The multiplicity of Hawaiian sovereignty claims and the struggle for meaningful autonomy

White Mothers, Brown Children: Ethnic Identification of Maori‐European Children in New Zealand

“…Scholars have noted that the institution of fractional identities and their associated nomenclature (i.e., half‐caste) reflected Victorian ideas of race as well as political efforts to circumscribe the size of indigenous populations (Kukutai, 2004; Smith et al, 2006). This was certainly true for Maori although, distinct from American Indians (Snipp, 1997) and Native Hawaiians (Kauanui, 2005), they were rarely called upon to authenticate their blood claims. Instead, there was wide latitude to interpret the western construct of blood from a Maori paradigm, in which the most important marker of identity was whakapapa or genealogy connecting the individual to kinship networks of whanau (immediate and extended family), hapu (subtribe) and iwi (tribe; see Walker, 1990).…”

Beyond Ethnicity, Into Equality

“…While this portrayal confirms one way in which ethnic tensions have been dealt with in the islands, continuing socio-economic inequality as a direct result of decades of global capitalism in Hawai'i suggests that confronting various forms of racisms and taking the transnationality of migrant histories seriously are just first steps. Admittedly, the play's conspicuous silence on vocal native Hawaiian challenges to immigrant and settler presences in the islands bespeaks the complexity surrounding cultural politics and native Hawaiian sovereignty claims in Hawai'i, which are by no means unified or homogenous as often assumed (Kauanui 2000). For instance, even though the US senate has rejected the now infamous Akaka Bill that would have granted native Hawaiians federal recognition as indigenous people, some indigenous activists actually opposed the bill, which they feel is not radical enough.…”