The Abiding Salience of the Local in a Global Age · Inspired by Benedict Anderson’s seminal work...

Oceania in the Age of Global Media Peter Britos, editor, Special Issue of Spectator 23:1 (Spring 2003) 83-98.

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On January 27, 1997, in his introduction of Hawaii’s Last Queen to a national PBS audience, historian David McCullough, host of The American Experience, labeled the 1893 overthrow of the hereditary monarchy of Hawaiì as “an unfamiliar story to most Americans today.”1 Then McCullough acknowledged another audience not only familiar with, but invested in, this story: “In Hawaiì, however, the subject is anything but old hat and interpretations of what ac-tually happened differ sharply, depending on who’s telling the story.” McCullough recognized—but located elsewhere— the pro-duction of history as an essentially political project; he linked an environment of contesta-tion to local politics and familiarity with “the story.” His allusion to Hawaiì recognizes the situated nature of public memory, of the im-portance of not only who’s telling the story, but who’s hearing it, and where.

Inspired by Benedict Anderson’s seminal work on imagined communities, scholars across disciplines have rediscovered the centrality of place as site of memory and desire and locus of identity formation in a postmodern world characterized by intense and often disorienting fl ux.2 Although the na-tion-state, or nation-ness to follow Anderson, remains the central ideational construct, the local and the global have become increasingly salient in the imagining and materialization of communities. This essay considers how historical stories appeal to “imagined com-munities” within local, national, and global formations through an examination of Ha-waii’s Last Queen and fi ve productions from

Hawaiì all of which share a focus on 1890s Hawaiì. I follow public historians who recognize the signifi cance of the local in the creation of public memory and of Cultural Studies scholars who emphasize the impor-tance of the formation, the dissemination, and the use of cultural products.3 I begin with an assumption that contexts, particulars of pro-duction, and specifi c uses combine to shape understandings of media texts. I also begin with Michael Roth’s penetrating questions: “What is the point of having a past, and why try to recollect it? What desires are satisfi ed by this recollection?”4 Two crucial fl ashpoints in Hawaiian history—the overthrow of Queen Liliùokalani and the Hawaiian nation in 1893 and the U.S. annexation of Hawaiì in 1898—function as symbols of, and necessity for, a growing movement for native sovereignty in Hawaiì, a movement that deeply complicates the concept of nationhood. Where stories of the overthrow and annexation fit in a Ha-waiian centennial account, in a discourse of

CAROLYN ANDERSON

The Abiding Salience of the Local in a Global Age The Case of Hawaiian History

Act of War: The Overthrow of the Hawaiian Nation, 1993

Hawaiian sovereignty, in an American narra-tive of expansionism and treatment of native peoples, in geopolitical struggles for inde-pendence or in global corporate marketing schemes are among the questions this essay addresses.

The National Community: Hawaii’s Last Queen for The American Experience (1997)In the 1980s and 1990s, The American Expe-rience, produced at WGBH in Boston, was the only regularly scheduled prime-time television historical documentary series in the United States. It is arguably the most influential series and certainly the most acclaimed. Created in 1987 by the late Peter McGee, the series takes an aggressive stance in (re-)organizing the discourse of national memory, and in presenting itself as sensitive to the multicultural diversity contained with-in what is nonetheless a metanarrative labeled “the American experience.”

In 1991, with an eye on the 1993 centennial of the overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy, independent producer Vivian Ducat submit-ted a proposal to The American Experience for a project that would consider the overthrow as a factor in the debates in America around “what it meant to be imperial.”5 Ducat met with (then) executive producer Judy Crichton and senior producer Margaret Drain, who expressed financial concerns and encour-aged Ducat to seek additional funding, which she did, unsuccessfully. Several years later Crichton indicated renewed interest in “the Hawaiian idea.” She cautioned that The Ameri-can Experience thinks in terms of characters an audience could relate to, and suggested that the story be told through the life of the queen. A start-up time of May 1995 was set.

The American Experience front office encouraged Ducat to select a native Hawai-ian associate producer (Nicole Ebeo). On her fi rst scouting trip to Hawaiì and later when she returned to fi lm, Ducat’s association with a well-known, well-funded national series operated as both access and obstacle. 6 Ducat described the situation: “People had their

backs up. I was an outsider getting national funds to make a film about their story…I had to gain their trust and I did that by do-ing my homework.”7 That homework was partially assigned by the academic advisors Ducat chose: Davianna Pomaikaì McGregor (University of Hawaiì, Manoa) and Ten-nant McWilliams (University of Alabama, Birmingham). The American Experience urges producers to employ both a specialist and generalist, and to consult them at all stages of the process. McGregor became an important local link. Ducat struggled with the expecta-tions and suspicions of a community which has often been misrepresented and whose “judgment [she] felt on [her] shoulders the entire time” and, simultaneously, her contrac-tual obligations to produce a fi lm that would be understandable and interesting to “people in Nebraska, and the people in Miami and the people in Seattle and the people on farms and people who live in big cities.” 8

Ducat’s solution to this dilemma is a bio-graphical piece deeply admiring of the last Hawaiian queen. McCullough introduces Liliùokalani’s story as part of the drama of turn-of-the-century American expansionism. Nevertheless, Ducat’s emphasis is on Hawai-ian loss, rather than American conquest, on Hawaiian isolation, rather than American intervention. Hawaii’s Last Queen begins with a prologue that swiftly accomplishes several narrative and conceptual moves. The narrator opens with, “Just a century ago, there was an isolated kingdom…a beloved

Queen Liliùokalani, circa 1893

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queen…removed from her throne... It was a great loss to her people.” An elderly Hawai-ian woman, Thelma Bugbee, says, “If you can imagine something within your own culture that is tremendously important to you . . . to-tally ripped out and gone. If you can imagine yourself relating to something like that, that’s what we went through.” The narrator men-tions Liliùokalani’s background and training. Aaron Mahi, Conductor, Royal Hawaiian Band, comments, “Liliù…knew the values of both sides. Knew the inevitable of what was going to happen to Hawaii.”

