UH PRESS TITLES HONORED WITH 2019 KA PALAPALA PO‘OKELA AWARDS

[See the original post on the UH Press website.]

At the 2019 Ka Palapala Po‘okela awards presentation on December 13, we were delighted that seven of our titles were selected as honorees. These included:
• Pathway of the Birds: The Voyaging Achievements of Māori and Their Polynesian Ancestors, by New Zealand author Andrew Crowe, won in two categories: Illustrative or Photographic Books and Text or Reference Books.
• Light in the Queen’s Garden: Ida May Pope, Pioneer for Hawaiʻi’s Daughters, 1862–1914, by San Diego educator Sandra Bonura, won the Award of Excellence for Nonfiction.
• The Charm Buyers, a novel by Lillian Howan, won the Award of Excellence for Literature.
• Nā Wāhine Koa: Hawaiian Women for Sovereignty and Demilitarization, with personal essays by Moanikeʻala Akaka, Maxine Kahaulelio, Terrilee Kekoʻolani-Raymond, and Loretta Ritte; edited by Noelani Kaʻōpua-Goodyear, tied as winner in the Hawaiian Language, Culture, and History category.
• In Haste with Aloha: Letters and Diaries of Queen Emma, 1881–1885, edited by David W. Forbes, tied for honorable mention in the Nonfiction category.
• Kalaupapa Place Names: Waikolu to Nihoa, John R. K. Clark, received the honorable mention in Text or Reference Books.
• Inhouse Design of New Zealand won in the Design category for Tatau: A History of Sāmoan Tattooing, by Sean Mallon and Sébastien Galliot.

For a complete list of results and nominees, and a link to photos of the event, visit the Hawai‘i Book Publishers Association website.

2017 Ka Palapala Po‘okela Awards: UH Press Nominees

June 23, 2017: This post has been updated with the results shown in bold.

Now in its 23rd year, the Ka Palapala Po‘okela Awards are presented by Hawai‘i Book Publishers Association to honor Hawai‘i’s finest books and their authors, illustrators, photographers, designers, and publishers. While previously given annually, HBPA has switched to a biennial schedule, and this year’s eligible titles have 2015 and 2016 copyright dates. The winners will be announced at the awards celebration scheduled for Thursday, June 22, 6 to 8:30 pm, at the ARTS at Marks Garage in downtown Honolulu; the event is free and open to the public.

University of Hawai‘i Press nominees include (listed alphabetically by author’s last name):

The Healers by Kimo Armitage (Excellence in Literature)

The Lives of Hawai‘i’s Dolphins and Whales: Natural History and Conservation by Robin W. Baird (Honorable Mention for Excellence in Natural Science)

Facing the Spears of Change: The Life and Legacy of John Papa ‘Ī‘ī by Marie Alohalani Brown (Winner of the Award of Excellence in Hawaiian Language, Culture & History)

Royal Hawaiian Featherwork: Nā Hulu Aliʻi by Leah Caldeira, Christina Hellmich, Adrienne L. Kaeppler, Betty Lou Kam, Roger G. Rose; copublished with Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco (Excellence in Hawaiian Language, Culture & History; Winner of the Award of Excellence in Illustrative or Photographic Books)

Hawai‘i’s Animals Do the Most Amazing Things by Marion Coste, illustrated by Rena Ekmanis (Honorable Mention for Excellence in Children’s Literature)

Sunny Skies, Shady Characters: Cops, Killers, and Corruption in the Aloha State by James Dooley (Honorable Mention for Excellence in Nonfiction)

Hawai‘i’s Scenic Roads: Paving the Way for Tourism in the Islands by Dawn E. Duensing (Excellence in Nonfiction)

Picture Bride Stories by Barbara F. Kawakami (Excellence in Nonfiction)

Unearthing the Polynesian Past: Explorations and Adventures of an Island Archaeologist by Patrick Vinton Kirch (Excellence in Nonfiction)

Hawai‘i’s Kōlea: The Amazing Transpacific Life of the Pacific Golden-Plover by Oscar W. Johnson and Susan Scott (Winner of the Award of Excellence in Natural Science)

Murder Frames the Scene by Victoria Nalani Kneubuhl (Winner of the Award of Excellence in Literature)

Protea: A Guide to Cultivated Species and Varieties by Lewis J. Matthews (Excellence in Natural Science)

For a Song by Rodney Morales (Excellence in Literature)

Plants for the Tropical Xeriscape: A Gardener’s Guide by Fred D. Rauch and Paul R. Weissich (Excellence in Natural Science)

Bayonets in Paradise: Martial Law in Hawai‘i during World War II by Harry N. Scheiber and Jane L. Scheiber (Excellence in Nonfiction)

Curve of the Hook: An Archaeologist in Polynesia by Yosihiko Sinoto with Hiroshi Aramata; edited by Frank Stewart; translated by Frank Stewart and Madoka Nagadō (Winner of the Award of Excellence in Nonfiction)

A Sky Wonderful with Stars: 50 Years of Modern Astronomy on Maunakea by Michael J. West (Excellence in Illustrative or Photographic Books and designer Mardee Melton for Excellence in Design)

For a complete list of this year’s nominated titles, see the HBPA website.

