Category: History

Ichikawa Hakugen’s Critique and Lingering Questions for Buddhist Ethics

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During the first half of the twentieth century, Zen Buddhist leaders contributed actively to Japanese imperialism, giving rise to what has been termed “Imperial-Way Zen” (Kodo Zen). Its foremost critic was priest, professor, and activist Ichikawa Hakugen (1902–1986), who spent the decades following Japan’s surrender almost single-handedly chronicling Zen’s support of Japan’s imperialist regime and pressing the issue of Buddhist war responsibility. Ichikawa focused his critique on the Zen approach to religious liberation, the political ramifications of Buddhist metaphysical constructs, the traditional collaboration between Buddhism and governments in East Asia, the philosophical system of Nishida Kitaro (1876–1945), and the vestiges of State Shinto in postwar Japan.

Despite the importance of Ichikawa’s writings, Imperial-Way Zen: Ichikawa Hakugen’s Critique and Lingering Questions for Buddhist Ethics, by Christopher Ives, is the first book by any scholar to outline his critique. In addition to detailing the actions and ideology of Imperial-Way Zen and Ichikawa’s ripostes to them, Ives offers his own reflections on Buddhist ethics in light of the phenomenon. He devotes chapters to outlining Buddhist nationalism from the 1868 Meiji Restoration to 1945 and summarizing Ichikawa’s arguments about the causes of Imperial-Way Zen.

July 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3331-2 / $52.00 (CLOTH)

Cultural Internationalism and Race Politics in the Women’s Pan-Pacific

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Since its inception in 1928, the Pan-Pacific Women’s Association (PPWA) has witnessed and contributed to enormous changes in world and Pacific history. Operating out of Honolulu, this women’s network established a series of conferences that promoted social reform and an internationalist outlook through cultural exchange. For the many women attracted to the project—from China, Japan, the Pacific Islands, and the major settler colonies of the region—the association’s vision was enormously attractive, despite the fact that as individuals and national representatives they remained deeply divided by colonial histories. Glamour in the Pacific: Cultural Internationalism and Race Politics in the Women’s Pan-Pacific, by Fiona Paisley, tells this multifaceted story by bringing together critical scholarship from across a wide range of fields, including cultural history, international relations and globalization, gender and empire, postcolonial studies, population and world health studies, world history, and transnational history.

“This book places at center stage an organization that embodies many of the crises of colonial modernity that scholars have been grappling with and refracts it through a set of actors and geographical locations that deserve to be better understood and taught widely. Paisley lays out her story in accessible yet analytically sophisticated ways that in turn make manifest the complex unfolding of cultural politics in the Pan-Pacific. The scholarship is extraordinarily impressive and represents the best kind of transnational research there is.” —Antoinette Burton, Bastian Professor of Transnational and Global Studies, University of Illinois

Perspectives on the Global Past
July 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3342-8 / $55.00 (CLOTH)

Eleanor Nordyke at Barnes & Noble, June 28

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Eleanor Nordyke, author and publisher of Pacific Images: Views from Captain Cook’s Third Voyage, Second Edition, will appear at Barnes & Noble, Kahala Mall, on Sunday, June 28, 1:00–2:00 p.m., to sign the newly released second edition of her acclaimed work. She will show a DVD on the topic and display large reproductions of some of the engravings in the book. Pacific Images is distributed by University of Hawai‘i Press.

Ms. Nordyke and Pacific Images were recently featured in the Honolulu Advertiser: http://www.honoluluadvertiser.com/article/20090531/LIFE/905310326.

Traditional Micronesian Societies

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Traditional Micronesian Societies: Adaptation, Integration, and Political Organization, by Glenn Petersen, explores the extraordinary successes of the ancient voyaging peoples who first settled the Central Pacific islands some two thousand years ago. They and their descendants devised social and cultural adaptations that have enabled them to survive—and thrive—under the most demanding environmental conditions. The dispersed matrilineal clans so typical of Micronesian societies ensure that every individual, every local family and lineage, and every community maintain close relations with the peoples of many other islands. When hurricanes and droughts or political struggles force a group to move, they are sure of being taken in by kin residing elsewhere. Out of this common theme, shared patterns of land tenure, political rule, philosophy, and even personal character have flowed.