This prologue promises a story of a great woman, whose life was filled with accomplishment, drama, and intrigue. A sympathetic local elder invites an audience of presumed outsiders to “relate to” a wrench-ing loss. A respected member of the Hawaiian community refers to the last queen familiarly while describing “what happened to Hawaiì” as “inevitable.” The rest of the documentary elaborates on a theme of tragic inevitability. The off-screen narrator (Anna Deavere Smith) and nine on-screen storytellers collaborate, with one notable exception, to present the biography of an honorable and wise leader, whose commitment to peace was used against her and her people in an immoral and illegal overthrow, orchestrated by greedy business-men. Strongly opposing this interpretation is Honolulu newspaper publisher Thurston Twigg-Smith, grandson of Lorrin Thurston.

The narrator provides a telling context: “Lead-ing the opposition was a young, hot-headed lawyer and journalist named Lorrin Thurston. He formed a secret society of white business-men.” Twigg-Smith describes Kalakaua [who preceded Liliùokalani on the throne] as a man aching for absolute power. He then of-fers these motives: “He [Thurston] wanted, as did the other members of that group, to do what the colonists had done in 1776, which was to throw off the yoke of monarchy and take on the civil rights and other things of a democracy. And they believed that was in the best interests of the Hawaiians and I believe so, too.” Twigg-Smith invocation of American democracy is clearly an attempt to seize the moral high ground as heir to and apologist for his grandfather’s actions. Twigg-Smith’s po-sition—one that dominated written history for most of the twentieth century—seems includ-ed as a gesture toward “objectivity,” which is a goal of The American Experience, according to Executive Producer Margaret Drain.

By personal preference and following se-ries guidelines, Ducat eschewed historical re-enactments, but she employed a moving camera perspective through various histori-cal locations (which The American Experience encourages). In arranging a location shoot, Ducat encountered a diffi culty that illustrates the resonance of history in contemporary Hawaiì: owners of Victorian homes were unwilling to have their residences photo-graphed as the meeting place where the overthrow was planned. They presumed their homes would be recognizable and mark them as sympathetic to the overthrow. Ducat did not need to fi nd local actors willing to express unpopular opinions, for she shunned the now common style of voicing historical sources. Liliùokalani is quoted on eleven occasions, but the quotations are presented as quotations. This strategy simultaneously draws listeners into Liliùokalani`s thoughts, yet maintains a sense of historical distance.

The biography builds to the climax of the Queen’s abdication, then moves swiftly to annexation. The last on-camera speaker recalls the first in displaying the emotional

Act of War: The Overthrow of the Hawaiian Nation, 1993

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THE ABIDING SALIENCE OF THE LOCAL IN A GLOBAL AGE

dimensions of public memory. Malcolm Naea Chun has spoken before, with conviction and from a [Hawaiian] nationalist perspective, but with restraint. In his final appearance, Chun describes the lowering of the Hawai-ian flag and the insult of its being cut into small ribbons, then given to the sons and daughters of missionary families as “tokens of remembrance…of their great victory over the Hawaiian kingdom and the end of the tyranny of the Hawaiian monarchy.” While speaking, Chun lowers his eyes, and his voice cracks; then, as he concludes, he suddenly looks up in sadness and proud resolution. The narrator briefly recalls Liliùokalani’s last years, as an American citizen, and her death. The fi lm ends with off-screen chant-ing, images of the Hawaiian shore, and these words: “For weeks after her funeral, strange events were recorded in the islands. Volcanoes erupted and the seas turned an odd hue, from the sudden appearance of a multitude of red fi sh. It was as if the elements recognized that the kingdom was no more.”

Hawaii’s Last Queen premiered at the

Hawaiì International Film Festival in Honolulu in October 1996 with a special “Governor’s screening,” after which Ducat spoke briefly. Local reviews and responses were generally favorable, some strongly so; others were tempered in their praise, with two reoccurring complaints: the absence of discus-sion of the on-going sovereignty movement and the mispronunciation of Hawaiian words by the narrator. Since The American Experience policy is to focus only on the past, Ducat had followed the series template. The second criti-cism struck a nerve, although here, too, Ducat had followed the series practice of utilizing a “box office” narrator. After considering local performers, Ducat chose Anna Deavere Smith, because of her vocal skills and her national reputation. Audiotapes of all Hawai-ian words in the narration were prepared by a Hawaiian speaker for Smith’s tutoring. Yet sometimes good intentions, hard work, and professional skill are not enough. Others from the resident community found quite different faults: Thurston Twigg-Smith considered the documentary “biased and one-sided,” distort-

Queen Liliùokalani, circa 1881 Queen Liliùokalani, circa 1893


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ing “major elements of Hawaiian history”; a review from “The MAN” posted this warn-ing: “Viewers should look with a critical eye to see how much of this program is truth and how much is misleading propaganda de-signed to infl uence local politics.”9

In January 1997, PBS broadcast Hawaii’s Last Queen nationwide. Almost seven million viewers—more than typical for the series and far more than American Experience executives anticipated—saw the documentary. Original reviews responded positively to the fresh-ness of an unfamiliar historical tale. With an array of headlines, hundreds of newspapers ran a complimentary Associated Press piece written by Honolulu-based Ron Staton that demarcates audience expectations: “Beyond Hawaiì, Queen Liliùokalani, the islands’ last monarch, probably is best known as the composer of Aloha Òe. But to native Hawai-ians, Liliùokalani is the revered symbol of their loss of sovereignty.” Staton later quotes Ducat as saying, “This is not a film about sovereignty. I tried to stay out of local politics.”10 In March 1998, The American

Experience programmed a national re-broad-cast of Hawaii’s Last Queen and cleared the documentary for foreign broadcast and satellite transmission world-wide. The docu-mentary is marketed vigorously through PBS video catalogs in three formats. PBS handles video sales, with the series receiving 50% of the profi ts. In 2003, PBS continued to maintain a web site on Hawaii’s Last Queen, providing a transcript, bibliography, information on Liliùokalani’s 160 musical compositions (with Aloha Òe performed by The Galliard String Quartet in RealAudio), a quiz on Hawaiì, and a teacher’s guide on “cultural values, expansionism, politics, racism, exploi-tation.”11

The Local Hawaiian Community: Telling the Story of the Overthrow of 1893For a decade before the 1997 broadcast of Hawaii’s Last Queen to a nation-wide audi-ence, producers in Hawaiì, operating from a variety of funding bases and political agen-das, had told the story of Queen Liliùokalani and the overthrow of 1893.

