Gagana Samoa Author on Radio Australia

Galumalemana Afeleti Hunkin, author of the newly revised Gagana Samoa: A Samoan Language Coursebook, was recently interviewed for Radio Australia’s Pacific Beat. Read the interview here.

Talking Hawaii’s Story on Hawaii Public Radio

Hawaii Public Radio’s Noe Tanigawa spoke briefly with one of the interviewees from Talking Hawai‘i’s Story: Oral Histories of an Island People, edited by Michi Kodama-Nishimoto, Warren S. Nishimoto, and Cynthia A. Oshiro. Listen to the interview here.

Evangelicalism in Korea

Born AgainKnown as Asia’s “evangelical superpower,” South Korea today has some of the largest and most dynamic churches in the world and is second only to the United States in the number of missionaries it dispatches abroad. Understanding its evangelicalism is crucial to grasping the course of its modernization, the rise of nationalism and anticommunism, and the relationship between Christians and other religionists within the country. Born Again: Evangelicalism in Korea, by Timothy S. Lee, is the first book in a Western language to consider the introduction, development, and character of evangelicalism in Korea—from its humble beginnings at the end of the nineteenth century to claiming one out of every five South Koreans as an adherent at the end of the twentieth.

“This book is important because Christianity in Korea is important. Korea is the most Protestant nation in Asia; Korean Christians are behind only Americans in the number of missionaries they dispatch abroad; and the number of Korean Christian churches established in North America has grown large enough to begin to influence Christianity on this side of the Pacific. In this accessible and clearly argued study of evangelical Christianity in Korea, Timothy Lee provides an explanation both of why Christianity has been successful in Korea and why evangelical Christianity has been more successful than other forms. He has mined materials in Korean and English that no one else has used in the same way and presents his findings in a manner that will appeal to scholars of Korean studies and religious studies as well as to laypeople seeking to understand a phenomenon that has grown so visible on the world stage.” —Don Baker, University of British Columbia

December 2009 / ISBN 978-0-8248-3375-6 / $40.00 (CLOTH)

Green Days/Holiday Schedule

University of Hawai‘i Press is a member of the UH-Mānoa campus Green Days initiative, established to promote sustainability and energy conservation. Most Press offices will be closed December 19, 2009-January 3, 2010, with the exception of our business office and warehouse, which will be open for customer orders and shipping December 21-23 and December 28-30. All offices will reopen on January 4, 2010.

Talking Hawaii’s Story Signings in December

On Friday, December 11, from 7:00 to 8:00 p.m., Michi Kodama-Nishimoto, Warren S. Nishimoto, and Cynthia A. Oshiro, coeditors of Talking Hawai‘i’s Story: Oral Histories of an Island People, will sign books at Barnes & Noble-Kāhala Mall. (For store information, call 737-3323.) Talking Hawai‘i’s Story presents a rich sampling of the landmark work done by the Center for Oral History by making available 29 first-person narratives that until now only appeared in the COH’s semi-annual newsletter.

The editors will also participate in the Saturday, December 12 Holiday Book Fair at the Japanese Cultural Center of Hawai‘i, 2454 So. Beretania Street, that will take place from 2:00 to 4:00 p.m. in the Community Gallery & Gift Shop. This event is free and open to the public.

Talking Hawai‘i’s Story is published by University of Hawai‘i Press for the Center for Oral History and the Center for Biographical Research. The softcover book retails for $19.00 and is generally available at island bookstores or can be ordered from UH Press by phone: 956-8255, toll free: 1-888-847-7377; email: uhpbooks@hawaii.edu; or online: www.uhpress.hawaii.edu. For event information, call 956-8697.

Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton to Speak at Center for Korean Studies, UHM

On Thursday, December 10, from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. at the Center for Korean Studies, UH-Mānoa (1881 East-West Road), award-winning translators Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton will give a talk on their new work, The Red Room: Stories of Trauma in Contemporary Korea. The two are visiting from western Canada, where Bruce Fulton is associate professor in the Department of Asian Studies, University of British Columbia. The Red Room brings together stories by three canonical Korean writers who examine trauma as a simple fact of life. Copies of The Red Room will be available for purchase, as will MĀNOA journal’s Enduring War: Stories of What We’ve Learned, which includes a translation by Fulton. Light refreshments will be provided and the event is free and open to the public.

Bruce and Ju-Chan Fulton are the translators of numerous volumes of contemporary Korean fiction, including Trees on a Slope by Hwang Sun-won and The Dwarf by Cho Se-hui, both also published by University of Hawai‘i Press. The Red Room retails for $15.00 and can be ordered from UH Press by phone: 956-8255, toll free: 1-888-847-7377; email: uhpbooks@hawaii.edu; or online: www.uhpress.hawaii.edu. For event information, call 956-8697.