Echoes at Fishermen’s Rock – Traditional Tokelau Fishing
© UNESCO LINKS
“Echoes at Fishermen’s Rock – Traditional Tokelau Fishing” is a straightforward manual on the traditional techniques for the capture of crabs, bird and especially fish of the lagoon, the reef and the open ocean of Tokelau. As such, it introduces the various species and thus the rich biodiversity of the small Pacific island country. For each technique, the manual gives detailed information on the relevant traditional protocols, fish behaviours, the winds, currents and lunar cycles as well as seasonal variations indicated by the annual rising of named stars and constellations that affect traditional fishing in Tokelau.
The original version was published in 2008 under the Tokelauan title “Hikuleo i te Papa o Tautai”. Written entirely in Tokelauan, it was the result of regular meetings near Wellington, New Zealand by a group of emigrant Elders from the atoll of Atafu who initiated the project. It collects and records the traditional fishing methods of the Elders’ homeland in order to preserve them for younger generations.
To make the collection even more accessible for these younger people, whose knowledge of Tokelauan is limited or even non-existent, and to make the detailed traditional knowledge contained in the book available to a wider scientific and general readership, an English translation was conducted by Antony Hooper and Iuta Tinielu.
To order a copy of the book, send an email to links(at)unesco.org
- "Echoes at Fishermen's Rock" [PDF]
- Other publications under UNESCO’s Knowledges of Nature series
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