Best wishes to each of our nominees!

UH Press awarded $90K open book grant

We’re pleased to announce that the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) have awarded the University of Hawai‘i a $90,000 grant to digitize 100 out-of-print UH Press books for open access.

The project is part of the Humanities Open Book Program, a joint initiative by the NEH and the Mellon Foundation. UH Press is one of eight publishers to receive the second round of funding totaling nearly $600,000.

We’re grateful to the Mellon Foundation and the NEH for choosing us for this funding opportunity, which will allow us to introduce our backlist to a new set of readers. Beginning in 2018, the selected titles will be hosted on a custom open-access portal where readers may download them in EPUB and PDF formats.

We also want to give a special shout-out to our colleagues at the UH Mānoa Library, who will assist in the digitization and hosting of the converted books, to our digital publishing manager Trond Knutsen, and to Katherine Fisher, our development and digital projects specialist, who was the lead writer and organizer for our grant application. It is through her tireless efforts that we are able to make more UH Press books accessible online.

Click here to read the complete press release announcement.

Read more about Humanities Open Book Program projects here.

Celebrating the “Wonderfully Subversive Power of Libraries and Librarians” as Robert Ji-Song Ku’s Dubious Gastronomy Wins APALA Literature Award for Adult Nonfiction

One of the raffle items at the APALA awards dinner—a bracelet with mini book covers of the winning titles.

In conjunction with the American Library Association annual conference in San Francisco, the Asian Pacific American Librarians Association (APALA) literary awards were presented at a lively dinner ceremony on Saturday, June 27. Dubious Gastronomy: The Cultural Politics of Eating Asian in the USA by Robert Ji-Song Ku, associate professor of Asian American studies at Binghamton University–SUNY, received the top honor in the adult nonfiction category. While Professor Ku regrettably was unable to attend the event, his prepared remarks were read by UH Press development director Colins Kawai, who accepted the award on his behalf. The speech is worth sharing here:

“It is a privilege and an honor to win the 2014-15 Asian/Pacific American Award for Literature in the adult non-fiction category. I am especially honored to receive this award from an association of librarians because, you see, I was practically raised by librarians since I was eight years old when my family immigrated to Hawaii from Korea in the early 1970s.

Having to work several jobs between them from before sunrise to long after sunset, my parents could not afford any sort of childcare, after-school programs, or summer camps for their three children. My mother’s solution was to drop us off at the public library for hours on end. And this is how I fell in love with books, which plunged me into the world of dinosaurs, great white sharks, and faraway galaxies. It also led me to C.S. Lewis’s Narnia, JRR Tolkien’s Middle-earth, Thomas Hardy’s Wessex, and Maxine Hong Kingston’s girlhood among ghosts, white tigers, and shamans.

I believe it was the filmmaker Michael Moore who said of librarians: “They are subversive. You think they’re just sitting there at the desk, all quiet and everything. They’re like plotting the revolution, man. I wouldn’t mess with them.”

I couldn’t agree more. The fact that I went on to earn a PhD in English literature, become a professor of Asian American studies, and author books about Asian Americans is a testament to the wonderfully subversive and revolutionary power of libraries and librarians. No, I don’t mess with librarians; I give them props!

I thank the University of Hawai‘i Press for publishing my book, and especially my editor, Masako Ikeda, for believing in my book from the very get-go. I thank my family—my wife Nancy and twin boys Eliot and Oliver—for everything under and above the sun. But most of all, on this day, I thank the members of APALA for bestowing upon me this incredible honor.”

All of us at UHP join him in giving props to librarians everywhere!

2015 Ka Palapala Po‘okela Awards: UH Press Nominees

The 22nd annual Ka Palapala Po‘okela Awards celebration is scheduled for Thursday, April 23, 6 to 9 p.m., at Imin Conference Center (Jefferson Hall) at the East-West Center, which adjoins University of Hawai‘i’s Mānoa campus. Hawaii News Now reporter/commentator Howard Dicus will again be the ceremony emcee. The awards are presented annually by Hawai‘i Book Publishers Association to honor Hawai‘i’s finest books and their authors, illustrators, designers, and publishers.

