Islands

To consider small islands as places for sustainable tourism or sustainable anything, for that matter, must surely be cause for critical deliberation. Small islands as sanctuaries, or rare citadels for ecological safekeeping and tight-knit communities, runs counter to islands as sites for extraction and development, yet increasingly the latter prevails. However, the former are the precise reasons that small islands are aligned with the global travel supply chain. Consuming small islands abides with the tropical idyll narrative and, within such invocations, the exposure of small islands to externalities renders its utility to purposes that run counter to benign and constructive outcomes. Herein is the dilemma for small islands and their entanglements with tourism expansion.
See full report here: http://projects.upei.ca/unescochair/files/2020/07/Annual-Report-on-Global-Islands-2019.pdf

Salt domes are geological features that occur when areas of salt deposits are pressured into layers above them, causing dome shaped distortions in horizontal strata. In some instances, the distortions protrude above flat areas of land or else appear underwater as seamounts. In the case of the five Louisiana salt dome hills considered in this article, their distinct elevation above the swampy bayous and flatlands surrounding them has led to their characterisation as islands by indigenous Atakapa-Ishak peoples and by subsequent Francophone and Anglophone settlers. The article considers the ways in which the five salt domes' islandness has been perceived, enhanced and/or undermined by various local inhabitants and/or the commercial operations that have operated on them. Discussion of these aspects involves consideration of the manner in which the salt dome islands' islandness is mutable and complex, particularly with regard to human impacts. This mutability is discussed with regard to both individual island placenames and the islands' overall designations.

Should the name of A&N islands be changed? This is a question that keeps coming up again and again like a bad dream, as if there is nothing more important in or for the islands. See: http://www.indiatimes.com/news/india/a-bjp-member-is-demanding-to-change-the-name-of-havelock-island-in-the-andamans-273983.html)  Am attaching here a short article I did exactly a decade ago (in 2007) for the Times of India questioning the rationale? It appears again in my new collection of 'old' A&N writings 'Islands in flux - the Andaman story'. The book is available now on amazon:  http://bit.ly/IslandsInFlux

Community structure and assembly are determined in part by environmental heterogeneity. While reef-building corals respond negatively to warming (i.e. bleaching events) and ocean acidification (OA), the extent of present-day natural variability in pH on shallow reefs and ecological consequences for benthic assemblages is unknown. We documented high resolution temporal patterns in temperature and pH from three reefs in the central Pacific and examined how these data relate to community development and net accretion rates of early successional benthic organisms. These reefs experienced substantial diel fluctuations in temperature (0.78uC) and pH (.0.2) similar to the magnitude of ‘warming ’ and ‘acidification’ expected over the next century. Where daily pH within the benthic boundary layer failed to exceed pelagic climatological seasonal lows, net accretion was slower and fleshy, non-calcifying benthic organisms dominated space. Thus, key aspects of

We have investigated the biotechnological potential of Arctic marine bacteria for their ability to produce a broad spectrum of cold-active enzymes. Marine bacteria exhibiting these features are of great interest for both fundamental research and industrial applications. Macrobiota, water and sediment samples have been collected during 2010 and 2011 expeditions around the Lofoten and Svalbard islands. Bacteria were isolated from this material and identified through 16S rRNA gene sequence analysis for the purpose of establishing a culture collection of marine Arctic bacteria. Herein, we present the functional screening for different extracellular enzymatic activities from 100 diversely chosen microbial isolates incubated at 4 and 20 °C. The production of esterase/lipase, DNase, and protease activities were revealed in 67, 53, and 56% of the strains, respectively, while 41, 23, 9, and 7% of the strains possessed amylase, chitinase, cellulase, and xylanase activities, respectively. Our ...

This editorial introduction delves into problematic aspects of positionality and publishing ethics related to island and Indigenous issues. Taking its point of departure in Gilley's paper on 'The case for colonialism' and Pöllath's paper 'Revisiting island decolonization', the present paper questions: Whose voices should we listen to when considering island and Indigenous issues? If some voices should be excluded from the debate, how should we determine which voices are excluded? Ultimately, the paper criticizes exclusionary approaches and argues that Island Studies Journal should be open to publishing articles from metropolitan and outsider perspectives as well as from islander and Indigenous perspectives―but that it is necessary for authors and readers to be aware of their own positions within the colonial matrix of power.

This is an earlier and substantially lengthier version of the European Commission’s Green Paper on Ports and Maritime Infrastructure, which I had prepared as a member of Commissioner Neil Kinnock’s wise men group.

