Pounding drums, throaty voices and electronic pulses rock my CD player. I have entered the world of Oceania, a remarkable musical collaboration between Maori poet and singer Hinewehi Mohi and Jaz Coleman, lead singer of the British post-punk band Killing Joke. Although Mohi characterizes the Maori as "precious feathers" blown about by global forces, her music, which sets traditional chants to a techno soundtrack, celebrates their ability to surf the winds of change.

We often imagine peoples like the Maori as existing pristine and timeless, within a display case at a natural-
history museum. Yet cultures have never remained static or isolated; even in ancient times, war, trade and migration made their marks. Now, rapid transportation and global communication and commerce accelerate change. The anthropologist Renata Rosaldo compares the high-speed transformations of cultures to a garage sale, where "cultural artifacts flow between unlikely places, and nothing is sacred, permanent or sealed off." We need to recognize the richness, diversity and creativity of this garage-sale culture. Hinewehi Mohi sings in her people's traditional language, yet to a techno beat, enabling her songs to escape national boundaries and enter the global marketplace.