National Guard of the Provisional Government of Hawaiì in front of ‘Iolani Palace, 1893

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1. Hawaiì Public Television Production: Hawaiians (1987)Like many public television stations, KHET in Honolulu carries a small permanent staff, and often recruits from the local production community for specific projects. That was the case for an ambitious three-part history of Hawaiì produced by the Hawaiì Public Broadcasting Authority (with corporate back-ing from Bank of Hawaiì) in 1987. Hawaiians was produced by Lynn Waters of the KHET staff and directed by Roland Yamamoto. By the mid-1980s, the Islands had experienced a full decade of “Hawaiian Renaissance,” a period of renewed interest in and admira-tion for Hawaiian culture. Hawaiians taps and extends such interest and admiration in a sweeping, three-hour series, promoted as “the definitive historical account of the na-tive people of the most famous islands in the world.”

Part Two, Innocence Betrayed, presents the 1800s as a century of loss, dramatized as a tragedy in three acts, as the losses accumulate and deepen: first, of a uniquely Hawaiian culture, then, of the people’s land, and, fi nally, of the Hawaiian kingdom. A typical off-screen narrator guides understandings of the visual material, displayed as evidence. Also typical-ly, a chain of “experts” appear and reappear, their comments linked, sometimes one to another, but more commonly to a narration presented as conclusive. All nine commenta-tors are Island residents; most of them are Hawaiian.12 They selected their own self-labels. Kekuni Blaisdell, who has the most speaking turns, presents himself as “M.D., Citizen of the Hawaiian Nation.” Many locals would recognize Blaisdell, a founder of Ka Pakaukau, a coalition of sovereignty groups, and a University of Hawaiì Medical School professor instrumental in establishing clin-ics for Hawaiians. For all viewers, Blaisdell introduces a subtext of political action with his forceful self-description.

What is atypical stylistically in Innocence Betrayed is the use of actors impersonating historical personages, literary characters and historical types, quoting from written sources

in direct address. Here juxtaposition drives the editing strategy whereby the words of a historical person will be challenged by the comments that follow, sometimes from anoth-er “historical person,” at other times from a contemporary expert, thereby creating a rheto-ric of rebuttal against the words and actions of the colonizers and the once-standard histories of Hawaiì. This representational style drives the first two acts; then, when the chronicle reaches the 1870s the re-enactments disappear, with one notable exception: Luliuòkalani, the last monarch, directly addresses the camera three times. These appearances—ghostly, and visually jarring—have an intriguing perfor-mative quality. Although her comments range from 1887 to 1893, her dress and physical ap-pearance do not change. The result suggests memory embodied; her personal memory and also a public memory. First, she describes her 1887 return to Hawaiì from England and her subsequent realization of “a conspiracy against the peace of the Hawaiian kingdom”; then, she recounts the circumstances by which she was “compelled to take the oath to the Constitution which had led to the death of [her] brother.” Finally, she reads the letter in which, under protest, and to avoid bloodshed, with the hope of reinstatement by the United States government, she yielded her authority as the constitutional sovereign of the Hawai-ian Islands.

The narrator’s omniscient voice resumes, providing more historical information paired with early twentieth-century moving images. The narrator sadly concludes:

Liliùokalani, a singular woman, on whom the tragedy of the Hawaiian race fell, lived 77 years. On her death in 1917, 139 years after the arrival of Cook, fewer than 40,000 Hawaiians survived. The people were gone; the heroes were gone; the religion was gone; the land was gone; the spoken history of 2,000 years was gone; and, with her passing, the last Hawaiian hope was gone, too.

According to historical researcher and co-writer, Ellen Pelissero, a central goal of the series was to educate young Hawaiians and to make them proud of their history. The producers wanted Hawaiians “to definitely


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be from the Hawaiian perspective.”13 Conse-quently, Waters, Yamamoto and Pelissero—all from Hawaiì, but not Native Hawaiian—ap-proached their task with considerable trepidation and consultation. Many ap-plauded their work. Pelissero tells of a young Hawaiian man who, after watching the televi-sion series, told Yamamoto “My aunties and my grandmother told me I should be proud I’m Hawaiian, but until last night, I didn’t know why.” Some challenged the limits of empathy, criticizing the series for not having been written by a Hawaiian, or a person fl uent in the Hawaiian language.14

The producers of Hawaiians expected to broadcast (and rebroadcast) only in the Is-lands, but the series has enjoyed a far wider reach over a considerably longer period of time than anticipated. KHET broadcasts the three-part series annually and public televi-sion stations on the continent continue to rebroadcast it. Video rental copies are avail-able at commercial outlets in the Islands; the series is sold at national chain stores. The Mountain Apple Company, owned by local composer-performer Jon de Mello distributes the series. Because de Mello had a distribution system, Hawaiians has a commercial life that is rare, but probably not unique, for a local public television series. Frequent classroom use and cable casting in the Islands extend the series’ reach and credibility.

2. Hawaiì Public Television Co-Production: Betrayal (1993)Even before the series Hawaiians was produced, Marlene Sai, who portrays Liliùokalani, was linked in the local imagina-tion with the Queen. In the 1960s, Sai recorded some of Liliùokalani’s compositions. She appeared as the Queen in Hear Me, Oh My People, a one-person play written by Don Berrigan presented in Hawaiì in 1984 and in Washington, D.C. in 1987, adding momentum to a growing interest in Hawaiian history. In 1988 the recently elected (and fi rst native Ha-waiian) governor, John Waiheè, encouraged Sai to fi lm her performance.15 With this goal in mind, Sai formed the Kukui Foundation.

For reasons that ranged from the stylistic (the one-person format was too constrictive), to the personal (Sai and the playwright had a falling out), to the scholarly (the screenwriter found the earlier play “grossly inaccurate”), Kukui Foundation decided to produce an original docudrama with a large cast.

To create dramatic situations and dialogue for Betrayal, Pelissero consulted the Queen’s autobiography and diaries and the published memoirs of Lorrin Thurston and Sanford Dole who became central antagonists in the docudrama. There were limits to the elasticity of this technique; consequently, dialogue and composite characters were created. To add action, location shooting, and some levity, a sub-plot about the failed counter-revolution of 1895 was added and local comedy writer Tre-maine Tamyose joined Pelissero as co-writer and Joy Chong as co-director.

