land im Meer. Original published 1986 by Scientific American Books Inc. New York. Spektrum Verlag, 207 pp. Heidelberg.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mieth, Andreas, and Hans-Rudolf Bork. 2009. Inseln der Erde. Landschaften und Kulturen, 208 pp. Darmstadt: Primus Verlag.

    Google Scholar 

  • Morgan, Peter. 1990. A high tide in the Caribbean, 283 pp. St. Michael, Barbados: Caribbean Communications

    Google Scholar 

  • Olausson, Pär M. 2007. Autonomy and islands: A global study of the factors that determine island autonomy. Turku: Abo Akademi University Press, 275 pp, Digital version available at: http://www.doria.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/33681/OlaussonPar.pdf?sequence=2. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • Péron, Françoise. 1993. Des îles et des hommes: l’insularité aujourd’hui, 287 pp. Rennes: Éditions de la Cité, Éditions Ouest-France.

    Google Scholar 

  • Persoon, Gerard F., and Huub de Jonge. 2007. Living behind Dikes & Dams. The Transformation of the Dutch Island Societies of Urk & Noord-Beveland. In Bridging islands – The impact of fixed links, ed. Godfrey Baldacchino, 237–250. Charlottetown: Acorn Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Petzold, Jan. 2016. Limitations and opportunities of social capital for adaptation to climate change: A case study on the Isles of Scilly. The Geographical Journal 182 (2): 123–134. https://doi.org/10.1111/geoj.12154.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2017. Social capital, resilience and adaptation on small islands. Climate change on the Isles of Scilly. Climate change management series, 223 pp. Berlin/Heidelberg/Wiesbaden: Springer

    Google Scholar 

  • Quammen, David. 1996. The Song of the Dodo. Island Biogeography in an age of extinctions, 702 pp. New York: Touchstone.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ratter, Beate M.W. 1988. Die Rolle der Raumperzeption in der nationalen Seerechtspolitik. – Das Beispiel der großen Antillen. Geographische Zeitschrift 76 (4): 225–238.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 1992. Karibische Netze. San Andrés y Providencia und die Cayman Islands zwischen weltwirtschaftlicher Integration und regionalkultureller Autonomie, 269 pp. Hamburg: Wayasbah

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 1996. Complex resource management – Requirements for sustainable development on small Caribbean Islands. In: Ratter, Beate M.W. and Gerhard Sandner: Small Islands, Large Questions. Introduction to a Special Issue. Geographische Zeitschrift 84(2): 114–124.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ratter, Beate M.W., and Gerhard Sandner. 1996. Small islands, large questions. Introduction to a special issue. Geographische Zeitschrift 84 (2): 63–66.

    Google Scholar 

  • Relph, Edward. 1976. Place and placelessness. London: Pion. 156 pp.

    Google Scholar 

  • Riquet, Johannes. 2014. The aesthetics of island space: Perception, ideology, geopoetics, 289 pp. Doctoral dissertation. University of Zurich, Faculty of Arts

    Google Scholar 

  • Royle, Stephen A. 2001. A geography of islands. Small island insularity. Routledge studies in human geography, 237 pp. London/New York: Routledge

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2014. Islands: Nature and culture. Earth, 224 pp. Chicago: Reaktion Books

    Google Scholar 

  • Seebold, Elmar (ed.) 1993. Etymologisches Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache. Friedrich Kluge. 23rd edition edited by Elmar Seebold, 922 pp. Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter

    Google Scholar 

  • Smith, Roy. 2006. Editor’s Preface. When is an Island not an Island? Journal of Developing Societies 22 (3): 227–234. https://doi.org/10.1177/0169796X06068030.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Steele, Fritz. 1981. The sense of place, 216 pp. Boston: CBI Pub Co.

