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32-597: The islands lie at the southeastern end of Malakula , which is the second-largest island in the nation of Vanuatu. They were named by Captain Cook after the Astronomer Royal Nevil Maskelyne as he sailed north from Port Resolution on Tanna in HMS Resolution in late 1774. The Maskelyne islands are relatively well-inhabited, (1,022 by 2009). which is considered to have historical reasons in part that life on

64-420: A major conference was held at the museum, which was the first time an international conference on ni-Vanuatu cultural heritage was held in the country. In 2004 an in-house, electronic collections management system was designed in order to effectively manage physical and digital collections, as well as to accurately represent the relationships that are so important in ni-Vanuatu culture. The system became known as

96-625: A maximum elevation of 879 m. Its peak is called Mt. Liambele. In 1768, Louis Antoine de Bougainville gave his name to the straits that separate Malakula from Santo. Malakula was inhabited for centuries by the Ni-Vanuatu people before Europeans encountered it. The first Europeans to sight the island were the members of the Spanish expedition of Pedro Fernández de Quirós , in 1606. After being visited in 1774 by Captain James Cook , on his second voyage to

128-665: Is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Malakula Malakula , also spelled Malekula , is the second-largest island in the nation of Vanuatu , formerly the New Hebrides , in Melanesia , a region of the Pacific Ocean . Malakula is separated from the islands of Espiritu Santo and Malo by the Bougainville Strait . Lakatoro , the capital of Malampa Province , is situated on Malakula's northeastern shore and

160-506: Is held in overseas collections, particularly in countries connected to Scottish Presbyterianism . Many other countries host ethnographic and scientific specimens from Vanuatu, as a result of colonial collecting practices. Since 1997 the original owners of the Lengnangulong sacred stone , which is from the village of Magam on North Ambryn, have requested either the repatriation of the object or formal acknowledgement of their ownership from

192-541: Is largely based on agriculture. The island has extensive copra plantations on the eastern coastal plains around Norsup and Lakatoro. The largest copra-producing plantation in Vanuatu is in Norsup. In 1939, a copra cooperative was set up at Matanvat in northern Malakula. For a while it turned to cargo cult activities, but after 1950 it resumed copra production. Both Norsup and Lakatoro have telephones and 24-hour electricity. Norsup

224-611: Is located in the Vanuatu Cultural Centre (VCC) in Port Vila , Vanuatu . It specializes in exhibits relating to the culture and history of this group of islands in the South Pacific . It is unique amongst Pacific national cultural institutions for rejecting many aspects of European museology, and creating new ways of working which value kastom practices. The Vanuatu Cultural Centre was founded in 1959. From its inception, it

256-547: Is the largest settlement on the island. Just off the northeastern coast of Malakula, there is a group of islands called the Small Islands , including, in order from north to south: Vao , Atchin , Wala , Rano , Norsup , Uripiv , and Uri . Also off the coast: Tomman Island to the southwest; Akhamb Island to the south; and the Maskelynes Islands to the southeast (including Sakao Island and Uluveo ). Malakula has

288-531: Is the site of the provincial hospital. Lakatoro has more stores than Norsup. It has a market house, a branch of the National Bank of Vanuatu , and an Air Vanuatu office. It is also the site of the island's main wharf and the administrative centre for Malampa province (which includes Malekula, Ambrym and Paama). The interior of Malekula is mountainous, rugged, and forest-covered. It is a good place for walking and bird watching. There are old cannibal sites hidden in

320-733: The Louvre . It was collected by Jean Guiart , a French anthropologist in 1949. Whilst the original is in Paris, in the Pavillon des Sessions of the Musée du Louvre, a copy of the stone is displayed at the National Museum of Vanuatu. In Vanuatu, ownership of the stone according the kastom is recognised as Zaki Tubuvi. Whilst Guiart paid a small amount of money for the stone, he did not pay the kastom owners - Tubuvi - and so according to ni-Vanuatu culture, Guiart's act

352-674: The Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology , at Cambridge . In 2002 the German painter Ingo Kühl , after participating in an expedition of the Cultural Center to ceremonies of the indigenous people on Malakula, his works that were created there were shown in an exhibition at the National Museum of Vanuatu in Port Vila and in 2004–2005 at the Ethnological Museum of Berlin . According to

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384-580: The 2009 census, Malakula has around 23,000 inhabitants. Nearly thirty different languages are spoken on the island. Unlike some earlier classifications, linguist and Oceanic languages specialist John Lynch (2016) considered the Malakula languages to form a coherent group. The two tribes living on Malakula are the Big Nambas , who live in the northern area of the island, and the Small Nambas, who live in

416-649: The Pacific , the islands were colonised in the late 18th century by both the British and the French, eventually becoming a condominion called in English the New Hebrides . In 1914 and 1915, the British anthropologist John Layard lived on Malakula, doing anthropological fieldwork , taking notes, making phonographic records, and taking more than 400 photographs. When he returned to Britain, he donated copies of his photographs on plates to

448-491: The Tabu Room, where kastom objects can be deposited by their owners for safekeeping, but where access to them is also kept along kastom traditions. The museum also has storage space, where objects that cannot be displayed are kept, either because they are fragile, or because they are the subject of dispute. The museum runs a Kastom School where traditional arts and stories are passed on to young people from Vanuatu. In 2020

480-498: The VCC and the museum moved to a new purpose-built structure in Port Vila. The new building was 45 metres long and 20 metres wide, and its architectural design was inspired by buildings from the northern islands. Its official opening was held at 9.30am on 17 November 1995, and was preceded by four days of ritual and cultural activity. This festival brought people from a range of communities to

512-571: The Vanuatu Cultural Information Network (VCIN). It was designed to work effectively in all three main languages: English, French and Bislama, but is less effective in other endemic languages. The database also records which objects are tabu, and who may access them, for example "family only" or "village - female only". However, in 2019, as a result of a lack of sustained funding, the catalogue had been "de-aggregated". The museum does not follow European museological traditions. For

544-639: The Vanuatu Culture Centre Women Fieldworker Network. During the 1970s, at the same time as the museum was starting its oral collecting programme, the independence movement in Vanuatu was developing, following the establishment of the Vanua'aku Pati in 1971. The party stressed the importance of kastom, in particular as a way to unite ni-Vanuatu against both the colonial rule of the Anglo-French Condominium . This meant that

576-401: The bush in northern Malekula, but at many of them the bones and skulls have been removed or buried. The Maskelynes and the small offshore islands along the east coast of Malekula have sand beaches, as well as coral reefs that are good places for recreational snorkeling and diving. There are three airports on Malekula. They are located at Norsup (in the northern part of the island), Lamap (in

608-532: The capital and emphasised the museum also belonged to them. The opening ceremony involved gift-giving and a "Kastom dedication" of the building. The "Kastom dedication" included covering the building with a spiritual net and the sacrifice of a specially selected pig. The date of the museum opening, 17 November, was also dedicated as National Cultural Day. The museum is within the shared structure, which contains an exhibition hall, where displays regularly change. The museum also has an archival space, known in 2003 as

640-410: The central part of the southern area. The tribes’ names are a reference to the size of the penis sheaths worn by the men, which are made out of banana or pandanus leaves. Until recently, it was the custom in the culture of these tribes to bind infants' skulls in order to permanently alter the shape of their heads . Cone-shaped skulls were considered a sign of higher social status. Malakula's economy

672-465: The country. The collection includes: masks, slit gongs, model canoes, pottery, animal and birds specimens from each island, as well as archaeological archives relating to the material culture of the first inhabitants. The geology collection includes bones belonging to the meiolaniid family of megafaunal horned turtles. The remains were excavated from the Teouma site, which was inhabited by Lapita people ;

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704-412: The first to include a comprehensive archaeological training programme for ni-Vanuatu. In 2002 the German painter Ingo Kühl , after participating in an expedition of the Cultural Center to ceremonies of the indigenous people on Malakula , his works that were created there were shown in an exhibition at the National Museum of Vanuatu and in 2004–2005 at the Ethnological Museum of Berlin . In November 2006

736-785: The importance of kastom became part of a national discourse. In 1980, post-independence, the Oral Traditions Project developed into the Vanuatu Cultural Centre Fieldworker Network. In 1994 the museum began a long-term partnership with the Australian National University in order to co-operate to solve some of the gaps in the ni-Vanuatu archaeological record. Excavations have been undertaken at several sites, including: Erromango (1994), Maluku Islands (1995), Mangaasi on Efate (1996–99), Teouma (2004-06). The excavations at Mangaasi were

768-531: The islands provided protection from attacks by mainland tribes which were not good seafarers, and thus had trouble reaching the island chain. However, the island chain also went through a variety of cycles of population and depopulation (causes not given in reference). The area is rich with fish and sharks, and Lonely Planet describes the Maskelynes as 'just gorgeous' and recommends them for snorkelling and diving opportunities—though warning of strong currents between

800-448: The islands, which appears on UNESCO's List of Intangible Cultural Heritage . Digital collecting has been an important aspect of the museum's work since 1976 when an Oral Traditions Project was founded. The project trained ni-Vanuatu men to record oral traditions. In 1990 this programme involved to include the collection of women's oral traditions, as well as men's, and was led by Jean Tarissei . By 1994 this programme had developed into

832-405: The islands. However, as of the late 2000s, there was little tourism in the area, being a very remote part of Vanuatu. The islands have very little modern infrastructure, even for the local Pacific island environment, though the Vanuatu government and various aid agencies have cooperated with locals to assist some smaller local schools and health facilities. This Vanuatu location article

864-447: The museum hosted an exhibition on the history of archaeological research in Vanuatu. In 2021 the museum was the location of the launch of Vanuatu's first anthology of women's writing Sista, Stanap Strong! Exhibitions in the 1990s included: money, contemporary art, domestic spaces. The National Museum of Vanuatu has a collection that includes archaeological and ethnographic objects, as well as biological and geological specimens, from

896-460: The museum: "There is much in Vanuatu's cultures that is tabu , that the outside world does not need to know, nor have the right to know, and these restrictions must be respected." In 2003 it was noted that absences in the collections included: material related to missionary activity, nationalism in Vanuatu, and material culture relating to cargo cults, for example those of John Frum . However, much missionary material culture that relates to Vanuatu

928-432: The ni-Vanuatu who visit, objects are inextricably linked to social networks and the museum has worked hard with communities and researchers across the islands to record these connections and their significance. This indigenous understanding of material culture is one that is rarely adopted and continued by the museums of colonised countries. Kirk Huffman emphasised the importance of the "unique, quasi-spiritual" operations of

960-405: The site provides the earliest evidence for human-meiolaniid interaction. Ceramic material from the archaeology collection includes Lapita pottery and Wusi pottery from Espiritu Santo . The archaeology collection also includes a photographic archive, which includes images of the excavation of Chief Roi Mata 's burial site. Another photographic archive records the tradition of sand drawing from

992-514: The southeastern part of the island), and Southwest Bay . The Norsup airport has a tarmac surface. Air Vanuatu operates daily flights to Malekula. Lakatoro is Malekula's road-transport hub. The best place to find trucks is at the Lakatoro Trading Centre. There are several trucks along the northeast coast as far as Vao. National Museum of Vanuatu The National Museum of Vanuatu ( Bislama : Nasonal Miusium blong Vanuatu )

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1024-429: Was designed to encompass a National Museum of Vanuatu. By 1960 a Board of Management was established with British, French and ni-Vanuatu members. In the early years the museum focussed on exhibitions, mostly of collections formed by colonisers. Its first site was on the waterfront of Port Vila. In 1989 leadership of the museum passed from the expatriate anthropologist Kirk Huffman, to ni-Vanuatu Jack Keitadi. In 1995

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