Rediscovery and molecular phylogenetic placement of the endemic diving beetle Allodessus skottsbergi (Coleoptera: Dytiscidae) in Rano Kau crater of Rapa Nui (Easter Island)

Easter Island, or Rapa Nui as it is known to its inhabitants, is located in the Pacific Ocean, 3600 kilometres west of South America. Annexed by Chile in 1888, the island has been a source of fascination for the world beyond the island since the first visit by Europeans in 1722 due to its intriguing statues and complex history. Inventing 'Easter Island' examines narrative strategies and visual conventions in the discursive construction of 'Easter Island' as distinct from the native conception of 'Rapa Nui.' It looks at the geographic imaginary that pervaded the eighteenth century, a period of overwhelming imperial expansion. Beverley Haun begins with a discussion of forces that shaped the European version of island culture and goes on to consider the representation of that culture in the form of explorer texts and illustrations, as well as more recent texts and images in comic books and kitsch from off the island. Throughout, 'Easter Island' is used as a case study of the impact of imperialism on the view of a culture from outside. The study hinges on three key points - an inquiry into the formation of 'Easter Island' as a subject; an examination of how the constructed space and culture have been shaped, reshaped, and represented in discursive spaces; and a discussion of cultural memory and how the constraints of foreign texts and images have shaped thought and action about 'Easter Island.' Richly illustrated and unique in its findings, Inventing 'Easter Island' will appeal to cultural theorists, anthropologists, educators, and anyone interested in the history of the South Pacific.

ABSTRACTMonolithic statues (moai) of Rapa Nui (Easter Island) are three‐dimensional objects and unique to the ancient public art of Eastern Polynesia. The primary purpose here is to summarize the specific landscape and statue production contexts of moai 156 and moai 157 in Rano Raraku, the statue quarry, demonstrating that they are embellished with rock art applied post‐production (sixteenth to seventeenth centuries) and after they were upright and partially buried by colluvium in a named quarry chamber. Secondly, motif analysis reveals that crescents are present on moai 156 and 157 and incorporated into other motif types at 'Orongo, Rano Kau. The crescent is the central motif in a diagrammatic schema of Rapa Nui design development. Thirdly, iconographic norms allow controlled comparison with other moai for applied rock art. Although Hoa Hakananai'a differs in material, size, and situation from all others, the motifs on it are within the conventions of the iconographic corpus. Rano Raraku and Rano Kau are validated as ritual places on the dualistic, regionalized Rapa Nui landscape. The internal affinities and overall continuity of Rapanui cultural expression is established within an evolving anthropogenic environment during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

New excavations in Easter Island's statue quarry: Soil fertility, site formation and chronology

Easter Island (Rapa Nui, Chile) is an intraoceanic volcanic island on the Easter hotspot, ~350 km E of the Eastern Pacific Rise. We match new field data with previously published age and petrochemical data to reconstruct the general evolution of the Island. This consists of three main volcanoes (Poike, Rano Kau, and the larger Terevaka), which experienced an overall similar and nearly coeval evolution, characterized by two periods: (1) buildup of a basaltic shield, culminating in the development of a summit caldera and the emission of more evolved highly porphyritic lavas (ca. 0.78–0.3 Ma); and (2) rifting along the shield flanks, by means of fissure eruptions (0.24–0.11 Ma). The trend of most eruptive fissures, NNE-SSW to NE–SW, appears to be controlled by the ~NE-SW elongated, emerged, and submerged morphology of the island. However, while the fissure-forming period at Rano Kau and Poike appears to be associated with reduced magma supply to the reservoir, at Terevaka it is characterized by the arrival of new basic magma, rejuvenating the system. The comparison to other intraoceanic volcanic islands suggests that, because of its tectonomagmatic features (low eruptive rate, scattered rift zones, and scarce lateral collapses), Easter Island represents an end-member type of hotspot volcano that is contrary to Hawaii, which represents the opposite end member.

