Dennis kawaharada biography

About the author.
The following oral history transcript is the result of a recorded interview with Dennis Kawaharada (DK) on July 10, 2023.
After earning English degrees from the University of Hawai'i and the University of Washington, Kawaharada taught and lectured for 35 years, at institutions.

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Dennis Kawaharada was born in Agana, Guam, in 1951, to nisei parents Makita and Matsuko, who moved to Guam from Hawaiʻi that year for work. In 1953, the family moved back to Hawai’i and settled in rural Kāne’ohe, where Kawaharada attended public schools, graduating in 1969. In essays collected in “Local Geography” (2004), he describes seminal multicultural experiences growing up and living in Hawai'i. In “Personal reflections on home territory,” posted at Amazon Book Reviews, one reader wrote, “I really enjoyed and appreciated this very personal account of growing up and seeking a deep understanding of the author's home—Hawaii. The author is of Japanese ancestry and describes what it was like through childhood, college and establishing adulthood on the island of Oahu—how the races related and how he grew to increasingly set roots in his home. ... Some of the discussion of races in Hawaii is quite frank but refreshingly honest.” A reviewer at “Honolulu Weekly” wrote, “Kawaharada is a gifted essayist—in his hands, the book's title piece becomes in equal parts discussi

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Happy Readers

Review of Local Geography: Essays on Multicultural Hawai’i. Ragnar Carlson. Honolulu Weekly. Vol 9, June 8-14, 2005.

In this collection, Dennis Kawaharada, a noted chronicler of native Hawaiian literature, explores the historical and contemporary terrain of his beloved Hawai’i. From a memoir of boyhood days in Kane’ohe to a travelogue from a recent expedition to the Northwest Hawaiian Islands, each of these essays weaves Kawaharada’s experience into something larger, creating a remarkable tapestry of cultural, personal and natural history. Kawaharada is a gifted essayist–in his hands, the book’s title piece becomes in equal parts discussion of the Hawaiian calendar, historical biography of Hawaiian literary figures and exposition on “Moolelo o Pakaa a me Kuapakaa,” a native Hawaiian chant in which the speaker circles O’ahu, naming each ahupua’a and each wind along the way. The opening essay, “Mango Trees on Kea’ahala Road,” explores the alienation and confusion that result when one&#
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The Wind Gourd of La‘amaomao, by Moses Nakuina, translated into English by Esther Mookini and Sarah Nakoa. Revised Edition: 2016. ISBN-13: 978-1517198961. 144 pages. $12.95.
Click on the cover image or title for more information.
Reviewer’s Comment: This saga of the 16th century heroes Ku-a-Nu‘unanu, his son Paka‘a, and Paka‘a’s son Ku-a-Paka‘a is a refreshing story offering rare insights into pre-contact Hawai‘i.... Mookini and Nakoa’s The Wind Gourd of La‘amaomao is yet another important conribution to the growing canon of precious Hawaiian works rendered into English. —Niklaus R. Schiweizer, The Hawaiian Journal of History, Vol. 25 (1991).
Reviews
Available from Amazon.com.
(Out of Print at UH Press)
Lā‘ieikawai by S.N. Haleole tells the story of the wooing of a young native chiefess of great beauty and high rank, her fall from grace, and her final deification among the gods. The story was serialized in Hawaiian in 1862-1863 in Ka Nupepa Kuokoa and published as a book in