June 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3248-3 / $42.00 (CLOTH)

Carlos Andrade at Limahuli Garden

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Limahuli Garden and Preserve in Ha‘ena is offering for the first time ever a moonlight event. “Mo‘olelo Under the Moon,” a new program, kicks off on Saturday, June 6, 7:30-9 p.m. This outdoor series will offer the rare opportunity to learn of Kaua‘i’s cultural history while experiencing the majesty of Limahuli at night. The first talk features Carlos Andrade, who will share some of the stories from his recent book Ha‘ena: Through the Eyes of the Ancestors. Advance sales are available immediately and proceeds will benefit Limahuli Garden. Fore more information, go to http://www.ntbg.org/sharing/news.php?id=550.

Jon Davidann at Pearl Harbor’s Pacific Aviation Museum Theater

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Hawai’i Pacific University professor Jon Davidann will hold a presentation at Pearl Harbor’s Pacific Aviation Museum Theater on Saturday, June 6, 2009, 2:00–4:00 p.m., and Sunday, June 7, 2009, 2:00-4:00 p.m. The presentation, entitled “From Perry to Pearl Harbor,” will trace the history of war in the Pacific from Admiral Perry’s arrival in Japan in 1853 to December 7, 1941. Dr. Davidann is the editor of Hawai`i at the Crossroads of the U.S. and Japan before the Pacific War, published this year by University of Hawai`i Press.

Call 808-441-1000 by June 3 for reservations. Attendance is free with paid admission to the Museum. For more information, click here.

UH Press Authors at the 2009 Ka Palapala Award Ceremony

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Jon Van Dyke (right) receiving one of three awards for Who Owns the Crown Lands of Hawai‘i?

Carlos Andrade with Maenette Benham, dean of the Hawai‘inuiakea School of Hawaiian Knowledge, UHM

Jon Van Dyke (second from left) and his wife, Sherry Broder, with Divorce with Decency author Brad Coates and his wife, Sachi Braden

For more on the 2009 Ka Palapala Awards, view our 13 May 2009 post below.

Asian Settler Colonialism Forum

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Editors Candace Fujikane and Jonathan Okamura will lead a public forum on their groundbreaking book Asian Settler Colonialism: From Local Governance to the Habits of Everyday Life in Hawai‘i at the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai‘i, Saturday, May 23, 2009, 1:00-2:30 p.m. In a series of essays, contributors from various fields and disciplines investigate aspects of Asian settler colonialism to illustrate its diverse operations and impact on Native Hawaiians. Contributor Haunani-Kay Trask, author of From a Native Daughter: Colonialism and Sovereignty in Hawai‘i, is among the guest speakers scheduled to participate in the forum. For more information on this and other upcoming JCCH events, click here.

Candace Fujikane and Jonathan Okamura will participate in the panel “Island Settler Colonialism” at the Hawai‘i Book and Music Festival, May 17, 2009, at Honolulu Hale. Click here for more details.

Hawaii Book and Music Festival 2009

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University of Hawai‘i Press will be among the local publishers participating in the Hawai‘i Book and Music Festival this weekend, May 16-17, 10 am-5 pm, at Honolulu Hale. Admission and parking are free to the general public.

UH Press authors Jon Van Dyke (Who Owns the Crown Lands of Hawai‘i), Heather Diamond (American Aloha: Cultural Tourism and the Negotiation of Tradition), Davianna McGregor (Na Kua‘aina: Living Hawaiian Culture), Carlos Andrade (Ha‘ena: Through the Eyes of the Ancestors), Richard Hamasaki (Westlake: Poems by Wayne Kaumualii Westlake; From the Spider Bone Diaries: Poems and Songs), Witi Ihimaera (The Uncle’s Story; Woman Far Walking, distributed for Huia Publishers, NZ), Gary Pak (Children of a Fireland; A Ricepaper Airplane), Robert Barclay (Melal: A Novel of the Pacific), Jon Thares Davidann (Hawai‘i at the Crossroads of the U.S. and Japan before the Pacific War), and Candace Fujikane and Jon Okamura (Asian Settler Colonialism: From Local Governance to the Habits of Everyday Life in Hawai‘i) will be leading or participating in numerous panels and discussions at the festival. Click here for a detailed schedule of events.

