No Makou Ka Mana: Liberating the Nation

Winner - 2015 Samuel M. Kamakau Award for Hawaii Book of the Year Winner - 2015 Ka Palapala Pookela Award of Excellence in Hawaiian Language Culture and History No Mkou ka Mana asserts that the founders of the Hawaiian Kingdom exercised their own agency and were not just acted upon by foreign powers. The ruling alii selectively appropriated tools and ideas from the West--including laws religion educational models protocols weapons printing and map-making technologies seafaring vessels clothing names and international alliances. The result? A hybrid system based on an enduring tradition of Hawaiian governance intended to preserve strengthen and maintain the lhui. Using rare primary documents and "iwi optics " Kamanamaikalani Beamer offers a new point of reference for understanding the motivations methods and accomplishments of Hawaiis great leaders. No Mkou ka Mana is exhaustively researched carefully written and powerfully argued...a major contribution to Hawaiian history and Hawaiian studies...The clear analysis engaging narrative and original voice will serve as inspiration to other small nations and indigenous peoples the world over." --Noenoe Silva "Beamers study highlights native agency in the face of Western imperialism. This is a dicey political trade-off for Knaka Maoli who must sacrifice the role of victim--and its political potential for reparation--in order to explore the nature of native cooperation and engagement with Europeans and Americans and their nineteenth-century imperialist agendas...Ultimately if we are to have a clearer sense of what colonialism really is in the modern age--not just about conquest but more about influence and hegemony--we need this book." --Jonathan Kay Kamakawiwoole Osorio