We the Voyagers: Our Moana Film Screening and Q & A with Mimi George, PhD, a cultural anthropologist and sailor

Cost:Free to members and students; $10 to all others
Register: www.sbmm.org or (805) 456-8747
Made possible by a collaborative effort between SBMM, the Tribal Trust Foundation, and Pacific Traditions Society

We are the living crew of Lata, the Polynesian culture-hero who built the first voyaging canoe and navigated across the Pacific. We are the only Polynesians left who still use only ancient designs, materials, and methods. In our films we share our history, motivations, and skills through story-telling, canoe building, and wayfinding, and we invite everyone to reconnect with ancestors and sustainable lifeways.

Our most experienced navigator taught us the ancient arts, and enlisted an anthropologist to help us make a film showing how we do it. When he passed away in 2009, we built a new vessel, and prepared to make a voyage. Like our culture hero Lata, we welcome men, women and children as crew, including hard workers with skills, and applicants of dubious character. Our community blesses the vessel and sailors, and we learn how to set the sails and deal with problems. We find our way in the open ocean by interacting with patterns of winds, waves, stars, and other signs that our ancestors show us when we need them. We arrive at islands and learn what happened to family members since the last voyage some generations earlier. We reconcile, reaffirm our love for each other, and look to our future together.

~ ~ ~
Since 2000, the Santa Barbara Maritime Museum has featured many artifacts and stories to share the history of the Santa Barbara Channel with more than 40,000 visitors annually and provides year-round experiential maritime history and marine science education for local youth. Featuring the impressive First-Order Fresnel Lighthouse Lens from Point Conception, SBMM’s current exhibits explore Geology of Oil in Santa Barbara Channel & Chumash Use of Asphaltum, the Honda Disaster, and Wives and Daughters: Keepers of the Light.

SBMM is located at the historic Santa Barbara Harbor at 113 Harbor Way, Suite 190, Santa Barbara, CA 93109. Visit sbmm.org or call (805) 962-8404 for details.
1/7/20 Images copyright: Vaka Taumako Project.