Abstract
This chapter highlights the integral role that Indigenous Sāmoan architecture plays within Sāmoan culture and the dynamics and implications of change. From high dome shaped thatch roofs to lower sloped, straight corrugated iron roofs, from open sides to partial or total walls, from round ends to square ends, the author examines the material, economic, and sociocultural factors of how and why these changes through a half century of globalization in the Sāmoan Islands. Sāmoans interpretations and ethnographic observations of the impacts these changes, as well as structural and phenomenological forms of analysis inform the exegesis, which overall aim to strengthen the view of how architecture both reflects and shapes sociocultural processes.
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Notes
- 1.
The English gloss ‘chief’ for ‘ matai ’ denotes a respected position in Sāmoa , gained through a descent group’s ancestral chiefly name. Each descent group typically holds several such names or titles, one of which is considered the highest ranking, and holds authority over the descent group’s communal lands and properties and represents the descent group in the village council of matai. There are two main types of matai— tulāfale (orators) and ali‘ i (high chiefs).
- 2.
La Pérouse ’s visit in Sāmoa ended in a violent clash between the French and the Sāmoans. As a result, Europeans avoided coming to Sāmoa for the next 40 years until the first European missionary of Christianity to Sāmoa, John Williams , arrived in 1830, long after Christianity had been introduced to all the other major island groups of Polynesia .
- 3.
The comments were made in English for the 80 delegates from the 23 members states of the Oceania Customs Organisation’s 14th annual conference from whom this ‘ava was presented to welcome them to American Sāmoa . This was the first time for American Sāmoa to host the event.
- 4.
Henry Utoaluga and A.J. Afano were both students of Ms. Reggie Meredith, a fine arts instructor at ASCC . By selling the paintings, they raised funds for their trip to visit museums and the art world of New York City .
- 5.
This point is only hypothetical. While statistics for reported cases of such violence have gone up simultaneously with the increase in walled housing in the villages, there also exists the high probability that a greater number of cases of violence occurred unreported to legal authorities outside the village in the past. It is also possible for domestic forms of violence to occur away from the house setting altogether, though this may be less likely.
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Acknowledgement
This chapter was written with support from The Wenner-Gren Foundation Hunt Postdoctoral Fellowship. [Grant #9320. Approved 10/4/2016].
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Van der Ryn, M. (2018). Contemporary Change in Sāmoan Indigenous Village Architecture: Sociocultural Dynamics and Implications. In: Grant, E., Greenop, K., Refiti, A., Glenn, D. (eds) The Handbook of Contemporary Indigenous Architecture. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-6904-8_24
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