Review: Integrating Archaeology and Ethnohistory: The Development of Exchange Between Yap and Ulithi, Western Caroline Islands

Hunter-Anderson, Rosalind L (September 2006). "Review: Integrating Archaeology and Ethnohistory: The Development of Exchange Between Yap and Ulithi, Western Caroline Islands". Asian Perspectives. Honolulu, HI: University of Hawaii. 45 (2): 295–299. doi:10.1353/asi.2006.0017. ISSN 1535-8283.

Abstract: Reviewed by: Integrating Archaeology and Ethnohistory: The Development of Exchange between Yap and Ulithi, Western Caroline Islands Rosalind L. Hunter-Anderson Integrating Archaeology and Ethnohistory: The Development of Exchange between Yap and Ulithi, Western Caroline Islands. Christophe Descantes. BAR International Series 1344. Oxford: Archaeopress, 2005. vi + 124 pp.; illustrations, maps, bibliography, appendices. £29.00. ISBN 1-84171-690-1. Integrating Archaeology and Ethnohistory (hereinafter IAE) contains eight chapters well illustrated with maps, diagrams, profiles, and plans. In sequential order, they are: Introduction; Theoretical and Methodological Approaches in Exchange Studies; Environmental Setting of Yap and Ulithi; Historical Ethnography of Western [End Page 295] Carolinian Interaction; Archaeology of the Western Carolines and Micronesian Ceramic Provenance Studies; Archaeological Investigations: Spatial and Ceramic Analyses; Discussion; and Conclusion. Two appendices—AMS Radiocarbon Determinations and Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis Data—and the bibliography conclude the work. IAE is a revision of Descantes' 1998 University of Oregon doctoral dissertation. As with other monographs in the far-too-expensive BAR International Series, this one has not been edited professionally, and minor irritations remain: typos, subject-verb disagreements, dangling and misplaced modifiers, alphabetical errors in the bibliography, and numerous awkward phrases and usages (a particularly annoying one is "materialist" for "material"). These flaws aside, IAE is valuable for its new data—and provocative as well. IAE explicates a phenomenon that has been documented ethnographically, in this case exchange practice between Yapese and Ulithians, and tries to add something new to the picture. New and valuable for regional archaeology are 28 radiocarbon dates that provide tighter temporal control on technological changes in Yapese ceramics, on the adoption of stonework architecture on Yap and Ulithi, and on the onset of land reclamation along the Gachpar Village (Yap) shoreline. The new dates complement the research contributions of Michiko Intoh, who has established a still-longer occupation sequence for Fais than is evident in…

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