The Green Paper has often been described as the most influential port policy document ever produced by the EC. The current version does not in any way commit the European Commission and interested readers are advised to refer to the final version of the Green Paper as published by the EC.

The present work requires careful and persistent reading so that the reader bypasses the necessary bureaucratic 'superficiality' and identifies my core arguments which, I am happy to say, have not changed to the slightest in the 15 years since its publication. Many of these arguments had been described as ‘politically dangerous’ and, consequently, did not find their way into the Green Paper. I quote one of them in p.7 (emphasis added):

…The Commission’s White Paper on the future development of the common transport policy  laid down a new vision for transport policy, following the principle of sustainable mobility; i.e. a strategy that acknowledges the need for a more balanced transport system that would fulfil its economic and social role while, at the same time, containing its effects on the environment. The overall objective of such an approach, as clearly described by the European Parliament , is to …promote sustainable, efficient transport systems which meet the economic, social, environmental and safety needs of European citizens; help reduce regional disparities; and enable European business to compete effectively in world markets… Again, the ‘challenge’ is apparent: a more balanced  pan-European transport system with the above objectives is in stark contrast with hub-porting; concentration of traffic to selected ports; longer distances; and consequent transport externalities. It is thus increasingly felt that the European Commission needs to depart from its all-pleasing ‘statements’ and make hard-nosed decisions in order to effectuate its cohesion and regional development objectives which are the overarching ones…(unquote).

A closing note of caution on my use of the word 'superficiality': With remarkable consistency, European institutions involved in the maritime sector have been focusing all along on issues such as safety and environmental protection; issues which, among others, have allowed the proliferation of various monopolies in the port sector. I believe this has not happened accidentally. I believe instead that the focus on the ‘secondary’ has obscured and diverted attention from the ‘primary’, which comprises the ‘politically sensitive’ issues of port pricing; infrastructure financing; state aids; transparency of port accounts; and, finally, a European ‘port governance’ model.

Transport networks are vital for the prosperity of countries and local communities as they facilitate passenger and cargo flows. Especially for islands, coastal transport systems are the lifelines for the well being of the islanders. The quality and quantity of links and modes, enhances the attractiveness of the islands as areas to live and develop business. Despite of their importance for the islanders, the perspectives of the latter as regards the performance of coastal transport system(s) as facilitators of the local communities are commonly neglected. The regulatory framework (state), business strategies (market), and passengers’ satisfaction, are all parameters having a direct impact on the performance of a coastal shipping system. Yet, most frequently decision-makers focus on the two former parameters (i.e. the efficient planning, development and operation of a coastal shipping system, or the subsidization of itineraries that are not profitable and thus maintain the status of ...

[ESP] Durante la época romana una gran población vivía en la isla de Ponza y para satisfacer las
necesidades de agua se construyeron varias obras hidráulicas. Entre ellas, destacan algunas
cisternas, un acueducto y un dique. Desde el siglo V con la decadencia de los romanos, la
isla fue despoblada hasta que en 1734 Carlos de Borbón promovió la repoblación de la isla a
través del envío de varias familias de Ischia. A su llegada, los nuevos habitantes recuperaron y
reutilizaron las estructuras hidráulicas de la época romana
Hoy estas obras se encuentran en sus mayoria en mal estado porque el agua llega en la isla a
través de las naves. La actividad económica primaria es el turismo marino, que sin embargo,
en los últimos años se ha visto afectado por la crissi mundial. Como en otras localidades
turisticas, una solucion podria ser promover la desestacionalización del turismo, a través de la
recuperación y valorización del patrimonio cultural y historico de Ponza.

[ENG] During the Roman Era there was a big population in the Island of Ponza and to satisfy its water
necessity there were built several hydraulic structures, as cisterns, an aqueduct and a dam.
From the V century with the roman decadence the island was abandoned until the 1734, when
Charles the Bourbon promoted a new population process sending there some families from
Ischia. At their arrive they reused the hydraulic structures from Roma Era.
Today these structures are all almost in bad conditions because water is shipped to the island via
water tank. The primary economical activity is the tourism, affected during last years by the world
economic crisis. As in other touristic localities, a solution could be to promote the de-seasonality of
tourism, through the recovery and enhancement of the cultural and historical heritage of Ponza.

