National PBS documentary features UH Hilo’s efforts to perpetuate Hawaiian language

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Kauanoe Kamanā, Larry Kimura, Pele Harman, and UH Hilo’s Ke Kula ʻO Nāwahīokalaniʻōpuʻu laboratory school are featured in film to be broadcast March 19.

Pele Harmon with group of girls.
Pele Harman is a teacher at Ke Kula ʻO Nāwahīokalaniʻōpuʻu, UH Hilo’s Hawaiian language immersion school for elementary and high school students. She bears the name of the fiery goddess of Hawaiʻi Island’s Kilauea volcano – where she also brings her fifth grade class to practice a traditional mele, a chant about the goddess written by her own great-grandmother. (File photo)
Kauanoe Kamanā portrait in garden setting as she gives interview.
Kauanoe Kamanā, principal of the Nāwahī School, was part of a group of teachers who spearheaded the Hawaiian language movement, with a focus on creating new, young native speakers. They did it without formal experience, teaching materials, or support from the state government. (File photo)

What does it take to save a language? Poet Bob Holman travels across the globe to uncover answers — including a stop in Hawaiʻi to feature ongoing efforts to perpetuate the native language.

Language Matters with Bob Holman makes its Hawaiʻi broadcast premiere Thursday, March 19 at 8:00 p.m. on PBS Hawaiʻi.

Filmed around the world, the two-hour documentary features Hawaiʻi in the third of three acts.

Among those featured are UH Hilo’s Kauanoe Kamanā, associate professor and director of Ke Kula ʻO Nāwahīokalaniʻōpuʻu. Nāwahī is the laboratory Hawaiian immersion school headed by UH Hilo’s Ka Haka ʻUla O Keʻelikōlani College of Hawaiian Language.

Larry Kimura, associate professor of Hawaiian language and Hawaiian studies at UH Hilo served as a Hawaiian language consultant on the film. He edited language concerns and organized project visits and filming of Nāwahī’s school program.

Larry Kimura casual portrait, indoor setting with artwork in the background.
Larry Kimura grew up listening to his grandparents, who were among the last native Hawaiian speakers in their community, and is now a professor at the University of Hawaiʻi at Hilo. He is a leading figure in the Hawaiian language movement, having worked extensively on documentation, revitalization, and language planning for Hawaiian. (File photo)

Also featured in the film is Pele Harman, who teaches at Nāwahī.

Others in the film from UH are Lolena Nicholas, Kawaihuelani Center for Hawaiian Language instructor, and Puakea Nogelmeier, UH Mānoa Kawaihuelani Center for Hawaiian Language professor. Also from around the state: Kepa Maly, W.S. Merwin, Kealiʻi Reichel and Kauʻi Sai-Dudoit.

Holman makes two other global stops in the film:

  • In Australia, Holman visits Charlie Mangulda, an Aboriginal songman (poet), who is the only person left on the planet who speaks Amurdak. With linguist Nick Evans, Holman also flies to Goulburn Island off the coast of Northern Australia, where he meets a community of 400 people speaking ten languages, many endangered, all vulnerable.
  • In Wales, Holman explores the humor, rage and lyricism of the Welsh people, who brought their language back from the edge of extinction. Currently, three million people live in Wales and speak the native language.

-PBS media release

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