Anthropology Commons^™

Small Islands, Big Heart: Reproducing The Marquesas Islands Through The Body, Patrick E. Molohon

All Master's Theses

Through the analysis of a Marquesan family in a touristic setting in Tahiti, this thesis explores the notion of the Polynesian body as a site of struggle between the gaze of cosmopolitan French tourists on the exotic other, and the resistance and self-interiorizing of the body by Marquesans. Many contemporary Marquesans choose to migrate to the more urbanized, popular tourist destination of Tahiti, for work, schooling, and medical procedures. Removed from their native land, Marquesans build upon traditional cultural practices and worldviews, while simultaneously actively creating innovative aspects of their experience in the new setting, on and within the body. …