Phantom islands are falsely mapped islands that turned out non-existent. This paper examines the histories and the etymologies of the names of Bermeja, Hy Brasil, and Sandy Island. Appearing cartographically since 1539, Bermeja's 'undiscovery' blocked Mexico's ownership of an oil-rich section of the Gulf of Mexico. Hy Brasil appeared first in 1330 maps and became falsely associated with Irish mythology. Sandy Island, near New Caledonia, was officially 'unfound' most recently in 2012, but existed on maps since 1908. This paper also examines the residential cruise liner The World, a manmade floating 'island' challenging our notion of place. Though not 'real', these islands exist as hope - Bermeja, a hope for power, Hy Brasil, a hope for a divine land, and Sandy Island and The World, a hope for the unknown. In a largely known, familiar world, discovery is not exploring the new, but revisiting the old; not uncovering what we do not know, but undiscovering what we do.

Key Words: Phantom Islands, Historical Cartography, Bermeja, Hy Brasil, Sandy Island

As niche specialist species, lizards from tropical environments are characterized by a low tolerance and high physiological sensitivity to temperature changes. The extent of vulnerability to thermal changes depends on the lizard's physiological plasticity to adjust the environmental changes. Herein we studied the thermal biology of Anolis allisoni, an endemic arboreal lizard from the tropical islands of the Banco Chinchorro Biosphere Reserve, Mexico, carried out during April and May 2012 and April 2014. We report field body (T b) and preferred body temperatures in the laboratory (T pref), operative temperatures (T e) and restriction of hours of activity. Anolis allisoni showed high and identical T b and T pref (33 °C), not significantly different than the mean T e (32.15 °C). The effectiveness of thermoregulation (E ¼ À0.30) and the analysis of hours of restriction suggested that the high temperatures of T e (40–62.5 °C) registered at midday (from 12:00 to 15:00) of A. allisoni habitat are hostile and force lizards to take refuge during a period of 3 h of their daily time of activity. The scarcity of opportunities to find alternative refuges for thermoregulation in Banco Chinchorro point out the vulnerability of A. allisoni and the risk of local extinction when considering future predictions of increase in global environmental temperatures.

This book is about one of the most intriguing features of human communication systems: the fact that words that go together in meaning can occur arbitrarily far away from each other. In the sentence This is technology that most people think about, but rarely consider the implications of, the word 'technology' is interpreted as if it were simultaneously next to the words 'about' and 'of'. This kind of long-distance dependency has been the subject of intense linguistic and psycholinguistic research for the last half century, and offers a unique insight into the nature of grammatical structures and their interaction with cognition. The constructions in which these unbounded dependencies arise are remarkably difficult to model and come with a rather puzzling array of constraints that have often defied characterization or proper explanation. This work provides a detailed survey of these constructions and the factors responsible for their creation and comprehension, describes new experimental evidence that sheds light on the nature of the phenomenon, and suggests new avenues for future research. The volume will be of interest to graduate students and researchers in the fields of morphosyntax, psycholinguistics, and cognitive science.
[https://global.oup.com/academic/product/unbounded-dependency-constructions-9780198785002?lang=en&cc=us]

Island peoples around the world remain entangled in colonial processes. Western and metropolitan powers are increasingly deploying discourse of a 'China threat' to justify neocolonial entrenchment in the form of greater Western militarisation and economic dominance. In this paper, we investigate how Western and metropolitan powers use the China threat and warnings of economic, environmental, demographic, and military disaster to maintain and deepen colonial influence in former colonies, with special focus on four island states and territories: Guåhan/Guam in Oceania, Kalaallit Nunaat/Greenland in the Arctic, Okinawa in East Asia, and Jamaica in the Caribbean. We undertake this investigation as a means of practicing decolonial political geography, collaborating as a group of scholars from around the world and drawing upon diverse epistemologies and experiences to inform collaborative research and writing. Due to the complexities we have confronted in our efforts to think outside coloniality, this paper foregrounds our decolonial methodology and process, even as we respect our empirical findings.

