Becoming the Unaine
Becoming the Unaine is a collaborative exhibition by linguist Tereua Miracle Oliphant Kaintoka and photographer Liz Louise Johnson.
The project focuses on the island nation of Kiribati, a small country of approximately 112,000 people in the central Pacific Ocean. Kaintoka and Johnson first met in a university classroom where Kaintoka, a linguist and i-Kiribati scholar, was teaching the first university-level course dedicated to the Kiribati language and culture. Among the first group of students was Johnson, who had recently returned from living in Kiribati for eighteen months. In this classroom, a seed was planted that would later grow into the beginnings of this project.
Six years later, the two reunited and returned to Kiribati to create a project that allowed them to step into a shared circle: a love of the Kiribati people and language, and the common ground of womanhood. It was in this space that Becoming the Unaine was created.
The project centers on the translation of the Kiribati word unaine: a respected elderly woman of wisdom. Kaintoka and Johnson chronologically recreated the arc of womanhood, beginning with pregnancy and continuing through menarche and marriage. It weaves together one lived life through seven women at different ages.
This weaving is significant. Kiribati, a low-lying nation in the central Pacific, is one of the most vulnerable places on earth to climate change. Recent reports warn that the islands may become uninhabitable within the next 30 to 60 years. With this urgency in mind, Becoming the Unaine gathers stories from what may be one of the last generations of women to live in an uninterrupted lineage on their ancestral land. This exhibition marks a moment in time when the land, the language, and the people are still united.