Jo Anne Van Tilburg of Rapa Nui's role in Polynesian seafaring history; Explore the natural environment of the Pacific Ocean and the ecology of Rapa Nui as part of that environment; Develop cultural exchanges with other Pacific islanders and continental peoples through the celebration of Rapa Nui maritime skills. Jo Anne Van Tilburg Jo Anne Van Tilburg is an American archaeologist best known for her research on the statues of Easter Island (Rapa Nui). Her primary specialty is rock art. Van Tilburg was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota and graduated from the University of Minnesota in 1965, receiving her Ph.D. from the University of California
Rapa Nui language 1880s to work as servants or labourers adopted the local form of Tahitian-Pidgin. Fischer argues that this pidgin became the basis for the modern Rapa Nui language when the surviving part of the Rapa Nui immigrants on Mangareva returned to their almost deserted home island. William J. Thomson, paymaster on the USS "Mohican", spent twelve days on Easter Island from 19 to 30 December 1886. Among the data Thomson collected was the Rapa Nui calendar. Father Sebastian Englert, a German missionary living on Easter Island during 1935–1969, published a partial Rapa Nui–Spanish dictionary in his "La Tierra de Hotu Matu’a"