Reviewed by: Among Stone Giants: The Life of Katherine Routledge and Her Remarkable Expedition to Easter Island Joan A. Wozniak Among Stone Giants: The Life of Katherine Routledge and Her Remarkable Expedition to Easter Island, by Jo Anne Van Tilburg. New York: Scriber, 2003. 351 pp. 1 map, 44 photographs, footnotes, bibliography, $27.00. ISBN 0-7432-4480-X. Rapa Nui (Easter Island) is a lone volcanic island in the southeastern Pacific Ocean. Because of its isolation (the closest landmass, Pitcairn Island, present population [End Page 416] 55, lies 1100 km to the west) and the presence of hundreds of massive anthropomorphic images ("giants" made of tuff or basalt), Rapa Nui has been veiled in an air of mystery since its rediscovery by Europeans in 1722. For the past three centuries people around the world have speculated whence these images and their makers came and how they got there. During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries few Euro American ships stopped at the island, except to exploit the islanders. Even those explorers making scientific voyages to study Pacific cultures recorded only token observations of the native culture on Rapa Nui. It was not until the early twentieth century that a scientific study of Rapa Nui culture was undertaken. This ethnographic and archaeological investigation was led by an English woman named Katherine Scoresby Routledge. In 1919, following her work on Rapa Nui, Routledge wrote a book for a non-technical audience titled The Mystery of Easter Island: A Story of an Expedition (London: Hazell, Watson & Viney). In her book Routledge related tribal land divisions, oral traditions, and myths of the island as told to her by informants, several of whom had lived prior to the establishment of a permanent foreign presence—the missionaries. She also described the stone images (moai), the platforms on which they were placed (ahu), and other archaeological remains of Rapa Nui. Circumstances within Katherine's life in England following the publication of The Mystery of Easter Island prevented her from publishing a scientific manuscript on her research. Furthermore, many of Routledge's notes and photos disappeared shortly before her death in 1935 and were thought lost. Jo Anne van Tilburg, the author of Among Stone Giants: The Life of Katherine Routledge and Her Remarkable Expedition to Easter Island, has spent many years tracking down Katherine's scientific notes and interviewing surviving members of Katherine's family. Many of us who have worked on Rapa Nui and have been aware that van Tilburg had acquired access to Routledge's notes have been anxiously awaiting the publication of a sequel to Routledge's 1919 ethnography—maybe a more scientific treatise of her studies. Among Stone Giants is not that book. Instead, van Tilburg uses Katherine's recently discovered diaries and notes, and the interviews with Katherine's family to develop a biographical sketch of a Victorian woman and aspiring anthropologist who relished documenting world views of cultures in faraway lands. Van Tilburg skillfully portrays Katherine, her extended family, English colleagues, and Victorian society in general. Van Tilburg also relates Katherine's reactions to, and interactions with the people whose lives and culture, myths and dreams she put to pen. Van Tilburg is an archaeologist who has worked on Rapa Nui for more than twenty years and heads the Easter Island Statue Project. In Among Stone Giants she proves to be most capable of analyzing both Katherine herself as well as Katherine's notes on Rapa Nui culture. The first few chapters of Among Stone Giants introduce the reader to Katherine Pease, who was born into a Quaker family and grew up in a stultifying Victorian England. Van Tilburg delves into the background of the Quaker faith and Victorian England to preface how the internal conflicts within English society influenced Katherine. For example, Katherine grew up during the period when Victorian women were considered to be the property of men, but Quakers believed in the innate equality of women and men. Quakers practiced tolerance and respect for different opinions with the ultimate spiritual authority residing in one's own conscience. Katherine's character, her social life, her perception of spirituality and mysticism, and her view of women's role in marriage...

