Class Assignment

Disease & Depopulation

[pages from LivesDeath.pdf]

  1. How do the populations of the three cultural areas of today compare to the 15th century? What accounts for the differences? (pp. 114-115)
  2. What was the effect of malaria on the different populations of New Guinea? How does malaria factor into the European perceptions of Melanesia? (pg. 115)
  3. How can the outsiders’ view of a "healthy" island population be supported by a "sinister" interpretation? Did the indigenous therapies contribute to islander well-being? (pg. 116)
  4. How did women’s health contrast to men’s health in Melanesia? What accounts for these differences? (pp. 116-117)
  5. What conditions were needed in the Pacific to sustain dense populations? What areas were able to achieve this? (pp. 117-118)
  6. What factored into the population decline of the Chamorros? What could have been done to easily remedy the situation? (pg. 244)
  7. When looking at depopulation in Polynesia, why did certain areas suffer more than other areas? (pp. 245-246)
  8. How did the islanders view infections in relation to Europeans? How did the Christian missionaries try to connect death to beliefs? (pg. 246)
  9. How is political context important to our understanding of population decline? What happened in Samoa (Western & American) when influenza arrived in 1918-19? (pg. 247)
  10. Why did the Melanesians suffer less from depopulation than the Polynesians and Micronesians? (pg. 248)

Extra Credit: Why did the population of Chuuk experience the least decline while other islands in Micronesia were experiencing extensive depopulation? (pg. 244)