Early Settlers of the INSULAR CARIBBEAN Early Settlers of the Insular Caribbean: Dearchaizing the Archaic offers a comprehensive coverage of the most recent advances in interdiscipli-nary research on the early human settling of the Caribbean islands. It covers the time span of the so-called Archaic Age and focuses on the Middle to Late Holocene period which-depending on specific case studies discussed in this volume-could range between 6000 BC and AD 1000. A similar approach to the early settlers of the Caribbean islands has never been published in one volume, impeding the realization of a holistic view on indigenous peoples' settling, subsistence, movements, and interactions in this vast and naturally diversified macroregion. Delivered by a panel of international experts, this book provides recent and new data in the fields of archaeology, collection studies, palaeo botany, geomorphology, paleoclimate and bioarchaeology that challenge currently existing perspectives on early human settlement patterns, subsistence strategies, migration routes and mobility and exchange. This publication compiles new approaches to 'old' data and museum collections, presents the results of starch grain analysis, paleo-coring, seascape modelling, and network analysis. Moreover, it features newer published data from the islands such as Margarita and Aruba. All the above-mentioned data compiled in one volume fills the gap in scholarly literature, transforms some of the interpretations in vogue and enables the integration of the first settlers of the insular Caribbean into the larger Pan-American perspective. This book not only provides scholars and students with compelling new and interdisciplinary perspectives on the Early Settlers of the Insular Caribbean. It is also of interest to unspecialized readers as it discusses subjects related to archaeology, anthropology, and-broadly speaking-to the intersections between humanities and social and environmental sciences, which are of great interest to the present-day general public. Sidestone

Catálogo del proyecto de Bill Viola ‘’Liber Insularum’ para la SAC y el MoCA Miami
Textos en español e inglés. 192 p. il. col. 23×17 cm.
Otros autores del volumen: Bonnie Clearwater (Directora del Miami MoCA), Gean Moreno (crítico del Herald), Adriana Herrera (asesora de ArtNexus y ArteAlDía), Teresa Arozena (artista y teórica de la imagen técnica) y Omar-Pascual Castillo (director del CAAM), junto a Roc Laseca, comisario del proyecto de Bill Viola ‘Liber Insularum’ para la SAC de Tenerife y el MoCA (Museum of Contemporary Art) de Miami.

In the capitals and think tanks around the world much debate has taken place on the importance of the Indo-Pacific as a new regional framework. Increasingly, the Indo-Pacific is treated as a fact, not as a geopolitical regional construct. Discussions focus on how to engage with the new region and design strategies. The 2021 AUKUS agreement is a good example of the shifts in thinking that the Indo-Pacific implies. Attention is turned to mini-lateral agreements and traditional military thought. Strategies issued by the UK, France or the EU have a similar emphasis. What does Indo-Pacific thinking imply for small island states such as the Seychelles? On the surface, agreements such as AUKUS and the new regional construction of the Indo-Pacific do not matter much for small island concerns. Yet, as I show in this contribution Seychelles and other small island states in the region need to pay close attention to the developments that Indo-Pacific discourses imply and need to start strategizing how they find their voice in the debate.

Se trata de una investigación antropológica que busca comprender las actitudes, conceptos e ideas de los habitantes de estas islas hacia su ecosistema, en específico hacia las especies exóticas invasoras (EEI), así como la conservación del medio ambiente en general, a la luz de sus concepciones más arraigadas sobre la naturaleza. Como expresión de ese estudio, esta publicación es un aporte al conocimiento de la cultura isleña en lo que toca a la biodiversidad, lo cual puede ser de ayuda para la planificación de proyectos sobre conservación y manejo del ecosistema de Juan Fernández, así como para futuras intervenciones en el territorio.

In 2007, Jersey’s government launched a competition in search for a further anthem to celebrate the island’s identity. Even though the island uses ‘God Save the Queen’ as its official anthem because of its allegiance to the British Crown, there are increasingly more occasions for the island to have its own anthem, such as at the Island Games or the Commonwealth Games when island athletes compete against other jurisdictions that might also use ‘God Save the Queen’. Two other songs, ‘Ma Normandie’ (‘My Normandy’) and ‘Beautiful Jersey’ (‘Man Bieau P’tit Jèrri’), have sometimes been used at times of celebration, but in recent years there has been increased discussion regarding the place of these songs because neither was originally composed as an official anthem for Jersey. Over the past few decades, Jersey has re-­‐thought internal cultural policy towards island identity. This has been part of a process of increased reflection on the island’s heritage as well as its place in the wider world. This article helps show how Jersey is rethinking identity through several spheres: media, political and cultural. By studying the process of finding its own anthem, the politics of local identity construction are highlighted and provide examples that help explain why a unique anthem is needed in the present-­‐day, and how the island is represented and has responded through song and discourse as a result of the competition and local cultural politics regarding the winning anthem.

