Festival of Pacific Arts, day 3

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This is the 11th Festival of Pacific Arts, but it's the first time that SIL (the linguistics organization we're seconded to when we're on the field) has had an official presence at a Festival. Yesterday (Wednesday) I spent the morning and early afternoon at our "Languages of the Pacific" exhibit. It's situated on the grounds of the National Museum, which is also where the film festival is happening (more on that tomorrow).

The exhibit has a number of displays highlighting the linguistic variety in the Pacific region, including language maps, a banner about indigenous counting systems, a display of grass-roots literacy projects, and a gallery of Bibles from throughout the Pacific that SIL has had a part in translating. We have a large white-board in the exhibit, on which we collect words in languages of people who visit the display. Yesterday, the word was "paddle." As the board filled up, it was fun to see some obviously related words and also very different words from other parts of the world. People enjoyed looking at the board to see if anyone had written their language there yet. People from over 60 languages have visited the booth so far.

Who has come by the exhibit? An amazing variety of people: teachers, researchers, painters, carvers, grad students, filmmakers, newscasters, pastors, canoe voyagers, and others. When I arrived yesterday morning, I had a wonderful conversation with an American who has just begun a master's degree in ethnomusicology. The "Languages of the Pacific" has been a great way of connecting with all kinds of people here for the Festival, celebrating the linguistic and cultural diversity of the Pacific together, and explaining our work.

Visitors looking at the "Languages of the Pacific" map

Displays of some of the work we're involved in

Collecting word lists from visitors' languages

Part of the display of translated Bibles. Circled is the Alamblak New Testament. (We lived with the Alamblak from 2003-2006)
I'll look forward to continuing to take part in the "Languages of the Pacific" exhibit throughout the Festival.

By mid-afternoon, I was pulled back toward the Pasifika Stage to enjoy more performances through the evening. It was as beautiful as the first evening, and the final performance of the night was from Papua New Guinea.
Rapa Nui dancers

Indigenous Taiwan's very colorful presentation
Nauru stick dancers
New Caledonia's stage show: it included a reggae band, traditional dancers, and an artist spray painting two canvases throughout the performance
Masked dancers from Gulf Province, Papua New Guinea


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