University of Hawaii at Hilo Catalog 2011-2012

Ka Haka ʻUla O Keʻelikōlani College of Hawaiian Language Graduate and Post-Baccalaureate Certificate Programs

Home » Graduate Education » Ka Haka ʻUla O Keʻelikōlani College of Hawaiian Language Graduate and Post-Baccalaureate Certificate Programs

For information on the graduate and post-baccalaureate certificate programs, please contact:

Director Kalena Silva, Ph.D. (kalena_s@leoki.uhh.hawaii.edu)
Kanakaʻole Hall 235
200 W. Kāwili Street
Hilo, Hawaiʻi 96720-4091
Tel: (808) 974-7342
Fax (808) 974-7736

Or contact: Graduate Programs Coordinator Scott Saft, Ph.D. (scott_s@leoki.uhh.hawaii.edu)
Web: www.olelo.hawaii.edu/khuok/

Professors:

  • Kalena Silva, Ph.D.—Hawaiian language, music, literature, hula;
  • William H. Wilson, Ph.D.—Hawaiian language and linguistic analysis, comparative Polynesian linguistics;

Associate Professors:

  • Alohalani Housman, M.Ed.—Hawaiian and indigenous education
  • Kauanoe Kamanā, Ph.D..—Hawaiian and indigenous education;
  • Charles M. Langlas, Ph.D.—Hawaiian culture and history, nineteenth century texts, oral history
  • Hiapo K. Perreira, M.A.—Hawaiian literature, oratory, religion

Assistant Professors:

  • Makalapua Alencastre, M.A.—Hawaiian and indigenous education
  • Jason D. Cabral, M.A.—Hawaiian language and linguistic analysis
  • Kekoa Harman, M.A.--hula
  • Noelani Iokepa-Guerrero, Ph.D.— Hawaiian and indigenous education
  • Keiki Kawaiʻaeʻa, M.Ed.—Hawaiian and indigenous education
  • Larry L. Kimura, M.A.— Hawaiian lexicon, Hawaiian poetry composition and exposition, native speaker documentation and corpus analysis
  • Yumiko Ohara, Ph.D.—descriptive linguistics, discourse analysis, pragmatics, second language learning
  • Scott Saft, Ph.D.—descriptive linguistics, discourse analysis, pragmatics

Vision and Mission of the College

ʻO ka ʻōlelo ke kaʻā o ka mauli— Language is the fiber that binds us to our cultural identity.

Consistent with the official status of the Hawaiian language in the state constitution, the Hawaiʻi state legislature mandated in 1997 the establishment of a college at the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo, with classes and staff meetings to be conducted through the Hawaiian language. Established by the University of Hawaiʻi Board of Regents in 1998, UH Hilo’s College of Hawaiian Language, Ka Haka ʻUla o Keʻelikōlani, was named in honor of Ruth Keʻelikōlani Keanolani Kanāhoahoa, the nineteenth century high chiefess known for her strong advocacy of Hawaiian language and culture.

The mission of the college is first to seek the revitalization of the Hawaiian language and culture, endangered by the dominance of Western culture in the twentieth century, so that both language and culture once again become commonplace in both educational and non-educational contexts in Hawaiʻi. Secondly, the college seeks to aid other indigenous peoples to revitalize their own endangered languages and cultures. Linguistics, the scientific study of human language, is central to the Ph.D. program of the college and informs its work in all other areas as well.

The college is still small and its post-baccalaureate programs are not fully established. The M.A. program in Hawaiian Language and Literature was initiated in 1998, just after the college was established. The Kahuawaiola Indigenous Teacher Education Program to train Hawaiian speaking teachers for Hawaiian medium schools was initiated in 1999. Two additional graduate programs were initiated later on, the Ph.D. in Hawaiian and Indigenous Language and Culture Revitalization in 2006, and the M.A. in Indigenous Language and Culture Education in 2007. For now, the college’s ability to train students whose indigenous language is other than Hawaiian is limited to the Ph.D. program. The M.A. program in Indigenous Language and Culture Education currently offers only a Plan B practicing track, which requires students to be fluent in Hawaiian language. In the future, when the faculty is larger, the college intends to open a monitoring indigenous education track that will be open to students focusing on other indigenous languages. The college will also open the certificate program in indigenous language and culture revitalization, which aims to give course work to students who have already obtained a bachelor’s degree in order to help prepare them for work as educators, or for entering one of the college’s graduate programs.