Fishnet of Connection: The Cultural and Ecological Resilience of Samoan Fishers

Samoan fishers have created extensive knowledge systems both historically (as traditional knowledge) and contemporarily (local knowledge), and individually and collectively through close interaction with the marine environment. Such knowledge has yet to be recorded in literature, and thus cannot be brought into discussions of cultural and ecological resilience in the face of a changing environment. To remedy this, talanoas were used in this research to holistically understand how subsistence, commercial, and game fishers in Samoa perceive and interact with their communities and the environment. Fishers were found to undertake the task of fishing for nutrition, income, leisure, community, and tradition. They had insights as to how the environment has changed recently and were found to be taking measures to adapt to and rehabilitate it. Using Pacific theories on resilience, the findings were analyzed to prove the cultural and ecological resilience of Samoan fishers.