[Talk] Gamà: A Webinar on the Philippine Pre-colonial Boat Building Traditions Highlighting the Butuan Boats

via the National Museum of the Philippines, Eastern-Northern Mindanao Regional Museum: A webinar on the Butuan Boats and boatbuilding traditions in the Philippines on 31 May.

In culmination of the National Heritage Month 2021 celebration with the theme “Victory and Humanity: Upholding Filipino Heritage and Identity”, the National Museum – Eastern Northern Mindanao (ENM) in Butuan City has invited our esteemed NMP archaeologists to present about the Pre-colonial Maritime Cultural Heritage highlighting the Butuan Boats in a webinar, entitled “Gamà”, on May 31, 2021 (Monday) at 9-12nn via Zoom and Facebook Live platforms.

With the title “Gamà” which means to build, fabricate, or manufacture, this event aims to highlight the extraordinary boat-building skills and maritime traditions of the pre-colonial Filipinos as represented by the artifacts of the Butuan Boats. In partnership with the NMP Archaeology (AD) and Maritime and Underwater Cultural Heritage Divisions (MUCHD), the NMP-ENM targets to bring this online event to the history and social sciences educators in the region. Primarily we are targeting the high school and college social sciences instructors and students. Interested netizens are also welcomed to join and participate.

Dr. Mary Jane Louise A. Bolunia, PhD of the NMP-AD will give an overview of the Pre-colonial Philippines through the Butuan Archaeological Project.

Dr. Ligaya S. P. Lacsina, PhD of the NMP-MUCHD will present her research and updated findings on the Butuan boats from her Doctorate dissertation at Finders University Australia.

This online activity will be held via Zoom session with maximum of 80 participants and unlimited number of participants via Facebook live through the NM-Eastern Northern Mindanao Regional Museum Facebook page and Youtube. The allotted time for the whole webinar is 3 hours.Since the 1970s, the remains of at least 11 ancient wooden boats have been found buried in the flood plains of Barangay Libertad, Butuan City, all within a 1 km radius of each other. Of the boats reported, five were examined by archaeologists and numbered according to when they were reported. Butuan Boats 1, 2, 4, 5, and 9 have planks edge-joined with wooden dowels and no metal fastenings. Plank-built boats are now rare in the Philippines and are constructed primarily in Batanes and Sulu. Butuan Boats 1, 2, 4, and 5 were also built using the lashed-lug boatbuilding tradition common in maritime Southeast Asia.

To learn more about this, come and join us in this webinar! Click the link to pre-register: https://forms.gle/tKLNoRkHaJfK7tcd6