Kaona jamaica osorio biography

V-V: Could you describe your concept of the relationship between Hawaiian and English in this piece? Also, what role does translation play in this poem? JO: The translation is only there for the poem to be accessible. Unfortunately not enough people speak Hawaiian, and the audience that really needs to be reached is beyond our beautiful islands, so the translation is essential.

V-V: Could you talk in general about the significance of including Hawaiian language in the poem and the choices you made? Also, since the poem is about passing on traditions, why did you choose to use a relatively newer mele instead of an older kaona jamaica osorio biography JO: We are calling upon our parents and grandparents but also our peers.

It is just as much our responsibility to pass on the torch as it is our kupuna. I guess it just seemed foolish not to choose this chant. JO: Leo was chosen mostly because of the way it sounded in the phrase. Leo is voice and only exists if it is being used, so in many ways it is more appropriate when we wanted to say that people need to speak and be heard.

JO: Not really. I think statehood is a joke, to be completely honest, and has absolutely no legal or moral standing. Man, this was a crazy powerful performance. The added complexity of the multiple languages just makes it even more mindblowing. Language is important as culture and identity are both a reflection of ones Language. I liked the way you used different ways of communiting your message through Hawaiian, English, and motion.

I really liked how you spoke about Kaona but then went on to say that some meanings should never be hidden. I also liked the line right before E Ho Mai when you spoke of our Kupuna wrapping us in words hoping that we will hold on to their meaning. I also liked how you identified the flower being a symbol us the children and then went on to use it throughout the poem.

I appreciate your performance mahalo. I was blown away by this performance. It was extremely powerful and emotional. I could feel the mana and emotions exploding from the two perfomers, which caused me to get chicken skin. I fully agree that language is very powerful and connects us to our culture. Without language, one is lost culturally; culture lives within the language.

Awesome job! This performance was intense. I believe that the use of layering the voices added an extra means of incorporating the meaning of kaona into the poetry rather than just an explanation of what it meant. I believe that this was a good way to get information of the Hawaiian culture and customs across to others that are uninformed on the topics being that it is a truly entertaining and at the same time mind boggling performance.

I am appreciative to you for getting this information out to share with people who would probably not have known it otherwise. In her poetry and activism were the subject of an award-winning film, This is the Way we Rise which premiered at Sundance Film Festival in I am invested in pursuing my work and sharing it in a way that will disrupt our institutions and transform our assumptions of what the academy can and should do in order to make way for a more just and ethical society.

My current research has shifted to trace the institutionalization of carceral systems in the Hawaiian Kingdom and Hawaiian territorial history. I trace these transformations into the contemporary period while investigating intergenerational resistance to carceral politics. American Quarterly. ISSN JSTOR S2CID External links [ edit ]. Authority control databases.

Germany United States. Hidden categories: Articles with short description Short description matches Wikidata CS1 maint: location missing publisher Year of birth missing living people. Toggle the table of contents. Jamaica Osorio. Add languages Add topic. Heoli is a three-time national poetry champion, poetry mentor and a published author. Q: What inspired you to become an educator and poet?

I grew up with a father, [Jonathan Osorio] who was a professor, and a musician. And what a lot of people don't know about my father is, he's also really quite a beautiful poet. His poetry gets turned into music. Some people see him as a musician, but he's a really talented writer. And so I grew up with that in my house every day. But I don't think anyone revered him as much as I did as a child.

I wanted to be just like him. PC: Daniella Zalcman dzalcman. And then he could come home and spend time with me and my siblings, and he could travel and advocate on behalf of our people.

Kaona jamaica osorio biography

And I saw that and to me, there was no better job in the world that would make space for all the things that I wanted to be. From a young age, I knew that I wanted to teach at a university. From what I observed, it seemed to me that all the fiercest people on the front lines were also on the front line at the university. The writing side came on much later.

It felt like the same thing. As I became more and more radical, I realized that I was being given a lot of opportunities to stand on a stage in front of a lot of people.