Book

Possessing Polynesians : the science of settler colonial whiteness in Hawai'i and Oceania

Arvin, Maile, 1983- author

Overview

\"From their earliest encounters with indigenous Pacific Islanders, white Europeans and Americans asserted an identification with the racial origins of Polynesians, declaring them to be, racially, almost white and speculating that they were of Mediterranean or Aryan descent. In Possessing Polynesians Maile Arvin analyzes this racializing history within the context of settler colonialism across Polynesia, especially in Hawai'i. Arvin argues that a logic of possession through whiteness animates settler colonialism, through which both Polynesia (the place) and Polynesians (the people) become exotic, feminized belongings of whiteness. Seeing whiteness as indigenous to Polynesia provided white settlers with the justification needed to claim Polynesian lands and resources. Understood as possessions, Polynesians were and continue to be denied the privileges of whiteness. Yet, Polynesians have long contested these classifications, claims, and cultural representations, and Arvin shows how their resistance to and refusal of white settler logic have regenerated Indigenous forms of recognition.\" -- Provided by publisher.

• Publisher: Duke University Press
• Subject: Ethnology Polynesia. / Polynesians Origin. / Polynesians Race identity. / Polynesia Colonization.
• ISBN: 9781478005025, 9781478005650

Item info:

1 item available

1 item total in all locations

Holdings :

Call Number	Copies	Material	Location
GN670.A785 2019	1	BOOK	AUTOSTORE