Hawaiian Language Services

Hawaiian (ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi, pronounced [ʔoːˈlɛlo həˈvɐjʔi]) is a Polynesian language of the Austronesian language family that takes its name from Hawaiʻi, the largest island in the tropical North Pacific archipelago where it developed. Hawaiian, along with English, is an official language of the US state of Hawaii. King Kamehameha III established the first Hawaiian-language constitution in 1839 and 1840.

In 1896, the Republic of Hawaii established English as the official language in schools. The number of native speakers of Hawaiian gradually decreased during the period from the 1830s to the 1950s. English essentially displaced Hawaiian on six of seven inhabited islands. In 2001, native speakers of Hawaiian amounted to less than 0.1% of the statewide population. Linguists were unsure if Hawaiian and other endangered languages would survive.

Nevertheless, from around 1949 to the present day, there has been a gradual increase in attention to and promotion of the language. Public Hawaiian-language immersion preschools called Pūnana Leo were established in 1984; other immersion schools followed soon after that. The first students to start in immersion preschool have now graduated from college and many are fluent Hawaiian speakers. However, the language is still classified as critically endangered by UNESCO.

A creole language, Hawaiian Pidgin (or Hawaii Creole English, HCE), is more commonly spoken in Hawaiʻi than Hawaiian. Some linguists, as well as many locals, argue that Hawaiian Pidgin is a dialect of American English. Born from the increase of immigrants from Japan, China, Puerto Rico, Korea, Portugal, Spain and the Philippines, the pidgin creole language was a necessity in the plantations. Hawaiian and immigrant laborers as well as the white luna, or overseers, found a way to communicate amongst themselves. Pidgin eventually made its way off the plantation and into the greater community, where it is still used to this day.

The Hawaiian alphabet has 13 letters: five vowels: a e i o u (each with a long pronunciation and a short one) and eight consonants: he ke la mu nu pi we ʻokina (a glottal stop).

The Hawaiian language takes its name from the largest island in the Hawaiian archipelago, Hawaii (Hawaiʻi in the Hawaiian language). The island name was first written in English in 1778 by British explorer James Cook and his crew members. They wrote it as “Owhyhee” or “Owhyee”. It is written “Oh-Why-hee” on the first map of Sandwich Islands engraved by Tobias Conrad Lotter [de] in 1781. Explorers Mortimer (1791) and Otto von Kotzebue (1821) used that spelling.

The initial “O” in the name “Oh-Why-hee” is a reflection of the fact that Hawaiian predicates unique identity by using a copula form, ʻo, immediately before a proper noun. Thus, in Hawaiian, the name of the island is expressed by saying ʻO Hawaiʻi, which means “[This] is Hawaiʻi.” The Cook expedition also wrote “Otaheite” rather than “Tahiti.”

The spelling “why” in the name reflects the [ʍ] pronunciation of wh in 18th-century English (still used in parts of the English-speaking world). Why was pronounced [ʍai]. The spelling “hee” or “ee” in the name represents the sounds [hi], or [i].

American missionaries bound for Hawaiʻi used the phrases “Owhihe Language” and “Owhyhee language” in Boston prior to their departure in October 1819 and during their five-month voyage to Hawaiʻi.[18] They still used such phrases as late as March 1822. However, by July 1823, they had begun using the phrase “Hawaiian Language.”

In Hawaiian, the language is called ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi, since adjectives follow nouns.