Defiant Indigeneity - (Critical Indigeneities) by Stephanie Nohelani Teves (Paperback)

About the Book

"...theorizes Indigeneity as a performative process, challenging the notion that it can be understood in terms of a prescribed set of unchanging cultural signs. ... Indigenous identity is made up of shared community understandings about belonging that is performed and articulated in multiple settings and contexts. For Kanaka Maoli people, Teves shows that Indigeneity is represented and articulated through the idea of "aloha," a concept that is at once the most significant and most misunderstood word in the Hawaiian lexicon" --

Book Synopsis

"Aloha" is at once the most significant and the most misunderstood word in the Indigenous Hawaiian lexicon. For Kānaka Maoli people, the concept of "aloha" is a representation and articulation of their identity, despite its misappropriation and commandeering by non-Native audiences in the form of things like the "hula girl" of popular culture. Considering the way aloha is embodied, performed, and interpreted in Native Hawaiian literature, music, plays, dance, drag performance, and even ghost tours from the twentieth century to the present, Stephanie Nohelani Teves shows that misunderstanding of the concept by non-Native audiences has not prevented the Kānaka Maoli from using it to create and empower community and articulate its distinct Indigenous meaning.

While Native Hawaiian artists, activists, scholars, and other performers have labored to educate diverse publics about the complexity of Indigenous Hawaiian identity, ongoing acts of violence against Indigenous communities have undermined these efforts. In this multidisciplinary work, Teves argues that Indigenous peoples must continue to embrace the performance of their identities in the face of this violence in order to challenge settler-colonialism and its efforts to contain and commodify Hawaiian Indigeneity.

Review Quotes

"A vital contribution. . . . Scale[s] an impressive breadth of performance media that demonstrate the diversity of Kanaka Maoli life and resistance to colonialism."--The Drama Review

"One of those rare books that captures the spirit of a moment. . . . If questions about the performance and politics of 'authenticity' inform and bedevil your work, then this book is for you."--Reading Religion

"Reckons with issues that affect many of our communities, from the consumption of our lands and cultures to continued marginalization of varied expression."--H-Net Reviews