Indigeneity in the Oceanic Commons: Reclaiming Relations from Taiwan to Hawai’i

The ASU Environmental Humanities Initiative is excited to announce the Indigeneity in the Oceanic Commons: Reclaiming Relations from Taiwan to Hawai’i, scheduled for Oct. 18-20, 2023, during ASU’s Humanities Week. This event brings diverse Indigenous elders, poets, writers and scholars together with environmental humanists to reassess what it means to care for ocean commons. Participants will explore how the commons are conceptualized from the perspectives of Indigenous Taiwan in relation to other Pacific island nations and oceanic cultures — whether it be terrestrial, aquatic, atmospheric or sociocultural. 

Drawing on our setting in the Salt River Valley, this symposium convenes respected Indigenous elders, paddlers, surfers and poets, with policy experts, community leaders and scholars from Taiwan, Hawai’i, Guam, Arizona and California, reflecting the rich connections to be found between Pacific Islanders and the indigenous peoples and cultures here in the Southwest. Keynote and plenary presentations will be offered by Paelabang Danapan (Puyuma), Senior Advisor to the President, Taiwan, and Former Minister of Council of Indigenous Peoples of Taiwan, Taiwan), Syaman Rapagnon (Tao, Taiwan), Elizabeth Deloughrey (UCLA), Dina Gilio-Whitaker (Colville Confederated Tribes, CSU, San Marcos), Clifford Kopono (School of Ocean Futures, ASU), and Hsinya Huang (National Sun Yat-Sen University).  ASU’s Environmental Humanities Initiative faculty and affiliates will also present on topics such as poetic and artistic mediations of oceans, diasporic and multiethnic relations in coastal communities, ocean resource extraction, and emergent ocean industries. The symposium will close with a roundtable reflecting on the recent oceanic turn in the humanities and emergent disciplinary formations such as the blue humanities and critical ocean studies.