Books
Mothers' Darlings of the South Pacific
The children of indigenous women and US servicemen, World War II
Edited by Judith A. Bennett and Angela Wanhalla
Like a human tsunami, World War II brought two million American servicemen to the South Pacific where they left a human legacy of some thousands of children. Mothers' Darlings of the South Pacific traces the intimate relationships that existed in the wartime Pacific between US servicemen and indigenous women, and considers the fate of the resulting children.
The writers interviewed many of the children of the Americans and some of the few surviving mothers, as well as others who recalled the wartime presence in their islands. Oral histories reveal what the records of colonial governments and the military largely have ignored, providing a perspective on the effects of the US occupation that until now has been disregarded by historians of the Pacific war.
Artefacts of Encounter
Cook's voyages, colonial collecting and museum histories
Edited by Nicholas Thomas, Julie Adams, Billie Lythberg, Maia Nuku, Amiria Salmond
Photographs by Gwil Owen
The Pacific artefacts and works of art collected during the three voyages of Captain James Cook and the navigators, traders and missionaries who followed him are of foundational importance for the study of art and culture in Oceania.
Recently, scholars from the Pacific and further afield, working with Pacific artefacts at the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology in Cambridge (MAA), have set out to challenge and rethink some longstanding assumptions on their significance.
The Cook voyage collection at the MAA is among the four or five most important in the world, containing over 200 of the 2,000-odd objects with Cook-voyage provenance that are dispersed throughout the world. The collection includes some 100 artefacts dating from Cook's first voyage.
This book catalogues this collection and its scholarship sheds new light on the significance of many artefacts of encounter.
For further information: Otago University Press
otago.ac.nz/press
university.press@otago.ac.nz
Books by Otago alumni
A Dame We Knew: A Tribute to Dame Cecily Pickerill, edited by Beryl Harris, December 2014.
Governor William Hobson: His Health Problems and Final Illness, Ronald V. Trubuhovich, foreword by Paul Moon, self published, December 2015.
Extractions to Reconstruction: The Development of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery in Australia and New Zealand, by Alastair Goss and Rob Linn, Historical Consultants Pty, Adelaide, 2015.
Women of the Catlins: Life in the Deep South, Diana Noonan (editor) and Cris Antona (photographer), University of Otago Press, April 2016.
Misi Utu: Dr D. W. Hoodless: An Educator's Vision and the Central Medical School, Fiji, by Margaret Guthrie, Mary Egan Publishing, Auckland.
12 Netball Poems, by Mark Pirie, addenda by Bill Sutton, The Night Press, October 2015.
Main Trunk Lines: Collected Railway Poems, by Michael O'Leary, HeadworX, Wellington, October 2015.
Ketamine for Depression, by Stephen J. Hyde, Xlibris, September 2015.
Worldly Goods, by Alice Petersen, Biblioasis, May 2016.
My Beloved Man: The Letters of Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears, edited by Nicholas Clark, Vicki P. Stroeher, Jude Brimmer, Boydell and Brewer (UK), June 2016.
Skippers: Triumph and Tragedy, by Danny Knudson, Lakes District Museum and the Queenstown and District Historical Society, April 2016.
Alumni: If you have recently published a book, please email the editor.