Interview: Pacific Science 71:4 special section editors

Published this October, Pacific Science volume 71, no. 4 arrived with a special section on habitat restoration, which includes seven open-access articles. We asked Editor-in-Chief Curtis C. Daehler and guest editors Melissa Price and Robert J. Toonen to weigh in on this issue’s special topic and other research important to the quarterly science journal. 

Image of He'eia National Estuarine Research Reserve
This scenic photo shows the He’eia National Estuarine Research Reserve, where some Pacific Science 71:4 contributors did their research. The reserve is managed in partnership by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the State of Hawai’i. (Photo by Manuel Meija of The Nature Conservancy.)

 

Vol. 71, Issue 4 includes a special feature: “Scaling Up Restoration Efforts in the Pacific Islands.” Why devote a whole section to this topic?

We have lost a lot of native species to habitat destruction in the Pacific region. Today, considerable attention is being given to protecting native ecosystems, for example, in the Hawai‘i Governor’s Sustainable Hawai‘i Initiative to protect 30% of the state’s watersheds by 2030. However, much less attention is given to restoration efforts, or the conversion of nonnative to native-dominated habitats. Invaded ecosystems may be more at risk for wildfires, and may enhance invasions of nearby native ecosystems. A few large-scale restoration success stories exist, such as that of Hakalau Forest National Wildlife Refuge, and there are a number of small-scale efforts across the Pacific led by nonprofit groups. In this issue, we hope to promote conversations about how we can scale up restoration efforts to improve resiliency, promote ecosystem services, and reduce extinction rates across the Pacific region.

Koolaus 2
Melissa Price, guest editor of Pacific Science vol. 71, no. 4, is an assistant professor in the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Management, CTAHR, at UH Mānoa. She provided this picture from her field work.

 

What challenges did you face in the creation of this special section?

The biggest challenges were representing the range of work being done around the Pacific and asking those working at small scales to think about how their work might be scaled-up. Also, a number of projects were just getting started, and it may be decades before there are results from these efforts. Finally, truly transformative work will likely be transdisciplinary. People involved in restoration must partner across sectors to solve challenging problems associated with restoration, such as seed production, removal of invasive plants and animals, and access for equipment and people to remote locations. We still have a long way to go in these areas, but we hope that this special collection will spark productive conversations.

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Call for Papers: Palapala

Palapala

Palapala: a journal for Hawaiian language and literature seeks papers for forthcoming volumes. Read the complete call for papers from the editors below:

Aloha Kākou!

Palapala is Hawaiʻi’s first academic, peer-reviewed journal dedicated to the study of and literature produced in ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi. Following the online release of our first volume, we are eager to call for new submissions for future annual editions. Our first volume can be accessed online for free through the following link: Palapala Vol. 1

Palapala journal comes to us at a time when despite a growing number of speakers and academic work being produced in Hawaiian, there are few avenues through which scholars can share their research within a centralized, peer-reviewed archive dedicated to their language of study. Though Hawaiian is one of the most well-preserved indigenous languages in the world today, few outside of Hawaiʻi think to give it the scholarly attention it deserves, and there is still much archival information left for us to discover. It is our hope that Palapala will create a shift in this trend, and help bring Hawaiian and Hawaiian literature back to the forefront of scholarship, particularly in Hawaiʻi schools, but also throughout the academic world. Those eager to study Hawaiian language and culture should have more access to academically-credible, peer-reviewed works, which Palapala hopes to produce and provide for the community of scholars interested in na mea Hawaiʻi. It is our ambition that with this journal, we can continue to expand our knowledge of ancestral Hawaiʻi, and share that ʻike with the global community.

Palapala currently solicits three types of contributions:

  1. New research on Hawaiian language and literature.
  2. Book reviews on significant new books as well as books that have been widely used as references for people working in Hawaiian.
  3. Important reprints of newspaper and journal articles that continue to be important for new research, whether from the Hawaiian language newspapers or from other sources that are now difficult to access.

Palapala prints articles in Hawaiian, English, and, if we can find peer reviewers, other languages. Anyone interested in contributing as an author or peer-reviewer may address an email to the editors at palapala@hawaii.edu. Please note that the annual deadline for submissions is September 1.

In honor of the many kupuna who strove to preserve Hawaiian language during its time of adversary, we look forward to embarking on this important voyage towards a better future for ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi.

Submission guidelines: Submissions (research articles and reviews) must be original works not scheduled for publication by another publisher or original work for which the contributor has received all necessary permissions to republish as open access. Reprints of important articles may also be submitted. Please send proposals or full-length articles for consideration to the editors at palapala@hawaii.edu.

Manuscripts must be provided in Word doc format with all images and tables extracted as separate files. Please format all manuscript notes as endnotes and refer to the 16th edition of The Chicago Manual of Style for citations and style guidelines. Please see the University of Hawai‘i Press Manuscript Guidelines for more details.

Upon acceptance, contributors will be asked to sign a publication agreement with University of Hawai‘i Press, and all content in Palapala is published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.