Introduction

As I write this review, the Cameron Crowe film Aloha has just been released to much criticism for its unrealistic portrayal of Hawai‘i; a protest atop Mauna Kea, the tallest mountain in the world f...

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In this short essay, I want to consider, first, how literacy studies as a field has been sponsored—What work has been foundational, transformative, and innovative?—and second, to reflect on how my own study of literacy has been sponsored. In particular, I want to think about how Brandt’s concept of “sponsorship” has not only been transformative in conceptualizing the dynamics of literacy, but how it is also useful in addressing questions of equity and diversity within literacy studies. As defined by Brandt, “sponsors of literacy” are “any agents, local or distant, concrete or abstract, who enable, support, teach, and model, as well as recruit, regulate, suppress, or withhold, literacy—and gain advantage by it in some way” (19). It is the first part of this definition that is key to my discussion: How have sponsors who “enable, support, teach, and model” informed what we do as a field broadly, and what I have done in my own work specifically? In theorizing a deep understanding of how literacy is enacted, Brandt has helped us to see that literacy does not simply empower or provide access to resources for individuals, but perhaps most importantly creates a complex web of relationships that may sustain literate action. We might think of sponsorship itself as a literacy practice and as literate action, marshalling resources in order to create opportunities for literacy development.

Reviewed are A Resource Guide to Asian American Literature, edited by Sau-ling Cynthia Wong and Stephen H. Sumida, Words Matter: Conversations with Asian American Writers, edited by King-Kok Cheung, and Screaming Monkeys: Critiques of Asian American Images, edited by M. Evelina Galang.

Looking at arguments put forth by courts, the State of Hawai‘i, and Native Hawaiian sovereignty activists, as well as constructions of Hawaiianness by Native Hawaiians and Locals on the mainland, the author analyzes a rhetorical shift from celebrations of cultural identity to assertions of nationhood and sovereignty on the part of Native Hawaiians that has at times made nonnative Locals feel displaced in the only “home” they have known. Both groups have had to deal with a legacy of U.S. imperialism and injustice, placing them at times in coalition to confront racism and at times in conflict.

Children growing up in Hawaii, coming as they do in their plasticyears under the influence of the public school, preparing themfor the assumption of the responsibilities which life in Hawaii demands, should come tofeel that, in cutting cane on the plantation, in driving a tractor in the fields, in swinging a sledge in a blacksmith shop, in wielding a brush on building or fence or bridge, as well as in sitting at a doctors or merchants or manager' or banker' desk, there is opportunity for rendering a necessary as well as intelligent, worthy, and creative service. -United States Department of the Interior, Bureau of Education, 1920 (4)

Discusses the first comprehensive examination of the system of public education in Hawai‘i, conducted in 1920. Notes the great importance of the study since it not only evaluated Hawaii‘s educational system but also provided the territorial government some gauge of Hawaii‘s status as a United States territory and its success in meeting the ideals of America.