Rehearsals in Colonialism: Tracking Transpacific Expressions of Indigenous and Settler Sovereignty, 1788-1900. In the 1800s a spate of Pacific monarchies declared pre-emptive independence amidst the upheavals of circling imperial interest. Kingdoms in Tonga, Hawai'i, and New Zealand lasted at least a century, but only years in Tahiti, Samoa and Fiji. Nevertheless they epitomised uncertain times when Indigenous and settler peoples alike focussed intensely on the sovereign status of subject people ....Rehearsals in Colonialism: Tracking Transpacific Expressions of Indigenous and Settler Sovereignty, 1788-1900. In the 1800s a spate of Pacific monarchies declared pre-emptive independence amidst the upheavals of circling imperial interest. Kingdoms in Tonga, Hawai'i, and New Zealand lasted at least a century, but only years in Tahiti, Samoa and Fiji. Nevertheless they epitomised uncertain times when Indigenous and settler peoples alike focussed intensely on the sovereign status of subject peoples in subject colonies. This project connects these moments of sovereignty for the first time in a unique opportunity to track the intellectual and social histories of contact in the transcolonial space of the Pacific and its settler colonial rim. Project outcomes will offer new insight into our colonial past and its legacies in the present.Read moreRead less