Assessing Hawaiian

Abstract

Over a period of 30 years, Hawaiian has moved from being a nearly extinct and forgotten language receiving almost no attention to being the single non‐English language most embedded as an official language of education and academic assessments in any of the 50 states within the USA. This change is highly related to the post‐World War II movement for equality for previously colonized peoples. It is also built upon inertia from government language use patterns and community identity factors in the small 19th‐century multiracial kingdom of Hawaii. Hawaii is the only one of the 50 states in the USA with two official languages recognized in its constitution. The gradual expansion of use of Hawaiian by the state of Hawaii has become a role model for other indigenous governments of the USA including American Indian tribes, Alaska Native villages, and Pacific Island territories. Assessments of Hawaiian language fluency and of academic knowledge through the Hawaiian language range from the private sector through to graduate school. While locally distinct historical factors have played a major role in the current attention to the use of Hawaiian, Hawaiian has also been weakened by shared American historical factors relative to restrictions of language diversity, and on indigenous languages in particular. Hawaiian was nearly exterminated by the elimination of public Hawaiian medium education in 1896, and a subsequent ban on its use as a medium of education in schools that only ended in 1986. Continuing into the present are perspectives on Hawaiian that undervalue high fluency in it compared to foreign languages and which run counter to other trends that place high value on Hawaiian for symbolic purposes.

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