The advance of Neolithic culture was a defining process in human history. Chronicled by the distribution of Austronesian languages, one such expansion of Neolithic peoples swept through the Indo-Pacific region just 4,000 years ago. A record of this dispersal is carried in the genes of modern people. Yet human populations have a much older history...

This study focused on prehistoric pottery production patterns in the Lapita and plainware periods from the islands of 'Upolu and Manono, Samoa. Incorporating a holistic approach to excavated pottery assemblages, stylistic, temper and clay analysis was undertaken to identify whether initial production technology matched a larger regional signature and to test how production strategies changed...

This thesis presents the results of a skill analysis augmented by a decorative analysis and temper analysis, conducted upon Lapita pottery from the Early period site of Tamuarawai (EQS), Emirau Island, Papua New Guinea. Lapita pottery is an essential component of the Lapita Cultural Complex and an important source of information through which the lives...

In 2008 and 2009, the author spent a month on the island of Atafu as part of the Tokelau Science, Education, and Research program co-directed by David Addison and John Kalolo. During this time he assisted in archaeological excavation, collected land snails and soil samples, made a film, and became a part of an atoll...

In ancient Hawai'i, elites employed ideology as a way of acquiring and stabilising political and economic power. Material evidence of this is found in the numerous temples throughout the islands and in the formalised rules for constructing elite households. Ethnohistoric literature describes Hawaiian households as a collection of buildings with specific functional purposes. By segregating...