Tom Neale woonde ruim 15 jaar alleen op het eiland Anchorage van het atol Suwarrow in de Stille Zuidzee. Hierover schreef hij het boek "An Island to oneself" in 1966. Boudewijn Büch liet het boek in het Nederlands vertalen en schreef er een nawoord bij. Lezing over de fascinatie van Büch voor Neale en over het persoonlijk leven van Tom Neale.

The marine birds, resident and migratories species, of the coast of S„o Paulo State. From August 1997 to December 2003, studies
allowed 20 main islands to be identified along the coast of São Paulo that constitute breeding colonies of six species of resident seabirds (Fregata magnificens, Sula leucogaster, Larus dominicanus, Sterna maxima, S. eurygnatha and S. hirundinacea). In all colonies estimations were made of the effective population size (suggesting a total of 24.000 individuals in Sao Paulo), banding and reprodutive cycle observations. The peak of the breeding season for all the six species begins in autumm and ends in spring. Biological samples were taken for genetic analyses and environmental characterizations were carried
out of the areas used for breeding. It was found that S. maxima is the most endangered species, with a effective population size of only 754 individuals, and in Brazil there are colonies of this species only in the coast of Sao Paulo. The results obtained, besides contributing to the related projects, also allow guidelines that aim for the preservation of
those island and points of rest during migration (Santos-Cubat„o Mangrove, Tanigu·,Iguape and CananÈia) that have been exposed to high levels of human interaction, mainly at The Alcatrazes Archipelago that has the biggest frigate bird colony of south Brazil and it is
a center of endemic terrestrial animals besides being 5 islands considered very important to seabird breeding (ItaÁuce, Apara, Laje da ConceiÁ„o, Queimada Grande and Guararitama).

Comparing some characteristics of Archaic Greek colonisation and modern colonialism, the paper reads the Odyssean motif of the isle of women, the woman/island pair, and the related erotic imagery as the results of an interaction between historical events and literary imagination. Indeed, besides being commonly found in ancient mythologies, isles of women are generally considered as the mythic precursors of the vision that sees settlement of a new land as the conquest of a woman. Since the binarism and strong sense of a superior centre common to the colonisation of the New World and colonialism do not seem appropriate to Archaic Greece, the peculiarities of the ancient and modern erotic imageries related to the arrival of a seafarer in a new land and the woman/island pair can be understood by considering the differences between modern Western colonialism and the Archaic Greek decentred attitude to place, religion, and ethnicity.

Prema morfografskim i morfometrijskim analizama koje su rezultat terenskog istraživanja, geomorfološkog kartiranja i kartiranja metodama daljinskih istraživanja, kao i pregledom dosadašnjih istraživanja mogu se navesti sljedeći zaključci: 1. S obzirom na litologiju, na području Općine Kali razvijeni su krški i fluviokrški tip reljefa, kao i antropogeni reljef u užem i širem smislu. 2. Reljef Općine Kali oblikovan je kombiniranim djelovanjem endogenih sila i egzogenih procesa na dodiru Jadranske ploče i Dinarida, odnosno na području kompresivnog bloka što je rezultiralo boranjem, rasjedanjem i navlačenjem odnosno nastankom različitih tipova reljefa. Endogeni i egzogeni procesi djelovali su simultano, s razlikama u utjecaju u pojedinim fazama razvoja (npr. intenzivnije djelovanje neotektonike u pojedinim razdobljima, u izmjeni ili paralelnom djelovanju s fazama u kojima su prevladavali paleoklimatski uvjeti povoljni za jačanje denudacijskih procesa). Djelovanjem egzogenih procesa tijekom geološke prošlosti izmijenjen je izgled reljefa, osobito na zapadnoj uzvisini na kojoj je usječeno nekoliko jaruga. Osim glavnih zaključaka u geomorfološkom smislu, potrebno je istaknuti utjecaj i značenje reljefa za život ljudi. Glavnim razlogom naseljavanja ljudi na istočnoj obali otoka Ugljana u fizičko-geografskom kontekstu može se smatrati reljef. Blago položene padine na dolomitnoj podlozi bile su najpovoljnije za naseljavanje, ali i agrarno korištenje. Za razvoj ribarstva, kao jednog od glavnih čimbenika razvoja Kali, također je bila pogodnija istočna obala jer su se duž nje formirale brojne uvale. Svi ostali, za život i poljoprivredu nepogodniji, dijelovi otoka, također su tijekom stoljeća radom ljudi postali upotrebljivi, što je vidljivo i danas u obliku brojnih suhozida i kućica.