Titles with a 2014 copyright date were eligible for this year’s awards. UH Press has a wonderful group of nominees (listed alphabetically by author’s name):

North Shore Place Names: Ka‘ena to Kahuku, by John R. K. Clark
(Excellence in Hawaiian Language, Culture & History)

Ocean to Plate: Cooking Fish with Hawai‘i’s Kusuma Cooray, by Kusuma Cooray; designed by Mardee Melton
(Excellence in Cookbooks; Excellence in Design)

Hawaiian Plant Life: Vegetation and Flora, by Robert J. Gustafson, Derral R. Herbst, and Philip W. Rundel; designed by Mardee Melton
(Excellence in Illustrative or Photographic Books; Excellence in Natural Science; Excellence in Design)

‘Ike Ulana Lau Hala: The Vitality and Vibrancy of Lau Hala Weaving Traditions in Hawai‘i, edited by Lia O’Neill Keawe, Marsha MacDowell, and C. Kurt Dewhurst
(Excellence in Hawaiian Language, Culture & History)

Kua‘āina Kahiko: Life and Land in Ancient Kahikinui, Maui, by Patrick Vinton Kirch
(Excellence in Hawaiian Language, Culture & History; Excellence in Nonfiction)

Sovereign Sugar: Industry and Environment in Hawai‘i, by Carol A. MacLennan
(Excellence in Nonfiction)

From Race to Ethnicity: Interpreting Japanese American Experiences in Hawai‘i, by Jonathan Y. Okamura
(Excellence in Nonfiction)

I Ulu I Ka ‘Aina: Land, edited by Jonathan Osorio
(Excellence in Hawaiian Language, Culture & History)

The Watersmart Garden: 100 Great Plants for the Tropical Xeriscape, by Fred D. Rauch and Paul R. Weissich
(Excellence in Natural Science)

Local Story: The Massie-Kahahawai Case and the Culture of History, by John P. Rosa
(Excellence in Nonfiction)

Call Me Captain: A Memoir of a Woman at Sea, by Susan Scott
(Excellence in Nonfiction)

Wahine Volleyball: 40 Years Coaching Hawai‘i’s Team, by Dave Shoji with Ann Miller; designed by Julie Matsuo-Chun
(Excellence in Special-Interest Books; Excellence in Design)

Surfing Places, Surfboard Makers: Craft, Creativity, and Cultural Heritage in Hawai‘i, California, and Australia; by Andrew Warren and Chris Gibson
(Excellence in Special-Interest Books)

The Value of Hawai‘i 2: Ancestral Roots, Oceanic Visions; edited by Aiko Yamashiro and Noelani Goodyear-Kaʻōpua
(Excellence in Nonfiction)

In addition to the above UHP titles, ones distributed by UH Press were nominated by their respective publishers:

‘Io Lani: The Hawaiian Hawk; photographs by William S. Chillingworth with essays by John L. Culliney

Breaking the Silence: Lessons of Democracy and Social Justice from the World War II Honouliuli Internment and POW Camp in Hawai‘i, edited by Suzanne Falgout and Linda Nishigaya

Secrets of Diamond Head : A History and Trail Guide, by Denby Fawcett

Lihu‘e: Root and Branch of a Hawai‘i Town, by Pat L. Griffin

Keka‘a: The Making and Saving of North Beach West Maui, by Sydney Lehua Iaukea

Reflections of Honor: The Untold Story of a Nisei Spy, by Lorraine Ward and Katherine Erwin with Yoshinobu Oshiro

For a complete list of this year’s nominees, read the Hawaii Book Blog post.

Kudos and good wishes to all!

Choice Magazine’s Outstanding Academic Titles for 2014 Announced

Earlier this month, Choice, the official publication of the Association of College and Research Libraries, announced their annual list of Outstanding Academic Titles reviewed in the magazine during the previous year. The list represents less than ten percent of 7,300+ books and other media titles reviewed by Choice during 2014. We are pleased to have the following UH Press books recognized for their excellence:

Situated Testimonies: Dread and Enchantment in an Indonesian Literary Archive
by Laurie J. Sears

“Drawing on contemporary psychoanalytic scholarship, Sears has produced an important study on trauma, memory, and the mediated power of language. She shows how close readings of colonial and postcolonial literature can be, indeed must be, part of the historical archive.” —Choice (February 2014)

Architecturalized Asia: Mapping a Continent through History
edited by Vimalin Rujivacharakul, H. Hazel Hahn, Ken Tadashi Oshima, and Peter Christensen
Spatial Habitus: Making and Meaning in Asia’s Architecture
Published in association with Hong Kong University Press

“This is an ambitious historiographical intervention into architectural/art historical accounts of ‘Asia.’ In contrast to studies that take the continent’s boundaries as cartographically or ontologically given, this volume emphasizes how Asia has been constructed and produced since the early modern period. . . . A valuable resource for specialists in art history, architectural history, anthropology, history, geography, religion, cultural studies, and Asian studies.” —Choice (September 2014)

Zhuangzi: Text and Context by Livia Kohn and distributed by UH Press for Three Pines Press, was also recognized as a 2014 Outstanding Academic Title.