    Google Scholar 

  • Taglioni, F. 2006. Les petits espaces insulaires face à la vairiabilité de leur insularité et de leur statut politique. Annales de Géographie 115 (652): 664–687.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Taylor, Peter J., Michael J. Watts, and Ron J. Johnston. 1995. Remapping the World. What Sort of Map? What Sort of World? In Geographies of Global Changes. Remapping the World in the Late Twentieth Century, ed. Peter J. Taylor, Michael J. Watts, and Ron J. Johnston, 377–385. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.

    Google Scholar 

  • The Editors of Encyclopædia Britannica. 2015. Island. Encyclopædia Britannica online, last updated 12-9-2015. Digital version available at: https://www.britannica.com/science/island - ref234009. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • Tomlinson, John. 1999. Globalization and culture, 248 pp. Chicago: University of Chicago Press

    Google Scholar 

  • Tuan, Yi-Fu. 1974. Topophilia: A study of environmental perception, attitudes, and values, 260 pp. New York: Columbia University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • ———. 1977. Space and place. The perspective of experience, 496 pp. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • UN – United Nations. 2016. UN Member States. On the Record. What are Member States? Digital version available at: http://www.un.org/depts/dhl/unms/whatisms.shtml [13.1.2017].

  • UN DESA – United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division. 2016. International Migration Report 2015. Highlights (ST/ESA/SER.A/375). New York: United Nations, 36 pp. Digital version available at: http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/population/migration/publications/migrationreport/docs/MigrationReport2015_Highlights.pdf. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • UNEP – United Nations Environment Programme. 1991. Island directory – By Arthur L. Dahl. UNEP Regional Seas Directories and Bibliographies No. 35. UNEP, 573 pp. Nairobi, (out of print). Digital new version available at: http://islands.unep.ch/isldir.htm. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017. Content last updated 14 September 2004.

  • ———. 2014. GEO Small Island Developing States Outlook. United Nations Environment Programme. Nairobi. Digital version available at: http://www.uneplive.org/media/docs/region/59/GEO_SIDS_final.pdf. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • Vaniček, Alois. 1972. Griechisch-lateinisches etymologisches Wörterbuch. Band II. Representation of the 1877 edition, 1294 pp. Wiesbaden: Sändig

    Google Scholar 

  • Walde, Alois, and Johann B. Hofmann. 1938. Lateinisches etymologisches Wörterbuch. 3rd ed. Heidelberg: Carl Winters’s Universitätsbuchhandlung.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wessel, Pål, and Walter H.F. Smith. 1996. A global, self-consistent, hierarchical, high-resolution shoreline database. Journal of Geophysical Research. Solid Earth 101 (B4): 8741–8743. https://doi.org/10.1029/96JB00104.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Wilson, Peter J. 1973. Crab Antics – The social anthropology of English-speaking Negro societies in the Caribbean, 278 pp. New Haven/London: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Winchester, Simon. 1986. Outposts. Journeys to the surviving relics of the British Empire. 7 Edition, 360 pp. London: Sceptre.

    Google Scholar 

  • Winterman, Denise. 2006. What’s so great about living in Vanuatu? BBC News Magazine on Thursday, 13 July 2006, 12:02 GMT 13:02 UK. Digital version available at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/5172254.stm. Last accessed 13 Jan 2017.

  • Young, Elizabeth, David Muir, Alastair Dawson, and Sue Dawson. 2014. Community driven coastal management: An example of the implementation of a coastal defence bund on South Uist, Scottish Outer Hebrides. Ocean & Coastal Management 94 (6): 30–37. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ocecoaman.2014.01.001.

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Geography, University of Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany

    Beate M. W. Ratter

  2. Institute of Coastal Research, Helmholtz Zentrum Geesthacht, Geesthacht, Germany

    Beate M. W. Ratter

Authors
  1. Beate M. W. Ratter
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2018 Springer International Publishing AG

About this chapter

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this chapter

Ratter, B.M.W. (2018). Introduction to the Geography of Small Islands . In: Geography of Small Islands. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-63869-0_1

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation