Tagaloa x Tangaroa: Pasifika popular music and climate justice

Saturday 15 June 12.30 - 1.30pm, followed by Q&A 

Lecture Room, Ground Floor

Join us for a discussion between Dr. Kirsten Zemke and Luka Leleiga Lim-Cowley on the interconnections between Indigenous Pacific popular music and climate justice.

This talk is part of a programme to celebrate the launch of the new exhibition Hawaii: Ma uka to Ma kai, Quilting the Hawaiian Landscape at the Pitt Rivers Museum. 

The Pacific region is one of the most severely impacted areas in the world by climate change; the countries comprising the Pacific, however, are amongst many of the lowest contributors to ecological crisis.

This talk will discuss the interconnections between Indigenous Pacific popular music and climate justice, focusing on the music of artists such as Stan Walker, Maisey Rika, Tiki Taane, Te Vaka, Israel Kamakawiwoʻole, Herbs, and Alien Weaponry. This music, located in drum and bass, heavy metal, Pacific fusion, Pacific reggae, and further genres, provides commentary on and insights into Indigenous Pacific environmental relationalities and praxes of climate justice. 

Dr Kirsten Zemke (she; they) is a pouako matua (senior lecturer) in ethnomusicology at Te Whare Wānanga o Waipapa Taumata Rau (The University of Auckland). Her research focuses on gendersexuality in popular music, Pasifika popular music, and hip hop. 

Luka Leleiga Lim-Cowley (ia; they) is a poet and doctoral candidate in social anthropology at St Antony's College. Their main areas of research are race, gendersexuality, disability, Pasifika activism, and Pacific Indigeneity.