He Moku ke Kanaka: Moʻokūʻauhau as a Theory of a Subject and Its Implications

this essay argues that moʻokūʻauhau, genealogies, can be read as traditional Hawaiian theories of subjectivity. The genealogy “Hanau-a-Hua-ka-Lani” presents the moku, island, as structurally homologous to the subject of the unconscious. Thinking of the subject as a moku allows us to find traditional Hawaiian theories of the subject that echo many of the fundamental conclusions of Lacanian psychoanalysis: namely, that the subject has an ontological lack (Verhaeghe). The subject is a moku insofar as it has been mokuhia (cut, severed, drained), signifying the refusal of jouissance in order for it “to be attained on the inverse scale of the Law of desire” (Lacan, Écrits 700).Moses Nakuina, in the introduction to Moolelo Hawaii o Pakaa a me Ku-a-Pakaa writes that the fourth and most important reason for publishing that particular moʻolelo in the early territorial period of Hawaiʻi's history was to showcase “ke Aloha Alii oiaio o na kanaka Hawaii i ke au i hala a hiki loa mai no i keia au” (Nakuina, Moolelo Hawaii o Pakaa). This is translated by Esther Mookini and Sarah Nakoa as “sincere love of the Aliʻi” in the translation of the story under the title of The Wind Gourd of Laʻamaomao (Nakuina, Wind Gourd vii). But this translation of “sincere love” misses, I contend, the ethos being asserted in Nakuina's claim. The translation that I would suggest in turn is to say that the story is meant to showcase the “impassioned fidelity and devotion of kānaka to their aliʻi.”1 I suggest this translation chiefly because these grandchildren of Laʻamaomao, Pākaʻa and Kū-a-Pākaʻa, who were the models for “Aloha Alii oiaio” are repeatedly called kauwā, slaves, and their aliʻi (chief), Keawenuiaumi, is always referred to by both the narrator and by themselves as their haku, their master. In the footnote on the term kauwā, Moʻokini tells us that “[t]o be called a kauwā could be a grave insult in the class- and status-conscious aliʻi society of ancient Hawaiʻi, though the term could be applied metaphorically to a servant, like Pākaʻa, who humbly served his master, or to a worshiper of a god” (Nakuina, Wind Gourd 112). This metaphorical and poetic understanding of the term kauwā has largely governed the way in which people have understood the story to this point. In the moʻolelo, however, Pākaʻa chooses to enter into literal slavery as a child in order to earn an opportunity to be near Keawenuiaumi's court and stake his claim to it (Nakuina, Moolelo Hawaii o Pakaa 20–27). For this reason, along with numerous other acts of incredible subordination performed by Pākaʻa and Kū-a-Pākaʻa throughout the moʻolelo, I refuse to believe that this repeated usage of the term “slave” or kauwā is merely a work of poetry. In fact, in keeping with the poetic convention of repetition, I would further argue that this very “metaphorical” usage of the term is meant to disarm precisely that poetry which it layers with mystique, forcing us to swallow the hard kernel of the Haku-Kauwā dialectic2 that is the truth of aloha aliʻi ʻoiaʻiʻo. This is the relation that aloha entails, aloha both for aliʻi and ʻāina alike. Aloha is a relation of mutual, though not necessarily equal, subjection. In this essay, I argue that aloha is a form of subjection that mutually conditions the subject and its subjector in a dialectical relation that subjects both parties to their own particular lack, rendering them dependent upon one another.So how does this understanding of aloha as a mutual subjection inform our understanding of aloha ʻāina? In order to properly answer this question, we must first take up the consideration of ʻāina. ʻĀina is typically translated as “that which feeds,” that is, the land and, on occasion, the ocean. But we see in Malo that ʻāina is not always ʻāina: “Elua inoa i kapa ia ma ka mokupuni, he moku ka inoa, he aina kahi inoa, ma ka moku ana i ke kai ua kapaia he moku, a ma ka noho ana a kanaka, ua kapaia he aina ka inoa” (Malo 146–49).3 We see this today with the Northwestern Hawaiian islands. We don't include them in the Pae ʻĀina of Hawaiʻi, the archipelago; they are instead named Moku Manamana, and so on, and part of Hawaiʻi Pae Moku. Moku is thus a more inclusive term that denotes simply the moku, the cutting, amputation of the sea by a land mass. In order to know ʻāina, then, we must first inquire as to the condition that kānaka (humans, native Hawaiians) called the moku. The only primary sources available for such a study are our cosmogonic genealogies, ancient chants, and prophecies.Kumu hula Keawe Lopes suggests in his reading of Keaulumoku's prophecy “He Mele na Keaulumoku no Aikanaka,” commonly known as “ʻAuʻa ʻia,” that the individual is implicated in the discussion of the moku: The opening lines of this particular mele detail what seems to be Keaulumoku's view in response to the influx of foreigners, and their foreign ways, into our island home. Keaulumoku urges the kama (native) to “‘au‘a,” to retain, and moreover, “to withhold, detain and refuse to part