"Kanaka"

Letter to the Editor I WAS interested in your issue of February last, in which appeared a letter from Mr. Leopold G. Blackman, of Paea, Tahiti, wherein he correctly contends that “ kanaka“ as a name is not now regarded as approbrious for Poly nesian or Melanesian mankind.

In many parts of the Pacific, these people ( kanakas , or men) were engaged as labourers, voluntarily or by conscrip tion. The term thus became synonymous of a labourer, and kanaka lost its actual meaning. In the same way the national name of the Slavonic people of Europe means the “Free people,” but in the course of misfortune of a large section of this nation, they became the serfs of their conquerers. And thus arose the term “Slave” —a person no longer free, but a forced worker, a person in servitude.

Now, as to the term kanaka , it means a man, and in its fullest sense conveys the meaning that he is an intelligent human being—as distinct from the lower orders of biological creation. The word kanaka is, therefore, fully the equivalent of the English term man, or in its adjectival sense, manly, or endowed with human dignity. Hence such an expression as <( noho-tangata” —to live a dignified human life; also the term “hoo-kanaka” (Hawaii), “faka~tagata” (Tonga), and the Maori “whaka-tangata”— all meaning to be or act manly or with dignity. The Maori form is, in fact, the motto of the famous school, Te Aute College, and also of this Association It may interest those who are students of the Pacific Islands languages—that the word tangata or kanaka, in many variant dialectical forms, is traceable throughout the Pacific. The well-known Polynesian philologist, E. Tregear, sets forth in his “Polynesian Comparative Dictionary” that a similar word, with the primary mean ing of “man or human being” is traceable even beyond Polynesia, and westward through Melanesia, to Malaya, the Celebes, Philippines, and even to Formosa.

I am, etc.,

George Graham.

Te Akanana Maori Association.

Auckland, NZ, May 4, 1944.

Letter to the Editor KANAKA is a purely Hawaiian word.

Early missionaries to the group forced the sound and spelling of “k” on Hawaiian speech, while eliminating altogether the “t” sound, then in use in the Hawaiian Islands.

When the first syllable is accented, kanaka means Hawaiian —e.g., wahine kanaka, an Hawaiian woman. With the

accent on the second syllable it means man.

My people may be reduced to 30 full bloods, but they are still Hawaiians. The above remarks on the word kanaka are facts. Your previous correspondents showed that they knew nothing whatso ever of the Hawaiian language.

I am, etc.,

Hoapili Wahine.

Polynesian Club, 250 George St., Sydney.

May 30, 1944.