COURTESY AHA PUANANA LEO / MAY 2006 UH-Hilo doctoral candidate Hiapo Perreira told graduating high school students in May a traditional Hawaiian story about a boy who gains knowledge across the sea and shares it when he returns. Like the boy, Perreira will share knowledge from his doctorate. CLICK FOR LARGE

UH offers first Ph.D. in a native language

UH-Hilo offers a doctorate in revitalizing the Hawaiian tongue

HILO » University of Hawaii at Hilo professor Hiapo Perreira is working on a doctorate in revitalizing the Hawaiian language, specializing in analyzing Hawaiian literature.

So it was appropriate last May when Perreira told graduating, Hawaiian-speaking high school seniors a piece of oral literature, the tale of a boy transported to a far country by a supernatural coconut tree.

Perreira is one of five students in the new program at the University of Hawaii at Hilo established in the fall leading to a doctor of philosophy degree in Hawaiian and Indigenous Language and Culture Revitalization.

It is the first doctorate offered at UH-Hilo, the first doctorate in the United States in a Native American language, the first doctorate in the world to revitalize an indigenous language.

When Perreira told the story in May, he did it with a coconut in hand on little Coconut Island in Hilo Bay. Just as his story was grounded in physical reality, the doctorate is thoroughly attached to the real world.

"We're not an ivory tower Ph.D. We're a community service Ph.D.," said UH-Hilo Hawaiian professor Pila Wilson.

Kauanoe Kamana, Wilson's wife, is another doctoral candidate. She is also principal of Nawahiokalaniopuu Hawaiian-language immersion school, Nawahi for short, founded in 1994 in Keaau south of Hilo.

Since the founding, the school has been learning what techniques work in immersion teaching, but there has been no unified record of that knowledge, Kamana said.

Obtaining a doctorate involves writing a dissertation, essentially a book. Kamana's doctoral book will be a practical guide to the lessons she and others have learned in running Nawahi.

Before Nawahi, the immersion preschool Punana Leo was founded in 1985. Now that Hawaiian-language education extends from preschool to doctorate, it might seem that Hawaiian is doing well. But the picture is more complicated.

Wilson estimates there are 15,000 people who can speak Hawaiian reasonably well compared to just 100 remaining elders who grew up speaking it.

About 2 percent of Hawaii's children are in language-immersion programs. In New Zealand, recent numbers were 44 percent for preschoolers and 17 percent in elementary and high school, Wilson said

But New Zealand children typically speak Maori only in the classroom. Nawahi students speak Hawaiian in the hallway, on the playing field, at home, everywhere.

That's why Katarina Edmonds, a Maori working for the New Zealand Ministry of Education, will be earning a doctorate in the revitalization aspect of the UH-Hilo program.

Just as English ranges from Shakespeare to slang, the quality of Hawaiian also varies. Professor Jason Cabral will earn his doctorate in Hawaiian grammar to promote a high standard for the language.

Professor Larry Kimura grew up speaking Hawaiian on Parker Ranch. He had a significant hand in creating the Hawaiian-language program at UH-Hilo and was responsible recently for complete bilingualism in the exhibits at the Imiloa astronomy education center. Now he's interested in Hawaiian poetry.

But like fellow professors Cabral and Perreira, Kimura lacks a doctorate. With approval from the UH Board of Regents, he'll be experimenting on himself as he earns his degree and develops the program, Wilson said.

The goal now is to make English the language of business and work and Hawaiian the language of the home, Wilson said. Strengthening Hawaiian has the broad value of strengthening Hawaiian families and strengthening the economy, because Hawaiian culture is a major reason when tourists come here, he said.

But more programs don't necessarily mean more speakers. The Navajo language was doing well in Arizona and New Mexico until the 1990s when Navajo youth simply decided that English was more important, Wilson said.

Students in immersion programs, the indirect but ultimate beneficiaries of the doctoral program, know they have to be above average. "The Hawaiian language is not going to live if you are below average when you speak," Wilson said.

The results show quality works. At Nawahi, 100 percent of the high school students graduate, and 80 percent of these Hawaiian speakers go on to English-speaking colleges. Universities accepting them include Harvard and Oxford.