The center is the only federally funded National Resource Center that focuses on the islands of Micronesia, Melanesia, and Polynesia.
The Center for Pacific Islands Studies at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa offers a unique opportunity for comprehensive engagement with the Pacific Islands region, often referred to as Oceania, and its place in the global arena through its student programs. It is the only program in the United States that offers both undergraduate and graduate degrees in Pacific Islands Studies.
05/25/2026
Still looking for summer classes? Consider knocking out your HAP & DS General Education requirement this summer with our PACS 108: Introduction to Pacific Worlds for an online synchronous course in Summer Session 2!
Interested in ocean resources and management? Register for PACS 655: Community-Based Fisheries Management in Oceania for an online asynchronous course in Summer Session 2!
05/15/2026
We are excited to share the program for the 6th Annual Pacific Graduation. We are excited to celebrate our students' academic accomplishments at 5:30pm today!
If you are unable to join us physically, and would love to watch the celebration, please tune into the livestream on the Center for Pacific Islands Studies page to follow along.
Congratulations to all graduates!
05/06/2026
Please join us at the opening of the Ocean of Peace exhibition at Honolulu Hale with the Mayor’s Office of Culture and the Arts and the East-West Center Arts Program. The opening will be this Friday, 8 May 2026, from 4–6 PM at Honolulu Hale with registration required and tickets available here: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ocean-of-peace-exhibition-at-honolulu-hale-tickets-1988581953153?aff=oddtdtcreator
The exhibition features the works of seven artists of Micronesian heritage and will be open from 8 May to 11 June 2026. It showcases painting, sculpture, weaving, and multimedia works in conversation with the Ocean of Peace declaration, a political and cultural framework that was officially endorsed at the Pacific Islands Forum Leaders’ Summit held in the Solomon Islands in September 2025. Featured artists include James Bamba (Guåhan [Guam]/Northern Mariana Islands), Carol Ann Carl (Pohnpei, CPIS Alumna), Gillian Dueñas (Guåhan [Guam], CPIS Student), Kalany Omengkar (Belau/Northern Mariana Islands), Anthony Watson (Belau), Lissette Yamase (Chuuk), and Manny Crisostomo (Guåhan [Guam]).
The exhibition is also supported by Bess Press, CPIS, and the Medical Legal Partnership for Children in Hawaiʻi. Learn more about the exhibition: https://honolulusistercity.org/may-8-june-11-2026-ocean-of-peace-exhibition-opens-at-honolulu-hale-featuring-micronesian-artists/
We are proud to see the wonderful work of our CPIS graduates, students, and broader communities on display at city hall--come celebrate and enjoy their work!
04/29/2026
Join us TODAYfor an exciting even featuring scholar and leader Dr. Hōkūlani K. Aikau and CPIS MA Student Vicky Lukan in conversation on Navigating Responsibility, Identity & Thriving as Pasifika Women in the Academy! Register in advance to join us at our reception featuring a fully catered spread by Highway Inn!
The event is on tonight, 29 April 2026 from 5:30-7:30 PM in Hālau ‘o Haumea at the Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies.
About the event:
In this conversation, we invite students and the community into Dr. Aikau’s journey, from studying Polynesian-Mormon identity to working alongside Indigenous land and water stewards. We will discuss how purpose, responsibility, and community have shaped her path, as well as her understanding of the academy as both a site of struggle and of profound possibility. The events are organized by a student and faculty committee under the Women in Pacific Studies Program, see attached for more information. Catered reception to follow.
Registration required: https://go.hawaii.edu/ioG
04/22/2026
Join us next week for an exciting even featuring scholar and leader Dr. Hōkūlani K. Aikau and CPIS MA Student Vicky Lukan in conversation on Navigating Responsibility, Identity & Thriving as Pasifika Women in the Academy! Register in advance to join us at our reception featuring a fully catered spread by Highway Inn!
The event is on Wednesday, 29 April 2026 from 5:30-7:30 PM in Hālau ‘o Haumea at the Kamakakūokalani Center for Hawaiian Studies.
About the event:
In this conversation, we invite students and the broader community into Dr. Aikau’s journey, from studying Polynesian-Mormon identity to working alongside Indigenous land and water stewards. We will discuss how purpose, responsibility, and community have shaped her path, as well as her understanding of the academy as both a site of struggle and of profound possibility. The events are organized by a student and faculty committee under the Women in Pacific Studies Program, see attached for more information. Catered reception to follow.
