Fall 2021 - Colloquium Series and Occasional Seminar

The Department of Anthropology will be offering the following events this semester.


Colloquium Series

Each colloquium will be held Thursdays at 3:00 pm remotely via Zoom unless otherwise noted. For inquiries (including Zoom, Slack, and previous recording information), contact Anthropology at anthprog@hawaii.edu.

Huli Kanaka: Radically Reformulating Race, Place, and Anthropology

In January 2021, our department issued a “Position Statement on Race and Racism” that called for “an honest and open rethinking about the ways that race and racism continue to shape our institutions of public life, including the university.” In doing so, we committed to developing a Fall semester colloquium series dedicated to addressing “Race and Racism at Home.” Following from our stated “kuleana to confront abiding structures of racism and other systems of oppression,” we now aim to explore what the concept of “huli kanaka” (the Hawaiian translation of anthropology as “study of people”) may offer us as a form of anti-racist and anti-oppressive anthropology. The term huli has alternative meanings beyond “study” that include turn, change, search, explore, and the top of the kalo used for replanting. With these thoughts and more in mind, we feature three roundtables of faculty, students, and friends from both within and outside of our department who will help us in our work to overturn racist and colonial forms in our field as we plant more generative ideas and practices for a decolonial anthropology here at Mānoa.

Overturning Anthropological Racism in Hawai’i: Lessons from the Bishop Museum’s (Re)generations special exhibit

  • Date: September 9
  • Participants: Keolu Fox, Christopher Bae, and Noelle Kahanu

Searching for Kuleana: Responsibility and Transformation within the University

  • Date: October 7
  • Participants: Chris Yano (Professor, Anthropology, UHM), ‘Ulise Funaki (PhD candidate, Anthropology, UHM), L. Ayu Saraswati (Associate Professor, Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, UHM), Kelley Lehuakeaopuna Uyeoka (Executive Director, Huliauapa’a), and Tarisi Vunidilo (Assistant Professor, UH Hilo).

Replanting Knowledge: The Politics and Praxis of Teaching and Studying Anthropology at Mānoa

  • Date: November 4
  • Panelists: Seth Quintus (Associate Professor, Anthropology, UHM), Ashley Atkins (PhD candidate, Anthropology, UHM), Valéry Atkinson (PhD candidate, Anthropology, UHM), Aashish Hemrajani (Homeless Outreach Program Coordinator, Hawai’i Health and Harm Reduction Center), and Noenoe Silva (Professor, Political Science, UHM).

Occasional Seminar

This event will be held remotely via Zoom. For inquiries (including Zoom details), contact Anthropology at anthprog@hawaii.edu.

Women, War, & Revolutions in Myanmar: Himalaya, Naga Hills to Thai-Burma Borderlands

  • Speaker: Dr. Khin Mar Mar Kyi, University of Oxford
  • Date: Friday, November 12
  • Time: 2 pm - 3:15 pm
  • Co-sponsored by the Departments of Geography and Environment and Sociology and the Center for Southeast Asian Studies.

Since the military coup on 1 Feb 2021, the world has witnessed Myanmar women in the frontline of the spring revolution against the brutal military junta in order to restore democracy in Myanmar. Sixty percent of the participants in the Civil Disobedience Movement (CDM) are women, and many are leading the nation-wide protests against the vicious junta. Many female Members of the Parliament, university lecturers, academics, teachers, medical doctors, actresses, models, and singers became revolutionary soldiers - some joining the fight in the jungle. For ten months, while international communities have been largely silent, these women are determined to bring peace, democracy and equality in Myanmar on their own. However, Myanmar women’s participation in this revolution is not new. Dr. Mar will share her observations and insights – the women’s strength, commitment, and success in the face of structural discrimination and violence -- based on her research and interviews with women who are currently leading the revolution and also those who had participated in the revolutions of the past.

