Talking Hawaii's Story: Oral Histories of an Island People (review)

On the beautiful island we know as Hawaii resides a melting pot of residents bubbling with tales of their lives on the islands, a sweet and spicy mixture of their upbringing, family, children, jobs, talents, hopes, and dreams. The interviewees fill their recollections with good times, hard times, love, and laughter, all blended with the intensity of having lived through the bombing of Pearl Harbor. This book satisfies yet leaves you hungry for a trip to the Aloha State to experience its rich delicious culture and the secret ingredients baked into the islands.

The memories of the island people are vast and empathetic; they come across as very fair. Many of these folks have since passed away and have left a legacy of strength behind them: pioneers, farmers, business owners, clerks, athletes, artists, and more. The book relates their grand tales of childhood adventures, making us hope along with them that they can save an extra nickel for a special treat, although it also documents job loss and promotions and life and death scenarios, through the oral histories.

In this anthology, the interviewers chose to take a life history approach to the interview process. They had no set list of questions, and no questions were printed within the interviews themselves. Each flowed as its own story, which allowed for a presentation of extremely individualized narratives, giving the reader a new experience each time. The stories unfold naturally, and you can sense a comfort in each voice as we are indulged in personal and sometimes painful experiences. Although interviewees were allowed to take their own path as they spoke, there is much crossover between the interviews to study as they were all born within the first three decades of the 1900s. Major events, such as "the immigration of agricultural laborers, labor strikes, the Great Depression, two World Wars, statehood, the expansion of the American Military presence, growth of tourism, the demise of the sugar and pineapple industries, and the development of a multiethnic, culturally diverse society" (prologue), are very much a part of the conversation across the interviews.

Each chapter begins a new interview and a new story. A photograph of each interviewee commences each chapter, as well as a brief and compelling quote from the body of the interview itself. The editors give us a synopsis covering the background of each interviewee before the narrative began. Also, sprinkled throughout are original photographs from the interviewees' own collections, bringing the reader even closer to their story. Main subject headings are placed within interviews to segment the story into meaningful pieces. Most delightful to me is a mini glossary at the end of each interview providing a crash course in the authentic lingo peppered through the narratives.

The interviews themselves remain largely unedited; some interviewees presented speaking in what is commonly referred to as Pidgin English. This greatly adds to oral histories' sense of genuineness. Many of the non-English interviews have been translated from the native language of the narrator. Native Hawaiians were among the men and women interviewed but also folks of Chinese, Filipino, English, French, Irish, African, Spanish, Korean, Japanese, Portuguese, Austrian, and Puerto Rican descent. Some were born on the islands, some came as children, and some as adults seeking work.

As a compilation of oral histories, there is much to explore and investigate. The family bond was very tight across interviews, as well as stories of immigrants struggling and working hard to make a life for themselves and their families. Interviewees delineated neighborhoods specifically, including neighbor relations, childhood experiences, and the positive and negatives of the mingling of different cultural and ethnic backgrounds. The U.S. was put to the test during the bombing of Pearl Harbor, and the primary sources in this book documenting that sequence of events represent that experience from different angles. Some interviewees were just children at the time, whereas others were adults...