with” their moku (heritage). (Pukui and Elbert qtd. in Lopes, “E Kama, E ʻAuʻa ʻIa” 31).Kumu Keawe's chapter in Moʻolelo: The Foundation of Hawaiian Knowledge goes on to detail the many ways in which kānaka have and continue to ʻauʻa, to retain and refuse to part with, their moku.His choice to translate the moku as heritage has opened this line of inquiry for me to consider the moku as more than simply one's territory, but to consider the moku as the foundation of one's being, as something intrinsic to the composition of the subject. The well-known lyrics of the chant proceed “ʻAuʻa ʻia e Kama e kona moku, / E kona moku e kama e ʻauʻa ʻia”; retained by the native is his heritage, and by that heritage the native is bound, fastened, and retained. If the moku is not only what one must retain, must bind, but is also accorded the agency to bind the native and retain the subject as well, then there is clearly a mutual subjection of kama to moku and moku to kama. For without the kama, there would be no moku, and without the moku, there would be no kama. They are both inextricably bound together. To kama is to bind, to be bound to. Kama is also the child, kamaʻāina being a term that signifies this unity of child and binding: a child that is bound to the land, as George Helm says, “whether you like it or not” (Yasso and Protect Kahoʻolawe ʻOhana). So when a composition includes, characterizes, or demands an action apropos of a moku, the subject is implicated in this idea of a moku. This is the fundamental presupposition that guides my inquiry today.Administering this logic, let us now turn to “Hānau-a-Hua-ka Lani” (Born-and-Fruiting-are-the-Heavens), the second genealogy that Poepoe offers in his account of Hawaiʻi's ancient history (9 Feb. 1906). I argue that this genealogy allows us to push this relation of the subject to the moku to its extreme: it will allow us to say concretely that the subject is the moku. Poepoe, interestingly, does not quote the first stanza of this genealogy, beginning instead with the second.4 The second stanza details the Earth's globe being born, taking root, being divided as heaven and Earth, then being suspended in space. It characterizes the Earth as possessing both the pali-kū, straight-cliff energy relating to the feminine, as well as the ākea, the great expansive energy related to the masculine.5 The honua, the whole of the Earth, belongs to both Wākea and Papa equally, though Papa holds the honor of giving birth to it. As soon as the Earth is born, it is said that “O ka Honua a hanau ka Honua / O ka Honua auanei ko lalo nei,” the Earth finds sustenance as it is born and posited down here on a level of relative proximity to us (Poepoe, 9 Feb. 1906). The chant then asks, if the Earth is down here with us, then who is it that presides above us? “O wai la? O ka Po. Aia! Aia hoi ha!” The Primordial Night. There, there it most certainly is! It is said that Wākea gives birth to the Pō, and that this night collapses the heavens over and over. Then the night is stuck back together, that it is mated until it climaxes. Then the Pō is strained and restrained; it is in utter agony as it produces the moon. Then the night is overturned and dismembered once more. This dismembered child is said to be Pō-lani, the Primordial Night Sky, the child given birth to by Wākea. Following Pō-lani are of Pō the of the of that gives birth to Pō in its (Poepoe, 9 Feb. 1906). The Pō is then posited the chant then asks, is to us? It is the first that I would like to is the that the birth the Primordial Night and the first of that being the that is to in the conclusions this it signifies that the moku is not a subject of it is not known can it be however, because the the of the moku, the moku, in of not being a of is the condition for for It is the of the Moku of nei,” down that we the of above in the than being the Moku the conditions of for for the of then are these conditions of the see in the beginning the and birth of an island that to with It is it is it is this is the of the But as soon as it is moku ia o that is, as soon as it the of there is in this once land is he it is and It has been as it is it has to be down by the that we with what is what is and what is Then Wākea the the he the which is are to and (Pukui with his this of the island that been to an this moku, island, which does not to a (Malo is to It Hawaiʻi as we properly know it it a land that and as to a merely of Wākea of what would have been the of a land to its own a Hawaiian we read this birth of the moku in the of and are or themselves (Pukui and Elbert In society that there is there is also is, as as I a in that many and the does not however, the The of as well as can only be understood in more precisely in to one in many be understood simply as an of In this is a of a to be But is also more a of it is what is what is and being in the to the of as well as both and literal is the as is the of to and was a So what is must be by as a in and the fundamental and, I would a that of Hawaiian is a and is a We find this important like or for the as