Reviewed by: Rapa Nui. El colonialismo republicano chileno cuestionado (1902-1905) ed. by Rolf Foerster Cristián Moreno Pakarati Foerster, Rolf (Ed.). Rapa Nui. El colonialismo republicano chileno cuestionado (1902-1905) Santiago de Chile: Catalonia, 2015. 208 pp. ISBN 978-956-324-353-6. US $25 (softcover). Available at www.catalonia.cl Chilean anthropologist and professor of the University of Chile, Rolf Foerster, has been very prolific lately, publishing large amounts of historic documents about Easter Island that he found buried in the National Archives, newspaper and periodical archives, as well as quite a lot of valuable unpublished material from many different sources. In this book in particular, Foerster deals with a very obscure period of Rapa Nui's history: the era under the despotic rule – and whip – of the colonial foreman of the Compañia Explotadora de la Isla de Pascua (Easter Island Exploitation Company), Horacio Cooper. The backbone of the book is the 140+ pages of previously unknown newspaper and magazine articles published in El Chileno from Santiago, and La Union, El Heraldo, and Lo Nuevo from Valparaíso, all of which contain very descriptive accounts of colonial brutality exercised by Cooper and his henchmen. The accounts are all based on first-hand reports and denouncements made by a young officer of the Chilean Navy, Luis Ross Mujica, who went on the Baquedano training ship to Easter Island in 1903, and the former employee of the Exploitation Company, Manuel Antonio Vega, who worked on the island for about five years. Foerster also added, as a last chapter, an unabridged version of Julián Ruiz' booklet Los crímenes de la Isla de Pascua [The crimes of Easter Island], originally published in 1904. This booklet is based mostly on Vega's account, but includes the testimonies of Chilean maid Paulina Vásquez, Chilean shepherd Rómulo Arancibia (who left descendants on the island), and the Rapanui deportee Nicolás Teao (appearing as Nicolás Timona). In the first part of the book, Foerster gives his introduction to these sources with an analysis of the people involved in the elaboration of the accounts, the context of Chile and Easter Island at the time, and the effects of these narratives in Chilean society. Despite the fact that this is a forgotten episode of Chilean politics in the early years of the 20th century, the consequences were quite remarkable. Not only did the testimonies of the victims and witnesses of the Company's abuses have significant coverage in the Valparaíso media, but it even went to the Chilean legislative power. Firstly, in the Parliament (Cámara de Diputados), legislators Guillermo Rivera (in 1903) and Daniel Rioseco (in 1904) gave long speeches complaining against the abusive behavior of the Company on Easter Island. This is one of the few occasions in history when Easter Island was part of a legislative discussion in the Chilean Republic (an old transcript of Rioseco's speech appears in the last part of the book). More importantly, two senators (Ballesteros and Varela) did the same in November 1904 in the Congress. The noble (?) intentions of these politicians cannot hide the amount of ignorance at the time about the situation of the distant Chilean colony. Foerster's main thesis is interesting. He suggests that the accounts included in the book are a most vivid early example of the failure of the Chilean project to colonize Easter Island. In other words, it is when the disastrous colonial attempt blew up in Chile's face. Earlier criticism in official circles to the annexation of the island started immediately in 1888 with the Toro brothers' failure in forcing the impoverished country to try something else. After the Chilean civil war, authorities set up a scheme through which a company of foreign investors would be the young republic's official enclave on the island (starting in 1895). When the accounts that now appear in this book proved how disastrous the "solution" was, turmoil was unleashed. For the Chileans who cared, the problem was not their government's absurd colonial policy, but the individuals involved. So, Horacio Cooper became a scapegoat on which to put all the blame of the Chilean failures and...

A new species of the perchlet genus Plectranthias is herein described from a single specimen found at Rapa Nui (Easter Island) in the South Pacific. Plectranthiasahiahiata sp. n. was collected at a depth of 83 m in a mesophotic coral ecosystem at Rapa Nui. The main difference between Plectranthiasahiahiata and other members of the genus is higher fin-ray counts (X, 18 dorsal; 18 pectoral) and its distinctive coloration. Compared to the three other known eastern South Pacific species, P.ahiahiata has more dorsal-fin rays, more pectoral-fin rays, fewer tubed lateral-line scales, fewer gill rakers, a longer head relative to SL, a very short first dorsal spine relative to SL, and a short third anal spine relative to SL. Plectranthiasahiahiata is distinguished from western Pacific species, by having more dorsal- and pectoral-fin rays. The closest relative based on genetic divergence (with 12.3% uncorrected divergence in the mitochondrial COI gene) is Plectranthiaswinniensis, a widely distributed species, suggesting important links between Rapa Nui and western Pacific islands. This new species adds to the high endemism of the Rapa Nui ichthyofauna, and is further evidence of the importance of mesophotic reefs as unique communities.