Dr. Khin Mar Mar Kyi “Dr. Mar” is the Interim Director and Convener of the International Studies at the University of Oxford. She is also one of the founding directors of the Oxford Thanakha International Gender Studies Centre in collaboration with Chiang Mai University in Thailand. This Centre has partnered with various international academic institutions and so far, conducted 22 international webinars on Myanmar’ coup related issues particularly gender issues in Myanmar. In her role as the Senior Research Fellow & Research Associate at Oxford University, she co-led the grant research funded program for “Religion, Gender, Identity, and Conflict in a Political Transition.” Dr. Mar holds a PhD in Gender and Anthropology from the Australian National University.

Anthropology Colloquium Series

Begun in 1997, the Anthropology Colloquium Series showcases contemporary anthropological scholarship and provides a forum to debate issues impacting the discipline. Topics are drawn from the four subfields and presenters include distinguished scholars, recent graduates, and those practicing anthropology outside of academia. All are welcome to attend.


Spring 2020 - Crawford Hall 115, Thursdays at 3:00 pm. A reception will follow the talks.

Date Title Speaker(s)
January 23 Determining the Origin of Human Skeletal Remains Using Stable Isotopes Lesley Chesson, Isotopes - Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency-DPAA
February 20 The Socio-Ecology of Landscape Construction and Formation on Ta'u Island, American Samoa  Seth Quintus, Department of Anthropology, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa
March 12 Restraint Without Control: Law and Order in Porgera and Enga Province, 1950-2014 Alex Golub, Department of Anthropology, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa
Canceled Graduate Student Symposium Anthropology Graduate Student Association, Department of Anthropology, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa
Canceled Ethnoprimatology: Studies of Primates in our Material and Perceptual Worlds Nick Malone, Department of Primatology, University of Auckland
Canceled Lapita and post-Lapita Pottery: Insights from Interdisciplinary Analyses Mathieu Leclerc, Department of Archaeology, Australian National University

Fall 2019 - George Hall 227, Thursdays at 3:00 PM. A reception will follow the talks.

Date Title Speaker(s)
August 29 Anthropology and the Mauna: A Roundtable Discussion on Kuleana Faculty and Graduate Students of the Department of Anthropology, UH Mānoa
September 5 People from the Pyramids: Interdisciplinary Analysis of Ancient Human Remains from HU-MFA Excavations at Giza, Egypt Emily Marlow, Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency
September 26 Barriers to Participation in Digital Game Cultures Kelly Bergstrom, School of Communications, UH Mānoa
October 10 Mosquitoes and the Making of the Annamite Hill Country: A Parasitical Speculative History Jonathan Padwe, Department of Anthropology, UH Mānoa
October 24 Anthropology Graduate Student Symposium Department of Anthropology, UH Mānoa
November 7 Lapita and its Transformations in Near Oceania, 3400-2600 B.P. Pat Kirch, Department of Anthropology, UH Mānoa

Spring 2019 - George Hall 227, Thursdays at 3:00 PM.

Date Title Speaker(s)
February 28 Mauka and Makai: exploring cultural ideas about beaches and mountains as public spaces in Brazil and Hawaiʻi Christian Palmer, Windward Community College. Co-sponsored by the Geography Department
March 8 Crafting a Tibetan Terroir: Wine Production, Identity, and Landscape Change in Shangri-La Brendan A. Galipeau, Annette and Hugh Gragg Postdoctoral Fellow in Transnational Asian Studies
March 14 The Archaeology of Internment: the Honouliuli National Monument, Oʻahu - a World War II-Era Japanese Internment and POW Camp William Belcher, University of Hawai‘i - West Oahu
March 28 Wastelands: Spoiled Identities and Countercommodities among Ashkali and Romani Scavengers Eirik Saethre, Department of Anthropology, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa
April 25 Living with Sacred Lands: Heritage and Mana in the Marquesas Islands Emily Donaldson, University of Vermont and St. Michael's College. Co-sponsored by the Center for Pacific Islands Studies

For further information, please contact Anthropology at anthprog@hawaii.edu