A $350,000 grant for the production of Betrayal was secured from the Hawaiì Leg-islature in 1991, but a series of complications caused delays. Nevertheless, the production moved ahead. Kukui Foundation negotiated generous agreements with KHET for its sound stages and the services of its union crew; local actors worked for scale. The shooting sched-ule was tight and began with a traditional Hawaiian blessing of the set. The state leg-islature appropriated a $100,000 completion grant and several local foundations provided fi nancial support for post-production costs. What had been a minority historical perspec-tive in the Islands regarding the overthrow only several years before was becoming a mainstream local perspective.

Betrayal was fi nished by summer of 1992, but Kuki and KHET decided to delay broadcast until January 1993 to position the docudrama as an important part of the observance of the centennial of the overthrow. According to Pelissero, Kukui imagined a local audience of three sub-groups: 1) native Hawaiians, eager to know “their own” history; 2) all students in the state (presumably incorrectly taught that Hawaiians had supported annexation); and 3) the local non-Hawaiian audience, especially the kamaàina haole (white, long-time resident)

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culture who “have their view of history” (which needs correcting). Certainly Betrayal takes the historical view that the Queen was betrayed and her subjects were wronged, but the docudrama ends in 1917 on an optimistic note regarding the possibilities for American justice: Liliùokalani tells her loyal assistant that she has fl own the American fl ag, an un-expected act provoked by her wish to honor the “Hawaiian boys” who died representing America in World War I. She speaks with hope, speculating that since Hawaiians have the vote, they may “be able to vote our lands back.” In contrast to her male friend who can-not, a feminist Liliùokalani can imagine that women, too, will some day vote in America.

Since Kukui Foundation had been turned down, quite unequivocally, for funding from national organizations, there was little ex-pectation of broadcast outside the Islands. However, once Betrayal was completed, Ku-kui successfully negotiated with the American Program Service of PBS. Many PBS stations

showed the docudrama in 1993 and later. The western region of public stations awarded Marlene Sai an honorable mention for her memorable performance. Betrayal is not dis-tributed commercially, but like Hawaiians, it moved easily into the state educational system. In “The Making of Betrayal,” Sai describes the docudrama as the most ambitious local television production ever mounted in Hawaiì, and one that employed “99% local people.” In this way, Betrayal functioned as creative outlet and training ground for the production of local history.

3. Hawaiì Independent Production: Act of War: The Overthrow of the Hawaiian Nation (1993) Na Maka o ka Àina (Eyes of the Land) is a two-person video production company established and operated by Puhipau and Joan Lander.16 Puhipau (also known as Abraham Ahmad, Jr.) was born of a Hawaiian mother and Palestinian father and has lived

Marlene Sai as Liliùokalani in Betrayal, 1993


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in the Islands most of his life; Lander came to Hawaiì in 1970. In 1980 Puhipau and Lander formed a political, personal, and professional alliance. Since 1981 Na Maka o ka Àina has produced more than one hundred videos. In some respects, Na Maka operates as guer-rilla television, but Na Maka’s crucial links to state and federal support mark it as a suc-cessful grassroots company with considerable influence in its own community and an impressive reach beyond it.

Made with extremely modest budgets, sometimes in Hawaiian, and often supported by the Hawaiì Department of Education, Na Maka productions were regularly screened on public access channels throughout the 1980s. In 1991, realizing that the centennial of the overthrow was approaching, and provoked by learning that a non-Hawaiian had plans (which never materialized) for a historical film, Na Maka and colleagues decided they had “better do one that has the Hawaiians’ point of view.” They submitted a proposal

for a documentary on the overthrow to the recently formed Independent Television Ser-vice (ITVS). 17 Their $290,000 proposal was approved; later they received $20,000 from the Native American Public Broadcasting Consortium. For the fi rst time, Na Maka had an operating budget that allowed produc-tion fl exibility and the opportunity to repay a decade of favors. Also for the first time, they had a contractual obligation to create a documentary for a national audience.

Act of War was a joint project, with Uni-versity of Hawaiì Professors Haunani-Kay Trask and Lilikala Kameèleihiwa control-ling the script and Puhipau and Lander making production decisions. The documen-tary opens with a bold prologue of striking contrasts: a female narrator begins a Hawai-ian creation legend; her voice and that story of idyllic island life are ruptured by images and synchronized sound from news footage of protests. Images of Hawaiian land and sea and Hawaiian activism are juxtaposed

Joan Lander and Puhipau during production.

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with the song “Blue Hawaii.” This musical sign of Hollywood Hawaiìthen pairs with visuals of tourism and (sub)urban sprawl. Under footage of a march, the narrator summarizes Hawaiian history and announces a community perspective:

We are the Hawaiian people. These islands have always been our home. We were sovereign over this land before there was an England, long be-fore there was a United States. By the nineteenth century, our independent nation was recognized by the dominant powers of the world. And in 1893, in an act of war, in an armed invasion, and in violation of international law, our nation was taken. And we have been compelled, against our right to self-determination, to become United States citizens.

The news footage continues; a woman in traditional Hawaiian clothing tells a cheer-ing crowd: “We are not American. We are not American. We are not American. We will die as Hawaiians. We will never be Ameri-can.” Cut to title: Act of War: The Overthrow of the Hawaiian Nation.

Most viewers from Hawaiì would recog-nize the events and individuals pictured in the news clips from January 1993; the images of 15,000 marchers and of spokesperson Hau-nani-Kay Trask would operate as reminders of the challenge to public memory mounted by Hawaiian activists. Viewers completely unfa-miliar with Hawaiì could still recognize the iconography of protest and the documentary’s unambiguous rhetorical position.

