Capitalism, Colonialism, and Nationalism in the Pacific

Undergraduate / Graduate

This course compares colonial capitalist projects and their dialogic transfor­mations up to present political dilemmas, with special attention to Fiji, New Zealand, and Hawai'i, and a focus on the labor diaspora, the fates of indigenous polities, and tensions in contemporary citizenship. We will compare Wakefield's "scientific colonization" in New Zealand, Gordon's social experiments and indentured labor in Fiji, and the plantations, American annexation, tourism, and the military in Hawai'i. We will compare the colonial experiences of the Maori, Hawaiians, and indigenous Fijians, and also those of the immigrant laborers and their descendants, especially white New Zealanders, the South Asians in Fiji, and the Japanese in Hawai'i. General pro­positions about nationalism, capitalism "late" and otherwise, global cultural flows, and postcolonial subject positions will be juxtaposed with contemporary Pacific conflicts.