We Are Moana, We Are Maui
July 30, 2016
We Are Moana, We Are Maui
Kia ora, Fakaalofa lahi
atu, Mālō e lelei, Tālofa lava, Bula vinaka, Kia orana, Ia ora na, Fakatalofa
atu, Malo ni, Iorana, Mauri, Aloha and greetings Disney:
As Pacific scholars who
have either studied Maui and his configuration of tā (time)
and vā (space),
or other aspects of Pacific histories and cultures, we are writing to raise our
concerns in regards to your depiction of our culture hero Maui. Currently,
there are ongoing international debates via social media by Pacific and
non-Pacific peoples about the Disney portrayal of Mauiʼs body, facial
features, and mannerisms. While we recognize that Moana is
an animated fictional film, the character Maui is not a fictional character to
us. He is a revered ancestor for some of us.
For many peoples of
Pacific heritage who have either grown up in their homelands or in diasporic
communities (homes abroad) in New Zealand, Australia and the United States, our
connections to one another are maintained through our ancestral links to the
Moana (Pacific Ocean); our kinship ties; and our genealogical and oral
historical links to ancient gods, goddesses, heroes, heroines, cosmologies and
cosmogonies.
The Moana, our sea of islands,
is the Pacific Ocean our ancestors navigated and settled over 2000 years ago
across the Oceania. The late Epeli Hauʻofa, an eminent Pacific scholar who coined the term sea of islands in
1993 wrote: Pacific peoples viewed the Moana as a sea of islands.
The Moana was a place where they sailed to explore, to nurture vā (relationships),
to trade and to conquer. Our ancestors raised generations of skilled seafarers
and navigators who used the stars, constellations, wave patterns, birds,
fishes, winds and clouds to guide their way across the seas where they settled.
In the islands they settled they passed onto their descendants indigenous
understandings of the world. These understandings were explanations of their
existence and would become the basis of their oral histories. Within these oral
histories, Hauʻofa reminds us, that one “legendary Oceanic athlete was so powerful that during a
competition he threw his javelin with such force that it pierced the horizon
and disappeared until that night, when it was seen streaking across the skyline
like a meteor. Every now and then it reappears to remind people of the mighty
deed.” This
athlete is Maui.
Though there are many
stories of Maui and variations across the Pacific, there are underlying
commonalities in the descriptions of his physical and mental attributes that
were tempered by a great sense of humour. Mauiʼs feats are heliaki, beautiful poetic expressions, of
resisting oppression and fighting injustice for the benefit of humanity. In
essence, for many Pacific peoples, one of the grand messages of Maui’s stories
is, to advocate for justice
by transforming society. The specificity of Mauiʼs tale is
unique to Oceania, but the generality of his legend is universal to all
societies.
While the Moana, our sea of islands,
would continue to sustain our populations and maintain our ancestral links it
would also bring to our shores in the late 1700s and early 1800s interaction
with papālagi (Europeans). This contact would invariably reshape our world
views, histories and cultures through colonization and a new form of religious
doctrine called Christianity. Perceptions of Pacific peoples in the early years
of interaction with papālagi were often derogatory and belittling of indigenous cultures…Oceanic
cultures were seen as savage, lascivious and barbaric(Hauʻofa 1993).
Due to the “civilizing” effects of colonization and Christianity another
depiction would inform views, this time through Hollywood film. Hereniko
(1999) writes… from Bird of
Paradise (1932, 1951) to South Pacific (1958) and The Thin Red Line (1998),
Pacific Islanders, particularly Polynesian were portrayed as a simple people
lacking in complexity, intellect, or ambition… When Pacific Islanders are not
laughing, dancing, or feasting in this idyllic setting, they are often depicted
as dangerous, evil, even cannibalistic. These kinds of portrayals by Hollywood
films…linger long in the popular imagination, so much so that it is not
uncommon [in the present day] for Pacific Islanders who travel to Europe to be
asked if they are still cannibals.
The Hollywood
stereotypical image of laughing, dancing, or feasting would
decades later become linked to a number of health challenges that face our
Pacific Island communities. These health challenges have given rise to physical
stereotypes of Pacific peoples that are often explained by others as excesses
of lifestyles due to too much laughing, dancing and feasting. It is much
easier to lay blame for the current health challenges on lifestyle excesses
rather than the impact of colonisation, environmental degradation and
discrimination in its various forms on our social and economic outcomes.
In the same way we have
navigated the mighty Moana we will also navigate the challenges that face our
communities. We will do this through education. We believe that through
education we will be able to build capacity and capability of Pacific peoples
to pierce the horizon artistically, academically, economically and socially. It
is the same story that your movie Moana will tell. It will be a story of hope,
adventure and overcoming challenges tempered with humour. It will be a story
that will hold many life messages, one that will resonate with many of us and
our children and our grandchildren.
