An empowering celebration of identity, acceptance and Hawaiian culture based on the true story of a young girl in Hawaiʻi who dreams of leading the boys-only hula troupe at her school. Ho'onani feels in-between. She doesn't see herself as wahine (girl) OR kane (boy). She's happy to be in the middle. But not everyone sees it that way. When Ho'onani finds out that there will be a school performance of a traditional kane hula chant, she wants to be part of it. But can a girl really lead the all-male troupe? Ho'onani has to try . . . Based on a true story, Ho'onani: Hula Warrior is a celebration of Hawaiian culture and an empowering story of a girl who learns to lead and learns to accept who she really is--and in doing so, gains the respect of all those around her. Ho'onani's story first appeared in the documentary A Place in the Middle by filmmakers Dean Hamer and Joe Wilson.
A spunky African American girl has a hula-hooping competition with her friends in Harlem, and soon everyone in the neighborhood--young and old alike--joins in on the fun.
The younger of two sisters narrates the events of the summers of 1964 and 1965 during which their mother finally summons up the will to leave their increasingly violent father.
Things at school have changed and at home Nanea's brother is talking about enlisting in the military; Nanea is having trouble coping with all these changes and turns to hula dancing to help her feel better.
Tammy Ho Lai-Ming's first collection has been fifteen years "between pen and press." The poems, cross-cultural and personal, paint a broad canvas from love to language, and family to politics. "Hula Hooping" is a valuable addition to the growing corpus of Hong Kong poetry in English. Tammy Ho Lai-Ming is a founding co-editor of "Cha: An Asian Literary Journal." She has edited several volumes of poetry and short fiction published in Hong Kong. "Tammy Ho's first book of poems marks the heart-felt, enigmatic, sassy, unapologetically socially engaged voice of an emergent generation that Hong Kong has long waited for." Shirley Geok-lin Lim Commonwealth Poetry Prize and American Books Awards winner; Research Professor, University of California, Santa Barbara
For students of Hawaiian language, music, dance and culture, this work is a rare mine of gold! The author gives the original songs in Hawaiian text, coupled with English translations. These songs are very much a part of Hawaiian culture and society, the texts showing roots in mythological facets, cultural associations, ecological backdrops, and even erotic imagery!