Easter IslandThe Essential Guide Kay Kenady Sanger EIF's newest publication, Easter Island. The Essential Guide, is the revised and updated edition of the 2011 book of the same name by EIF's Vice President Kay Sanger. Kay has spent a considerable amount of time on the island documenting rock art and compiling visitor information, and is highly qualified as both a writer and archaeologist. She is the author of five guidebooks and recently published the popular book, Write your Memoir in 10 Steps. This book is the most comprehensive and up-to-date guide to Easter Island currently available. It will help first time travelers to plan their trip and explore on their own, or provide additional information as they tour the island with a knowledgeable guide. Whether you are planning a first trip, or if you have already been to Rapa Nui, this book will be a great source of information about Easter Island. Starting off with a preface by Easter Island expert and EIF founding member Georgia Lee, the book begins with basic Easter Island facts and lists the must-see sites. The guidebook, at nearly 200 pages, is considerably longer than the first edition, but still compact enough to take to the island. The revised edition contains more photographs, especially color images, many of them new images taken by various photographers. Maps of island areas described in the section Exploring the Island will help visitors to get their bearings. All maps and many illustrations were drawn by Kay's husband, Tom Sanger. The first section details how the island was named, the climate, flora, fauna and environmental issues facing the island and its people today. The second section deals with history: the first settlers, European colonization and religious conversion, and slavery. It ends with a section on modern Rapa Nui and includes a timeline that helps put everything into perspective. Archaeology of the island, with sub-sections on moai, rock art, and rongorongo are described in the next part of the book. Methods of moving the moai are detailed and illustrated. Kay worked extensively with Georgia Lee documenting the rock art of the island in the 1980s, thus she is well-qualified on this subject. The section ends with a description of the people of Rapa Nui. A chapter about planning a trip to the island covers arrival by plane or boat, what to bring, money and banking, health considerations, communication, vehicle rentals, hiring tour guides, and other necessary visitor information. Click for larger view View full resolution In the section Exploring the Island, the island is divided into six parts; Hanga Roa village, north of Hanga Roa, the southwest corner, the south coast, the northeast coast, and the north coast. Each area is described in detail and includes a map, highlights, pictures, and drawings. The Recreation section includes information on swimming, diving and snorkeling, surfing, kayaking and boat trips, fishing, biking, hiking, and horseback riding. At the end of the section, five great hikes are suggested and detailed. Suggestions for enjoying nightlife, dance shows, food buffets, and the annual Tapati Rapa Nui festival are covered in a section on Entertainment and Festivals. The last few sections cover shopping, dining, and accommodations. Although hotels and restaurants on the island can seem to be in a perpetual state of flux, there is a comprehensive listing of places to eat, along with hotels and residenciales, with websites and phone numbers to assist in making advance reservations. The book ends with a useful glossary of Rapanui terms and a suggested reading list. All proceeds from the sales of Easter Island. The Essential Guide support the Easter Island Foundation, which provides scholarships for university students of Rapanui ancestry. We are offering the guidebook to our members and readers at a special price of $20. [End Page 73] Copyright © 2015 Easter Island Foundation

Sea turtles are deeply rooted in Pacific cultures. Rapa Nui (Easter Island, Chile) has a complex societal and ecological history and marine resources have always been exploited; nevertheless, little is known about relationships between these resources and Rapanui islanders. This study aims to explore the historical and contemporary role of sea turtles on Rapa Nui, contrasting it with information from other Pacific region societies. We triangulated information through a literature review, semi-structured interviews, and participant observations. Our results show a strong cultural connection between Rapa Nui and other Pacific islands, with turtles represented in their art, culture, mythology, symbolism, popular traditions, and ritual and spiritual life. Use of these animals on Rapa Nui has varied historically, and nowadays turtle consumption is widely rejected among Rapanui community members. Currently, sea turtles have a crucial role in tourism, constituting an opportunity for local development, further knowledge, and conservation of natural heritage.

