Origins of the Polynesia, Melanesia, and Micronesia Divide | Tripartite Division of Oceania

polynesia melanesia and micronesia are the most well-known geographic divisions and groupings of oceania and of pacific islanders while many pacific islanders have adopted and even embraced these labels we must not forget that these three categories were originally created and imposed by europeans and did not reflect how pacific islanders traditionally viewed their seas of islands and as you will soon find out the three-part division had little to do with geography but rather was based on superficial and racial grounds guahu si pulan and in this video we will explore the origins of the polynesia melanesia and micronesia divide while the creation of the tripartite pacific division is usually credited to frenchman judo monteville in 1832 this was not entirely his own invention devil based his three-fold division off of a pacific racial theory that had been in development since the 18th century according to this racial theory the pacific was inhabited by two distinct human races a yellow race and a black race the yellow rays had a light skin complexion and were civilized enough to form nations the black rays had a dark skin complexion and were considered uncivilized and lived in barbarity derville linked polynesia and micronesia to the more civilized yellow race while melanesia was linked to the less civilized black race this racial theory of the pacific traces its roots about one century before deville to a frenchman named charlo de bros who in 1756 published his story one of the earliest significant publications on oceania in this book he proposed that the islands in the pacific ocean including the islands we considered today as melanesia and micronesia were to be labeled as polynesia derived from greek meaning many islands debrose's conception of polynesia encompassed a much greater geographic area than modern polynesia more importantly he was the first scholar to apply the emerging theory of race to oceania the bros speculated that the black-skinned inhabitants of australia and the interior areas of island southeast asia were parts of an old black race who were originally spread out in ireland southeast asia but were driven to the interior by lighter skinned peoples in line with racial theory at the time the burroughs considered the black skin aboriginal australians to be the most savage people of all in contrast to their lighter-skinned neighbors thus since 1756 he established racial stratification which would exemplify and influence academic thinking about oceania still at the time there was not a strong contrast between the pacific islanders we consider today as polynesians micronesians and melanesians this would change about two decades later in 1778 when german johann reinhold foster set the foundation for the racial division between melanesians and polynesians while foster recognized the variety of peoples in the pacific he ultimately reduced pacific islanders into two racial categories based primarily on skin color a fair skin race and a dark-skinned race the bear-skin race of pacific islanders inhabited much of modern-day polynesia and were also united by language and culture in contrast the darker-skinned race of pacific islanders inhabited parts of modern melanesia and lacked a common language and culture predictably foster considered the lighter skin islanders to be more civilized and beautiful than the darker-skinned islanders and he ranked these dark-skinned islanders to be above the even blacker-skinned and more savage aboriginal australians while the term melanesia did not exist yet foster laid the foundation for the racial opposition between melanesia and polynesia the formal label for this racial opposition was finally realized in 1825 when the frenchman jean-baptiste boarded the son of invented the word melanians from the greek word milos meaning black to racially categorize the dark-skinned pacific islanders from the lighter skin islanders of polynesia and similar to foster san vesant separated the melanians from the even darker skinned aboriginal australians the term micronesia first appeared in an 1819 map by italian bartolome borgie borgie relabeled debrose's polynesia as polynesia over micronesia translated as polynesia or rather micronesia micronesia is derived from greek meaning small islands the separation of micronesia as a distinct category from polynesia appeared a few years later in 1831 when frenchman gregoria luis dominic divided the yellow race or light-skinned pacific islanders of polynesia on the basis of the cultural practice of taboo de rienzi categorized the area for yellows who did not culturally practice taboo as micronesia while retaining the brose's term polynesia for the yellows who did culturally practice taboo the very next year in 1832 joe de monteville published his famous tripartite division of oceania which firmly linked race with geography in his paper he acknowledged his various sources and laid out his ideas of race to form his racialized version of oceania so derville took the bros's term polynesia and applied it to the islands of oceania and following foster and boy this sunday he believed that oceania was inhabited by two races a yellow and a black race and that they must be categorized separately thus deville grouped the dark-skinned peoples of oceania under the term melanesia also like dominion de rienzi he divided the yellow race or the light-skinned islanders of polynesia on the basis of the cultural practice of taboo as well as language resulting in micronesia whose peoples lack the practice of taboo and the linguistic unity of polynesia derville's invention of polynesia melanesia and micronesia was a product of racial theory and in line with racist thinking he considered the darker skin melanesians to be uncivilized and ugly compared to the lighter skin micronesians and polynesians within a decade of his publication dumont de ville's racialized tripartite division became popular in french cartography and by the 20th century derville's threefold division of oceania into polynesia melanesia and micronesia became the most well-known geographic divisions and groupings of oceania and of pacific islanders and remains so to this day if you liked and enjoyed the video consider supporting me on patreon so i can continue to produce more pacific studies contents like this video subscribe to the channel turn on all notifications follow me on social media and a special seduced mossy to patreon supporter putty un seduce masi for watching guahusi pulan and pulan has spoken esta

Channel: PulanSpeaks

Views: 75,305

Keywords: polynesia, micronesia, melanesia, polynesians, micronesians, melanesians, oceania, pacific, islands, education, islanders, austronesians, austronesian, guam, hawaii, pacifika, pacifica, pulan, pulanspeaks, marianas, guahan, papuans, hawaiians, taihitians, taihiti, cook, james, durville, carolines, samoa, vanuatu

Id: 5U2yHqpmXyU

Length: 8min 20sec (500 seconds)

Published: Thu Feb 24 2022