Abstract
For tens of thousands of years the lives of Hawai’ians have coexisted with nature. The vast ocean and the volcanic islands have provided abundant gifts to the islanders and sustained every living being in intricate balance. As in many indigenous orally based cultures, people’s livelihoods in Hawai’i have been deeply intertwined with nature. People worship nature in their daily lives with chants, prayers, and dance. It is not possible to discuss Hawai’ian life and its people, even their psychology and communication, without referring to the context of nature and what Abram calls the “larger more-than-human worlds” (Abram, 1995, n. 3041 that exnand hevnnd limited human rnnsciousness_
E Ho Mai E
Ho Mai ka ike mai luna mai e
O na mea huna no’eau o na mele e
E Ho Mai, E Ho Mai, E Ho Mai, e ‘ a
Give us knowledge from above
All the wisdom of the songs
Give us, grant us, bestow us
(traditional chant before ho’oponopono)
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© 2014 Yukari Kunisue
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Kunisue, Y. (2014). Listening to the Natural World: Ecopsychology of Listening from a Hawai’ian Spiritual Perspective. In: Peeples, J., Depoe, S. (eds) Voice and Environmental Communication. Palgrave Studies in Media and Environmental Communication. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137433749_12
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137433749_12
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
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