Conversations on human geography and island studies

Like many edited collections, this volume had its genesis in conference presentations and ensuing conversations, and that has been explained in the first chapter. But what edited collections capture less often is that these conversations may extend beyond the boundaries of a given conference venue and may involve more than the relatively discrete communications between one or more editors and several authors who produce individual chapters. I have wanted to unsettle the 'how' of the edited collection in two ways, and this and the next chapter are evidence of that aspiration - but I have explained much of that motivation in Chapter 1. Here, let me just remind the reader that this collection is intended to be read as a group effort, an ongoing exploration among colleagues.

What follows, then, is the edited transcript of a synchronous, recorded telephone conversation in October 2015 that was held over several time-zones spanning from Hawaii to Tasmania via the United Kingdom The two-hour conversation was prepared for in two ways: first with all of us reading each other's chapters (with the exception of the introduction and Royle's retrospective and prospective views which follows this chapter); and second with each of us then generating questions for a collective discussion on the basis of that reading. Those questions were then circulated in advance of our teleconference call, and many of them were covered in the discussion that unfolds below.