Hapa () is a Hawaiian word for someone of

multiracial The term multiracial people refers to people who are mixed with two or more races (human categorization), races and the term multi-ethnic people refers to people who are of more than one ethnicity, ethnicities. A variety of terms have been used ...

ancestry. In

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; ) is an island U.S. state, state of the United States, in the Pacific Ocean about southwest of the U.S. mainland. One of the two Non-contiguous United States, non-contiguous U.S. states (along with Alaska), it is the only sta ...

, the word refers to any person of mixed ethnic heritage, regardless of the specific mixture.: "Thus, for locals in Hawai’i, both hapa or hapa haole are used to depict people of mixed-race heritage.": "Currently, Hawaiian locals use 'hapa' to refer to any individual who is racially mixed." The term is used for any multiracial person of partial

East Asian East Asia is a geocultural region of Asia. It includes China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan, plus two special administrative regions of China, Hong Kong and Macau. The economies of Economy of China, China, Economy of Ja ...

Southeast Asian Southeast Asia is the geographical southeastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of China, east of the Indian subcontinent, and northwest of the Australian mainland, which is part of Oceania. Southeast Asia is ...

, or Pacific Islander mixture in California. In what can be characterized as

trans-cultural diffusion In cultural anthropology and cultural geography, cultural diffusion, as conceptualized by Leo Frobenius in his 1897/98 publication ''Der westafrikanische Kulturkreis'', is the spread of culture, cultural items—such as ideas, fashion, styles, rel ...

or the

wave model In historical linguistics, the wave model or wave theory () is a model of language change in which a new language feature (innovation) or a new combination of language features spreads from its region of origin, being adopted by a gradually expa ...

, this latter usage has also spread to

Massachusetts Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...

Ohio Ohio ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Erie to the north, Pennsylvania to the east, West Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, Indiana to the ...

, and

Oregon Oregon ( , ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is a part of the Western U.S., with the Columbia River delineating much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while t ...

. Both uses are concurrent.

Historical and Hawaiian usage

The word "hapa" entered the Hawaiian language in the early 1800s, with the arrival of Christian missionaries who instituted a Hawaiian alphabet and developed curriculum for schools. It is a transliteration of the English word "half," but quickly came to mean "part," which could be combined with numbers to form fractions. For example, ''hapalua'' is half, ''hapahā'' is one-fourth, and ''hapanui'' means majority. In Hawaii, the term can be used in conjunction with other Hawaiian racial and ethnic descriptors to specify a particular racial or ethnic mixture. An example of this is ''hapa haole'' (part European/White). Pukui states that the original meaning of the word ''haole'' was "foreigner." Therefore, all non-Hawaiians can be called ''haole''. In practical terms, however, the term is used as a racial description for whites, with the specific exclusion of Portuguese. Portuguese are traditionally considered to be a separate race in Hawaii. '' Hapa-haole'' also is the name of a type of

Hawaiian music The music of Hawaii includes an array of traditional and popular styles, ranging from native Hawaiian folk music to modern rock and hip hop. Styles like slack-key guitar are well known worldwide, while Hawaiian-tinged music is a frequent par ...

in which the tune, styling, and/or subject matter is Hawaiian, but the lyrics are partly, mostly, or entirely in English. Many ''hapa-haole'' songs had their musical roots in the Western tradition, and the lyrics were in some combination of English and Hawaiian; these songs first gained popularity outside the

Territory of Hawaii The Territory of Hawaii or Hawaii Territory (Hawaiian language, Hawaiian: ''Panalāʻau o Hawaiʻi'') was an organized incorporated territories of the United States, organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from Apri ...

beginning in 1912–1915, and include titles such as " My Little Grass Shack in Kealakekua" and "

Sweet Leilani "Sweet Leilani" is a song featured in the 1937 film, '' Waikiki Wedding''. It won the Academy Award for Best Original Song, and Bing Crosby's record became one of the biggest hits of 1937. Harry Owens wrote the song on October 20, 1934 for his dau ...

." ''Hapa haole'' is also used for Hawaiian-language

hula Hula () is a Hawaiian dance form expressing chant (''oli'') or song (Mele (Hawaiian language), ''mele''). It was developed in the Hawaiian Islands by the Native Hawaiians who settled there. The hula dramatizes or portrays the words of the oli ...

songs that are partly in English, thus disqualifying them as "authentic" Hawaiian hula in some venues such as the

Merrie Monarch Festival The Merrie Monarch Festival is a week-long cultural festival that takes place annually in Hilo, Hawaii during the week after Easter. It honors King David Kalākaua, who was called the "Merrie Monarch" for his patronage of the arts and is cre ...

Controversy

Some see the use of the term to refer to mixed Asian people without any connections to Hawaii as a misappropriation of

Hawaiian culture The culture of the Native Hawaiians encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms practiced by the original residents of the Hawaiian islands, including their knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits. Huma ...

, but there are '' kamaāina'' and ''Kānaka Maoli'' who see it as hypocritical to protest anyone using what was originally taken from another culture to begin with. Still others take a stronger stand in discouraging its usage and misuse as they consider the term to be vulgar and racist. However, the term, unlike other words referring to mixed-race people, has never been a derogatory term when it is used in its original Hawaiian context, although there is some debate about appropriate usage outside this context. As Wei Ming Dariotis states, Hapa' was chosen because it was the only word we could find that did not really cause us pain. It is not any of the Asian words for mixed Asian people that contain negative connotations either literally (e.g. 'children of the dust,' 'mixed animal') or by association (Eurasian)."

In popular culture

In 2010, a film called ''

One Big Hapa Family ''One Big Hapa Family'' is a 2010 live-action/animated documentary film directed by Canadian director Jeff Chiba Stearns. The documentary explores aspects that influence most Japanese-Canadians to marry inter-racially and how the mixed Japanese ge ...

'' was released about Japanese Canadians.

Notes

Citations

Sources

Books

Journal articles

* * * *

Articles

* *

Videos

External links

How the Hawaiian word 'hapa' came to be used by people of mixed heritage
(audio)
Hapa Happy Hour
podcast * online presentation about the Hapa Project {{Multiethnicity Asian-American culture Ethno-cultural designations Hawaiian words and phrases Multiracial affairs in the United States