Legacies of a Hawaiian Generation

Judith Schachter is Professor of Anthropology and History at Carnegie Mellon University. She has been doing fieldwork in Hawai`i for more than two decades. Her publications include Kinship with Strangers: Adoption and Interpretations of Kinship in American Culture (University of California Press, 1994) and A Sealed and Secret Kinship: The Culture of Politics and Practices in American Adoption (Berghahn Books, 2002). Her research includes articles on family and housing policies and, currently, on the movement for indigenous rights in Hawai`i (in Social Identities, 2011).

Through the voices and perspectives of the members of an extended Hawaiian family, or `ohana, this book tells the story of North American imperialism in Hawai`i from the Great Depression to the new millennium. The family members offer their versions of being "Native Hawaiian" in an American state, detailing the ways in which US laws, policies, and institutions made, and continue to make, an impact on their daily lives. The book traces the ways that Hawaiian values adapted to changing conditions under a Territorial regime and then after statehood. These conditions involved claims for land for Native Hawaiian Homesteads, education in American public schools, military service, and participation in the Hawaiian cultural renaissance. Based on fieldwork observations, kitchen table conversations, and talk-stories, or mo`olelo, this book is a unique blend of biography, history, and anthropological analysis.

Preface and Acknowledgments