First Record of Baseodiscus hemprichii (Nemertea: Baseodiscidae) on Easter Island (Rapa Nui) and a New Eastern Distribution Boundary for the Species1 Christopher B. Boyko Abstract A single specimen of the nemertean Baseodiscus hemprichii (Ehrenberg, 1831) was collected from Easter Island during August 1999. This represents the first record of the species on Easter Island, the first identified nemertean from that island, and extends the eastern boundary of the species' range by approximately 4800 km. The small South Pacific landmass of Easter Island, or Rapa Nui, is situated nearly 3800 km from the South American mainland and over 2200 km from Pitcairn Island, its nearest neighbor to the west. All of the marine fauna shows affinities to the Indo-Pacific, although the water temperatures of 17.5-24°C are relatively cool (DiSalvo et al. 1988). All available data indicate that the marine invertebrate fauna of Easter Island is depauperate compared with other islands of the tropical Pacific (Rehder 1980, Massin 1996), but it has a high percentage of endemic taxa (e.g., 36% for Mollusca, 39% for Porifera [unpubl. data]). It is therefore considered its own biogeographic province along with tiny Sala y Gômez, 415 km to the east (Briggs 1974). On Easter Island, however, specimens of only eight invertebrate phyla have been identified to the species level to date. A single specimen of nemertean was collected during August 1999 as part of an invertebrate survey of Easter Island. It was subsequently readily identified as Baseodiscus hemprichii (Ehrenberg, 1831) on the basis of its distinctive color pattern. This represents not only the first record of the species on Easter Island, but extends the eastern boundary of the species' range by approximately 4800 km. Although nemerteans have been recorded as occurring on Easter Island (DiSalvo et al. 1988), this is the first identification of any specimen to the species level. The specimen is deposited in the American Museum of Natural History, New York (AMNH). Family BASEODISCIDAE Bürger, 1907 Genus Baseodiscus Diesing, 1850 Baseodiscus hemprichii (Ehrenberg, 1831) Figure 1 Nemertes Hemprichii Ehrenberg, 1831:12-13. Baseodiscus hemprichii: Gibson, 1979:146-153 (synonymy). Material Examined: Under lava boulder, intertidal zone, Anakena, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), Chile, 30 August 1999, coll. C. B. Boyko and S. Reanier: 1 specimen, 25 cm length (AMNH 1512). Distribution: This species has a broad Indo-Pacific distribution and is known from the Red Sea to the Hawaiian Islands. This range is now extended southeastward to Easter Island. Remarks: The Easter Island specimen had a white ground color with a single median stripe of purple along the dorsal margin [End Page 41] and a similar but thinner stripe along the ventral margin. The dorsal stripe forms a collar just posterior to the head and there is an additional incomplete band of purple on the dorsal cephalic surface. The Easter Island specimen most closely resembles one figured by Gibson (1979: fig. 5d) in terms of color pattern. Although some variability in color exists in this species, Gibson (1979) maintained that this taxon could be unambiguously identified by the color pattern alone. This species, like most other Baseodiscus, has a weakly developed proboscis (Gibson 1979). Click for larger view View full resolution Figure 1. Specimen of Baseodiscus hemprichii (Ehrenberg, 1831) from Anakena, Easter Island (Rapa Nui), 25 cm length (AMNH 1512). Dorsal view. Drawing from color transparency deposited in AMNH. Although some authors (DiSalvo et al. 1988) have suggested that species known only from single specimens on Easter Island may occur as chance dispersals from western populations, the data available on the prevailing unidirectional east-west ocean current flow appear to refute the likelihood of this happening frequently (Rehder 1980, Massin 1996). More likely, these "rare" taxa are actually living in low-density established populations or in unexplored habitats. Indeed, the locality data for the specimen of B. hemprichii support this, because it was collected from the underside of a large lava boulder in the intertidal zone that was positioned in a way that made overturning it relatively simple. Most similarly sized rocks are too heavy to move and examine the lower surfaces, where the highest concentration of invertebrate fauna reside. Baseodiscus hemprichii is probably well...

