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| | The hanai practice described above survives today. But the reality of customs continued from ancient Maoli traditions is that their development occurred during a time when the Maoli were a racially homogeneous community. Descriptions of how hanai children were recognized, as full members of the family without lessened community recognition, come from a time when recognition questions involving trans-racial hanai did not arise. Thus, no custom squarely addresses how the general Hawaiian community has or should recognize a racially non-Hawaiian child that is hanai into a racially Hawaiian family.
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< | The face of the Hawaiian community has changed dramatically in the last century. Hawaiians are continuing the tradition of hanai, but in the highly racially-mixed communities and hanai family members now include racially-non-Hawaiian (RNH) persons and their descendants. |
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> | The face of the Hawaiian community has changed dramatically in the last century. Hawaiians are continuing the tradition of hanai, but in highly racially-mixed communities and hanai family members now include racially-non-Hawaiian (RNH) persons and their descendants. |
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A. Modern Challenge: The Trans-racial Hanai Family |
| | B. Effect: Three Nested Rings of Harm
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< | These exclusionary RNH- hanai practices are causing harm on three fronts. First, the hanai person suffers by not being granted the same rights to participation in the community that his hanai family members would by virtue of his hanai status – a status that has deliberately avoided diminished recognition within the family or community. Second, it is important to realize that the Hawaiian family as a whole is associatively injured. The ohana concept does not allow assault – physically, socially, politically – on a member to remain localized. The community that calls into question the legitimacy of a hanai child harms not just the child but insults the entire family unit. Third, the Hawaiian community as a whole is harmed. The community is allowing race to nullify the opportunity for meaningful community contribution by a child of a community family. The community is also creating unnecessary exceptions to recognition traditions of Hawaiian family members and treatment of hanai persons which degrades the culture that the policy aims to preserve. |
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> | These exclusionary RNH- hanai practices are causing harm on three fronts. First, the hanai person suffers by not being granted the same rights to participation in the community that his hanai family members would by virtue of his hanai status – a status that traditionally has deliberately avoided diminished recognition within the family or community. Second, it is important to realize that the Hawaiian family as a whole is associatively injured. The ohana concept does not allow assault – physically, socially, politically – on a member to remain localized. The community that calls into question the legitimacy of a hanai child harms not just the child but insults and causes emotional harm to the entire family unit. Third, the Hawaiian community as a whole is harmed. The community is allowing race to nullify the opportunity for meaningful community contribution by a child of a community family. The community is also creating unnecessary exceptions to recognition traditions of Hawaiian family members and treatment of hanai persons which degrades the culture that the policy aims to preserve. |
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III. A Call for Change: Cultural Preservation Policies that Maintain Substantive Cultural Values |
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< | The harm that these exclusionary policies cause is so pervasive within the Hawaiian community that they must be changed. Community leaders must look to traditional Maoli goals of customs and practices to inform the development of new policies for RNH-hanai family members. As the Hawaiian community strives to prevent cultural extinction it must take care not to subverting major customs such as the recognition for ohana members in a community and the status of hanai members in an ohana. These cultural cornerstones should not be overturned. Efforts to preserve these values, to reaffirm the importance of recognition of our hanai family, whatever their biological race, would have the effect of correcting the discordance between cultural values and modern recognition rules while also preventing the multifarious harms described above. |
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> | The harm that these exclusionary policies cause is so pervasive within the Hawaiian community that they must be changed. Community leaders must look to traditional Maoli goals of customs and practices to inform the development of new policies for RNH-hanai family members. As the Hawaiian community strives to prevent cultural extinction it must take care not to subvert major customs such as the recognition for ohana members in a community and the status of hanai members in an ohana. These cultural cornerstones should not be disregarded. Efforts to preserve these values, to reaffirm the importance of recognition of our hanai family, whatever their biological race, would have the effect of correcting the discordance between cultural values and modern recognition rules while also preventing the multifarious harms described above. |
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< | Appendix II: Illustration of NRH-Hanai Exclusion |
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> | Appendix II: Illustration of RNH-Hanai Exclusion |
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< | Mohica-Cummings v. Kamehameha School illustrates this problem well. Kamehameha School is a prestigious K-12 private school providing services that include difficult to obtain Hawaiian cultural and language education courses. Their admission’s policy is racially preferential and it is effectively completely exclusive to persons with a Hawaiian ancestor. There is no language in their policy speaking to RNH-hanai children and the current interpretation denies admissions preference to this group. Braydon Mohica-Cummings is the son of a RNH-hanai woman. He was admitted to Kamehameha School, but his admission to the school was rescinded when it was discovered that his Hawaiian familial status was through his hanai grandfather, a Native Hawaiian man. After a court provided injunctory relief allowing Braydon to attend school while the suit challenging the lawfulness of Kamehameha’s racially preferential policies was in progress, the school settled the case with the family. The settlement included an agreement to allow Braydon an exception to their ancestor requirement, but no general exception for NRH-hanai persons has been instituted. |
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> | Mohica-Cummings v. Kamehameha School illustrates this problem well. Kamehameha School is a prestigious K-12 private school providing services that include difficult to obtain Hawaiian cultural and language education courses. Their admission’s policy is racially preferential and it is effectively completely exclusive to persons with a Hawaiian ancestor. There is no language in their policy speaking to RNH-hanai children and the current interpretation denies admissions preference to this group. Braydon Mohica-Cummings is the son of a RNH-hanai woman. He was admitted to Kamehameha School, but his admission to the school was rescinded when it was discovered that his Hawaiian familial status was through his hanai grandfather, a Native Hawaiian man. After a court provided injunctory relief allowing Braydon to attend school while the suit challenging the lawfulness of Kamehameha’s racially preferential policies was in progress, the school settled the case with the family. The settlement included an agreement to allow Braydon an exception to their ancestor requirement, but no general exception for RNH-hanai persons has been instituted. |
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