Primer for Teaching Pacific Histories

Matt K. Matsuda is Professor of History and Academic Dean of the Honors College at Rutgers University-New Brunswick and author of Pacific Worlds: A History of Seas, Peoples, and Cultures and Empire of Love: Histories of France and the Pacific.

• Acknowledgments  viiIntroduction: Objectives  1Part I. Foundations1. Begin with the State of Our Knowledge  192. Secure the Fundamentals: Navigation, Diaspora, Settlement  253. Underscore the Connections: Encounters in the Contact Zone  334. Review Disputed Legacies and Arguments  51Part II. Devising Strategies5. Imperialism as a Teaching Tool  676. Anthropology and Ethnology as Teaching Tools  897. Conflict as a Teaching Tool  958. Identity as a Teaching Tool  105Part III. Performed Histories9. Distinguish Representations and Realities  11310. See the Process of Enacting Knowledge  121Notes  145Selected Bibliography  155Index  161

“This is an inspired and inspiring text-a welcome and much needed contribution rich with resources, pedagogical innovation, and practical strategies. Conceptually exciting, it takes an ‘assemblage’ approach that emphasizes relationships and connections between actors and events across time. It offers a rethinking as to what constitutes the Pacific world itself-from the margins to the center, particularly from the Pacific Rim to the Oceanic basin-all while emphasizing connectivity in relation to global histories.” - J. Kehaulani Kauanui, author of (Paradoxes of Hawaiian Sovereignty: Land, Sex, and the Colonial Politics of State Nationalism) “Bringing multiple aspects of Pacific histories together in new and welcome ways, Matt K. Matsuda provides a more comprehensive approach to teaching the field than any other publication that currently exists.” - Heather Streets-Salter, author of (World War One in Southeast Asia: Colonialism and Anticolonialism in an Era of Global Conflict) "This book is an assemblage of key concepts in Pacific histories, topic and primary text suggestions, pedagogical approaches, and discussion-based exercises for the classroom. With its pragmatic approaches to pedagogy, this book would be useful for environmentally minded educators who seek to integrate transnational, decolonial, and Indigenous perspectives in understanding environmental history, literature, and social movements." - Heidi Amin-Hong (ISLE) “A Primer for Teaching Pacific Histories outlines a course with a rich, welcome, and innovative historical perspective on the broader Pacific region.” - David Hanlon (Contemporary Pacific) “In A Primer for Teaching Pacific Histories, Matt Matsuda offers guidance on course structure, themes for inquiry, and resources to consult. The author’s multitude of overarching main ideas and supporting examples supply enough fundamentals for instructors working outside of their comfort zone as well as seasoned scholars looking for new perspectives.” - Michelle Ladwig Williams (Pacific Affairs)