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Island World: A History of Hawai'i and the United States (Volume 8) Paperback – October 28, 2009

by Gary Okihiro (Author)
4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 12 ratings
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Brilliantly mixing geology, folklore, music, cultural commentary, and history, Gary Y. Okihiro overturns the customary narrative in which the United States acts upon and dominates Hawai'i. Instead, Island World depicts the islands' press against the continent, endowing America's story with fresh meaning. Okihiro's reconsidered history reveals Hawaiians fighting in the Civil War, sailing on nineteenth-century New England ships, and living in pre-gold rush California. He points to Hawai'i's lingering effect on twentieth-century American culture―from surfboards, hula, sports, and films, to art, imagination, and racial perspectives―even as the islands themselves succumb slowly to the continental United States. In placing Hawai'i at the center of the national story, Island World rejects the premise that continents comprise "natural" states while islands are "tiny spaces," without significance, to be acted upon by continents. An astonishingly compact tour de force, this book not only revises the way we think about islands, oceans, and continents, it also recasts the way we write about space and time.
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  1. Print length
    326 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    University of California Press
  4. Publication date
    October 28, 2009
  5. Dimensions
    5.6 x 0.82 x 7.7 inches
  6. ISBN-10
    0520261674
  7. ISBN-13
    978-0520261679
  8. See all details
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Editorial Reviews

Review

“All will come away intrigued and enlightened.” ― Publishers Weekly Published On: 2008-06-16

“A startling perspective and a compelling one.” -- John Whitehead ― Wall Street Journal Published On: 2008-10-17

From the Inside Flap

"This quirky, brilliant book gives the reader the thrill of cultural history done well. Okihiro undertakes a conventional topic in a jarring way, avoiding the assumption of set boundaries of nations and human societies."―Henry Yu, author of Thinking Orientals: Migration, Contact, and Exoticism in Modern America

"This beautifully written book integrates the history of Hawai'i into that of the U.S. better than any other I have ever read." ―Patricia Seed, author of American Pentimento: The Invention of Indians and the Pursuit of Riches

Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ University of California Press; First Edition (October 28, 2009)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Paperback ‏ : ‎ 326 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0520261674
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0520261679
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1 pounds
  • Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.6 x 0.82 x 7.7 inches
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.6 4.6 out of 5 stars 12 ratings

About the author

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Gary Y. Okihiro

Gary Y. Okihiro

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Gary Y. Okihiro is professor of international and public affairs at Columbia University, and is the founding director of Columbia's Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race. He is a past president of the Association for Asian American Studies, and the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Studies Association.

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4.6 out of 5 stars
4.6 out of 5
12 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

Leo
5.0 out of 5 stars A poetic history of Hawaii with seemingly obscure stories that ...
Reviewed in the United States on February 25, 2017
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A poetic history of Hawaii with seemingly obscure stories that are proven to impact the entirety of the United States. A refreshing perspective.
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rosete1
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United States on January 4, 2018
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excellent scholarly method and content - there's a lot of history in this history
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Rocco
4.0 out of 5 stars Fresh and Welcome Perspective
Reviewed in the United States on December 16, 2011
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Often, when historians analyze the history of what we label an "island," we analyze the impact of continental political forces upon the island and its culture. Gary Okihiro has taken the opposite approach in his book Island World. The people of the Hawaiian Islands brought historical and cultural meanings to the U.S. In contrast to the "civilized" Western view of the world, which divides the Earth into continents and seeks to manipulate the meanings and functions of nature through science, the Polynesian peoples of the Pacific, in Okihiro's estimation, were (are) one with nature and their water civilization. For the peoples of the Pacific, history and geography do not occur within the Western imaginary confines of the continent and nation-state. Rather, all lands upon the Earth are, in a sense, islands, moving upon and connected with the massive plates that create the Earth's crust. Thus, Okihiro presents a multi-faced, fluid approach to world history, through the lens of the Hawaiian people, where cultures impact other cultures regardless of Westernized conceptions of geographic location. Okihiro analyzes these cultural exchanges through stories of religion, music, gender, film, education, travel, war and literature.

Okihiro's opening chapter provides a poetic, organic and feminine view of the land and sea that is Hawai'i. Earth is power to be revered and worshiped in Hawaiian social existence, as Hawaiians view themselves as a product of their environment, of volcanic birth. The Pele story, Okihiro claims, shows that "the volcanic fire-queen," like the Polynesian people of the Pacific, was unfettered by notions of time and space. Rather, Hawaiians, like their Polynesian descendants, lived in "a land not rooted and anchored to one spot, but [a land] that floated free" (22). Moreover, the peoples of the Pacific, coming to life and living in a volcanic geography, had indigenous roots that few cultures or peoples on Earth could relate to. As Okihiro shows for the remainder of his tome, such an existence and history had (has) much to offer U.S. culture and society. However, Western society sought to engage the feminine origins of Hawaii and its people with the masculine approach of imperialism.

Polynesian culture, specifically Hawaiian culture, clashed with white, Christian European and American paternalistic values and ambitions. Foreign visitors viewed the Hawaiian Islands themselves in the framework of Western scientific rationalizations rather than Hawaiian cultural realities. For example, volcanoes held religious, metaphoric life meanings for Hawaiians while Europeans typically saw only natural beauty through the lens of science. One American painter describes the Crater of Kilauea as one "I shall always think of as a piece of a dead world" (39). In another example, Okihiro characterizes the American bombing of Mauna Loa to divert its lava flow as "an assault against and desecration of the sacred earth, the gods and ancestors, and the Hawaiians" (41).

Okihiro provides numerous examples of the cultural exchange emanating from Hawaii toward the U.S. Surfing, a center of Hawaiian social and religious life, had a profound impact not only on American social life, but also upon its film and music industries. Hawaiian music was highly sought after in the 1920's U.S. and influenced blues and country music as well. Hawaiians served with U.S. forces during the War of 1812 and with Union forces during the American Civil War. Hawaiians were also actively engaged in gold mining and speculation in California after 1848. In essence, "the island acted upon and moved the continent" (211).

Perhaps most important are Okihiro's depictions and perceptions of U.S. missionary culture, race and gender in relation to Hawaiians. The Second Great Awakening initiated a creation of and large flow of missionary societies that sought to "civilize heathen societies." Although abolitionism and temperance found their roots in this religious movement, the movement itself still contained racial and gender driven motivations, as Okihiroi makes clear in his analysis of the missionary, "educational" work of Samuel Armstrong. Hawaiian citizens and immigrants were often treated in the same light as Native and Black Americans. White Americans were often chastised for or forbidden from miscegenation. Moreover, schools were created to assimilate non-white cultures, and hence eviscerate their indigenous identities.

This social movement coincided with the expansion of the U.S. marketplace in a westward trajectory, with capitalist entrepreneurs seeking to monopolize the fur and sugar trade across the Pacific. By the late 19th century, social constructs of manliness that had emasculated Native American societies throughout the century, sought to emasculate non-white, indigenous peoples, including Hawaiians (and islands themselves), across the Pacific while simultaneously proving white manliness through imperialization. This was, indeed, the so-called "White Man's Burden."
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