Pseudanthiashangapikosp. nov. (Teleostei, Serranidae, Anthiadinae) is herein described from three specimens collected from a depth of 83 m in a mesophotic coral ecosystem off Hanga Piko, Rapa Nui (Easter Island), Chile. Pseudanthiashangapikosp. nov. can be distinguished from its congeners in live coloration and by the following combination of characters: dorsal-fin rays X, 17; anal-fin rays III, 8; pectoral-fin rays 16 (left side of one specimen 17); vertebrae 10+16; scales relatively large, two scales above lateral-line to base of fifth dorsal spine, and 16–17 circumpeduncular scales; gill rakers 11+23; and a slender body, with greatest body depth 3.6 (3.4–3.8) in SL. The most similar DNA barcodes (mitochondrial COI gene) are from Pseudanthiasventralis Randall, 1979 and Pseudanthiashawaiiensis Randall, 1979, with 16.8% and 17.0% uncorrected divergence, respectively. This fish is one of four new species that were documented from a pair of technical dives at a single location in Rapa Nui, emphasizing the high number of undescribed species likely still unknown in mesophotic coral ecosystems, especially in geographically remote locations. Pseudanthiashangapikosp. nov. adds to the Rapa Nui ichthyofauna, which hosts the second-highest level of endemism in both shallow and deep-water fishes.

New records of early life stages of cephalopods are presented based on planktonic collections carried out around Easter Island (Rapa Nui; 27°7′S, 109°21′W) and at the nearby Apolo Seamount (located at ∼7 nautical miles southwest from Easter Island) during March and September 2015 and March 2016. A total of 13 individuals were collected, comprising four families (Octopodidae, Ommastrephidae, Chtenopterygidae, and Enoploteuthidae) and five potential genera/types (Octopus sp., Chtenopteryx sp., rhynchoteuthion paralarvae, and two undetermined Enoploteuthid paralarvae). Cephalopod mantle lengths (ML) ranged from 0.8 to 4.5mm, with 65% of them (mainly Octopodidae) corresponding to newly hatched paralarvae of ∼1mm ML, and 35% to rhynchoteuthion and early stages of oceanic squids of around 1.5–4.5mm ML. These results provide the first records on composition and presence of early stages of cephalopods around a remote Chilean Pacific Island, while also providing a morphological and molecular basis to validate the identity of Octopus rapanui (but not Callistoctopus, as currently recorded), Ommastrephes bartramii and Chtenopteryx sp. around Rapa Nui waters. Despite adult Octopodidae and Ommastrephidae having been previously recorded at these latitudes, the current findings provide evidence to suggest that the northwest side of Easter Island, and one of the nearby seamounts, may provide a suitable spawning ground for benthic and pelagic species of cephalopods inhabiting these areas. For Chtenopterygidae and Enoploteuthidae, this is the first record for the Rapa Nui ecoregion.

