When the Wild Winds Blow: Micronesia Colonization in Pacific Context

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "When the Wild Winds Blow: Micronesia Colonization in Pacific Context" at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Micronesia is a vast region composed of thousands of smaller islands scattered across nearly three million miles of ocean in the northwestern tropical Pacific. With few exceptions, however, Micronesia has received relatively little archaeological attention compared to other parts of Remote Oceania, despite islands having been settled in a complex series of dispersals spanning millennia, some of which are contemporaneous with Lapita and others that derive from descendant Lapita populations. While recent advances in different analytical techniques and theoretical perspectives provide a more nuanced picture of how peoples first colonized these smaller islands and subsequent events that occurred thereafter, this session provides new insights into how and when Micronesia was colonized and addresses lingering unanswered gaps with which to focus future research. The session also highlights issues in preserving and protecting the region’s cultural heritage in the face of development, climate change, and other natural and social processes.