Nitasha Tamar Sharma's new book explores history and experiences of Black people in Hawaii
Jan. 9—When Nitasha Tamar Sharma was growing up in Manoa, people who didn't know her would look at her and define her as "local." It is true that she was born and raised here, but her heritage is an unusual one for Hawaii. Her father was from northern India ; her mother, the Brooklyn, N.Y.-born daughter of Jewish immigrants from Russia.
The family spent enough time in India for her to become conversant in what she calls "village Hindi, " and lived in Brooklyn long enough that when she graduated from Roosevelt High School and continued her education on the mainland, she was comfortable being a minority. By then, Sharma had embraced Hawaiian culture by studying hula with kumu hula Maiki Aiu Lake and kumu hula John Keola Lake since she was 5 years old.
Sharma discovered African American hip-hop culture while she was studying anthropology at the University of California, Santa Cruz. The music became her point of entry into the African American community.
During college, she became interested the similarities and differences in the experiences of Native Hawaiians and African Americans. This evolved into an interest, as she describes, in how "inter-minority racism is shaped by white supremacy."
Sharma went to University of California, Santa Barbara for graduate school. She is currently a professor of African American and Asian American studies at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill.
In Sharma's new book, "Hawai 'i Is My Haven : Race and Indigeneity in the Black Pacific, " which was published in September by Duke University Press, explores the history and experiences of Black people in Hawaii. The book includes interviews with local Black residents—most of whom are anonymous—including singer and ukulele player Kamakakehau Fernandez, who is pictured on the cover.
How did you become interested in Black studies ?
When you're very not common, you don't create community based on your background, so my community is not based on finding other Indian Jewish people. My community is based on people's politics and worldviews. I came to political consciousness as a person of color racialized through Black popular culture and Black people, and that's why I'm really interested and concerned about anti-Black racism.
On the mainland, race is traditionally Black and white. In Hawaii, whites are the racial minority, Asian Americans have held political and economic power since the 1960s, and Asian ethnic groups have their own sense of racial hierarchy. How does that change things for Black people ?
Every Black person I spoke to, whether they're Hawaii-born or from elsewhere, said that if you're Black or white you face this presumption that you're not from here, and face nonlocal discrimination, but they're not the same. White people have historically had this relationship to taking over the island and also as perpetrators of anti-Black racism, and haoles still do have financial and political power. Black people may face negative experiences in Waikiki or with locals that they read as anti-Black racism that they might face for not knowing cultural norms here. Sometimes locals tie Black folks to being part of the military, so that negative reaction is actually a reaction against occupation.
Have people been surprised to learn that Black people have been in Hawaii for more than 200 years ?
Almost everybody is surprised. Very few people know the history.
Have people been guessing who the people were that you interviewed ?
I don't know, but I am committed to respecting their privacy. Someone read the book and said, "Some of the quotes are so cringey, " but that's life. We don't all have enlightened perspectives, and (some ) Black people have racist ideas about Black people, especially when they're not raised by Black people.
What do you want people to learn from the book other than Black history and the experiences of the people you interviewed ?
Perpetrators of racism toward Black people come from all the communities. It isn't a white on Black issue. It's the ways that all communities have adopted and internalized anti-Black racism. What I'm hoping is that what we can see is how our issues intersect. I also want us to recognize that Hawaiian sovereignty and self-determination go hand in hand with a reckoning with anti-Black racism within the same communities. We will only get full liberation for decolonization if it goes hand in hand with contending with internal decolonization.
