Museum's anthropology department busy
By Bob Krauss
Advertiser Staff Writer
Bill Brown, president and chief executive officer of Bishop Museum, said that the project on the origin of Polynesian ancestors in China is one of a number of initiatives under way in the anthropology department at the museum.
Brown said decades of work in the South Pacific by Dr. Yosihiko Sinoto, senior archaeologist in the department of anthropology, has made possible an agreement between the museum and the government of French Polynesia to cooperate in research, education and the preservation of artifacts.
Oscar Temaru, president of French Polynesia, and Brown signed the agreement in March at a formal ceremony in Papeete. Sinoto said the museum invited government officials to list areas where they are looking for help. The ministers of education, environment and culture provided the following list, which is under consideration at the museum:
Brown had high praise for his chairman of anthropology, Tianlong Jiao, for spearheading cooperation between scientists of Taiwan and Mainland China as well as between Hawai'i and China. "Tianlong is doing important work," Brown said. "We consider him a gem."
The department chairman is in charge of a joint venture between the Shanghai Museum and Bishop Museum to exhibit artifacts found in excavations on the south coast of China that document the ancestral origin of Polynesians. The artifacts include adzes that are almost identical with those found in Polynesia. The Bishop Museum exhibit will open to the public next year.
At the same time, Brown said a renovation of Hawai'i Hall, the original building at the museum, is under way. All of the exhibits except the whale, the heiau and the grass house will be changed.
Reach Bob Krauss at bkrauss@honoluluadvertiser.com.
