Polynesia is a subregion of Oceania, made up of over 1,000 islands scattered over the central and southern Pacific Ocean. The indigenous people who inhabit the islands of Polynesia are termed Polynesians. They share many similar traits including the language family, culture, and belief. Historically, they were experienced sailors who used stars to navigate at night. The term Polynesia was first ..
Micronesia is a subregion of Oceania, comprising thousands of small islands in the western Pacific Ocean. It has a shared cultural history with two other island regions, Polynesia to the east and Melanesia to the south. The region has a tropical marine climate, and is part of the Oceania ecozone. There are four main archipelagos along with numerous outlying islands. Micronesia is divided politic..
Melanesia Melanesia is a subregion of Oceania (and occasionally Australasia) extending from New Guinea island in the southwestern Pacific Ocean to the Arafura Sea, and eastward to Fiji. The region includes the four countries of Vanuatu, the Solomon Islands, Fiji, and Papua New Guinea. Besides these independent countries, Melanesia also includes:- New Caledonia, a special collectivity of France- ..
The outrigger canoe is a type of canoe featuring one or more lateral support floats known as outriggers, which are fastened to one or both sides of the main hull. Smaller canoes often employ a single outrigger on the port side, while larger canoes may employ a single-outrigger, double-outrigger, or double-outrigger, or double-hull configuration (see also catamaran). The sailing canoes are an imp..
A kayak is a small, narrow watercraft which is propelled by means of a double-bladed paddle. The word kayak originates from the Greenlandic language, where it is the word qajaq (prodnounced [qajaq]). In the UK the term canoe is often used when referring to a kayak. The traditional kayak has a covered deck and one or more cockpits, each seating one paddler. The cockpit is sometimes covered by a s..
Ju Si-Gyeong (December 22, 1876 - July 27, 1914) was one of the founders of modern Korean linguistics. He was born in Bongsan County, Hwanghae Province. He and his students helped standardize the Korean language, based spelling and grammar of the vernacular. He studied Classical Chinese from his childhood. After studying modern linguistics in Seoul, he established the Korean Language System Soci..
Traditional Polynesian navigation was used for thousands of years to make long voyages across thousands of miles of the open Pacific Ocean. Navigators traveled to small inhabited islands using wayfinding techniques and knowledge passed by oral tradition from master to apprentice, often in the form of song. Generally each island maintained a guild of navigators who had very high status; in times ..
Robin Knox-Johnston Sir William Robert Patrick "Robin" Knox-Johnston, CBE, RD and bar (born 17 March 1939) is an English sailor. In 1969 he became the first person to perform a single-handed non=stop circumnavigation of the globe and was the second winner of the Jules Verne Trophy, together with Sir Peter Blake. For this he was awarded with Blake the ISAF Yachtsman of the Year award. In 2007 he ..
Animals Few terrestrial vertebrates live in Antarctica, and those that do are limited to the sub-Antarctic islands. Invertebrate life includes microscopic mites like the Alaskozetes antarcticus, lice, nematodes, tardigrades, rotifers, krill and springtails. The flightless midge Belgica antarctica, up to 6 mm (1/4 in) in size, is the largest purely terrestrial animal in Antarctica. The snow petre..
Some of Antarctica has been warming up; particularly strong warming has been noted on the Antarctic Peninsula. A study by Eric Steig published in 2009 noted for the first time that the continent-wide average surface temperature trend of Antarctica is slightly positive at >0.05 ºC (0.09 ºF) per decade from 1957 to 2006. This study also noted that West Antarctica has warmed by more than 0.1 ºC (0...
Due to its location at the South Pole, Antarctica receives relatively little solar radiation. This means that it is a very cold continent where water is mostly in the form of ice. Precipitation is low (most of Antarctica is a desert) and almost always in the form of snow, which accumulates and forms a giant ice sheet which covers the land. Parts of this ice sheet form moving glaciers known as ic..
Several governments maintain permanent manned research stations on the continent. The number of people conducting and supporting scientific research and other work on the continent and its nearby islands varies from about 1,000 in winter to about 5,000 in the summer, giving it a population density between 70 and 350 inhabitants per million square kilometers (180 and 900 per million square miles)..
Each year, scientists from 28 different nations conduct experiments not reproducible in any other place in the world. In the summer more than 4,000 scientists operate research stations; this number decreases to just over 1,000 in the winter. McMurdo Station, which is the largest research station in Antarctica, is capable of housing more than 1,000 scientists, visitors, and tourists. Researchers ..
Yi Sun-sin was a Korean naval commander, famed for his victories against the Japanese navy during the Imjin war in the Joseon Dynasty, and is well-respected for his exemplary conduct on and off the battlefield not only by Koreans, but by Japanese admirals as well. Military historians have placed General Yi Sun-sin on par with Admiral Horatio Nelson as arguably the greatest naval commander in his..
Marine energy or marine power (also sometimes referred to as ocean energy, ocean power, or marine and hydrokinetic energy) refers to the energy carried by ocean waves, tides, salinity and ocean temperature differences. The movement of water in the world's oceans creates a vast store of kinetic energy or energy in motion. This energy can be harnessed to generate electricity to power homes, transp..