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Native Hawaiian Culture A. INTRODUCTION The c u l t u r e of n a t i v e Hawaiians is manifested in many f a c e t s of d a i ly l i f e . One of the most important for any c u l t u r e is language. The Commission was f o r t u n a t e to have an expert on the Hawaiian language write t h a t s e c t i o n for the Commission's Report. The second s e c t i o n of t h is chapter d i s c u s s e s c u l t u r e in a d i f f e r e n t c o n t e x t — h i s t o r ic p r e s e r v a t i o n . Another important aspect of the l i v e s of ancient and even p r e s e n t - d ay n a t i v e Hawaiians is the r e l i g i o n as p r a c t i c e d p r i o r to the coming of the American m i s s i o n a r i e s . The next cnapter c o n t a i n s information on the n a t i v e Hawaiian r e l i g i o n , also w r i t t en by a foremost expert in the s u b j e c t. B. THE HAWAIIAN LANGUAGE _V I n t r o d u c t i o n 1/ A n t h r o p o l o g i s t s and c u l t u r al e x p e r t s recognize the c r u c i a l r o le played by language in i d e n t i f y i ng p e o p l e . Language demonstrates the uniqueness of a people , c a r r y i n g with i t c e n t u r i e s of shared e x p e r i e n c e, V The following s e c t i o n is a complete reproduction of the paper prepared by Larry L. Kimura, e n t i t l ed "Language Section of Native Hawaiians Study Commission Report" (February, 1983), w r i t t e n at the d i r e c t i o n of and funded by the Office of Hawaiian A f f a i r s . Mr. Kimura is an i n s t r u c t or in Hawaiian Language, Department of I r . d o - P a c i f i c Languages, at the U n i v e r s i t y of Hawaii, Manoa campus. Minor e d i t o r i a l changes have been made t o conform to the Final R e p o r t 's format, and the footnotes have been renumbered. Except for these changes, l i t e r a t u r e , h i s t o r y , t r a d i t i o n s and r e i n f o r c i n g these through d a i l y use. A unique Polynesian language r e s t r i c t e d to the Hawaiian I s l a n d s is i n e x t r i c a b l y t i e d to the d e f i n i t i on and i d e n t i t y of the Hawaiian p e o p l e. The language is in fact known to the world by the same name as the people themselves—Hawaiian. However, it terms i t s e l f ' o l e l o H a w a i ' i , or Hawai'i language, thus l i k e the English terra recognizing the indigenous s t a t u s of the language unique to these i s l a n d s. There is no mention of the o r i g in of the Hawaiian language in the oral t r a d i t i o n s . The words of the p r o g e n i t o r s , Papa and Wakea, are r e c o r d e d in Hawaiian and it is assumed t h a t the e x i s t e n c e of a s e p a r a te Hawaiian language is as old as t he e x i s t e n c e of the Hawaiian p e o p l e. Although composed of many small communities and four primary g e o g r a p h i c a l d i v i s i o n s , the a n c i e nt i n h a b i t a n t s were able to make a d i s t i n c t i o n between t h e i r own language and languages e x i s t i n g o u t s i d e the t r a d i t i o n a l boundaries of H a w a i ' i. The sense of e t h n i c i t y is recorded in t h e chant of K u a l i ' i , in which a pre-European voyager from the i s l a nd ( c o n t ' d ) Mr. Kimura's paper appears as submitted by OHA and is o t h e r w i se unchanged. The s p e l l i n g of Hawaiian words as they appeared in the o r i g i n al paper has a l s o been r e t a i n e d , even though the s p e l l i n g of some words d i f f e r s from t h a t used in the remainder of t h i s Report. The r e f e r e n c e s used by Mr. Kimura appear in the "List of References," marked with a " [ 2 ] " . OHA s u b s e q u e n t l y sent supplementary information on the Hawaiian language to the Commission, a l s o from Mr. Kimura, and t h is m a t e r i a l is included in the Appendix of t h i s Report.
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