Culture, Identity and patrimony: Questioning the Past in Tahiti

At the beginning of the 21st century, the cultural heritage has become a major stake in Tahitian society. From the seventies we have seen a re-evaluation of some pre-Christian activities condemned by churches like dances and tattoo. Along with the Tahitian language these practices have become the main indicators of Tahitian identity in the Polynesian world today. Nevertheless if the identity discourses often represent the ancient Tahitian society as a golden age, the relation to the past is more ambiguous because in this strong Christian island it refers to a pagan time. Despite of that, a grass root movement structured in associations and engaged in identical claiming, has tried to revalorize the cultural heritage by means of ceremonies largely filled with pre-Christian references. They claim for reconciliation with the ancestors and with the past. They also hope for a cultural awakening of the society. These last years the social status of these associations has improved and they have influenced the political community who tried to determine a new cultural and patrimonial public policy. In this way, the number of cultural manifestations has increased and some of them became official like the Matari'i i nia celebration. Matari'i is the Tahitian name for the Pleiades and the rise of this constellation indicates the traditional New Year Eve. In this context of revitalization this paper will try to investigate how the actors of the cultural life in Tahiti (especially the government cultural agencies, the cultural associations and the Churches) reshape the local ”stage setting” of patrimony, culture or tradition and what this phenomenon reveals about the evolution of the relationship the Tahitians have with their pre-Christian past