Pottery was once ubiquitous in the Western Pacific, with its manufacture embedded in the social contexts of Pacific Islander groups at the time of their settlement in the region around 3,000 years ago. Today, it survives in only a handful of communities scattered across Melanesia. In most regions, pottery was abandoned in the centuries following initial human settlement, and many of the rare traditions that persisted until European contact have since disappeared.
Wusi, a village on the remote west coast of Espiritu Santo, Vanuatu, is one of the rare locations where traditional pottery manufacture has continued into the 21st century, although only a handful of practitioners now remain in the community. Pottery is deeply ingrained in Wusi’s history and central to ni-Vanuatu identity, yet its manufacture is increasingly threatened by environmental, economic, and social pressures, including cyclones, depopulation, and technological obsolescence. There is a growing urgency to document the endangered traditional knowledge associated with pottery in the Western Pacific, and Wusi offers an ideal setting to produce a record of relevance locally and across the region.
We aim to document the vulnerable Wusi pottery-making tradition and to produce a documentary film that records its material knowledge and cultural significance, situating it within the broader historical context of Vanuatu and the wider region. The film and photographs will combine documentation of pottery production with recorded conversations and semi-structured interviews to capture the technical knowledge and social frameworks that underpin pottery-making as a resilient kastom and a vital form of material knowledge.
PI: Mathieu Leclerc
Collaborators: Edward King; Noah Mikov; Jessica Rowe
Research Location: West Coast Santo, Vanuatu
Host Institution: Australian National University
Top Banner Image: Wusi pots used for cooking traditional recipes. Photo credit: Mathieu Leclerc, 2025.