The fi lm’s strategy is persuasion through historical elaboration. Four scholars—Trask, Kameèleihiwa, Kekuni Blaisdell, and Jon Kamakawiwoòle Osorio—all Hawaiians, all identifi ed with their academic credentials, join the off-screen narrator in telling the story of the overthrow of the Hawaiian nation. Trask is the primary storyteller, with almost fifty turns. Blaisdell is not identifi ed as “Citizen of the Hawaiian Nation” as he had been in Hawaiians, but that citizenship is implied through an attitude of righteous indignation that characterizes the comments of all four speakers. According to Osorio, Act of War is “Native history, revisionist history.” When the historian joined the project, Puhipau pre-

dicted it would be important to Hawaiians and Osorio thinks it has been.18

J. Kehaulani Kauanui argues that Act of War “recreates an indigenous genealogy…and of-fers a new way [for Hawaiians] to make sense of the loss.”19 But the producers also had an obligation to make Act of War accessible to a broad audience, so the hour-long documenta-ry is packed with details of Hawaiian history. Periods are punctuated with grim statistics of catastrophic declines in the native Hawaiian population. More than 100 quotations are incorporated into the audio track. Authors’ names (or publications) and dates appear on screen, but the historical figures are not “enacted.” Instead, drawings, archival photo-graphs, political cartoons, and contemporary photography of historic locations present a visual equivalent of the historicity of the quo-tations. The commentators extend, analyze, and sometimes contradict these fragments of a historical record that is presented as often untrustworthy or incomplete.

Approximately a third of the documen-tary focuses on four crucial days—January 14-17, 1893—which are recalled by Trask, Kameèleihiwa and Osorio. Each speaks directly to the camera, often in the present tense. As elsewhere, quotations are voiced, here edited in an especially rapid tempo. The most obvious rupture in presentational style and mode of argument comes when the source of the title is revealed to be President Grover Cleveland, who said: “By an act of war, the government of a friendly and confi d-ing people has been overthrown. A substantial wrong has thus been done which we should endeavor to repair.”20 The film then shifts to a mele (traditional Hawaiian song) on the soundtrack and archival footage of turn-of-the-century life in Hawaiì on the visual track. Superimposed on these vintage moving im-ages is an English translation of the Hawaiian song lyrics, alternating with captions describ-ing historical events of 1894-96, including the declaration of the Republic of Hawaiì in 1894, the (failed) counter-revolution of 1895 and the imprisonment and subsequent pardoning of the Queen. In a dramatic gesture, English


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narration is silenced.After recalling how “the taking of the

Hawaiian Islands” was pivotal in establishing the United States as a global military power, the narrator concludes with recognizing the tragedy of post-annexation Hawaiian life, not as something that happened in the past to “them,” but as a present, lived experience for “us.” Act of War ends with a call to action:

And what has been the result of becoming part of America? Our children were punished for speaking our native language; taught to be ashamed of our culture, our names, our skin. Our home became America’s playground, their battleground, their 50th state, their real estate. And in our own homeland, we are the homeless, we are the poor, we have the shortest life expec-tancy, we are the uneducated, we fi ll the prisons. But, after more than a century of dispossession, we are still here. Today we are discovering our history, learning our language and asserting our right to the land and to self-determination. The time has come for us, the Kanaka Maoli, to once again take our place among the family of nations.

In May 1993 public screenings of Act of War began in Honolulu; in June it was broadcast on Hawaiì Public Television with little pub-licity; in September with far more. In 1994, it screened broadly in the international fes-tival circuit and aired on public television stations on the continent through the Pacifi c Mountain Network Satellite feed.21 Reviews, locally and globally, were mainly positive, many strongly so; most reviewers considered the documentary historically credible, politi-cally persuasive, and morally necessary.22 In June 1993, while visiting a Hawaiian health clinic, Hillary Rodham Clinton met a friend of the producers of Act of War, who gave her a video copy and asked her to show it to the president. By the end of the year Na Maka was able to add a postscript to Act of War that announced that [then] President Bill Clinton had signed a congressional joint resolution that acknowledged the illegal overthrow of the Kingdom of Hawaiì and apologized to Native Hawaiians on behalf of the people of the United States.23 In 1994, Lander and Puhipau received an offi cial commendation

from the Hawaiì House of Representatives in recognition of their work, with particular mention of the international success of Act of War.

Na Maka also operates as a distribution company for its productions. They have sold over 1,000 copies of Act of War, mostly to American universities (splitting profi ts with ITVS), and have donated an equal number. The documentary is used in many classrooms, often in combination with other Na Maka productions.24 Sporadic screenings at inter-national festivals continue. In 2002-2003 the documentary played on World Link, a global satellite network, on the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network throughout Canada, and on Free Speech TV, another satellite network. For Hawaiians living off-islands, Act of War functions as an important organizing tool for the sovereignty movement.25

Local Hawaiian Community: Telling the Story of the Annexation of 1898In anticipation of the August 12, 1998 cen-tennial observance of the U.S. annexation of Hawaiì and propelled by recent archival fi ndings by a Hawaiian researcher of native petitions against annexation, Na Maka o ka Àina and Hawaiì Public Television both co-produced historical documentaries that extended and deepened the revisionism of earlier productions.

1. Hawaiì Independent Production: We Are Who We Were: From Resistance to Affi rmation (1998)Co-produced by The Hawaiian Patriotic League and Na Maka, this fi fteen-minute video makes a startling claim: there was no annexa-tion of Hawaiì. Through a combination of narration and voiced quotations of historical fi gures, the documentary summarizes recent fi ndings of historian Noenoe Silva that dem-onstrate widespread resistance to annexation. It outlines the requisites for a legal treaty and then argues that Joint Resolution 55, passed by a simple congressional majority in 1898, did not have the effect of a treaty and, thus, American sovereignty has never existed in the

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Islands. The documentary addresses a Hawai-ian community with its assertion that “It is an illusion that we went from being Hawaiian subjects to American citizens.” Before the centennial, the video mobilized this constitu-ency with its mention, after the credit roll, of a planned anti-annexation march for August 12, 1998. The copyright indicates rights reserved under “Hawaiian Kingdom Law.”26

During the summer of 1998 Na Maka distributed copies of We Are Who We Were to all the Hawaiian organizations that comprised the Annexation Centennial Committee. It played repeatedly on public access channels; the Hawaiian Patriotic League purchased airtime for its broadcast several days before the centennial on the local FOX affiliate. Predictably, the video provoked strong feel-ings. “The annexation that never was” was debated on local talk radio, as was the docu-mentary’s presentation of a controversial legal claim that, by July of 1998, had resulted in a United Nations Report that recommended that Hawaiì be included in a United Nations list of “non self-governing territories” and thus become eligible for decolonization and a U.N.-sponsored plebiscite.

