Tag Archives: hawaii

The Origin of the Hawaiian Fishhook Pendant

Nationality: American
Age: 50's
Occupation: Shopkeeper
Residence: Lahaina, HI
Performance Date: March 18, 2014
Primary Language: English

Context:

I was wandering through some of the shops in Lahaina, wondering about the abundance of fishhooks that could be worn as necklaces. So I asked one of the shopkeepers about them.

 

Interview:

Me: So I was curious as to where the practice of wearing fishhooks originated. Do you know?

Informant: There are many wild tales as to how the practice started. I had a customer about ten years ago who was very concerned about because of his religious beliefs. He wanted to buy a fishhook but was worried about its pagan connotations.

Me: Okay. Makes some sense I suppose.

Informant: Yes. So I contacted a friend who lives on another island about this. And his response was that the Hawaiians never wore their fishhooks.

Me: Okay.

Informant: The Hawaiians were a purely practical culture. And for them, they would not have worn their fishhooks as ornamentation. They would only carve them to use. So when you hear these legends of safe voyage and this and that – that is not true. However, I do have some examples of one of the few things that the Hawaiians did wear. You see these things here that look like hooks? [Pictured above]

Me: Yeah.

Informant: They look like hooks, but they’re not. They are something that was only worn by the royalty, the ali’i, or the representative of a royal. They are called paloas, which roughly translates as “whale’s tooth” or “tongue of the chief,” and they would wear massive ones on dozens of strands of braids. And that was one of the few things that the Hawaiians wore as a culture. This then translated, over time, along with the importance of the fishhook to the Hawaiian peoples, into the practice of wearing fishhooks as ornamentation. Also, these are mostly Maori designs that we have, not Polynesian. So this is one possible origin of the fishhook as ornamentation. I hope that answers you questions.

Me: Yes. It does. Thank you very much.

Informant: You’re welcome

 

Analysis:

To me, it is odd that something that has become such a major part of the consumer culture of Hawaii, something that is often seen as being traditional Hawaiian ornamentation, actually was not used for ornamentation at all. Yes, the fishhook is an incredibly important aspect of the Hawaiian culture, as the Hawaiian’s main source of protein came from the sea. There were no large land animals, no large game birds. Pigs, cattle, cats, dogs, and chickens only came to the Hawaiian Islands when the Europeans brought them. Thus, the fishhook would have been extremely important to the Hawaiians, an idea that was then taken by the tourist industry and turned into a decorative consumer item. I personally even have a fishhook on a length of cord that I got in Hawaii (the Big Island) years ago. Yet, the fishhook as decorative ornamentation has become so ingrained in Hawaiian culture that it might as well have become a folk tradition. It has become part of the traditional Hawaiian culture.

“The Story of Maui”

Nationality: Chinese-American
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Honolulu, HI
Performance Date: March 2013
Primary Language: English
Language: Chinese, Hawaiian

 

            The informant is from Honolulu, Hawaii and she first heard the myth in elementary school, where she explained she learned most of the folklore and traditional stories related to Hawaii due to the inclusion of what she called “cultural education” in classroom curriculum. A practicing Hula dancer, the informant also picked up stories during her dance classes as a child. The informant also explained that the myth was authored into a song by Israel Kamakawiwo’ole, a popular Hawaiian folk singer who encouraged Hawaiian sovereignty by reviving and popularizing traditional Hawaiian stories.

           

             Maui―like the island―was a demigod. Well, he was better than a person but he wasn’t a deity. He was a super trickster kind of guy; he was fun, and sneaky, like a hero. Maui is actually in a lot of Hawaiian stories, but one of the popular ones that a lot of kids know is that he was canoeing with his brothers when he received a message from a god. It might’ve even come to him in a dream, but it had definitely come from a god. The message was that if he went fishing, he would pull up a huge catch, um, but he couldn’t turn around to look at it or he would lose his catch. So he and his brothers are paddling, and Maui feels his line go taut. He pulls it, it’s really heavy, but he keeps pulling as the canoe moves forward. One of his brothers, the story goes, turns around, and because the brother looked the line snapped. Turn out, Maui had actually pulled up the Hawaiian islands. That’s why Hawaii is shaped like a chain, with the big island and the small ones trailing behind it. They descend in size because that’s what they looked like coming out one by one from the ocean. It’s actually said that there would have been more Hawaiian islands. . .but somebody looked.

