Research Guides: New Books in the Library Archive: Week of January 26, 2015

FEATURED BOOK

Hawaiian Plant Life: Vegetation and Flora by Robert Gustafson; Derral R. Herbst; Philip W. Rundel
Call Number: QK473.H4 G87 2014 (Hawaii Pacific)

Hawaiian Plant Life has been written with both the layperson and professional interested in Hawai'i's natural history and flora in mind. In addition to significant text describing landforms and vegetation, the evolution of Hawaiian flora, and the conservation of native species, the book includes almost 875 color photographs illustrating nearly two-thirds of native Hawaiian plant species as well as a concise description of each genus and species shown.

New Books: HAWAII PACIFIC

Books are in call number order

Tomorrow's Memories: A Diary, 1924-2000 - Angeles Monrayo
Call Number: CT275.R297 A3 2003 (Hawaii Pacific)

Angeles Monrayo (1912-2000) began her diary on January 10, 1924, a few months before she and her father and older brother moved from a sugar plantation in Waipahu to Pablo Manlapit's strike camp in Honolulu. Here for the first time is a young Filipino girl's view of life in Hawaiʻi and central California in the first decades of the twentieth century - a significant and often turbulent period for immigrant and migrant labor in both settings.
Dismembering Lahui: A History of the Hawaiian Nation to 1887
Call Number: DU624.6 .O86 2002 (Hawaii Pacific)

Jonathan Osorio investigates the effects of Western law on the national identity of Native Hawaiians in this impressive political history of the Kingdom of Hawai'i from the onset of constitutional government in 1840 to the Bayonet Constitution of 1887, which effectively placed political power in the kingdom in the hands of white businessmen.
Gender on the Edge: Transgender, Gay, and Other Pacific Islanders
Call Number: HQ77.95.O3 G46 2014 (Hawaii Pacific)

Transgender identities and other forms of gender and sexuality that transcend the normative pose important questions about society, culture, politics, and history. This edited volume is an exploration of the ways in which non-normative gendering and sexuality in one such region, the Pacific Islands, are implicated in a wide range of socio-cultural dynamics that are at once local and global, historical, and contemporary.
'Ike Ulana Lau Hala: The Vitality and Vibrancy of Lau Hala Weaving Traditions in Hawaii
Call Number: TT877.5 .I54 2014 (Hawaii Pacific)

The weaving of lau hala represents a living tradition borne on the great arc of Pacific voyaging history. This thriving tradition is made immediate by masters of the art who transmit their knowledge to those who are similarly devoted to, and delighted by, the smoothness, softness, and that particular warm fragrance of a woven lau hala treasure. This is an intriguing collection of articles and images about the Hawaiian tradition of ulana lau hala: the weaving, by hand, of dried Pandanus tectorius leaves.

REFERENCE

Proquest Statistical Abstract of the United States 2015
Call Number: HA202 .P76
(Library Use Only)

Published annually by the Federal Government since 1878, The Statistical Abstract of the United States is the best-known statistical reference publication in the country, and perhaps, the world. You’ll find it behind nearly every reference desk in U.S. libraries as the authoritative go-to source. Librarians value the Statistical Abstract as both an answer book and a guide to statistical sources.

SOCIAL SCIENCES

Capturing Contemporary Japan: Differentiation and Uncertainty
Call Number: HC462.95 .C365 2014

What are people's life experiences in present-day Japan? This timely volume addresses fundamental questions vital to understanding Japan in the first decade of the twenty-first century. Its chapters collectively reveal a questioning of middle-class ideals once considered the essence of Japaneseness.

Contributors draw on rich, nuanced fieldwork data collected during the 2000s to examine work, schooling, family and marital relations, child rearing, entertainment, lifestyle choices, community support, consumption and waste, material culture, well-being, aging, death and memorial rites, and sexuality.

LANGUAGE and LITERATURE

A Poetics of Courtly Male Friendship in Heian Japan
Call Number: PL726.2 .S34 2007

Western scholars have tended to read Heian literature through the prism of female experience, stressing the imbalance of power in courtship and looking for evidence that women hoped to move beyond the constraints of marriage politics. Paul Schalow's original and challenging work inherits these concerns about the transcendence of love and carries them into a new realm of inquiry - the suffering of noblemen and the literary record of their hopes for transcendence through friendship.
From Fu Manchu to Kung Fu Panda: Images of China in American Film
Call Number: PN1995.9.C47 G74 2014

Throughout the twentieth century, American filmmakers have embraced cinematic representations of China. Beginning with D.W. Griffith’s silent classic Broken Blossoms (1919) and ending with the computer-animated Kung Fu Panda (2008), this book explores China’s changing role in the American imagination.