The study of navigation involves questions about the conceptualization of space and ways in which people share their spatial understandings with others. This article focuses on one aspect of spatial cognition, a phenomenon commonly known as “frames of reference” (FoRs). It explores the myriad ways in which Taumako islanders in the southeastern Solomons talk about spatial relations that English speakers term ‘front’ and ‘back.’ I examine how Taumako notions of ‘front’ and ‘back’ articulate with FoRs that are well established in the anthropological literature, and I explore the challenge of applying commonly-accepted FoR typologies to actual Taumako usage. In some contexts, there was little disagreement among my interlocutors as to proper use of the salient terms. In others, there was considerable divergence; and in certain instances even the same person appeared to be inconsistent from one occasion to the next. I will attempt to identify those areas in which I found widespread consensus as well as those in which disagreements were pervasive, and I will consider possible reasons for that difference.

Summitry in the Americas has become the predominant insti-tution driving relations between the United States and its neighbors.

Raymond Firth’s We, The Tikopia, first published in 1936, still sets the standard for detailed, nuanced, sensitive ethnography.  As Malinowski’s student, Firth—who died in 2002 at the age of 100—was a hard-headed functionalist, whose forte was careful examination of cultural “institutions” and their effects on individuals as well as on other institutions.  Suspicious of abstruse theoretical pronouncements, he presented his analyses in plain language and always situated them in relation to the “imponderabilia” of real people’s everyday lives. We, The Tikopia has been a foundational text for generations of anthropologists, and it helped to guide my research on three Polynesian outliers over the past four decades.  Since the time of Firth’s initial fieldwork, conditions in the region have changed drastically, as even the most remote communities have become enmeshed in the world market economy.  In 2007-08, I studied a revival of indigenous voyaging techniques on Taumako, a Polynesian community near Tikopia, in the southeastern Solomon Islands.  I was struck by the extent to which the cash economy permeated Taumako life, altering the tone of kin relations in ways that would have been unimaginable on Tikopia in the 1920s—or even on Anuta, where I conducted research, in the 1970s.  Here, I will examine Taumako kinship in light of the insights offered by Sir Raymond three quarters of a century ago and explore the changes to the kinship system brought about by new economic forces.

Different voyaging communities in the Pacific use a variety of non-instrument navigational techniques for way-finding across long distances. The use of a star compass has been well documented for several groups. Wind compasses are less well documented and appear to be less utilized throughout the region. This article seeks to understand the Vaeakau-Taumako wind compass as it compares to other wind compasses, as well as how wind and star compasses and other navigational techniques compare to each other as cognitive frameworks for navigation.

Recent decades have seen a revival of interest in traditional voyaging equipment and techniques among Pacific Islanders. At key points, the Oceanic voyaging revival came together with anthropological interests in cognition. This special issue explores that intersection as it is expressed in cognitive models of space, both at sea and on land. These include techniques for “wave piloting” in the Marshall Islands, wind compasses and their utilization as part of an inclusive navigational tool kit in the Vaeakau-Taumako region of the Solomon Islands; notions of ‘front’ and ‘back’ on Taumako and in Samoa, ideas of ‘above’ and ‘below’ in the Bougainville region of Papua New Guinea, spaces associated with the living and the dead in the Trobriand Islands, and the understanding of navigation in terms of neuroscience and physics.