The article delves into Hawaii's intricate cultural landscape, revealing the deep connection its people have with the land, or ʻāina. Through voices of cultural practitioners and historians like Evan Mokuahi Hayes, it highlights the healing powers of the land, with intimate reflections on personal and collective identity. Dr. J. Uluwehi Hopkins stresses the worldview of stewardship over ownership, a perspective that honors ancestral ties to the land. The article explores historical shifts, including Western contact and the implications of land ownership, linking them to the preservation of Hawaiian culture and identity in contemporary times.
Hawaii has this beautiful way of, even when you have nothing to give, it will meet you there; it has a way of healing broken parts of you.
We have cosmogonic genealogies that say we grew right out of the land here, that the land itself is our ancestors.
Our Hawaiian chiefs wanted to form a government that other nations would respect and therefore interact with in an equal way.
The Hawaiian people actually didn't want land ownership, but the government enacted it because they realized that if we established land in a way that had an owner, if another foreign power came and took us over, they had to respect the landowners.
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