Bishop Museum partners with the Mary Kawena Pukui Cultural Preservation Society to celebrate the life, work and legacy of Native Hawaiian scholar Mary Kawena Pukui during the museum’s After Hours event dedicated to the woman who worked tirelessly to preserve Native Hawaiian culture, its traditions and practices.
The public is invited to “Nānā i ke Kumu: Celebrating the Legacy of Mary Kawena Pukui,” 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. Friday, at Bishop Museum’s Great Lawn.
“Mary Kawena Pukui is a titan in Hawaiian cultural preservation and spent over 50 years documenting, translating and compiling Hawaiian knowledge systems during a time when Hawaiian culture and traditions were being lost,” said Taylour Chang in a release. Chang is director of public programs and community engagement at Bishop Museum.
“Her body of work amounts to one of the most significant contributions to our understanding of Hawaiian culture today. We invite our community to join us in honoring our beloved Mrs. Pukui with an evening of tributes by ʻahahui Hawaiʻi (Hawaiian organizations) with mele, hula, and special presentations,” Chang said.
The event also celebrates the 2025 release of Mary Kawena Pukui’s $1 coin as part of the United States Mint’s Native American $1 Coin Program that recognizes and honors the important contributions of Indian tribes and individual Native Americans, according to the U.S. Mint.
Evening program:
• 5:30 p.m. - Hoʻokupu (presentation of gifts and offerings) by invited Royal Societies, Civic Clubs and Native Hawaiian organizations.
• 7 p.m. - Wehena (opening) Hula honoring Mary Kawena Pukui with Kumu Hula John Kahaʻi Topolinski and “Reminiscences on Pukui’s Life and Works” with guest speakers Cy Bridges, Naomi Losch, Sarah Keahi, Laʻakea Suganuma and moderator Mandy Suganuma.
• 8:30 p.m. - Pahina (closing).
While working at Bishop Museum, Pukui recorded and documented the largest library of oral histories of her time. She produced and translated more than 50 seminal publications throughout her life and posthumously, including the definitive “Hawaiian-English Dictionary,” “ʻŌlelo Noʻeau: Hawaiian Proverbs and Poetical Sayings,” and “Native Planters in Old Hawaiʻi: Their Life, Lore and Environment.”
Pukui’s unparalleled contributions to cultural revitalization encompass every facet of Hawaiian knowledge, practice and existence that empowered the Hawaiian Renaissance of the 1970s and became the foundation for the continuing efforts to advance Kanaka Maoli (Native Hawaiian) identity and independence.
This year Bishop Museum launches its ongoing “Nānā i ke Kumu” program series that seeks to engage practitioners, scholars and students in continuing Pukui’s efforts to perpetuate ʻike kupuna (ancestral insights and knowledge) for future generations.
The event is $10 presale or $15 at the door.
