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Full-Text Articles in Hawaiian Studies

E Ho’Omau Mākau, We Will Continue: The Living Sovereign Entities Of Contemporary Hawaiian Songs, Kēhaulani Lagunero Jun 2025

E Ho’Omau Mākau, We Will Continue: The Living Sovereign Entities Of Contemporary Hawaiian Songs, Kēhaulani Lagunero

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the relationship between contemporary Hawaiian mele (songs) and Hawaiian ea (sovereignty), focusing on how mele acts as sovereign living entities representing cultural resilience, identity, and resistance to settler-colonial influences. Through semi-structured interviews with Kānaka Maoli, participant observation at cultural events, and close analysis of mele, I identify that these songs are not only expressions of cultural memory, but also living embodiments of ea—sovereignty because they are alive, and they are alive because they are ea. Drawing from the frameworks of cultural survival, survivance, symbolic power, and defiant indigeneity, I explore how mele actively engage …


The Intersection Of Law And Culture: Native Hawaiian Rights And The Hawaiian Homes Commission Act, Kiana Cablayan-Kennedy, Leia Hernandez May 2024

The Intersection Of Law And Culture: Native Hawaiian Rights And The Hawaiian Homes Commission Act, Kiana Cablayan-Kennedy, Leia Hernandez

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

The Hawaiian Homes Commission Act (HHCA) of 1920 is a crucial legislation for Native Hawaiian rights. The HHCA addresses the socio-economic disparities that Native Hawaiians face, especially after the overthrow of the Hawaiian Monarchy by the United States in 1893. The HHCA entails over 200,000 acres of land for homesteading to Native Hawaiians to preserve Native Hawaiian culture and self-sufficiency. Despite the purpose of the HHCA, multiple challenges have accumulated over the years - precisely the landmark case of Kalima v. State of Hawaii. Kalima v. State of Hawaii brought forth issues from 1959 through 1988 but became a civil …


Sovereignty, Statehood, And Subjugation: Native Hawaiian And Japanese American Discourse Over Hawaiian Statehood, Nicole Saito May 2021

Sovereignty, Statehood, And Subjugation: Native Hawaiian And Japanese American Discourse Over Hawaiian Statehood, Nicole Saito

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

Although discourse over Hawaiian statehood has increasingly been described by scholars as a racial conflict between Japanese Americans and Native Hawaiians, there existed a broad spectrum of interactions between the two groups. Both communities were forced to confront the prejudices they had against each other while recognizing their shared experiences with discrimination, creating a paradoxical political culture of competition and solidarity up until the conclusion of World War Two. From 1946 to 1950, however, the country’s collective understanding of Japanese American citizenship began to shift with recognition of the community’s military service record and an increased proportion of veterans elected …


Self · Ish: Examining And Reshaping Filipino & Filipinx Identities Within The Continental United States And Hawai’I Via Post-Colonial Literature, Kiana Anderson May 2020

Self · Ish: Examining And Reshaping Filipino & Filipinx Identities Within The Continental United States And Hawai’I Via Post-Colonial Literature, Kiana Anderson

Senior Theses

This thesis explores a conversation between the “self” and Filipino culture to examine the ways the Filipino diaspora exists in literature amongst colonization and trauma. Through literary texts spanning across time and geographical locations, like Elaine Castillo’s America Is Not the Heart and Jessica Hagedorn's Dogeaters, I interrogate the cultural and psychic meanings associated with the concept of home within the context of these hybrid histories. By examining the neo-canonical literature of some of these authors, I interrogate their sense of self, voices and visions via the languages, symbols, cultural frameworks and emotions that are prevalent within the literary …


Living Aloha: Portraits Of Resilience, Renewal, Reclamation, And Resistance, Camilla G. Wengler Vignoe Jan 2015

Living Aloha: Portraits Of Resilience, Renewal, Reclamation, And Resistance, Camilla G. Wengler Vignoe

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

When Native Hawaiians move away from the islands, they risk losing their cultural identity and heritage. This dissertation utilizes a Hawaiian theoretical framework based in Indigenous research practices and uses phenomenology, ethnography, heuristics, and portraiture to tell the stories of leadership, change, and resilience of five Native Hawaiians who as adults, chose to permanently relocate to the United States mainland. It explores the reasons why Kanaka Maoli (politically correct term for Native Hawaiians) leave the 'āina (land; that which feeds) in the first place and eventually become permanent mainland residents. Some Hawaiians lose their culture after relocating to the United …