Island World: A History of Hawai'i and the United States (Volume 8) (California World History Library)

Island World: A History of Hawai'i and the United States (Volume 8) (California World History Library) by Okihiro, Gary Y.. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9780520252998.

Brilliantly mixing geology, folklore, music, cultural commentary, and history, Gary Y. Okihiro overturns the customary narrative in which the United States acts upon and dominates Hawaii. Instead, Island World depicts the islands press against the continent, endowing Americas story with fresh meaning. Okihiros reconsidered history reveals Hawaiians fighting in the Civil War, sailing on nineteenth-century New England ships, and living in pre-gold rush California. He points to Hawaiis lingering effect on twentieth-century American culture―from surfboards, hula, sports, and films, to art, imagination, and racial perspectives―even as the islands themselves succumb slowly to the continental United States. In placing Hawaii at the center of the national story, Island World rejects the premise that continents comprise "natural" states while islands are "tiny spaces," without significance, to be acted upon by continents. An astonishingly compact tour de force, this book not only revises the way we think about islands, oceans, and continents, it also recasts the way we write about space and time.