"Travel-Based Research in Hawaii"

by: Ali Lax

Ali Lax is a recipient of the 2021 Ryan Heumann Anthropology Undergraduate Scholarship for research-related travel.” Here, she talks about her research process.

As we slowly transition to a post-COVID-19 lifestyle, I’ve been given the opportunity to focus on travel-based research in Hawaii.

For this experience, I wanted to research how indigenous Hawaiians have lived with and are moving forward from COVID. At the beginning of the pandemic, we saw thousands of people fleeing to Hawaii, Puerto Rico, or other islands to escape and detox. The images I saw on social media and the pleas of Hawaiians asking people to stop coming captured my interest. I wanted to know how deadly COVID-19 had hit indigenous Hawaiians and how this paradise-produced image has blinded mainlanders from considering the well-being of others. It is vital to understand that Hawaii and its people are not just vacation getaways; they are a timeless culture with history and living descendants. Social media has emphasized this dreamscape of Hawaii and led thousands of predominately white mainlanders to move in. This results in a rapid increase in the cost of living and disenfranchises its indigenous community to uphold a derivative image of hula girls and luaus. Discovering how COVID-19 and post COVID life will be vital to moving forward as anthropologists and in signaling societal changes.

I believe anthropology is important due to the significance it holds. Cultural anthropology can integrate itself into a plethora of disciplines and can focus on the nuances of cultures. It is a field that can gain value from minorities in the discipline such as BIPOC, people with a disability, the LGBTQ+ community, and many, many more. Its importance is that it simply focuses on humans. Humans are ever-changing and cannot be described so simply. Anthropology is there to describe and study every little aspect of humanity: whether it be language, evolution, food, relationships, etc. Even as an anthropology major, people still ask me what it is. Even as “underdogs”, important archaeological, historical, and evolutionary discoveries have been found due to anthropologists. Anthropology has been interesting to me as I can see these changes happen from within. The students and faculty at UCSC’s anthropology department are changing what was previously known about anthropology and creating new interests.

As my time comes to an end at UCSC, I’d like to thank everyone who was able to make this research trip possible.