Reddit mentions: The best oceania history books

You might find some inspiration in open world car racing games. Fuel is the first game that comes to mind, but also the open world side of the Burnout games. The gameplay is literally travel; drive from A to B the fastest you can. And the world is open and various enough to make exploration interesting. It's not exactly what you're talking about, but it's related.

I love the idea of using Polynesian navigation as a jumping off point. The book Vaka Moana has a lot of useful source detail. Also have to work stick charts in the visual presentation somehow.

Any book by Mary Roach- her books are hilarious, random, and informative. I like Jon Krakauer's, Sarah Vowell's, and Bill Bryson's books as well.

Some of my favorites that I can think of offhand (as another poster mentioned, I loved Devil in the White City)

No Picnic on Mount Kenya

Guns, Germs, and Steel

Collapse

The Closing of the Western Mind

What is the What

A Long Way Gone

Alliance of Enemies

The Lucifer Effect

The World Without Us

What the Dog Saw

The God Delusion (you'd probably enjoy Richard Dawkins' other books as well if you like science)

One Down, One Dead

Lust for Life

Lost in Shangri-La

Endurance

True Story

Havana Nocturne

Read Killing Keiko its an amazing read for anyone who thinks that "setting all the whales free" is a simple option. A must read for anyone who cares about whales under human care. Everyone I know in the marine mammal community has a copy.

They don't have anything to do with Canadian politics specifically but two very interesting books that I just finished.

1. Origins of Political Order, Francis Fukuyama
   
   
2. The World Until Yesterday, Jared Diamond
   
   Diamond's new book has opened my eyes on the value which traditional societies can provide to modern one's today. A really thought provoking book. Fukuyama is one of my most trusted authors on topics including sociology and historical development, the book focuses on political institutions and their development specifically through China and the Middle East (because that was where it all started).

First, for a proper, basic understanding of what makes people happy on the most fundamental level, and what social structures support that best, I think anthropology is a good place to start. I recommend The World Until Yesterday by Jared Diamond, which is an overview of modern primitive societies suggesting the social structures humans evolved. The idea is that anything contrary to the evolved structure risks being contrary to the human organism itself, and thus can be a cause of stress. Specifically, daily life in "Western, educated, industrial, rich, and democratic" (WEIRD) societies is in fact an aberration compared to how we evolved to live.

Obviously, any return to primitivism would be absurd, so next you would want to look into sociology, political science, psychology, and any number of other sciences to figure out how to apply just the benefits of primitive social structures in a modern, progressive, open society manner that guarantees human rights and diversity.

Personally, I think that the way humans will organize themselves in the future, assuming we even survive the next few centuries, will be a global network of massively distributed communities, each small in population and run via direct democracy, which is reminiscent of tribal social structures, but with all the benefits of the modern Internet, technology, medicine, science, etc.

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If you enjoyed it, may I recommend Jared Diamond's The World Before Yesterday. He's an author and anthropologist who spent time with many aboriginal people (in particular in Papua New Guinea). Note, it's not exactly a breezy reading; it can feel like a college textbook sometimes.

I think the video was interesting, and I thought many of their insights were spot-on. It was a good reminder that people who are from primitive cultures are not necessarily culturally or intellectually inferior. However, it's tempting to swing the other way and fall into the believe of the "noble savage." That's where I thought Diamond's book was so fascinating. Things that we do that horrify them (Diamond's book talks about how the West treats our elderly), there are things that other cultures do that would horrify us (he gives an example of how one tribe views self-reliance and children that was plain scary).

It's an interesting question. It reminded me of a book I bought at a Maritime Museum in Bath, Maine (USA).
https://www.amazon.com/Shipyard-Maine-Percy-Small-Schooners/dp/0884482731/

I think the bookstores of Maritime Museums are a really good place to start. I found this after looking at the Bath Museum's store page:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00CNQ2W5A/

But there a ton of maritime museums out there. I have visited a bunch. Almost all had history books focused on local maritime subjects.

>Maybe one day it will be like Star Trek and. . .

Dude, have you read biographies or journals of history's explorers?

Star Trek was modeled after them.

This one is an easy read and is basically like reading Star Trek, only it really happened

In that case, if you want to explore the subject further, the books of James Churchward I mentioned earlier are a good place to start.