2. Hawaiì Public Television Co-Production: Nation Within: The Story of America’s Annexation of the Nation of Hawaii (1998)In early 1997, Tom Coffman, the former chief political reporter for the Honolulu Star Bulletin, began to write a documentary treatment and a book-length manuscript on the annexation period. Coffman, who has lived in Hawaiì for almost forty years, was committed to taking the concept of Hawaiian nationhood seriously while simultaneously understanding annexa-tion as an American event.27 He obtained funding support from a variety of founda-tions and formed a crucial collaboration with KHET, which provided staff, facilities, and broadcast potential. KHET producer-director Joy Chong-Stannard, whose credits include co-direction of Betrayal and whose family has lived in the Islands for fi ve generations, joined the project as director. They set a target date

of August 1998, the centennial of annexation.Throughout Nation Within, Coffman and

Chong-Stannard blend national and local perspectives. Their documentary begins and ends in Washington, D.C., grounding its history in that site of American decision-making, but the fi gures within that ground are two Hawaiian researchers (at the National Archives, in the opening scene) and a statue of King Kamehameha (in the statuary hall of the Capital, in the fi nal scene). Nation Within is refl exive about the historical project. The work of historical research is shown and the issue of historical revisionism is recognized, in references to events and people labeled as either forgotten or misrepresented. This rhetorical strategy culminates in naming two infl uential—and, to the documentarians, dis-reputable—publications: Belle M. Brain’s 1898 book The Transformation of Hawaii, is labeled “the fi rst volume of what became a vast lit-erature of denial” and Lorrin Thurston’s 1936 memoirs are characterized as “setting the tone for the written history of Hawaii in the twentieth century.”

Nation Within seeks to end a century of denial of the widespread, organized, and sustained resistance by Hawaiians to American intervention in, and control of, their nation. The fi rst words heard in Nation Within are in Hawaiian (then translated into English); these words quote a petition against annexation, which, along with another, carried the signatures of almost the entire Hawaiian population. Six historians and writ-ers collaborate on-screen to tell an American story of expansionism, personified in the figure of Theodore Roosevelt. They also provide an account of Hawaiian resolve that pictures Queen Liliùokalani as a steadfast champion of the Hawaiian nation, but she is not alone in her courage. The Hawaiian na-tionalist leader Joseph Nawahi emerges as an infl uential presence; male and female mem-bers of the Hawaiian Patriotic Leagues appear as staunch opponents to an American destiny whose inevitability was—and through the onscreen comments, continues to be—chal-lenged. Nation Within is the tragic story of a

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nation, not a single, heroic individual. It tracks the complicated relationships of American pol-iticians and businessmen with the missionary descendants who orchestrated the overthrow and then controlled the territorial government of Hawaiì. This fact-driven, eighty-fi ve-min-ute documentary also explores the global politics of the 1890s, building on Coffman’s original historical research to demonstrate how pro-annexationists in Hawaiì exploited American fears of a Japanese empire.

By opening with the quotation “To under-stand today, you have to search yesterday,” Nation Within announces its concern with current political realities, but the local sov-ereignty movement is never mentioned. It is certainly referenced visually (for a local audience) when television news footage of a 1993 demonstration supporting sovereignty pairs with the narrator’s recognition that the centennial of the overthrow was an occasion for retelling stories of Hawaiì’s last queen. By implication, the 1998 centennial of the an-nexation (with its anticipated atmosphere of protest) should be an occasion for “unearthing the strange fi ve years” between the overthrow and the annexation. And the title supports the contention that a Hawaiian nation exists with-in America. Two Hawaiian scholars—Noenoe Silva and Jon Kamakawiwoòle Osorio—are pivotal in telling the story of native protest. Silva and Osorio speak with force, convic-tion, even outrage, but always as scholars, never using the fi rst person to claim personal identifi cation. It is to voiced quotations that the documentary turns for personal recollec-tions, as expressed by Hawaiian, American, and Japanese writers/speakers. Three narra-tors bring different perspectives to a climatic point of joint agreement: this annexation story is a tale of injustice. One of the narrators notes that treaties “should have” a two-thirds vote of the Senate and implies moving to a joint resolution (passed by a simple majority vote) was dishonorable. The legality of annexation is not explicitly challenged, but a narrator claims that, with annexation, “A small band of white men, supported by the government of the United States, had given away the national

heritage of a 2,000-year-old society.” The doc-umentary ends with Hawaiì`s part, as a U.S. territory, in setting the stage for America’s emergence as a great naval power in what became known as “the American century.”

Hawaiì Public Television broadcast Na-tion Within twice in the week preceding the August 12, 1998 centennial of the annexation and again in October. The day after the fi rst broadcast, producer Tom Coffman responded to Thurston Twigg-Smith and others on a special live radio show; local newspapers fea-tured debate on the documentary during the centennial week.28 Although 76 public televi-sion stations broadcast a 60-minute version of Nation Within in 1999 and American Public Television has re-licensed the documentary for a second four-year period, Coffman’s early attempt to place Nation Within on The American Experience was unsuccessful. He was told that the series had already covered a related topic with Hawaii’s Last Queen; moreover, his use of multiple narrators would not be acceptable, since “we [at The American Experience] have one narrative voice of history.”29

Conclusion: Producing Locally, Reaching Globally What might be learned to foster a general un-derstanding of the salience of the local in an age of global media from these six particular production histories? First and foremost, lo-cal productions demonstrate a variety, vitality and an impact on local audiences—and be-yond—that should not be overlooked. At both local and national levels, public funds and corporate underwriting anticipate, infl uence, and reinforce production agendas. In many respects, local public television in Hawaiì operates as a mirror, on different economies of scale, of the national public television agenda to appeal to and represent diverse, but ultimately united, communities. There are ongoing challenges to the notion that any mi-nority community and its viewpoint(s) can be fairly represented by skilled and sympathetic professionals, even if that group’s represen-tatives are included in some participatory capacities. General resentments often fi nd ex-

96 SPRING 2003


pression in specifi cs, presumed emblematic of ignorance, disregard, or bias. Special funding sources seem necessary to break the loop and put under-represented communities in control of their own representations; yet, even in situations of ideal internal harmony, there remains another power struggle for credibility that extends beyond the confi nes of “point of view.”30 Assumptions of a unifi ed community perspective (of history, of public memory, of current political agenda) based on race, ethnicity, or cultural identification are as problematic at the local level as they are at the national level. In many discourses surrounding these productions “the Hawai-ian perspective” is an unstable referent, more clear in its rejection of past historical writing and attitudes than in its embrace of a current political agenda.

