Hawaiian Language
| Note on Usage |
| Writing the Hawaiian language on the
Web presents challenges since most browsers will not read
the diacritical marks that are sometimes critical to meaning
and pronunciation. In most places, we omit the diacritical
marks in our text and show the correctly spelled Hawaiian
word in parentheses, using ' for the 'okina and ^ for
the kahakô. See Ka 'Ôlelo
Hawai'i for online resources. |
The
words and phrases of the Hawaiian language are all around
us in the islands, in our place names, street names, many
popular songs, on TV and radio, and also on TheBus, at the
beach and wherever local folks gather.
Most visitors have learned a small vocabulary before they
leave and newcomers soon find themselves mixing some Hawaiian
words into their everyday speech.
Some
of the language we hear is not really the Hawaiian language,
which is called Ka
'Ôlelo Hawai'i,
but a Creole language, locally called
Pidgin.
It is not the same Pidgin that one may hear in Asia or the
South Pacific, as it developed uniquely in Hawaii and results
from many races needing to learn how to communicate with each
other to conduct the business of their daily lives.
There
are many online resources for learning about both, so we've
separated them on these pages:
Ka 'Ôlelo Hawai'i Hawaiian
Pidgin
|