 

            The story the informant retold bears all the classic indicators of a myth. It takes place in a pre-world (or, in this case, “pre-Hawaii”) setting, the characters involved are of divine or semi-divine importance, and it describes the genesis of a land and its people―the story of Maui is, more narrowly, a creation myth.

            The myth’s presence in Kamakawiwo’ole’s song immediately reminded me of stories about Hercules. The lyrics retell a string of Maui’s heroic deeds much in the same way books on Greek mythology usually dedicate a chapter or more to describe the (lengthy) list of Hercules’ achievements. The informant explained that Kamakawiwo’ole encouraged a resurgence of a Hawaiian identity movement through his music, and his lyrics clearly illustrate the pride Hawaiians should have in their land and culture. For Kamakawiwo’ole’s musical rendition of the myth, please see his “Maui Hawaiian Sup’paman,” produced  by Big Boy Records.  

The god Maui forms the Hawaiian islands

Nationality: Japanese-Korean-Hawaiian
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: May 1, 2013
Primary Language: English

My informant was born and raised in Hawaii. He talked about one of the Hawaiian myths that he learned while growing up:

“So one of the stories of ancient Hawaiian folklore is the story of Maui—the God Maui, and how he pulled up the Hawaiian islands. So one day, Maui being a little bit mischievous in his own right, tricked his brothers to take him out fishing. But as he paddled, Maui was on the other side of the canoe, and so he tossed his line. But instead of letting it hook a fish, he dropped it all the way down to the sea floor. And so his brothers, surprised by the large ‘fish’ that Maui caught, asked Maui what was going on. But Maui, the trickster that he is, convinced his brothers that it was just a really big fish. And so his brothers pulled and pulled, and eventually, Maui brought up what we know today as the Hawaiian islands.”

This story is a myth because it takes place “before” the real world, and has a sacred truth value. It is an example of a creation story; it explains how something came to be. This story has been passed down since the times before there were any scientific explanations of volcanoes or how they worked. Because of its antiquity and its association with an important Hawaiian god, this story is still told to people like my informant. Knowing this story connects him to the ancient Hawaiians and reinforces his own identity as a local Hawaiian. Thus, the functions of this folklore evolved: it was originally explanatory, and now its significance lies more in its cultural relevance. People no longer refer to it to explain how the Hawaiian islands came to be, but it is still a valuable piece of folklore because it keeps old Hawaiian beliefs and customs alive.

**For a written recording of this story, see Maui Goes Fishing by Julie Steward Williams (1991). It is a published version of the same story; it was written and illustrated for children.

Maui lassos the sun

Nationality: Japanese-Korean-Hawaiian
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: May 1, 2013
Primary Language: English

My informant was born and raised in Hawaii. He talked about one of the Hawaiian myths that he learned while growing up:

“There’s a story about Maui. One day, Maui’s mother was complaining that the days were too long, so the things she was trying to dry—cloth or something like that, I’m not too sure—were being damaged by the sun. So Maui went and got a rope made out of his sister’s hair. He climbed up to the tallest mountain. There, the stories differ in variation a bit, but the one that I learned when I was growing up said that as the sun was rising, he managed to lasso one of the sun’s rays and pull the sun into a shorter orbit. This made the days shorter. In another variation, which I don’t remember too well, apparently Maui’s blind grandmother was at the top of the mountain and he had to convince her that he was his grandson.”