well as or to and both and I believe the has the as being both and is the that the and the that the to insofar as the conditions of for as what is into a to we can see that the Moku in its has this this to in its upon will the there is in a of these this of the moku are the and the literal that to it as it to The first of these is the no is the moku then it to Hawaiʻi is, then, in its and by and the of the upon the that to the moku always in a not which not until has its and its in one form of has and by of it be but only a ka as a of Hawaiian we can see has The Moku we know as Hawaiʻi has been as by the has to and to it. It is thus the of Wākea to the is the of to that it is under Wākea that the of the on were of my the on the and Hawaiian relation to the on the of the as a tells us that the was of the It the of the in the the of by of the which in with the The of the aliʻi were well-known and to. that their in relation to as an that for individual and and of This that to is the of and that governed of Hawaiian in what we consider Hawaiian is no in my that this of more than So when Wākea is the who is to the to its we must read this as the of the Moku and it Wākea is to then the moku, to it to a particular when its are and it is to a particular is the Moku he these of the Moku is then to and to the and The work of as the of is then to in order to the Moku by of its The how this of for the energy of which and the of the island, however, there would be no island to be In this the conditions of for as what is into a to find in Lacanian theories of the subject that the of Hawaiʻi to It is the of this essay to the of the applied to the of Hawaiian because there are clearly in these moʻolelo that today have no we not as of the to that our have for the Lacanian of the subject with Hawaiian we will be to the of the we moʻolelo in order to something the The Lacanian subject is always the subject of the it is than in with is not the of his own to the subject of that a of the (Lacan, Écrits that is there is instead an the of the subject of which the subject this is what is known as the unconscious. The is by that a to in the find in “Hanau-a-Hua-ka-Lani” the dialectical relation of the and the that is to my understanding of and a that in on the of We the discussion of this however, with its namely, the The is an (Lacan, that the of work for the most and It is the on the level of the of the subject (Lacan, that and in order to a of be understood as something and It is (Lacan, and it to the It is not in way because is the in in in the The is in dialectical relation with the and be properly or without to its dialectical The then, is the or of the The in and the that one can The the subject to the the demands of the for in the of the the that the It is in this that the in the of the something that always to the The is by a of that other than it not to but to and the can be said to be by the and it is for that reason that in the of but it does not always necessarily up This is because of bind to the in Lacanian to the subject because of its with the of the which the in that is what is and the (Lacan, of the The is in the and it is that which to and the It is what by a push a the The is an that is a it was is a of the It is thus without our the that it was The in the discussion of as a for for the of the a for as This is the of as a to to a to an that it must be understood in this because that and is also a will to a will to This that is the of the is the will to in a ka that will that is with and to This is the of and it is not until we are this by a like the that and This be read as a way in which the subject its particular in order to the of by a which be The Wākea is one such The as it is in moʻolelo is largely by the of it with the of So it is in this that I say that the the the to insofar as the conditions of for as what is into a to a understanding of this then, we now a of the Hawaiian of the subject as it is in a ka The is We have the subject of the of the that and to The moku to in a and, in an of the this a of the moku into its own the of the island a into the moku, the for its as one who the (Lacan, the which is of this and thus a As the the on the the into with the of that to the of the in Following this to the we will find that a ka like an ontological The detail this is the very of the island and its relation to ʻāina: the moku is a an a in the that is The moku is that which is not that which is not a it could The moku is as in well-known that that jouissance has to be in order to be attained on the inverse scale of the Law of desire” (Lacan, Écrits Wākea the moku in a in which it must refuse the the of its in order to it by other namely, by to his to this is what it for the moku to ʻāina. It the by Wākea in order to its and this that the moku and the subject who is mokuhia must be to when the moku is in this when it is properly and so on, and people are to on the moku, it something The moku a in the Lacanian in which it a its of The is what it ʻāina, what it a into a aliʻi ka he kauwā ke (Pukui This holds for