Climate Change, Christian Religion and Songs: Revisiting the Noah Story in the Central Pacific

Abstract

Dissemination of the actants climate change and sea-level rise in the Pacific atoll states has forged new linkages between people, things and signs. In this context, Pacific Islanders have articulated and mobilised the Biblical Noah Story qua religious-political narrative in response to scenarios of future inundation and displacement. Contra the routines of exclusion applied in the social sciences, this chapter construes the efficacy of the Noah narrative as a product of its positioning within assemblages. The reticulations of the Noah Story with politics and songs are discussed to show how in Kiribati, Pacific Islanders meet the challenge posed by climate change in order to reclaim power over the meaning and shaping of their future in respect to land, people, nature and nation.