LECTURE: Hawaiian LANGUAGE

Hawai'i, is the correct spelling "ha-VAI-ee."

Although people that speak Hawaiian find some basic mutual understanding of other Polynesian languages, the languages are NOT interchangeable and the Hawaiian (very melodic) language is endangered. Although it is only 13 letters (5 vowels (a, e, i, o, and u) and 8 consonants (h, k, l, m, n, p, w, and '), it is incredibly versatile, rich, and descriptive.

The Hawaiian society was a highly literate society in the late 19th Century (they had 15 Hawaiian-language newspapers even though they did not have a written form until 1860 ), but the language was banned in schools after 1896 due primarily to colonization and missionaries. In the 1970’s it started to come back. English is the primary language in Hawaii except for the privately owned island of Ni‘ihau. The longest word, lauwiliwilinukunukuʻoiʻoi, (a type of f long-snouted fish). The term "wikiwiki" means fast, which inspired the name for Wikipedia.

ALOHA has many meanings beyond "hello," including love, mercy, and compassion Interestingly it is like the word SHALOM in Hebrew which means hello, goodbye, peace, harmony, wholeness, completeness, prosperity, welfare, and tranquility. It is not just the absence of conflict, but the presence of wellbeing and safety, the absence of war. “All that is written in the Torah was written for the sake of peace”, since the world is preserved, by justice, by truth, and by peace.Baca selengkapnya