a kanaka, for what is an aliʻi but a kanaka, a or “to the of the that that is the of the that is, the the the moku ʻāina and a of (Lacan, it is to a above the The kanaka who is mokuhia is to it. offers of the aliʻi ka ʻāina he kauwā ke in that has no for but the land and it for a (Pukui Following we see that the ʻāina is a whole that is the kanaka is not is and by the of Wākea along the of and The conditions for that are in I don't that are a level of As we this however, we can see that it more as Malo the very that an ʻāina is ʻāina is to the it would be and a moku. The is for the of the as tells us aliʻi no ke aliʻi i ke (Pukui which we in ʻāina ka ʻāina i ke This history of ʻāina, then, is in its as something that on of being it is its lack, its the of being “that which it is merely a moku, an a of the ocean. subjects of ʻāina, island, and with our of a of that the ʻāina more its as a is the of the kauwā, to the aliʻi an to their and their as master. this not what Pākaʻa in his as a (Nakuina, Moolelo Hawaii o Pakaa and was in the whole and of Keawenuiaumi's Pākaʻa, as his and his the aliʻi that he as was by the of that Keawenuiaumi's and when Pākaʻa was into The story of Pākaʻa as precisely because it this of lack in the the that the aliʻi is a kanaka as ʻāina is a moku. the must the being, in the question, if we know that the of is the of the kauwā, in the we not allow kauwā to into of the question, however, the of is not a of is it a of though these to how is typically instead has to with a term that the of the in consideration over the relative to it. So it is not the that we simply the ʻāina or the as kānaka have is instead a fundamental in the as it is the of the (Lacan, that which is and that be is thus a part of the that be be for it is in a that is by the something the has the of tells us that of truth is that it us with the can no be into Knowledge always the of the truth this but a that is the reason we the of is in the poetry we to our ʻāina and our This is the reason we say that our aliʻi are and that they i ke in They are only as such because there is something them that and can only be to in mele that that they are the that they are with something that their So it is not our that the aliʻi the it is the that the aliʻi is posited in a particular of that them in proximity to the their it is not the or particular that but the for or to the that it. This be in of the or of the the by its but it is not and will be the as is the that denotes the for it is the that a proximity to the This of being is for the moku and the kauwā, are of the moku being a of that can be by the by a ka Lani” and the kauwā being the which the of the aliʻi is in chants, and so of is I would like to this essay to a The that we have ʻāina is a the ʻāina, in its being a that is, as an that can and the kanaka, is a This and our it a of This is what we know of as our our like us they have and a question, however, our have for us? the ʻāina does not but the ʻāina and the are not one and the of our a they are not necessarily this ʻāina. They have and in this ʻāina, but they are not necessarily this ʻāina. This ʻāina does not us, does ʻāina If were to one it in fact, be for the that would would of its own the are not the they are not of us, the kauwā who their moʻolelo and their They would not our because they are a of the the subject to there would be no so with this on the we say that the are in They not have the that ʻāina does have or to The in fact, are the of a lack in they The allow us to say that ʻāina must be with in order to the that Hawaiʻi once was and is in The us to the whole of to a lack into it. with this lack kānaka have to ʻāina, only in a as This lack is our of relation to the ʻāina and it is what allows us to and so If the ʻāina was we would have no to was what was in ancient Hawaiʻi and more which we love to was in a very way a a but only because they were to a lack in their a for kānaka to As tells us, is the lack that the It is its lack that it an of of that is our is then the and for our to ʻāina. The ʻāina is and we are kauwā because the ʻāina is in by who by of their lack, our of relation to ʻāina. They are the to we are they are the to we say we are This subjection is however, the that of and the of this is a subjection that is aloha in its that is an aloha that by the of the that a mutual subjection. of insofar as it the of the will a or over thus you to and of us that what we find in the is a that in most an honor that must be if one is to one's in the aloha to is if one does not It is this that characterizes the mutual subjection of aloha that is (Nakuina, Moolelo Hawaii o Pakaa). If we in giving or it is because we are we are of our to an we know in in I would suggest that we know for is that we are We are in one or As Keawe Lopes in ka au i we by a ka i ka mai / aliʻi ka ʻāina / kauwā ke ka we by the and of of that which tells us that the ʻāina is a and the people are its Keawe this condition of being a kauwā in that kauwā au i ke aloha / ua ka that we are only kauwā insofar as we this is known for