ENG 771, Fall 2026
“Star Waka 2040AD”: 21st Century Pasifika Speculative Fiction
In the 1999 poem “2140AD,” poet Robert Sullivan (Māori) reimagines the vessel integral to Pacific voyaging—the waka (canoe)—as an interstellar vessal for Māori to connect with “the top boss”, the Māori skyfather Ranginui, an ancient ancestor and primordial atua (god) recounted for generations across tā (time) and vā (space). Elements of wonder and the fantastic have always been an integral component of Indigenous Pasifika narratives, from traditional orature to contemporary literature. This course focuses on Indigenous Pacific speculative fiction created in the 21st century, and related elements of wonder and the fantastic informed by traditional belief narratives and its engagement with colonialism. The course introduces key terms, texts, writers, scholarship and criticism, as well as salient theories and methodologies.
Course SLOs: reflect the Department’s graduate program curriculum map. In this course, students can:
- Gain an enhanced understanding of the depth and breadth of English as a discipline through engaging with key terms, texts, authors, and scholarship relevant to the course topic as representative of the broader genres of Pasifika, Hawaiian, and Indigenous literatures, Indigenous futurisms, fantasy, wonder, and speculative fiction;
- Practice close reading skills to analyze a range of texts, engaging with ethical, cultural, aesthetic, and political issues salient to the archive they construct; through such endeavors, understand salient questions, issues, themes, key terms, and contexts, as well as conduct comparative literary studies work alongside archival research;
- Engage in responsible and ethically conducted research, as well as understand, develop, and adopt responsible frameworks and practices for work in English studies from (and beyond) our cultural location in Hawaiʻi and the Pacific;
- Practice advanced research methods in the topic area, and understanding continuing relevance of earlier cultural formations (such as the development and trajectory of pre-21st century Indigenous Pasifika literature as a foundation to the course topic), and apply one or more theoretical models in the study or production of Indigenous Pasifika literature in social, historical, political, and cultural contexts, and thus develop a more complex understanding of such dynamics and conditions surrounding the creation, production, popularity of such works, and their intervention with, as well as integration and unsettling of non-Indigenous (settler colonial) narratives (i.e. fatal impact theory, death of authentic Native peoples and cultures post-contact, the myth of postcoloniality, etc.) about Indigenous Pasifika (and other) colonized peoples;
- Practice written and oral ability to place creative and/or scholarly work within broader artistic and/or critical conversations, and present findings to an audience through class assignments (written work, presentations)
Methods: View relevant films, and read a selection of primary texts (narrative prose, poetry, graphic novels, comics, selected visual arts) alongside critical scholarship; class discussion of works viewed/read and salient questions applicable to each; LCDR (lead a class discussion on an assigned reading); contribution to an ongoing digital humanities project (1500-1800 words); colloquium-style oral presentation on a specific text, writer, theme, issue or question, chosen in consultation with the professor; completion of a final research-based project (4000-4500 words).
Salient questions: What is Indigenous Pacific speculative fiction, and how does it compare with other genres of speculative fiction? What role does traditional belief narratives and cultural practices, as well as impacts of colonialism ,play in the shaping of the genre, and the direction of the field? What understandings of Indigenous Pasifika literary production and cultural aesthetics can we come to through close reading and analysis of such texts? What do such texts contribute to our overall understanding of Pacific literature? How do these texts counter settler hegemonic discourse about the Pacific, Pacific Islands peoples, and Pacific Islanders’ intellectual and aesthetic production? How do these texts further decolonization efforts and support real world community-centered and land-based (aloha ʻāina) politics? Why do these questions matter?
Likely assignments:
- 1500-1800 word contribution to a specific assigned topic that will contribute to an ongoing digital humanities project on Pacific literature.
- Final research-based project (15 pages or 4000-4500 words).
- Lead a class discussion on an assigned text (primary reading or secondary scholarship)
- Participation in a colloquium-style presentation on an approved topic relevant to the course
Possible primary readings (most are available in digital formats via the UHM library; hard copies if desired can be borrowed via UHM and/or state public libraries; books will NOT be ordered via the UH Bookstore):
- Britos, Peter. Valley of Spiraling Winds (2025) [via UH Library: UH Press Books at DeGruyter]
- Cole, Gina. Na Viro (2022) [via UH Library: E-book Central]
- hoʻomanawanui, kuʻualoha, Joyce Pualani Warren, and Cristina Bacchilega, eds. An Ocean of Wonder, the Fantastic in the Pacific (2024). [via UH Library: UH Press Books at DeGruyter; JSTOR]
- Leong, Sloane. Prism Stalker (2018) [tba]
- Matuku, Steph. Falling in the Rarohenga (2021) [via UH Library: E-book Central]
- Wendt, Albert. Black Rainbow (1995) [tba]
- Wendt Young, Lani. Mata Ori (2021) [Kindle, e-book]
- Thompson, Tulia. Josefa and the Vu (2007 [via UH Library: E-book Central]
- Selected short works by additional Indigenous Pasifika writers such as Marie Alohalani Brown (ʻŌiwi), Daren Kamali (Fiji), Patricia Grace (Māori), Bryan Kamaoli Kuwada (ʻŌiwi), John Pule (Niue), Robert Sullivan (Māori), Albert Wendt (Samoan), and others will be posted on Lamakū or available online.
- Scholarly articles including works by Elizabeth Deloughery, Grace Dillon, Epeli Hauofa, Michelle Keown, Caryn Lesuma, Selina Tusitala Marsh, John Reider, Alice Te Punga Sommerville, Teresia Teaiwa, Albert Wendt, and Steven Winduo, among others will be posted on Lamakū or available online.
Possible films (in class or via weblink):
- Hereniko, Vilsoni. The Land has Eyes (2004).
- Kapanui, Lopaka. Ka Hoʻi, the Return (2021).
- Tupou, Misa. Kava Kultcha (2002).
- Margulies, Laura. Kapō Maʻi Lele and her Flying Lady Parts (2025).