This link will tell you a bit about him. You can find a Kindle edition of his first book about Lemurea (which he called 'Mu'—hence the use of the word by the pop group video you posted a link to) on Amazon: The Lost Continent of Mu. His other books are still available in various editions, new and second-hand.

I hope that's of help?

> If you ever get a chance to look at the book "Buevers du Kava" (drinkers of kava) definitely flip through it (even if you don't read French

It's a bit pricey for a book I can't read so I'm really hoping they put out an English version at some point.

I'm halfway through The Sea & Civilization right now. The scope is amazing and it's a scrumptious read. http://www.amazon.com/The-Sea-Civilization-Maritime-History/dp/140004409X

I recently took a cross country flight and was reading "The Lost Continent Of Mu" by James Churchward. Fascinating book, but I was particularly struck by how he allowed his own bias into his descriptions of the perfect society of Mu.

There are many things he made clear he didn't know, but he was sure to (multiple times) let the reader know that among this great society of equals, the WHITE MEN were the rulers.

Read that a last sentence a few times. And now you know how 'history' works. He's discussing a society that generated the sum total of ancient art and mythology by interpreting dead languages from literal stone tablets... but he still couldn't imagine a society where men ruled as true equals.

My Top 3:

• Colonizing Hawai'i: The Cultural Powers of Law by Sally Engle Merry is fascinating.
  
• The Devil behind the Mirror by Steven Gregory
  
• The Art of Not Being Governed by James Scott

Talofa lava!

In terms of books that might give an earlier insight into Samoan culture (as it were observed by a German) this volume (there are a pair I think) is a good encyclopedic resource of sorts. http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B001M29JX4/ref=mp_s_a_1_7?qid=1463652911&sr=8-7&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_QL65&keywords=kramer+history+of+samoa&dpPl=1&dpID=517TDOxllbL&ref=plSrch

I know! I'm sorry. Lol. I picked up A Night to Remember and then stopped looking!

I think it's because the complete picture is massive. To properly explain it you have to go all the way back a century or two and connect it all the way to the present moment.

I found talking to a number of white Australian's that many feel that the aboriginal problems of today have nothing to do with them. There is a massive disconnect between reality and perception which is really hard to bridge in one article, especially when most of your readers don't accept many of your facts.

When you have a common shared belief, like refugees are bad people who don't need the help of those much better of, then statements like "Stop the boats" are accepted as well considered policy while entire books the likes of John Pilger writes are viewed as akin to conspiracy theories. Not that I've met many Australians who would have read Pilgers books.

Going back to your question about Pilger's work, I think to some extent he answers your "Why" question in his book "A secret Country".

Link to book: http://www.amazon.com/Secret-Country-John-Pilger/dp/0099815907/ref=la_B001HCU88O_1_3_title_2_pap?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1395451588&sr=1-3

For example, in reading about primitive New Guinea, the author describes sacred religious objects as fetishes.

In sexual context, I believe a fetish is a specific way of having sex, without which the person in question cannot orgasm. In contrast with a "kink", which is something that you like, but is not exclusively necessary.

Try this one and you have a little left over for something else.

http://www.amazon.com/Lost-Shangri-Survival-Adventure-Incredible/dp/0061988340/ref=amb_link_356763542_3?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-6&pf_rd_r=1PH8N1KYP59FYZXACN4Q&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1313957462&pf_rd_i=283155

There is no solid evidence on the existence of 'matriarchal societies'.

If you are thinking of the data reported by Margaret Mead, that has turned out to be a false.

Hey, I was thinking about this a couple of days ago. You might like Goose Green. It is non-fiction, but it was really well-written. The images the author describes of the 2 Paras running across muddy fields as mortars ploop into the muck around them and fail to explode is a pretty crazy one.

Another good one if you like that is The Bear Went Over The Mountain. It's about Russian tactics in Afghanistan, covering a lot of the small battles they fought.

Ka Whawai Tonu Matou: Struggle without End

Evolutionary there's advantage in exterminating males (including male children) and abduct and rape the females during wars.

See e.g. http://www.amazon.com/The-World-Until-Yesterday-Traditional/dp/0670024813 for a description of an environment we've evolved to fit into.