UH Press Titles Honored at the 2009 Ka Palapala Award Ceremony

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University of Hawai‘i Press books were among the winners at this year’s Ka Palapala Po‘okela Awards Ceremony, held on May 9, 2009, at the Bishop Museum. The awards are presented by the Hawai‘i Book Publishers Association to recognize the finest books published during the previous year.

Who Owns the Crown Lands of Hawai‘i, by Jon M. Van Dyke, took three top honors: Excellence in Hawaiian Culture, Text/Reference, and Nonfiction. The Nation calls Van Dyke’s book “definitive. Who Owns the Crown Lands of Hawaii? [is] certain to become the standard reference for that question.”

Ha‘ena: Through the Eyes of the Ancestors, by Carlos Andrade, received Honorable Mentions for Excellence in Hawaiian Culture and Nonfiction. Andrade’s work is an ambitious attempt to provide a unique perspective in the complex story of the ahupua‘a of Ha‘ena.

Dying in a Strange Land, by Milton Murayama, received an Honorable Mention for Excellence in Literature. Familiar faces from All I Asking For Is My Body, Five Years on a Rock, and Plantation Boy return to advance the story of the Oyama family from the years immediately following World War II to the 1980s.

Haena Now Available in Paperback

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Ha‘ena: Through the Eyes of the Ancestors, by Carlos Andrade, is now available in paperback. Ha‘ena received Honorable Mentions for Excellence in Hawaiian Culture and Nonfiction at the 2009 Ka Palapala Po‘okela Award Ceremony, sponsored annually by the Hawai‘i Book Publishers Association.

Ha‘ena is a land steeped in antiquity yet vibrantly beautiful today as any Hollywood fantasy of a tropical paradise. He ‘aina momona, a rich and fertile land linked to the sea and the rising and setting sun, is a place of gods and goddesses: Pele and her sister, Hi‘iaka, and Laka, patron of hula. It epitomizes the best that can be found in the district of northwestern Kaua‘i, known to aboriginal Hawaiians as Hale Le‘a (House of Pleasure and Delight). This work is an ambitious attempt to provide a unique perspective in the complex story of the ahupua‘a of Ha‘ena.

May 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3410-4 / $18.00 (PAPER)

Carlos Andrade will discuss Ha‘ena and moderate the panel “Holding Fast to the Land” at the Hawai‘i Book and Music Festival, May 16-17, 2009, at Honolulu Hale. Click here for more details.

Damien by Aldyth Morris Back in Print

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“A moving, theologically perceptive monologue delivered by Father Damien. In fervent, plain-spoken language, Morris’ play evokes the strength and spirituality of this complex man of God whose life of service to ‘a festering mass of flesh’ was assailed by contemporary detractors and also by his own inherently self-doubting nature.” —Booklist

The acclaimed Hawai‘i Public Television production of Morris’ play, starring Terence Knapp as Father Damien, received a Peabody Award in 1978.

Also available from University of Hawai‘i Press:

“Holy Man: Father Damien of Molokai by Gavan Daws

“May be the best biography of Damien yet written. Carefully researched and reported, the author’s fascination with the man and the disease is transmitted to the reader.” —Library Journal

Leper Priest of Molokai: The Father Damien Story by Richard Stewart
“Rather than portraying his subject as a plaster saint, Stewart provides a full-bodied portrait of an inspirational, yet admittedly flawed, human being.” —Booklist

Molokai by O. A. Bushnell
This absorbing historical novel set in the late 1800s in Kalaupapa, where Damien ministered, “searches the hearts of the doomed and damned with an intense compassion. The author has painted the background of his novel with a knowing brush. . . . A vivid experience for the reader.” —New York Times Book Review

Father Damien will be canonized on October 11, 2009.

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