We wrote this letter to
ask that you invest in our
communities through our children in providing a fund to support the education
of children of Pacific descent. This fund will be used for scholarships that
will grow the capacity and capability of Pacific peoples. This
kind of investment will be beneficial to you as an entity that is helping
indigenous communities. This was the case with Southwest Airlines. In 2000,
Southwest Airlines provided a scholarship fund to the Zia Pueblo tribe for
using the Zia Puebloʼs sun symbol on the Southwest Airplanes. People praised Southwest
Airlines for this investment in a native community (Who Owns Native Cultures?,
2003:91-92).
We are seeking an
opportunity to have further discussions in regards to this request and would
like to hear from you in regards to the request.
Mālō, Mahalo, Faʻafetai,
Vinaka, Māuruuru, Fakaue lahi, Meitaki Maata and Thank you.
We are Moana, We are Maui
ʻOkusitino Māhina, PhD, Auckland, Aotearoa/New
Zealand
Nuhisifa Seve-Williams,
PhD, Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Tēvita O. Kaʻili, PhD,
Kahuku, Hawaiʻi
Teresia Teaiwa, PhD,
Wellington, Aotearoa/New Zealand
April Henderson, PhD,
Wellington, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Malia Talakai, PhD,
Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Katerina Teaiwa, PhD,
Canberra, Australia
Cresantia Koya Vakaʻuta, PhD,
Suva, Fiji
Vincente M. Diaz, PhD,
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Tina Delisle, PhD,
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Teena Brown Pulu, PhD,
Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Belinda ʻOtukolo
Saltiban, PhD, Salt Lake City, Utah
Karlo Mila, PhD,
Wellington, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Albert Refiti, PhD,
Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Sailiemanu
Lilomaiava-Doktor, PhD, Honolulu, Hawaiʻi
Christopher Fung, PhD,
Boston, Massachusetts
Sione Vaka, PhD, Auckland,
Aotearoa/New Zealand
Liana Kongaika Kinikini,
DNP, APRN, NP-C, Salt Lake City, Utah
George Gavet, PhD
candidate, Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Joseph Keaweʻaimoku
Kaholokula PhD, Honolulu, Hawaiʻi
Josephine Herman, PhD,
Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Edmond Fehoko, PhD
candidate, Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
James Perez Viernes, PhD,
Mangilao, Guam
Emalani Case, PhD,
Wellington, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Laurie Lali McCubbin,
PhD, Louisville, Kentucky
David Gaʻoupu Palaita,
PhD, Oceania
Kuʻualoha Hoʻomanawanui,
PhD, Haʻikū, Hawaiʻi
Helen Tupaʻi, PhD,
Pearl City, Hawaiʻi
Anna Marie Rago Christiansen,
D.A., Lāʻie, Hawaiʻi
Alice Te Punga Somerville,
PhD, Sydney, Australia
Trisha Kehaulani
Watson-Sproat, JD, PhD, Honolulu, Hawaiʻi
Kealalōkahi C. Losch, EdD,
Honolulu, Hawaiʻi
Jemaima Tiatia-Seath, PhD,
Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Yvonne Underhill- Sem,
PhD, Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
ʻAisea Nau Matthew Māhina, MA, Auckland,
Aotearoa/New Zealand
Hikuleʻo Feʻaomoeako-ʻI-Kenipela
Melaia Māhina, BA, Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Elizabeth J. Rago, MSW,
Kahuku, Hawaiʻi
Laura Zimmer-Tamakoshi,
PhD, West Chester, Pennsylvania
Fepulea'i Micah Van der
Ryn, PhD, Pagopago, American Samoa
Chris Chan, PhD, Singapore
‘Anapesi Kaʻili, MA,
Salt Lake City, Utah
Ty Kāwika Tengan, PhD,
Honolulu, Hawaiʻi
Ping-Ann Addo, PhD,
Boston, Massachusetts
J. Kehaulani Kauanui, PhD,
Middletown, Connecticut
Jacob Fitisemanu Jr, MPH,
Salt Lake City, Utah, USA
Eliza Matagi, BS, Salt Lake
City, Utah
Vili Nosa, PhD, Auckland,
Aotearoa/New Zealand
Ema Wolfgramm- Foliaki,
PhD, Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Brian Kāfakafa Dawson, MA,
Honolulu, Hawaiʻi
Mele Taumoepeau, PhD,
Dunedin, Aotearoa/New Zealand
Sylvia Frain, MA, Tahuna/
Queenstown, Aotearoa/ New Zealand & Guåhan/ Guam
Lisa Uperesa, PhD,
Auckland, Aotearoa/New Zealand
1 comment:
The petition was sent to Disney and they responded just by talking about donations. So this is another letter. Tēvita O. Ka'ili
Kahuku, HI
17 AUG 2016 — Mālō e lelei We Are Moana, We Are Maui Supporters:
After days of no response from Disney, Nuhisifa and I followed up with email messages. Today, we received a response from Disney directing us to their Charitable Giving site. We replied that we are not asking for charitable support. What we are asking is for Disney to reciprocate to Oceania for appropriating the symbols, iconographies, mythologies, cosmologies, deities, and arts of Oceania for their upcoming animated film Moana. We referred them to our letter and reiterated to Disney to invest in Oceania by establish a scholarship fund for the children of Oceania.
ʻOfa atu, Tēvita O. Kaʻili & Nuhisifa Seve-Williams
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