ABSTRACT
In 2013, I published a study of Maasina Rule, a movement that dominated politics in the south-eastern British Solomon Islands Protectorate (BSIP) from soon after World War II into early 1953, particularly on the island of Malaita where it began.1 More has probably been written about Maasina Rule, over a longer period and by a more diverse collection of authors, than about any other Melanesian movement except John Frum on Tanna, which remains active. The corpus of relevant material is enormous. My book references some 70 books and articles fully or importantly about Maasina Rule, by historians, anthropologists, political scientists, Solomon Islanders, missionaries and active or former colonial officers. Many others have written about the movement within other topics, and newspaper articles, dissertations and unpublished manuscripts also exist. Moreover, archives hold thousands of
pertinent documents, including writings by Maasina Rule adherents and wonderfully in-depth reports submitted by officers battling the movement.2 Beyond all of this material, we have first-person oral accounts of the period from Solomon Islanders and Europeans. Maasina Rule challenges the researcher, not to exhume data but to avoid being buried by it.