Discrete cranial morphological traits of prehistoric/protohistoric Rapa Nui (Easter Island) inhabitants have been examined and have illustrated distinct regional or tribal differences; however, craniometric traits have not been as extensively evaluated to determine if similar regional population differences exist. This study examines the range of variability of Rapa Nui craniometrics and utilizes population genetic techniques to evaluate the level of homogeneity/heterogeneity within the island populations. The data consist of 50 cranio-facial measurements of Rapanui (Easter Islanders) skeletal material from the Late Prehistoric (1680-1722) and Protohistoric (1722-1868) periods. The sample was divided into five tribal regions: North, Northeast, South, Southwest, and West. General linear models (GLM) statistical analyses revealed one variable significant for males and 10 for females across tribal regions, totaling 11 regionally significant variables. Discriminant function analyses utilizing crossvalidation provided classification error rates of 55.8% males and 59.0% for females when utilizing those eleven significant variables. Minimum F(ST) values for males (0.06378) and females (0.09409) were calculated from unbiased Mahalanobis D(2) values. These values indicate that males have greater between-group homogeneity than females. The determinant ratio for the Northeast tribal region was the only significant ratio, yet all but one of the regional determinant ratios displayed a pattern of greater male than female mobility. These results indicate that significant craniometric differences between the tribal regions did not exist in prehistoric/protohistoric Rapa Nui populations, supporting the findings of previous research which has documented the homogeneity of the craniometrics of those tribal populations. The calculated minimum F(ST) values indicate the existence of different levels of heterogeneity between the male and female Rapa Nui regional populations resulting from differential levels of migration and gene flow. This variation reflects the establishment in prehistoric times of extensive tribal marriage tumus, and the existence of lineage endogamy/restricted exogamy, not the widespread practice of strict tribal endogamy.

The Mana Tupuna Project reimagines the connection between contemporary Rapanui people and the carvings of their ancestors. The inaugural iteration of this multifaceted project focuses on the Mulloy collection in the University Wyoming Museum of Art. By digitally bridging between museum art abroad and people on Rapa Nui, this project reinforces Polynesian language, culture, and values in both local and global settings. Beginning in March 2020, international travel and tourism to Rapa Nui (Easter Island) stopped due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the island was in a state of relative isolation for nearly two and a half years. Resilient and indomitable as ever, the people of Rapa Nui took this time to refocus on traditional farming, fishing, Rapanui language, and cultural revitalization projects. The Mana Tupuna project, which is a collaboration between the Rapa Nui Tour Guides Association, Rapa Nui wood carvers, and the author, explores and assesses colonial discourses, their effects on the art and culture of Rapa Nui, and the possibilities for more sustainable forms of tourism that do not rely solely on people physically visiting the island. The applications that support Mana Tupuna function as language and culture revitalization tools. Educational institutions on Rapa Nui have already begun to use them. These applications re-anchor Rapa Nui wood carvings from the 1950s and 1960s, now residing in the University of Wyoming Art Museum, to the people and places of Rapa Nui via 3D modeling, 360° photography, virtual reality, and the internet. Crucially, the global tourist audience can also access versions of these applications. Wood carvings (moai toromiro), among the first trade goods exchanged between Europeans and the Rapanui, have been a key element of social interactions between the islanders and their visitors since the first Europeans visited the island 300 years ago. This article, which privileges traditional Polynesian cultural values, explores the history of Rapa Nui wood carving and Western views of this tradition.

Recent expeditions to Rapa Nui (also known as Easter Island) and New Caledonia have revealed undescribed species from mesophotic and deeper depths. This includes three new species from Rapa Nui, Hacelia raaraa, Linckia profunda (Ophidiasteridae), Uokeaster ahi (Asterodiscididae) and two new species from New Caledonia, Astroglypha pyramidata n. gen. and Ophidiaster colossus (Ophidiasteridae). The new genus Astroglypha is described for A. pyramidata but the genus also includes the Atlantic Tamaria passiflora, which is reassigned herein. Pauliastra n. gen. is designated as a replacement for the homonym issue with Pauliella. New occurrences and synonymies are addressed for taxa related to New Caledonia, Rapa Nui and adjacent regions. A morphology based phylogenetic analysis agrees with prior work which placed Goniaster among the Asterodiscididae and posits biogeographic relationships among asterodiscidid genera. Implications for the Goniasteridae and placement of Goniaster among asterodiscidid genera are discussed. Biogeography and relationships among taxa from Rapa Nui and New Caledonia are reviewed. In situ observations from species observed from Rapa Nui are included.