The literal meaning of this story may seem rather nonsensical. It is hard to picture someone actually lassoing the sun with a rope made of human hair. Yet with myths, the literal truth is not the important part. Myths have a sacred truth; they are thought to have happened in a time and place beyond the “real” world. This particular myth explains why the days are not as long during some parts of the year. My informant remembers this myth because his parents told it to him growing up, and it was repeated at Hawaiian cultural events held at his school. It is told time and time again because it is rooted in the Hawaiian oral tradition and it connects older times to the modern day. One reason people retell this myth is to try to understand the culture of their ancestors and to remember their beliefs. In that way, they pay their respects to ancient Hawaiian culture as they respect the myth and tell it to future generations.

**For a written recording of this folklore, see the book How Maui Slowed the Sun by Suelyn Ching Tune. It is a published version of this same story; it was written and illustrated for children.

Poi

Nationality: Japanese-Korean-Hawaiian
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles
Performance Date: May 1, 2013
Primary Language: English

My informant was born and raised in Hawaii. He talked about a particularly special food that is important in Hawaii, and then talked about how it is linked to Hawaiian culture in general:

“So poi is a very important food to the ancient Hawaiian culture. And supposedly the poi plant—the taro plant—came from the son of the main god, which is probably the sun god I believe, named Wakea. And so, supposedly when the ancient Hawaiians ate poi, it was kind of a family affair. The males were the ones to pound it and prepare it. It’s pounded out… basically you have to turn it into a paste. So you take the taro root, which is  kind of starchy, kind of like a potato. You just pound it out into a paste and add a little bit of water to it so you get the right consistency. And poi was a sacred food so nobody could be like, angry around the table when you ate poi, so it brought families together. And the way you ate poi was to take your index finger and middle fingers and dip them into the first joint of the poi bowl, and everyone would dip their fingers into the poi bowl and eat poi like that. And it was supposed to symbolize purity, or something like that, I’m not too sure. Personally, local Hawaiian culture is like… You won’t eat poi that often, it’s not quite continued specifically from ancient Hawaiian culture. So when you eat poi now, it’s generally not the same affair as it was during ancient Hawaiian days. So you’ll usually eat it with a Hawaiian meal with like, lomi lomi salmon or something like that. But it definitely hasn’t carried over with all of the same connotations to today. The production of it is dying out a bit, but some groups are trying to keep the ancient Hawaiian traditions alive. But normally now, if you get poi, you’ll just go to the supermarket and get a bag of poi. Personally, it’s kind of bland, so I don’t care for it that much, but I know people who definitely like it. I still eat it today at potlucks with my family. Generally, if people get together and have parties, we will just have potlucks as opposed to big luaus. Luaus are generally more festive for tourists who come down to have the Hawaiian experience. So anyway, the rule I was always brought up with was, ‘Bring more food than you ate.’ So we would get together and have potlucks after baseball games on Saturdays. So Saturdays would always have a giant assortment of food placed out from all different families, often including poi. But yeah, local Hawaiian culture is different from ancient Hawaiian culture. Generally Hawaiian people are kind of known to be really friendly and stuff, and to a large extent, I find that to be true. A lot of Hawaii people are generally chill. But it’s definitely not the culture you see like, on postcards.”

My informant describes how poi inherently carries a great deal of significance. There are special guidelines for how it is supposed to be prepared and eaten. These customs all promote a pleasant experience; there is no room for negativity around the table where poi is served. Eating poi is supposed to involve family and friends, so it brings people together. As my informant explained, the traditions surrounding poi are more formal when it is presented to tourists during a luau than when it is served at local potlucks. He talked about the differences between stereotypes about Hawaiians and what he actually thinks is true about locals; he agrees that locals have a positive vibe, but they don’t live life like postcards. Even so, they still make efforts to carry on some traditions, like eating poi. Although the poi itself may not be particularly tasty to my informant, he still appreciates its historical and cultural significance. He thinks that traditions like eating poi with each other help foster the kind of “chill,” positive, relaxed mindset that local Hawaiians have.