"Return to Kahiki: Native Hawaiians in Oceania."

In 1907, John Tamatoa Baker, the former royal governor of Hawaiʻi island, businessman, and aloha ʻāina, wrote a series of letters to Ke Aloha Aina during a voyage through Oceania. His voyage allowed him an opportunity to develop not only relationships with other Oceanic peoples, but also a nuanced understanding of Hawaiʻi as part of a broader pan-Oceanic culture. At the same time, his own complicated history as both aloha ʻāina and entrepreneur led to a constant struggle between his capitalist and anti-imperial understandings of Oceania.

Dr. Kealani Cook is an Assistant Professor at the University of Hawaiʻi-West Oʻahu. His recently published monograph, Return to Kahiki examines Native Hawaiian relationships with the rest of Oceania in the nineteenth century. His current research examines trans-Oceanic intellectual and cultural exchanges

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