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Institute of Hawaiian Language Research and Translation Opens at UH M?noa

Nick Yee
Nick Yee

Hawaiian language students at University of Hawai‘i at M?noa are working with millions of historical documents that were previously lost in translation.

The Institute of Hawaiian Language Research and Translation is working to locate and translate a repository of papers in written only in Hawaiian.  The largest source comes from more than 100 different Hawaiian language newspapers published until the late 1940’s.  Of those, only a small portion have been translated into English, and remain an untapped source of information into Hawai‘i’s past.

Puakea Nogelmeier is leading the department.  He says the institute will reconnect scholars with historical Hawaiian material that had been beyond reach.

The center is also gives Hawaiian language students a chance to regularly practice their language skills while being employed. Paige Okamura is a Grad Student with the program. 

Paige.mp3

The institute is a collaboration with the UH Sea Grant College, the School of Hawaiian Knowledge, other UH departments, and a local non-profit called Awaiaulu.  Information translated to the public will be made available for all departments in the UH system.  

Nick Yee’s passion for music developed at an early age, as he collected jazz and rock records pulled from dusty locations while growing up in both Southern California and Honolulu. In college he started DJing around Honolulu, playing Jazz and Bossa Nova sets at various lounges and clubs under the name dj mr.nick. He started to incorporate Downtempo, House and Breaks into his sets as his popularity grew, eventually getting DJ residences at different Chinatown locations. To this day, he is a fixture in the Honolulu underground club scene, where his live sets are famous for being able to link musical and cultural boundaries, starting mellow and building the audience into a frenzy while steering free of mainstream clichés.
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