Second, although national funds rarely fl ow to local projects, distribution patterns are increasingly fl exible, while remaining tied to resources and sponsorship. The international festival circuit, desktop publishing, web sites, Internet streaming, satellite transmission, and links to various distribution sites facilitate the ability for local productions to reach national and even global audiences and to reach be-yond television screens through home and educational video markets. Nevertheless, access to broad reaching well established, and well-maintained distribution channels is neither guaranteed nor easily available to many local productions. Local history usually remains local. Still, projects designed for local audiences partially, and perhaps ironically, often measure their success by the breadth of audience reach.

Third, context shapes expectations and understandings of audiences. The production

of history matters to communities. Viewers obviously respond to texts, but they are also receptive to the conditions of production and exhibition. Local projects have pride of place to local audiences. In contemporary Hawaiì, the debates about sovereignty are so intense, and the consequences so great, that any production dealing with the events of 1893-1898 automatically becomes part of a recognized struggle over historical repre-sentation and public memory. The work of Na Maka o ka Àina has been at the center of that struggle.31 In the last generation, his-torical opinions and ways of “doing history” considered mainstream have changed signifi -cantly, but contestation remains, on both sides of the stream.

At the national level, attitudinal shifts are less drastic and more diffuse, but still refl ect a spirit of revisionism. For many Americans, Vivian Ducat’s admiring portrait of Hawaii’s Last Queen (which has the endorsement of an honorable mention for the 1998 Erik Barnouw Award from the Organization of American Historians) has become the official and complete history of the overthrow and its (pe-ripheral) place in the American imagination; it may occupy that position for some time. Ironically, the documentary most determined to present the overthrow and annexation as a not-at-all-peripheral in American history—Nation Within—was produced in Hawaiì. The signifi cance of this documentary, along with the others discussed, will be refocused and their opportunities to intensify, solidify, and challenge various senses of community will be renewed and expanded in Spring 2003 when the 108th Congress considers a resolu-tion supporting Hawaiian Sovereignty.

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NOTES This essay revises “Contested Public Memories: Hawaiian History as Hawaiian or American Experience,” 143-

168 in Television Histories: Shaping Collective Memory in the Media Age, eds. Gary R. Edgerton and Peter C. Rollins (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 2001). Both essays grew from the author’s participation in a 1997 NEH Summer Seminar at the East-West Center, University of Hawaiì.

1. Hawaiì is the traditional Hawaiian language form of the word. Native activists re-introduced Hawaiian pronunciation markings a generation ago. By the 1990s, the state was incorporating traditional accents and diacritical marks in all Hawaiian words printed at state offi ces. In 2003, such usage is widespread, although not universal, in the Islands. I adopt traditional usage in this essay; however, in the title Hawaii’s Last Queen and in the transcript provided by The American Experience, the American English formation “Hawaii” is employed, so I replicate that form in quotations from and references to the documentary. The resulting inconsistency in these markings/spellings reminds us that history is written, and revised, and communities are assembled, and split, through language.

2. Anderson, Imagined Communities: Refl ections on the Origins and Spread of Nationalism, rev. and extended 2nd ed. New York: Verso, 1991.

3. See David Glassberg, “Public History and the Study of Memory,” The Public Historian, 18: 2 (Spring 1996): (pp. 7-23) and Raymond Williams, “The Future of Cultural Studies,” (pp. 151-162), in The Politics of Modernism. London: Verso, 1989.

4. Michael S. Roth, “Hiroshima, Mon Amour: You Must Remember This,” 91. In Revisioning History: Film and the Con-struction of a New Past, ed. Robert A. Rosenstone. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995.

5. Information on Ducat and Hawaii’s Last Queen was obtained from an interview with Ducat, March 7, 1998, New York and from personal correspondence in 1998, 1999 and 2003.

6. Interview with Margaret Drain, Executive Producer, February 17, 1998, Boston. According to Drain, a producer re-ceives $8,000- $15,000 for research and development, which is then deducted from the production budget. Drain took exception to the average cost per hour for FY 97—$740,500—that Daniel Golden claimed in his four-part se-ries on WGBH; she put costs at $400,000-$500,000. See “Local Programming Doesn’t Rate,” Boston Globe, June 23, 1997, p. A9. Golden’s estimate includes station overhead and educational outreach; he lists his source as WGBH.

7. Ducat, as quoted by Tim Ryan, “Portraits of the Past,” Honolulu Star Bulletin, November 2, 1994, D1.8. This description of the audience is from Drain, personal interview. Drain was surprised at the “heat” surrounding

Queen Liliùokalani and said she did not think the series had “done [any other] fi lm that has so many current-day political ramifi cations as Hawaii’s Last Queen.”

9. Twigg-Smith, “Overthrow Documentary Left Out Important Details,” Honolulu Star Bulletin, January 29, 1997, p. A1; ”The American Experience: Hawaii’s Last Queen Needs Critical View,” Molokai Advertiser-News, January 15, 1997.

10. For example, “Last Hawaiian Monarch Still Revered,” Rocky Mountain News [Denver], January 27, 1997.11. See http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/Hawaii/ 12. In its most common Hawaiì use, “Hawaiian” is a classifi cation of indigeneity, not residency. See J. Kehaulani

Kauanui, “Off-Island Hawaiians ‘Making’ Ourselves at ‘Home’: A (Gendered) Contradiction in Terms?” Women’s Studies International Forum 21:6 (1998): 681-693 on the complications of identifi cation. Until fairly recently, the term “local” was a non-problematic term for those, especially non-Caucasians, born and raised in Hawaii. The Hawaiian words kamaàina (old resident) and malahini (newcomer) also indicate residency distinctions. Hawaii state and U.S. federal defi nitions of “native Hawaiian” impose a 50 percent plus blood quantum rule. This rule is resented and often ignored by many Kanaka Maoli who identify as “Hawaiian.” Yet, as Blaisdell and Makuau report, this rule simultaneously leads 96 percent of Hawaiians to describe themselves as “racially mixed,” Kekuni Blaisdell and Noreen Mokuau, “Kanaka Maoli, Indigenous Hawaiians,” in Hawaiì Return to Nationhood, 49-67, ed. Jonathan Freidman and Ulla Hasager, IWGIA Document 75. (Copenhagen: The International Working Group for Indigenous Affi ars, 1993).

