Barry Rolett

Barry V. Rolett is a professor of Anthropology at the University of Hawaii. He was introduced to Polynesia through a Thomas J. Watson Foundation Fellowship during which she explored the South Pacific (by plane, freighter canoe, and on foot) while retracing Captain Cook’s route on his second voyage of discovery. He returned to Tahuata in the Marquesas Islands for his Ph.D. research and was adopted by a Marquesan family with seven sons. His adopted brothers and various cousins joined his excavation and the entire community followed their work with great interest. This was the first archaeological project on Tahuata and his close relationship with the community led to many more projects in later years. They also collaborated to establish the Tahuata Museum, a small museum for exhibiting and curating the artifacts discovered during their projects. Dr. Rolett published extensively on the Pacific Islands and is the President of the Andover Foundation for Archaeological Research, an organization that pursues archaeological research through the involvement of local communities and the general public in French Polynesia and China.