The Ancient Art of Voyaging: A Night with Traditional Master Navigators of Micronesia

Featuring Sesario Sewralur, Cecilio Raiukiulipiy, Mario Benito, and Milton Coleman Jr. (aka “Jun”)

Experience a glimpse into the realm of Traditional Master Navigators of Micronesia, as they humbly share stories of stars, voyages, navigation, and the enduring quest to keep their ancient knowledge, practices, and legacy alive. Witness the Planetarium transformed into an immersive celestial map, as the presenters share traditional seafaring methods, star and constellation identification, and Indigenous scientific knowledge systems, offering a rare opportunity to learn about the Pacific region outside of a colonial perspective.

Pacific Studies scholar Dr. Damon Salesa observed that, prior to Western contact, not one of the over 1,000 Pacific Island languages contained a word for “the Pacific”- this was because, to Indigenous Pacific Islanders, "the Pacific" was not a place. Each island culture created and belonged to their own, distinct reaches of the Pacific, defined in part by their voyaging traditions and techniques. Salesa calls these lived oceanic regions “Native Seas,” which “blanketed the inhabited Pacific, like an intricate weave of maritime places, constantly being made and unmade, with Islanders holding all of it together with warp- and weft-like voyages.”

The Ancient Art of Voyaging is part of a week-long Native Seas educational program in the Bay Area, presented by the Berkeley Center for New Media (BCNM), curated by Sophia Perez, UC Berkeley PhD and coordinator of BCNM’s Indigenous Technologies series, with support from UC Berkeley’s Chancellor's Advisory Committee for Student Services (CACSS), the Critical Pacific Islands Studies Collective (CPISC), and the Pacific Islander (PI) Initiative. Native Seas bring several traditional navigators, including students and relatives of revered Master Navigator Papa Mau Piailug, from the Northern Mariana Islands to the Bay Area. These distinguished navigation teachers represent the only two remaining schools of traditional Pacific navigation and carry forward ancient knowledge systems that have guided oceanic travel for centuries without modern instruments. As teachers, their work is foundational to keeping the ancient art of traditional navigation alive, and they will be visiting CalAcademy and UC Berkeley to foster intellectual exchange and create visibility for Pacific Islander and Indigenous communities.

Join us for an unforgettable evening of storytelling, seafaring wisdom, and navigation like you've never known it before!