Background
Finney, Ben Rudolph was born on October 1, 1933 in San Diego, California, United States. Son of Leon Howell Finney and Melba Regina Trefzger.
(Dust Jacket: "In 1976 there occurred one of the most dari...)
Dust Jacket: "In 1976 there occurred one of the most daring and unusual voyages of modern times - the sailing of a reconstruction of an ancient double-hull Polynesian canoe with a full crew aboard from Hawaii to Tahiti and return, covering a distance of almost 6000 miles. A dedicated group of scientists, sailors, and other volunteers, led by the author, had for years worked on this project, the object of which was to retrace the legendary voyages that once linked those far-flung islands and in doing so demonstrate to skeptics that the ancient Polynesians could have intentionally sailed across vast stretches of the Pacific without navigational instruments when most seafaring peoples were still hugging continental shores...."
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0396077196/?tag=2022091-20
(1973, hardcover edition, University Press of Hawaii, Hono...)
1973, hardcover edition, University Press of Hawaii, Honolulu, Hawaii, 206 pages. Here is an in-depth study of economic change in the New Guinea Highlands, based on field observation conducted in 1967 and 1968.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0824802624/?tag=2022091-20
(The Polynesian Society is a non-profit organization based...)
The Polynesian Society is a non-profit organization based at the University of Auckland, New Zealand, dedicated to the scholarly study of the history, ethnography, and mythology of Oceania. The society was co-founded in 1892 by Stephenson Percy Smith and Edward Tregear, largely in response to a conviction, widely held at the time, that the Maori and other Polynesian peoples were a dying race. Smith and his friends hoped that it would help to preserve the traditional lore of the Maori before it disappeared and provide scholars with a forum for learned discussion of their ethnographic research. The Society published the quarterly "Journal of the Polynesian Society". The nautical feats of the Polynesians have long evoked the curiosity and admiration of writers who created a perhaps too romantic picture of their canoes, seamanship and navigational expertise. This view was challenged by a Society member in 1956. In response to this, the Society's journal organised a series of papers which were reprinted into this book as a memoir.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0824805844/?tag=2022091-20
( The Polynesian island of Tahiti is in the imagination a...)
The Polynesian island of Tahiti is in the imagination an island paradise, an idyllic world inhabited by noble savages, carefree and uncomplicated. Tahiti separates myth from reality. Finney describes and analyzes the forces of change that have confronted Tahiti and its inhabitants in the modern world. As the author notes in the introduction, "Neither isolation in the South Pacific, nor the romantic aura invested in them by philosophers and escapists of the West, has saved Tahitians from intense involvement in the twin processes of industrialization and urbanization." This study of Tahitian life concentrates upon two different communities. One is a peasant community moving from subsistence farming to an increased reliance upon the production of cash crops. The other is a proletarian community whose members were at the time abandoning farming and fishing in favor of wage labor. Finney compares the two contemporaneous communities, enabling him to define different but interrelated variables of the economic and social change. These are responsible for Tahiti's evolution from a subsistence oriented peasant life to a life based increasingly on cash crops and wage labor. What happens to family life, work patterns, land use, and other traditional modes of social organization when a small, underdeveloped society is confronted with economic forces largely beyond its control? In dealing with this question as it applies to Tahiti, Finney makes an important contribution to our understanding of how modernization affects a society once thought to be outside the boundaries of the modern world. A major study in English of the socio-economic forces at work in Tahiti, this book provides the reader with both an understanding of the changing nature of Tahitian life, and the reactions of Tahitians to such changes.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1412806402/?tag=2022091-20
( In the summer of 1985, a mostly Hawaiian crew set out a...)
In the summer of 1985, a mostly Hawaiian crew set out aboard Hokule'a, a reconstructed ancient double canoe, to demonstrate what skeptics had steadfastly denied: that their ancestors, sailing in such canoes and navigating solely by reading stars, ocean swells, and other natural signs, could intentionally have sailed across the Pacific, exploring the vast oceanic realm of Polynesia and discovering and settling all its inhabitable islands. Their round-trip odyssey from Hawai'i to Aotearoa (New Zealand), across 12,000 nautical miles, dramatically refuted all theories declaring that—because of their unseaworthy canoes and inaccurate navigational methods—the ancient Polynesians could only have been pushed accidentally to their islands by the vagaries of wind and current. Voyage of Rediscovery is a vivid, immensely readable account of this remarkable journey through the Pacific, including tales of a curiosity attack by sperm whales and the crew's welcome to Aotearoa by Maori tribesmen, who dubbed them their sixth tribe. It describes how Hawaiian navigator Nainoa Thompson guided the canoe over thousands of miles of open ocean without compass, sextant, charts, or any other navigational aids. In so doing, it documents the experimental voyaging approach, developed by Ben Finney, which has both transformed our ideas about Polynesian migration and voyaging and been embraced by present-day Polynesians as a way to experience and celebrate their rich ancestral heritage as premier seafarers. By sailing in the wake of their ancestors, the Hawaiians and other Polynesians who captained, navigated, and crewed Hokule'a made the journey described here a cultural as well as a scientific odyssey of exploration.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0520080025/?tag=2022091-20
(Surfing traces the history of the sport from its beginnin...)
Surfing traces the history of the sport from its beginnings in ancient Hawaii through the mid 1960s. This revised edition of the 1966 classic features extensive illustrations, a new introduction, and articles by Mark Twain and Jack London recounting their observations on surfing. The book also explores the development of the surfboard and follows surfing’s timeline from the earliest legends to the accomplishments of modern surfing heroes. By Ben Finney and James D. Houston. 120 pages, approximately 50 black-and-white historical photographs, with maps and diagrams, size: 10 3/4 x 9". Smythe-sewn paperbound book.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0876545940/?tag=2022091-20
Finney, Ben Rudolph was born on October 1, 1933 in San Diego, California, United States. Son of Leon Howell Finney and Melba Regina Trefzger.
Bachelor, University California, Berkeley, California, 1955. Master of Arts, University Hawaii, 1959. Doctor of Philosophy, Harvard University, 1964.
Senior statistician Kaiser Steel, Fontana, California, 1956. Manufacturing analyst Convair Division General Dynamics, San Diego, 1956. Aviation ground officer United States Naval Reserve, Pensacola, Florida, 1957.
Teaching fellow Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1960—1964. Assistant professor University California, Santa Barbara, California, 1964—1967. Senior research fellow Australian National University, Canberra, Australia, 1968—1970.
Associate professor University Hawaii, Honolulu, 1970—1973, professor, 1973—2000, professor emeritus, since 2001, chairman Department Anthropolgy, 1985—1995. Research associate East-West Center, Honolulu, 1972—1976. Visiting scholar Harvard University, 1979—1980.
National research council associate Ames Research Center National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Mountain View, California, 1984—1985. Councillor science and cultural council French University of Pacific Papeete, Tahiti, 1991—1994. Co-chairman department space and society International Space University, Strasbourg, France, since 1994.
Research associate department anthropology Bishop Museum, since 1989.
( In the summer of 1985, a mostly Hawaiian crew set out a...)
(Dust Jacket: "In 1976 there occurred one of the most dari...)
(The Polynesian Society is a non-profit organization based...)
( The Polynesian island of Tahiti is in the imagination a...)
(Surfing traces the history of the sport from its beginnin...)
(1973, hardcover edition, University Press of Hawaii, Hono...)
Married Liudmila Alepko Finney. Married Ruth Elizabeth Sutherlin, August 10, 1964 (divorced December 1985). Children: Sean Tumoana, Gregory L.