Registration required: https://go.hawaii.edu/ioG
04/08/2026
🌈 TODAY IS THE DAY! It’s 2026!
Giving Day is about coming together to support our students, programs and outreach across the state. Every gift made today helps create opportunities, strengthen our communities, and shape the future of Pacific Islands Studies!
Funds raised will go towards supporting student and community events, facilitating faculty and student research, and enhancing programming at the center.
Make your impact today—visit https://go.hawaii.edu/86P or our link in bio to give and learn more!
03/30/2026
Congratulations to PACS MA student Alec Weiker on his coathored piece with Melvin Jackson, “COFA Citizens Lose Access To Commercial Driver’s Licenses” published by Civil Beat. Read their article here: https://www.civilbeat.org/2026/03/cofa-citizens-could-lose-access-to-commercial-drivers-licenses?utm_source=cpisweekly.beehiiv.com&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_campaign=cpis-weekly&_bhlid=0b548dcd75c1602b9ac640c694bb57709a9a8e6c
03/27/2026
The Ecotone (an AAPI EHEJ Scholarly Forum Series) Presents: Between the Pajaro Valley and Ilocandia: Developing a Transnational History of Migrant Agrarian Life with Dr. Meleia Simon-Reynolds and Dr. Kathleen Cruz Gutierrez | Wednesday, 1 April 2026 11:00-12:00 PM in the Center for Korean Studies Auditorium
The 1930 anti-Filipino race riots in Watsonville, California, are often considered a watershed moment in Filipino-American history. The five days of rioting across the Pajaro Valley by hundreds of white vigilantes that culminated in the murder of Fermin Tobera, a Filipino farmworker, have long informed, if not overshadowed, what we know of the historical Filipino enclave that was Watsonville and the number of Filipino communities that called it home.
In 2021, descendants of the first wave of Filipino migrants to settle in the valley partnered with researchers at UC-Santa Cruz to form Watsonville is in the Heart (WIITH), a community-initiated, student-engaged research initiative that aims to document and uplift stories of life, labor, and migration through oral history interviewing, digital archiving, curriculum development, and exhibition curation.
In this sharing, WIITH team leaders discuss the initiative’s core research principles and methods. WIITH operates on a model of co-creation, inspired by oral history practice, and of student-engaged experiential learning. The speakers will highlight two projects: 1) a digital map documenting the 1930 riots and Filipino community formation over the twentieth century; and 2) Saritaan, a recently launched partnership between WIITH and Pangasinan Polytechnic College in Lingayen, Philippines, to investigate the history of migrant-sending communities from the Ilocos region, the top labor-sending region in the Philippines in the early twentieth century. These projects bridge Asian and Asian American studies and intervene in literature long bifurcated by area studies versus diaspora concerns.
03/25/2026
Join us for a seminar, Te Parau Mau e Te Parau Ti’a: French Nuclear Colonialism in Mā’ohi Nui/French Polynesia and Ongoing Environmental Consequences, with Vehia Wheeler TODAY, Wednesday, 25 March 2026 3-4 PM in Moore 258 & on Zoom (Register here: https://go.hawaii.edu/b7D)
From 1966 - 1996, France conducted 193 nuclear explosions in their South Pacific colony known as French Polynesia, on the atolls of Moruroa and Fangataufa. The nuclear explosions were apart of France’s nuclear weapons expansion at a time of Cold War geopolitical tensions and when the US and the UK were equally testing nuclear weapons in the Pacific. Despite decades of local, regional and worldwide protest, such as the Nuclear Free and Independent Pacific (NFIP) movement, France continued to impose their nuclear testing agenda in French Polynesia until 1996. While France claimed that these were “clean bombs,” and used this as their official narrative until 2016, there have been numerous and continual environmental issues due to the radiation exposure of the 193 nuclear bombs. These consequences continue today, but are largely unknown, as there are a lack of studies and transparency of these impacts. In the ongoing spirit of the NFIP movement, Mā’ohi activists today continue to seek “Te Parau Mau e Te Parau Ti’a” or Truth and Justice to these ongoing issues, and seek accountability from France for better environmental clean-up in the territory and an end to French colonialism in the Pacific. This talk will go over French nuclear colonialism in Mā’ohi Nui, the ongoing environmental impacts and Mā’ohi actions towards nuclear justice.