13. Telephone interview with Ellen Pelissero, March 8, 1998. All subsequent quotations from Pelissero are based on this interview and personal correspondence. For example, Haunani-Kay Trask, a faculty member at the Univer-sity of Hawaiì, who, along with her sister, attorney Mililani Trask, founded Ka Lahui Hawaiì, a native initiative for self-government. Pelissero has studied Hawaiian, but does not consider herself fl uent.

15. See Jeff Nicolay, “Betrayal,” Honolulu Star Bulletin and Advertiser, TV Week, January 17-23, 1993, 1, and Stu Glauber-man, “Overthrow Documentary Funded by the State,” Honolulu Advertiser, August 17,1992, A4. Nicolay quotes Sai as saying “sovereignty is inevitable. I think [Betrayal] will only help direct the people of Hawaii with a posi-tive understanding of the basis for sovereignty. This can only come about if we all understand what happened in history and why.” Background information on Betrayal and related projects provided by Ellen Pelissero.

16. Information on Na Maka comes from a personal interview with the producers, July 27, 1997, Naàlehu, Hawaiì, various profi les in the Act of War press kit, including Catherine Kekoa Enomoto, “The Fallen Reign,” Honolulu Star Bulletin, March 22, 1992, F1, and personal correspondence. For further information, access www.namaka.com

17. ITVS was created by U.S. Congressional action in 1988 obligating the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB)

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to set aside monies for productions of independent producers with the stated purpose of increasing diversity of programming and addressing the needs of unserved and underserved audiences. See “Friends of Public Television,” Wall Street Journal, February 7, 1992, p. A14, for complaints lodged in Congress by Senator Robert Dole, and by the editorial writer, regarding the “radical” productions funded by ITVS, among them Act of War. Between 1974 and 1981, fi ve minority consortia—including the Native American Public Broadcasting Consortium and the Pacifi c Islander Educational Network—were established to add diversity to public television. Hawaiians are inconsistently included in various federal mandates that address Native American concerns.

18. Interview with Jon Kamakawiwoòle Osorio, July 22, 1997, Honolulu and subsequent personal correspondence. 19. J. Kehaulani Kauanui, “Images of Struggle/Imagining Nations: An Act of War for Off-Island Education on Hawai-

ian Sovereignty.” Unpublished manuscript, presented at the ASAO Meeting, February 1997.20. Cleveland, “Message to the Senate and House of Representatives,” December 18, 1893, Affairs in Hawaii, Foreign

Relations of the United States, 1894, (p. 456).21. An ITVS report issued July 3, 1997 indicated that 93 public television stations (out of 300) had broadcast Act of

War, some stations multiple times. Not all stations respond.22. The day of a local rebroadcast of Act of War on KHET, Vicki Viotti wrote “The video’s view of history is open to

criticism.” The Honolulu Advertiser, September 17, 1993. Reviewers outside of Hawaiì often linked the documen-tary to other native rights struggles.

23. Joint Resolution Senate Resolution, #19 of the 103rd Congress, introduced by Senator Daniel K. Akaka of Hawaiì, was signed on November 23, 1993. United States Public Law 103-150, 1993 states that “the indigenous Hawaiian people never directly relinquished their claims to their inherent sovereignty as a people or over their national lands to the United States, either through their monarchy or through plebiscite or referendum.”

24. One of many signs of Na Maka’s identifi cation with and allegiance to a local constituency is the substantial differ-ence in price for local buyers compared to others. In early 2003, the Na Maka web site lists the price for a video copy of Act of War for “Hawaiì Institutions” at $65 and “Non-Hawaiì Institutions” at $165. (For any home use, a video is $35.

25. Kauanui, passim. At the symposia “Native Pacifi c Cultural Studies: On the Edge,” University of California at Santa Cruz, February 11-12, 2000 and “Pacifi c Islands, Atlantic Worlds,” New York University, October 25-27, 2001, participants (including members of the Hawaiian diaspora) noted the importance of Act of War and other historical videos in both teaching and organizing. See The Contemporary Pacifi c: A Journal of Island Affairs (13:2, Fall 2001).

26. According to Joan Lander, as of January 2003, the most comprehensive web sites containing current information on these issues are: http://www.Hawaii-nation.org/ index.html; http://www.hookele.com/kuhikuhi/ea.html; http://www.Hawaiiankingdom.org/; http://www.AlohaQuest.com and http://libweb.Hawaii.edu/libdept/Hawaiian/annexation/petition.html.

27. Information from telephone interviews with Tom Coffman, October 12, 1998 and February 1, 2003 and personal correspondence. Additional information on Nation Within came from telephone conversations and personal correspondence with Joy Chong-Stannard, March, April, and October, 1998. Video and book versions of Nation Within are available through Amazon.com.

28. See Twigg-Smith, Hawaiian Sovereignty: Do the Facts Matter? Honolulu: Goodale Publishing, 1998.29. The account is from Coffman, of his meeting with Senior Producer Mark Samels, at WGBH, Boston.30. The fi rst publicity materials carried the subtitle: “Hawaiian history through Hawaiian eyes.” Before its premiere

festival screening Puhipau stated, “Act of War is a historical account of what went down 100 years ago. It’s not merely a point of view” (Gary C. W. Chun, “Reely Big Show,” Honolulu Advertiser, November 7, 1993, G1).

31. Na Maka has forged ties with many native communities. The organization participates in world indigenous media arts festivals and conferences and their work is programmed on multiple satellite networks for aborigi-nal peoples. Puhipau is included in Living Voices, a compilation of audio interviews with Native Americans and Pacifi c Islanders sponsored by the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian. (See http://www.nmai.si.edu/livingvoices/html/eng_vol3.html)

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The Abiding Salience of the Local in a Global Age · Inspired by Benedict Anderson’s seminal work...

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